Indie-punk/pop-punk darlings Scoville Unit have returned! In 2019, the band roared back to life with their self-titled album, the first studio album by the New York band in 13 years. Now, Scoville Unit has a lot of momentum with their new album, See What Can Be, dropping on June 2 and the band already setting their sights on another album very soon after that. Following the release of the band’s latest single and video entitled “Reasons,” New Noise sat down with the band’s singer and guitarist Gandhar Savur to talk about the new video, the new album, and what’s next for the pop-rockers.
So you have the new album coming out, you just put out the video for the first single “Reasons.” It’s a really interesting video what inspired it.
We were supposed to show up and do a big video shoot in this big barn and the location fell through a day or two before. So we were scrambling trying to figure out what to do, because we had the camera crew and everything. And, we just said, “Let’s go to our drummer’s basement.”
It was not an ideal situation, so we started to figure out what else we [could] do to make the most of this terrible situation. and our singer/bass player Drew had the idea, “We’re going to be in his house, why not try to incorporate other parts of the house into it?” And we started making up different silly ideas of how to incorporate the house. Then his wife volunteered to be in the video. And we brainstormed and just did a bunch of nonsensical things. We were able to edit it into a video that, if it looks intentional, it wasn’t. cause
Yeah, because I was trying to figure out if there was a story to it, or what exactly was happening. But it was really interesting, I liked it, I just couldn’t tell if there was a narrative to it?
We’re just kind of riffing on relationships and playing on domestic life and then escaping down to the basement to rock out.
What made you pick the album title for See What Can Be?
This album was very inspired by a trip to Costa Rica I was actually there for a year and a half in Costa Rica. And I just heard that phrase and I liked it. It was just an idea that we had, I’m going to move to Costa Rica, and then we were able to just execute, and do it. And See What Can Be? Describes this concept of you can come up with an idea and just execute and make it happen.
What would you say your musical influences are particularly on the new record?
We’ll always be inspired by the punk rock that we grew up with. During the pandemic, there was a lot of classic rock that we were listening to I personally was listening to a lot of Big Star and Fleetwood Mac and bands like that. So I think that that kind of found its way into the music a little bit.
You’ve been a band for a while now, but there’s this big gap in your discography from to 2019. What happened there?
We’ve never been a traditional band. We’ve always just come together and made an album when we had songs and everyone was motivated to do it. There’s even been different configurations of the of the band. It’s always been Drew and I and whoever’s around. So, after a couple of albums, we all took a natural break to get jobs and do all that post-college stuff.
And there was no real reason to have to go back and make an album until, all of a sudden we started playing music again. And then we had all of these songs written, and then there’s a sense of urgency. Let’s go make an album! And let’s get there and play shows! And it really hasn’t stopped since then. Of course, the pandemic got in the way, and I moved temporarily. But the songs haven’t stopped yet. So we probably will have another album coming out pretty soon as well. Three in a row. Seems like we’re back in the groove.
So you talked a little bit about like the perspective of moving to Costa Rica for this. So what do you think makes this album different unique from your other records?
[For] our last album we went to really nice studio in Philadelphia. But we went in there and they basically just told us what to do, when to play your instrument and when to sing. The engineers were taking care of everything. And on this record we recorded it ourselves. We had more time to experiment and kind of figure out the best presentation of each one of these songs. And I think that resulted in an album that has more diverse sounds to it.
What’s next for Scoville unit after the album comes out?
We have a handful of shows lined up right now. And we’re being submitted for a couple of support slots for a few tours. So hopefully one of them pans out because we’re definitely looking to hit the road again soon.
Anything else you want to talk about regarding the new album or about the band?
Just that we consider ourselves very grateful that there’s people out there that care about our music. And that makes it all worth it for us. We’re really excited to share this new album with everybody.
You can pre-order the upcoming album on Scoville Unit’s Bandcamp. And don’t forget to follow Scoville Unit on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter for more updates.
