[Interview] Three men have been invited into the middle of a festival. That is the god of the harvest, Dionysus’s festival. They’ve been immersed in the rhythm of the celebrations. That merry band is the Royal Pirates.
Royal Pirates is still a fresh new three member band. Rather than being known by their band name, you might remember them more for their various variety show appearances, from <Laws of the Jungle>- where James showed off his perfect build, to <Laws of the City>- where Moon captured the hearts of women everywhere with his guitar skills, and stirred up a little romance with fellow cast member Baek Jinhee. However vocalist and guitarist Moon, drummer Sooyoon, and bassist James have the skills the back up their chiseled good looks. After forming the band in America and composing and performing their own songs in clubs there, they’ve come to Korea. Their opportunity to debut in Korea came when their current agency saw the videos with an extremely high view count of some performances they uploaded onto youtube. By now it’s been just a little over a year since their debut and they’ve already released two albums, little by little gaining awareness not only in Korea but in Japan and China as well. Just before the shoot they played a concert in China and came back on a late flight. Despite their busy schedules, the boys are full of laughter. Though we couldn’t clearly parse what they were saying, the boys were all smiles, and let out “euhaha”-s for each other’s short words. It was like the scene of a festival. It was a festival of bushes and autumn leaves, wine and grapes, and goats and young Dionysus. Purity, passion, and bright smiles were in abundance.
The God of Festival Dionysus’ close companions were half-man half-goat satyrs, and so the shoot will proceed with a goat.
M: Although the three of us are liberal and full of passion, we’re not like the mischievous satyrs who chase after the goddesses. (laugh) While coming here we looked up videos on goats. We watched a video of their crying sound of “meh” remixed with music and followed along for a bit. I think that crying sound can bring some fun to music. I’m looking forward to the shoot.
You must like animals.
J: All the members have raised animals. When I lived in America I had a dog, two cats, and two chickens, all at the same time. We even got eggs from the chickens every day. I’m suddenly very sorry for those chickens.
Your name has “royal” and “pirates”, is there a meaning to it?
M: “Royal” has a luxurious and classic feel to it, and “pirates” is a bit aggressive and rough, and I thought the two could co-exist in our band. Looking at the legendary bands they all have this partiality to them as the common point. That’s not what we had in mind at first though; I picked it because I liked pirates but later on it gained that meaning. (laugh)
How did you come to start the band and music?
S: When we lived in America, Moon and I formed the band in his garage. We would perform with the garage door open and the ajuhssi next door would come out to watch us with a bottle of beer. He said that he was a staff member for the Rolling Stones but we never knew if that was true or not. We often practiced songs from the band Muse or Japanese songs, and CCM. James joined later on.
J: When I was in elementary I was into hip hop and R&B thanks to my sister, and while learning the trumpet I came to like jazz music as well. In high school I was in a pop-punk/metal band. Starting when I was sixteen we spent five years touring around America. The story from there is endless. We didn’t have any money so we would collect spare change in paint bucket or peanut butter jar, and I even fought with a member who was a boxer. At that time I broke my nose and it’s a little bent. It wasn’t a healthy lifestyle. (laugh) Even when I met Moon and Sooyoon for the first time when they needed a bassist we bickered but I didn’t want to kill the moment so we didn’t fight.
M: Unlike James, Sooyoon and I lived really peacefully. The thing that made us not fit well with James, rather than his personality, was the cultural difference between Korea and America. As soon as there was a problem we would become cautious around each other, and that eventually became a poison. After resolving all the built-up tension, we got a lot closer.
Your songs are enjoyable, but are particularly remarkable for their softness and sentimentality.
M: Before we debuted we only made rough and intense songs. After a year of debut what we had to show was mostly youth and sentiment. While performing, the jam sessions we improvise with are considerably rougher and express our charms well. Though it’s the same song, we often perform a rock version of it.
J: Right now the place where we can clearly show ourselves is on stage. Since I was filming for <Laws of the Jungle> I only had one month to prepare for this new album. The recording, composing, and writing came out to be quite more modest from what we expected, and truthfully it’s not the direction we wanted to go.
What sort of band do you want to become?
M: Like the Beatles. Though we’ve had a different start from the Beatles, our goal is to be an icon that lasts for a long time musically and has an impact on culture. That includes having an album jacket that is unique to our own colors as well. The thing we really want to do is, like the Beatles, have the songs on our album make a movie.
You have to have an impact on culture, but these days bands who conduct performances well are rare.
S: That’s because there’s too much artificially created sound from the computer. You can feel it when watching the movie <Begin Again>, I think adding improvised outdoors sounds are good. Though the sound of the outdoors isn’t refined, only we can put our souls into it. It’s not only the computer, but also when writing sessions, the performances have an accompaniment. Not long ago on the plane I was listening to Deulhukhwa (Chrysanthemum) -sunbaenim’s album. The individuality of the drum performance was extremely strong. It was a clear up and down performance. I thought, “Ah, so this is the person known as Joo Chankwon. I can also make this type of music, I want to.”
J: I think up until now we didn’t know what we each wanted. We didn’t know how to deliver it. We also had dance-type songs. In the future I want to make music I want to, rather than music that caters to success. This moment is the most important. Starting from the next album, you should be hearing songs that are genuinely us.
S: Please look forward to it. We’ll definitely be the Kings of the Pirates. (laugh)
Collaborators:
Editor - Lee Yejin, An Sangho | Photographer - Park Chawook | Hair - Baek Heungkwan | Make-up - An Sunghee | Assistant - Shin Seungsoo
+ Royal Pirates’ Interview can be seen on page 110 of the November issue of <The Celebrity>
