Photo by Madison Boyce
Written by Richie Oliver
Defining himself as “scuzz pop,” Will Schwester, also known as Plague Skater, hails from New Jersey. Using different filter techniques to create his unique sound, Schwester creates a deafened, “from the other room” style, something completely unique.
We had the opportunity to ask Schwester some questions following the release of his latest single, "we were architects once...", which dropped last week. Keep reading to see what he had to say!
When you listen to music, what does it say to you?
I don’t really know. It doesn’t totally speak to me. Really, it just nudges me and I have to go with the flow and let it do its thing.
It’s kind of like how the Jedi use the Force in "Star Wars", I guess. You can use it for yourself and it can make you more powerful, but ultimately you have to let go and allow it to take its own course.
How do you define “scuzz?”
Scuzz, to me, at least, is when everything in a song is super fuzzed-out and loud, so it becomes a wall of sound just on that alone. I’d describe that sound as a big, warm, kinda itchy blanket. That sound and that feeling is what I’m getting at when I call my music “scuzzy”.
Do you find catharsis when making music?
Yeah, just not in the way that people usually do when they make music. Not every song is, like, a huge purging of emotions for me.
Some are, but they’re kind of few and far between. 99% of the time, I get a ton of catharsis from the act of making music.
I have to be doing something all the time, drawing, skating, building something, taking something apart, and music is just another aspect of that. It satisfies my need to create.
In your new single “we were architects once…” you sing the line, “her hair’s all washed out with gore.” What are some of your favorite gory films?
"Friday the 13th", "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre", and "The Amityville Horror."
How excited are you to release “Plague Skater II” on April 16th?
Hella. I’m honestly so psyched that people actually get to hear it now instead of just seeing me make jokes about it on Twitter. I’m also really interested to see what everyone thinks about it.
How would you compare “Plague Skater II” to your debut album?
It’s totally better, in my opinion. I love my debut, but with "Plague Skater II", there’s more actual songs on the record, it’s longer than 14 minutes, it’s cleaned up just enough that you can hear everything that’s going on, and to top it off, my friend Josie did an insanely good job mastering the record. I love this thing a lot, I’m pretty proud of how it came out.
When writing, does the music come first, or the lyrics? Do you tend to follow a melody?
Music comes first every time, no matter what. It’s always easier to add lyrics to a finished piece of music than it is to add music to a finished set of lyrics, so I really can’t do it any other way than music first.
I’ve been using melody more as I’ve gotten more confident as a singer, but I still do scream a decent amount. I’ve gotten a lot better at blending the melodic stuff with the screams, which I’m definitely going to keep up going forward.
What are some influences that most people wouldn’t expect from you?
A lot of people who ask about my influences think I only listen to and am influenced by emo and hardcore, which I totally do listen to and am influenced by, but there’s a ton more. I’m super influenced by 60’s pop groups like the Crystals, the Shangri-Las, and Tommy James and the Shondells.
Super technical math rock bands like Hella and Orthrelm are in there too. There was a week not too long ago where I listened to only Kero Kero Bonito and Bolt Thrower. Pretty much any sample-based music gets my creative buzz going as well.
What do you want your epitaph to say?
“That’s it?”
Jumping ahead ten years, what do you want people to say when they go back and listen to Plague Skater?
Hopefully the planet Earth still exists and I’m still making records ten years in the future, so really I just hope people go back, listen to the old Plague Skater records, and think about how cool the progression from recording songs on my phone in my bedroom to whatever I’m doing in the future is.
We want to give a huge thank you to Will Schwester for taking the time to chat with us! Be on the lookout for his new record “Plague Skater II”, releasing on April 16, 2021, and be sure to follow us on Twitter @lgndsoftmrw to be the first to read our full review of the album.
Plague Skater's latest single “we were architects once…” is available now wherever music is streamed, and you can read our full review of the track by Reece Carmen here. You can further support Schwester by picking up some merch via Flea Collar Tapes and following him on Twitter @PlagueSkater.
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