Interview by Dominik Pachala with Topon Das of Fuck the Facts
For the readers who don’t know who you guys are who and what is Fuck the Facts?
Topon Das: We’re a band from Ontario. We’ve been around for a little while, we started years ago. There’ve been a few band member changes over the years.
So you guys have done a bunch of splits with a bunch of different bands, is there a band in particular you guys want to do a split with and are there any upcoming splits with any bands we should know about?
Topon Das: We don’t have any upcoming splits lined up but , yeah, we definitely have talked with a few bands about doing something. It would be cool to talk to the guys from Kill the Client to try doing something. Yeah there are a ton of bands we’d like to do something with but it all comes down to finding the time on our end and on their end to get the things worked out. The last split we did was with Leng T’che, that was really cool because after we became friends and we really liked the band.
So somewhat similar to the question before, what bands would you guys like to tour with?
Topon Das: We did a tour with Anti-Gama in Europe and that was really awesome because I was a fan of the band beforehand. So that was the first time I was a fan of the band before we toured with them. I know that when you tour with a band and you see them for 30 nights, that’s when you really start to get into their stuff. That’s how I got into few bands like Unearthly Trance. There aren’t a lot of offers that we get to tour with bands like the tour we’re going to be doing with Ken Mode. Me and Jessie (Ken Mode) have known each other for quite a bit and we got in touch with each other and talked about doing something. That’s what we’re used to when it comes to touring.
You guys are playing free show in Edmonton on May 2nd at Filthy McNasties. Will you guys be concentrating your set list on the newer material or are you guys gonna play older material also?
Topon Das: When we started doing shows this year, we did a bunch of 10-year anniversary shows. So we went back and played a bunch of really old songs. So for this tour we’re really focusing on the newer stuff, we’re playing stuff from Disgorge Mexico, the split with Leng T’che, the unnamed EP and a couple new songs that are going to be on our next album.
So how do you feel your music has evolved since Vagina Dancer?
Topon Das: Every time I hear that album title, I try figure out what I was thinking. For one, that tape was basically noise. That dates back to pre-band era. Like when I was talking about the 10 year anniversary, that’s when the band started around 2001. The tape came out sometime around 1998. So from then, it was a solo project, it’s changed a ton. Our music is always evolving we don’t want to limit ourselves to just one thing. I’m happy with the evolution of the band, it’s definitely been influenced by the different members that have come into the band even from 2001. One of the main purposes of the band is to keep evolving.
So you guys have been signed on Relapse, what sort of difference have you guys noticed between releasing records with labels vs DIYing?
Topon Das: It’s been a long time since we worked with Relapse, I think its been 5 years. I think a lot of people thing that when you get signed to a label, management will deal with more stuff. But you end up doing a lot more stuff than you would do otherwise. We have a huge DIY ethic, we released a couple of DIY things while we were on the label. I think it was awesome that we could work with them since the label is recognized in the scene and they have contacts that we don’t have, but at the same time they didn’t allows to do whatever we wanted even for other realizes and independent stuff .
Can you talk about John Zorn’s Naked City and how it influenced Fuck The Facts?
Topon Das: I pulled the band name off of a Naked City album. This was a long time ago… I was really into the album, I still think it’s a really awesome album. I haven’t listened to it in a while but it has a lot of really cool shit going on. When I heard that, I just really want to have an extremely open mind to music and do whatever I wanted to and not worry about being a grindcore band, a metal band or even a really weird experimental band. I felt that that album mixed the noisy stuff with the smoother stuff. I feel that we’re kinda like that. We’re doing the stuff we want to do and not really forcing ourselves to do anything weird or different or anything.
