{"id":2257,"date":"2010-03-26T00:36:22","date_gmt":"2010-03-26T07:36:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/?p=2257"},"modified":"2010-03-26T00:36:22","modified_gmt":"2010-03-26T07:36:22","slug":"new-music-aquience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/2010\/03\/26\/new-music-aquience\/","title":{"rendered":"new music: Aquience"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cOn Hip Hop Band Aquience\u201d<\/h1>\n

by Lisa Gregory<\/b><\/p>\n

Aquience is an electronica\/hip hop\/acoustic band that came together in Fayetteville, North Carolina in 2009. This motley crew consists of three members: Sir Voh, Jaiden Frost, and Squid (alternatively spelled: S!r Voh, JA!DEN FROST, and Squ?d). I interviewed them at the Xtasy Ice Caf\u00e9, a friendly coffee shop in Fayetteville, where I found out that yes, they will be releasing Untidaled, their first EP, for free online download later this month. No two songs sound alike. The tracks contain a spectrum of sounds that range from the dreamy and mellow \u201cOcean Blue\u201d to the poppy \u201cDo it Like you Want Me (Ah Ha Ah)\u201d to \u201cLevel 5,\u201d which is literally a fun and games song that for me conjured up images of a crowd of techno dancers having an insanely good time in the middle of a chaotic video game. \u201cAbigail\u2019s Lullaby\u201d is the acoustic Squid wrote for his newborn daughter (Abigail Maria Nykole Hall) and Jaiden raps his soul out in \u201cLost Smile,\u201d which also features a nicely drawn out vocal solo from Squid at the song\u2019s close.
\n***
\nQ: How did you guys meet each other?
\nJD: We\u2019re cousins.
\nQ (JD): You and Squid are cousins, but how about you and Voh?
\nJD: We\u2019re cousins too, which we found out about a year ago. I\u2019ve known Squid since he was two and I was four.
\nQ (Voh): So how did you meet Jaiden and Squid?
\nVoh: I lost my apartment and didn\u2019t have a place to stay. I showed up at the house where Jaiden stayed – Kasa de Punk – and talked to the house owner. The owner let me stay on the couch in the beginning, but after a while everyone got sick of me being there, so I ended up sharing a room with Jaiden.
\nQ: Where did your band name originate?
\nVoh: Super Nintendo\u2019s Donky Kong Country. The background theme of the Coral Capers level is called Aquatic Ambience. We merged the two words together and got Aquience.
\nJD: We\u2019re totally geeks.
\nQ: What genre of music is Aquience?
\nVoh: We kind of fuse everything we do with hip hop.
\nSquid: We started out being electronica hip hop crunk [but after switching things up a few more times] we became electronica hip hop acoustic.
\nQ: What are some of your influences?
\nSquid: Aaron Lewis from Staind would be my acoustic influence\u2026 Hip hop and pop influences are Eminem and Lil\u2019 Wayne.
\nVoh: My influence? Video games. And for some reason when I make a beat it winds up as crunk as hell.
\nQ: Crunk?
\nJD: Crunk is Southern dirty hip hop. Deep and bassy heavy hip hop.
\nQ (JD): How about your influences?
\nJD: Lunchbox [AKA LunchboxXx]. IDK (alternative spelling !Dk?) is my favorite band and Lunchbox is their frontman.
\nQ: What genre would IDK fall under?
\nJD: Nu Grunge.
\nSquid: Lunchbox is like this: If Tool and Deftones got together and had a baby and this baby grew up and had sex with Korn who then gave birth to Siamese twins, Lunchbox would be just like the Siamese twins.
\nQ: What instruments do you play?
\nSquid: Guitar, bass guitar, vocals.
\nJD: Bass guitar, keys, drums, I make synth beats (AKA programming), I can sing and rap.
\nVoh: I do programming and play all the instruments JD listed minus drums.
\nQ: Do you play any special brands or hope to get sponsored by any company in particular?
\nSquid: FruityLoops!
\nJD: FL Studio\u2026
\nVoh: \u2026the software program.
\nJD: And maybe Rock Band\u2026 Our mic is a Rock Band mic that we just found at the house one day and started using.
\nSquid: I like Washburn guitars. And Martin string is delicious.
\nQ: What was your first inspiration to play music?
\nSquid: I was five when Grandpa got me a guitar. I didn\u2019t really pick it up until I was ten, but by twelve I knew I wanted to play guitar for the rest of my life. It\u2019s surprising that I do any singing at all though. I started singing when I was five, but Dad always told me to shut up when I sang in the back of the car. He\u2019d say \u201cJust let the song sound like it\u2019s supposed to.\u201d
\nVoh: I was making a video game and I really liked the music, but it was illegal to reproduce it, so I started making my own with MIDI synth computer software.
\nQ (Voh): When did you start?
\nVoh: Freshman year.
\nJD: My first inspiration was hearing System of a Down when I was twelve. I heard it and said, \u201cI wanna play that.\u201d \u201cAerials\u201d was the first song I learned on bass.
