Brahms plays with Passion Pit in Royal Oak this Friday.

The brainchild of Aloha frontman Cale Parks, Brahms is giving Parks an outlet away from his everyday output with his other band. Founded just last year, the trio has been working on demos for their upcoming full length album, which Parks hopes to have out sometime within the next year.

The band’s first live date was opening for their current tourmates, Passion Pit and, according to Parks, their nervousness was more or less mid-level. He described it as a “17 on a scale of 36.” Any nervousness was most likely lost on the guys in Passion Pit, who tapped Brahms to open for them on their summer tour.

I had a chance to talk with Cale over email while the band was out on the road. We discussed how the album is coming along and the trouble with the term “darkwave disco.” Here’s my interview with Cale Parks:


MyCityBuzz: How has this tour with Passion Pit been for the band’s exposure?
Cale Parks: The response has been nothing but positive. Passion Pit’s fans are amazing and seem excited to listen to us every night. We’re playing to more people than we’ve ever played to. It’s coming at a nice time, so early on in our career. We feel completely exposed.

MCB: All being in different bands prior to Brahms, what was the main goal of this project that was different from past bands?
CP: The goal is to simply create something new and exciting to us as a unit. There are no leftover notions of what used to be in past individual projects.

MCB: What sort of influences did the group pull from for the project?
CP: Each member listens to different types of music. This is what makes writing music together interesting. The only unified influence would be dance music, in general.

MCB: How quickly did the initial songs come together that came out on the EP and MySpace page?
CP: To be clear, the demos we’re giving away are not an EP. They’re just musical samples of the first 2 months of us being a band for people to download and enjoy until we can put together a proper release. They came together very quickly and we’re already rearranging them into new versions. They’re evolving.

MCB: Has the term “darkwave disco” been a bit played out when trying to describe music such as yours?
CP: I’m not sure. People are going to call it what they want to call it. We prefer “tropical goth,” but hey, to each his own.

AM: What are the tour plans after the tour with Passion Pit?
CP: We may do some touring in the fall. Possible U.K. shows. It’s all in the works. Right now, we’re just focusing on writing and recording this summer.

Brahms plays with Passion Pit at the Royal Oak Theater this Friday (June 25th). Tickets are SOLD OUT, but tickets may become available at www.tickets.com before the show. Additional band info and dates can be found at www.myspace.com/brahmsisaband.