Machines of Loving Grace

by James Bonisteel

Machines...they are a very interesting band to see. They really had a way of getting the audience going, from Scott jumping into the audience and trying to surf all the way to the back. From listening to their new album, "Gilt," this by far is one of the better albums they have put out in awhile. The reason why I say that is you could tell they experimented around a little with this album to make it different. The put in a lot of different samples. We caught the band right when they were about ready to go to their hotel room, but they were nice enough to talk to us first.

RAD: Last time I saw you was about a year and a half ago you were talking about taking it easy for awhile or breaking up one of the two.
MoLG: It's a good idea, but I don't think we talked about breaking up at all. That was just the end of the tour then. Actually, we started working on the new record "Gilt" then.
RAD: Where did you get the name for that album anyway?
MoLG: Actually the original title for the album was "Gilt After Tris" and it was just too long and so we shortened it to "Gilt." "Gilt's" a cool word--there was an immediacy to it. The original title was a chemical reference but "Gilt" still conveys the same idea, trial by fire or some sort of purification ritual or something like that. So that's basically where it came from.
RAD: Where did this band originate from?
MoLG: We formed in Tucson, Arizona by the University of Arizona. Now we're based all over the place. Mike and I still live in Tucson, although we're not there very much, and Ray's base is in Phoenix. Dave and Greg who are our drummer and guitarist live in Chicago.
RAD: So you think with each of your albums there was sort of a growing up period? Are just getting more in tune with what you are doing?
MoLG: So far there has been a lot of changes, and the lines of thought that we have been pursuing have become stronger with what we are doing.
RAD: So what does the future hold in store for this band, past your new album "Gilt."
MoLG: Well... world domination. We're obviously are going to be touring quite a bit on this record. Past that, who knows.
RAD: So if you could do anything else, would you do?
MoLG: The only reason we are a band is because we have nothing else to do, really. There are the ups and downs, obviously. The up-side of it is to create something which we have been pretty successful, and the down-side is the business end of it.

The Machines of Loving Grace are coming to a local concert venue near you soon, so check your local listings and times. That's just a goofy way of telling you to get away from the television, grab a friend, and go see them.