Interview with Adam Kreutzer of The Kreutzer Sonata

Local hardcore band The Kreutzer Sonata were recently victorious in our annual albums of the year bracket. Their album The Gutters of Paradise was the collective favorite album of four of us at Change the Rotation for 2018. If you haven't heard the album yet, it's about time! Stream it at The Kreutzer Sonata's Bandcamp page. You can see The Kreutzer Sonata twice around Chicago this weekend. Tonight they play at Co-Prosperity Sphere for the Up the Pups fundraiser show with Through N Through, Sasquatch Turf War, October Bird of Death, Shitizen, The Magnifiers and Gnus. Saturday night they play at Liar's Club with Fear City, The Bollweevils, Anger and Fishgutzzz. Vocalist Adam Kreutzer talked with me about The Gutters of Paradise, the next album, the next release after that, old songs and favorite food spots.

Phil Collins: Congrats on winning the bracket! The album has been out for nearly a year already, do any of the songs feel different to you now than they did originally?

Adam Kreutzer: Thanks Phil. Some of the songs on the album feel a little dated for the band's sound in some ways I suppose but overall I still believe in the album that we wrote together. As a band we write fast and put out albums while already having an overload of new material in mind. The songs off Gutters that resonate the most we still keep in the set though. I can say the songs meaning and messages still stay true for us.

PC: It seems like each release stands as its own document, which doesn’t happen by accident. How do you know when it’s time to wrap a release?

AK: I’ve always enjoyed bands who have a discography of records that don’t repeat themselves. That’s definitely a goal with TKS. Gutters sort of happened organically with us just having a slew of new songs with a new band lineup. Where as our upcoming release The RoseHill Gates relies heavily on themes musical, lyrically and visually in the artwork. Gutters is a more straightforward hardcore record while we aimed to write a bunch of songs for this upcoming record that have more dynamic shifts and moods to them. As far as knowing when it’s time to wrap up a release its usually a matter of having too much material at hand and chopping it down into a number of tracks that we think work cohesively as one piece of art. I am a big fan of listening to albums front to back and of bands that can master that format. To do that is a goal with this band.

PC: The new album focuses on your time working near the RoseHill cemetery, right?

AK: Yeah, I worked at a four am bar for going on 6 years before I left right across from the RoseHill Cemetery. The place was like a twilight zone in the middle of the night and a family oriented restaurant during the day. It was a place I grew to love when at the same time it constantly drove me crazy. I can say they were some of the most important years of my life and spanned the longevity of my past marriage and way of life. It was an album that needed to be written lyrically for me. Very proud of the songs we wrote as a band for this one.

PC: Would you call it a concept album?

AK: There’s not a true story arc to the album like a lot of concept albums have but most of the songs are made up lyrically of stories of the years spent up in far North Chicago. There are a lot of strong underlying themes in the structure we put together but I don’t really think of it as a concept album. More so a collection of stories.

PC: I heard there are some Chicago restaurants that have been particularly inspiring lately. Are there any food recommendations you want to share?

AK: Yeah, Kasia’s Deli, Red Apple Buffet, Staropolska and Podhalanka Polish restaurants as well as Fireside Resturant in Edgewater and Hollywood Grill. Cleo’s soccer bar also has great late night wings. We thanked a lot of food places in the liner notes this time around cause food is dope.

PC: In the words of the Descendents, I like food. Food tastes good. Do you like to stick to a regular order at a certain restaurant or do you switch it up?

AK: Switch it up for sure. I like to CHANGE THE ROTATION when I go out to eat.

PC: Oh yeah! I want to ask about some of TKS’s older releases, particularly the pre- Fight Songs stuff. Those came out a long time ago but I wonder if any of those songs will find their way back into the band’s live sets?

AK: That crosses my mind sometimes, but I’m not sure if it will happen anytime soon. Some of those songs I’d love to re record someday because I feel like we could make them sound a lot better now with how we’ve come along as a band and with more experience in a studio. But yeah not sure if it will happen anytime soon.

PC: I would love to hear some of those songs rerecorded down the road. You brought back a couple songs into the live set from Fight Songs and the Union Boys split recently, how has that been?

AK: It’s been good. The new lineup has brought some life back to those songs and there are definite plans to re record a couple of those tracks this year on a larger release.

PC: Any word on what that release would be or is that under wraps?

AK: We have all the songs written for it but maybe once The RoseHill Gates is pressed and out for a while we’ll talk more about it. But it will definitely be going back to what we were talking about about the whole not making the same record twice. It will be a change up for sure but we’re really stoked on the direction.

PC: Right on. Anything else we should keep our eyes open for with TKS?

AK: New record, a bunch of out of state shows in new and old places, some new music videos for the new record and a bunch of the usual shenanigans.