Tsunami Bomb on Tour in Germany!
Tsunami Bomb
Munich, Germany
by Sabine
Tsunami Bomb were opening that night for Hopesfall. Although I must admit that this was quite a strange combination of bands I enjoyed both shows to the same extent. Tsunami Bomb is one of those rare girl fronted bands that has found their own style and doesn’t sound like an imitation of either Courtney Love or Gwen Stefani. Agent M has a very unique voice and her stage presence took the audience by storm. She is gorgeous and I had the pleasure to sit down with her and their bass player, Matt. And also thanks to Riggi for taking pictures!
Sabine: First of all, how is the tour going?
Agent M: It’s going good. We did our first show in Belgium at the Groezrock festival and then we have been playing in Germany ever since. It’s been really fun.
I know that this is sort of a standard question but I would still like to know why you are called Agent M?
That’s just my stage name.
Your guitar player quitted with the band. Why?
He was basically tired of touring. He wanted to have a home and a bed to go to every day. He did not want to be on the road all year.
How do you cope with being on tour all the time?
I just try to stay healthy and to get enough rest.
On Coolgrrrls.com we vote every year the top 25 women of rock. And you are usually among the top 20. Seemingly you are some sort of role model for a lot of young girls. Did or do you have any role models?
Yeah, I started out listening to Green Day and Operation Ivy. Those were the first bands who really got me into music. And as far as female musicians go, after that I started listening to a lot more girl singers like Tilt and No Doubt. That’s about it. There weren’t that many back then.
Do you think it’s a disadvantage to be a girl in the punk scene?
Sometimes but not usually. Usually everybody is really respectful. I think the only places where they are somewhat disrespectful… well, we had some problems in Spain and Italy. But that’s about it. Everywhere else the people are really nice.
What’s your advice for girls who want to start a band?
Uhm, I think one thing that worked for me is not to be super girly as far as music goes. If you sing in a punk band it has to have some edginess to it. So if you sound very happy, light and girly the only fans that you will probably have are other girls. So you just have to be a little more edgy to get a broader audience.
What are the musical influences of Tsunami Bomb?
Matt: That’s hard to say. We all listen to so much stuff. Each person in the band listens to something else. But I think we all like Alkaline Trio, Glassjaw and stuff like that.
What was your motivation to start a band?
I just loved punk music so much that I just wanted to do it. I wanted to be part of it and not just listen to it.
I got into punk rock through skateboarding. That was back in the day when all the skateboarding was kinda focused around punk rock. No one could have imagined that you could ever make a living out of punk rock or skateboarding back then.
Ok, maybe this is a stupid question but after the Tsunami catastrophe in Asia around Christmas did you get rude emails or something because you are called Tsunami Bomb?
We did not really get any bad feedback or something but we got dropped off a few samplers and stuff. The only bad thing that happened was that kids told us that they were wearing their Tsunami Bomb shirts on the streets and they got into trouble because of that. People were like ‘I can’t believe you’re wearing that shirt!’.
I mean, if we had named our name after that event well, that would suck. But we called ourselves Tsunami Bomb years ago. It’s kinda ironical if people say that we are exploiting that event for publicity reasons…
Yeah, because it doesn’t really get us more fans.
What would you say is your music about, or what are your lyrics about?
The lyrics are about kinda the everyday struggle. Things that everybody can relate to. It doesn’t matter if you are a guy or a girl. There are these basic kinds of issues.
Do you think that it’s sometimes difficult that you are the only girl in the band? Because you probably get all the attention and the focus is all the time on you?
Sometimes but I think in general people just always want to talk to the singer. But then being a girl on top of it makes all the people want to talk to me most of the time. So I think I do get more attention than the average vocalist. But I don’t think that it’s extreme.
I think that Agent M gets 90% of the attention, which I personally like. Like last night I had that strange encounter when some kids were walking up to me and asking ‘hey do you know when the band’s coming out?’ Like, yeah, probably later. Hehe.
OK, so what are your plans for the near future?
After this tour if over we gonna go home and then leave for the Warped Tour. And then we will start writing out next record.
That’s it, thank you very much!
-Sabine
Visit, Agent M & Matt on the web at: www.tsunamibomb.com
Leave a Reply