Ten years is a long time. In band terms, that’s practically a life sentence. It’s enough time to learn a thing or two, earn some scars, make it big, or become jaded. Now a decade into their musical careers, Prince Edward Island’s Racoon Bandit are releasing a pair of singles to celebrate the better parts while singing about some of the worst parts.
“Modern Life,” the first of the two videos to be released in this fresh batch, is a song about modern isolation written by the band’s drummer, Roger Carter.
“It’s about the struggle between reality and social perception and a warning about the potential outcome of false identity,” explains Carter. “I guess it’s about social media and the danger of loneliness/emptiness when immersed in the eye of social media and filtered self identity.”
The video, produced by by Prince Edward Island’s Chris Robison of Farmhouse Creative Labs, employs the use of vintage footage from the early days of space exploration. Mirroring the sentiments of David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” produced almost fifty rears earlier, it’s a reminder that being launched into stardom can also be isolating.
“Tatter Star,” written by the Racoon Bandit’s singer and guitarist Fraser McCallum, is of a far more earthly nature. Drawing inspiration from the Rabbie Burn’s poem A Man’s a Man, the song is a response to the the sometimes uncomfortable compromises one faces over the course of a career in the music industry and “ultimately a call to take strength in the camaraderie of playing music with your band brothers.“
“I have Scots residency myself,” says McCallum of his early connection with The Bard. “My Mum is from Rabbie Burns’ hometown. She used to recite his poetry as a kid, as you do in Scottish schools, so she introduced me to that a poem a few years ago, among others, and it struck me.
I wrote it out of a feeling, after some years of playing/writing/managing the band and other projects, that it’s impossible to make a steady go of it as a rock band, that it’s next to impossible to make a living at and that many of the industry vehicles aren’t really concerned with you or your project. Perhaps this was my own idealism when we started out in our 20s, but there’s a lot about the music industry that isn’t glamorous and can be quite raw.
The song is also a call to each other in the band to keep playing for one another and making cool shit that pleases us and some of our followers. At the same time we’ve enjoyed the 10 years and been able to experience so much, have met wonderful people and collaborated with lots of other great artists. we’ve put out 5 EP’s or albums all recorded and released through our own studio, so we’re very grateful for all of that.”
Despite the challenges of the industry, Racoon Bandit have endured it for a full decade and assure us that they’re not about to pack it in with hints of an EP coming in either late 2018 or early 2019.
Tour Dates:
07.06.18 – Charlottetown, PEI @ Fishbones
07.09.18 – Saint John, NB @ Market Square