Lockslip is a new band from Los Angeles comprised of vocalist Sara G., bassist Joe El-Khoury, drummer Noah Baxter, and guitarists Nick Pinder and TJ Jaeger.
They just dropped their debut release today, a self-titled burner consisting of 4 tracks of chaotic metalcore that could have come out on in the '90s, my favorite era for the style.
Sara—who also fronts Entry—sent me a link to check out the EP last week and I thought it would be cool to introduce Lockslip via a quick chat about the project.
So, what's the Lockslip formation story?
The band was started by guitarists TJ and Nick. They played music together years back and decided they wanted to be in a band again. They found Noah (drums) and Joe (bass) on Craigslist then tried out some vocalists but nothing stuck.
One day, a mutual friend tagged me in their Facebook post about needing a vocalist, and I decided to just go for it and at least meet them and see It seemed like a good fit. I trusted that he wouldn't have suggested us to each other if he didn't believe in It. We jammed a few times, and that was that.
When you sent me the message about the band, you referred to it as “metalcore,” which is definitely not the same style Entry would fall into. Tell me about your background musically and how what you’re doing with Lockslip fits into that.
This is definitely new ground for me performance wise, but it's honestly what I envisioned for myself when I was younger. When I first started really finding my own music, I was drawn to the heavy and chaotic.
In high school and still now my favorite heavy bands were Converge, Cave In, Botch, etc. The first record I ever bought on vinyl was 'It's A Shame...' by Ed Gein. So I've always been a bit of a fan of this style of music.
What are some of the lyrical themes you took on with this first batch of songs, and did you go about it any differently than the way you go about writing Entry material?
I have a hard time getting away from just writing about my frustrations with the world, so that's still pretty much what these songs are. The real difference is the structure and complexity of the songs themselves. It was actually pretty difficult to transition to this style because I am so used to writing in a really straightforward manner.
TJ and I had some writing sessions where he helped me sort of fill in the blanks, and during recording, the rest of the band gave some powerful input. The vocals were more of a collective effort for this release than I've ever done before, and I really appreciate the push from everyone else to try new things.
What’s the plan for Lockslip now that the music is coming out? Will you be playing shows soon?
The plan is to release these songs to the world and continue making new music. We are working on getting some shows together soon.
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Lockslip is streaming across all digital outlets. Hit their Linktree to find all of their social media pages.
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