\nQ: Have you had any formal training?
\nSquid: Nope.
\nVoh: If YouTube counts as formal.
\nJD: Classical Flamenco guitar.
\nQ (Squid): What makes you \u201cSquid\u201d?
\nSquid: I had dreds.
\nQ (JD): What makes you Jaiden Frost?
\nJD: I am Jaiden Frost.
\nQ (Voh): What makes you Sir Voh?
\nVoh: It\u2019s a spin off my real name. Joe became Voh. The \u201cV\u201d stands for verbosity. I\u2019m randomly verbose. The Kangaroo Gas Station, for example, is the Australian Marsupial Gasoline Distribution Facility. The \u201cSir\u201d just comes from my mannerisms. I\u2019m classy?
\nJD: He\u2019s extremely polite\u2026 very genteel.
\nSquid: If he had the money he\u2019d dress in a top hat and black suit with pin stripes every day.
\nQ: About the music\u2026 Who writes the lyrics? Who puts it to music?
\nJD: Squid and I write lyrics. Voh makes the beat and I produce the song, but sometimes Voh and I switch. I\u2019ll do a beat and he\u2019ll produce.
\nQ (JD): \u201cLost Smile\u201d is wrought with emotion. How did you record it that way?
\nJD: If you listen close, there\u2019s a sniffle in mid-first verse. I had just gotten a phone call saying my parents had to go to prison. The lyrics were from a self-project. I took the lyrics and decided to record them soon after the phone call. The beginning of the song has me wondering why I can\u2019t feel. I had a period where I couldn\u2019t feel anything, couldn\u2019t cry\u2026 By the middle of the song, I\u2019m figuring out why, and by the end I\u2019m telling myself I need to change\u2026 live in reality and not so much in my own mind. The blues vocal solo Squid does at the end is something he was just walking around singing at the time of recording.
\nQ (Voh): In \u201cLevel 5,\u201d are you portraying any video game in particular, a mixture of favorites, or did you dream up your own game?
\nVoh: Look at it as a random video game. The first chorus is a battle, the first verse is a bit of wandering around. There are elements of old Final Fantasy. The final boss comes in at the end with fanfare. There are experience points. The original NES [Nintendo Entertainment System] sound\u2026 I went for that.
\nJD: Some of the raw phrases you hear in \u201cLevel 5\u201d are just weird terms we came up with and proclaimed around the house. This was a fun song. We felt free to insert anything we wanted since it wasn\u2019t anything we planned for radio play. But aside from a couple of beats that I came up with\u2026 some minor things, this song is basically all Voh\u2019s doing.
\nQ: Who wrote Abigail\u2019s Lullaby?
\nJD: Squid did the guitar, vocals, effects, and the lyrics. It\u2019s all him.
\nQ (Squid): How old is your daughter?
\nSquid: Six weeks. Abigail Maria Nykole Hall.
\nJD: She\u2019s Catholic… not really\u2026 but she\u2019s got three fucking names in case she doesn\u2019t like any of them.
\nQ: Is it true that you might actually give your first CD away?
\nJD: Yes. We have discussed it, we have agreed. We didn\u2019t spend any money on it\u2026 the Rock Band mic was found. Voh had his laptop. If anyone wants a physical copy they can buy it if they want to, but whoever wants to download it will be able to download the whole thing for free.
\nQ: When is your expected release date?
\nJD: We\u2019ve only got one more song to record. It will feature vocals from both Squid and Lunchbox from IDK\u2026 Hmm\u2026 March 27\u2026 Untidaled.
\nQ: Is there anything I haven\u2019t asked you about that you would like to add?
\nJD: We recently made an appearance in a short film called \u201cFinal Straw,\u201d which has been submitted to Comedy Central\u2019s Tosh.O. Also we just did a podcast for the Fayetteville Feed. That\u2019ll be up in a few days and they\u2019re sending the podcast to Q98.
\nQ: Anything else?
\nSquid: Parkton [NC] is the mother ship.
\nVoh: Fuck Rachel Watson.
\nJD: \u2026Spin Shannon.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cOn Hip Hop Band Aquience\u201d by Lisa Gregory Aquience is an electronica\/hip hop\/acoustic band that came together in Fayetteville, North Carolina in 2009. This motley crew consists of three members: Sir Voh, Jaiden Frost, and Squid (alternatively spelled: S!r Voh, JA!DEN FROST, and Squ?d). I interviewed them at the Xtasy Ice Caf\u00e9, a friendly coffee shop in Fayetteville, where I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2257","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":523,"url":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/2008\/10\/06\/o-c-t-cd-review\/","url_meta":{"origin":2257,"position":0},"title":"O.C.T. cd review","author":"admin","date":"October 6, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"http:\/\/www.reviewermagazine.com\/oct\/O.C.T.Outta ControlCD review by Stephanie Freedman In the heart of party town Pacific Beach resides a band that embodies the essence of the beach town to perfection. 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