INTERVIEW: GO WITH STRANGERS

Eugene, thank you so much for taking time out of your busy schedule to participate in this interview. I would like to start off with a few questions to allow our listeners to get to know you a little bit. Can you tell me a little bit about yourself: Where you grew up, how you got into playing music, and where you’re living now? 

Hi Danielle, thank you so much for your time in curating this interview. Surely – I grew up, and am still in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I was sent to piano school from a young age, thanks to my dad’s love for piano, and my mom’s insistence.

After piano preschool, I was switched to private teaching with a family relative who was a piano teacher. She was a great teacher, but a very strict one. (I think it was also around this time that I was introduced to rock music, by a friend who was learning guitar, and his parents had just bought him an acoustic-electric guitar too.) After class one day, I discovered an old classical guitar, buried under piano books, in the storeroom of my piano teacher’s home. I pleaded with her to borrow it home, very much to her horror. That’s how I got into guitars, and music.

Thinking back, although I hated learning the piano. I truly have my parents to thank for literally pushing me to learn the piano (dragging me to attend classes every week). So even though I never had any background education in music production, I believe that everything I could at least do now (musically), began from there. And I was also lucky to have a very supportive mother who supported me in every way, even when I told her I wanted to stop learning piano to focus on guitar playing.. I know many other parents would have freaked out at such a request.

What other music projects have you been involved in previously? 

Band/music projects wise, I began my music-writing journey more than a decade ago, with an alternative-metal band Kojira. We had a digital album out right before disbanding. It was also around that time that my dad passed, and I found solace in the peace and serene sound of my dad’s old upright piano in my home. (Which was sorely neglected, due to my pursuit of guitars). I started writing piano music, and released it under the name Gene Shanzo. A few days after the release, Gene Shanzo was contacted by Café Del Mar to have a song released on a piano compilation album of theirs. After that, I got involved in a dreamy electro/indie-pop band, made an EP; then realized I missed guitar-driven music, and Go With Strangers was born.

Where does your passion for making music come from?

I think being able to see a music composition and art piece interweave, to grow and achieve its final form; and actually knowing that others from different parts of the world feel something from my song, that is personal to their heart. It is the greatest privilege, healing, and therapy, to me, as an artist – That connection, just through music.

Tell me a little bit more specifically about Go with Strangers and how this music project came to fruition?

Go With Strangers is an alternative-rock music project that started during the Covid lockdowns, I was discovering post-rock music and I came across the band Mogwai. Coincidentally, their album As The Love Continues was recently released.

I covered the song “Ritchie Sacramento”, and also wrote my first song “Further”. I think it was around the same time I was discovering Shoegaze music (a genre of music that I somehow overlooked my entire music life). The kind responses on the Mogwai cover and my first song Further was what gave me the encouragement to continue singing and writing music for Go With Strangers. Debuting Finding Ikigai EP, back in 2022.

The production of your latest release, Ave, Reverie, covered a span of three years. Can you talk about that creative process and what that looked like for you? 

It was just a lot of writing, in the silence of the night.

The guitar parts always come first in my songwriting, and I need to feel what I’m playing. If I don’t feel the groove of the riff, I’ll quickly move on. But there is also the issue where, when I play a guitar riff (that I initially found interesting) for a few more minutes too long, it sometimes begin to sound weird to me, and I’ll end up scraping it. It’s a waste, actually. I think many potentially good riffs were lost in that way.

I admire composers who can write music over a vocal idea. Until this day I could never do that (or have the patience to do that). Vocal writing always comes last for me. Sometimes I would try to meditate beforehand if possible, then put on my earphones, set the song to repeat, close my eyes, and just replay the song until a vocal idea materializes. Quite a boring process.

I’m not a meditative person, although I wish I would do it more often. But there was one time when I was sitting on the floor in padmasana (cross-legged seating), in the middle of my room. After a few minutes of breathing and meditation, I actually felt my surroundings melted away, leaving me feeling like I was suspended in space. The quietness of my surroundings slipped into an empty void. It was a very serene feeling, nothing eerie at all. But at that time, I wasn’t sure what I was experiencing. So I made myself snap out of it. Only after some reading did I find out it was actually a positive thing in the world of meditation, to be able to encounter such an experience. That night itself after that encounter, I remember coming up with the chorus for “Reverie (I’ll Be Waiting)”.

What are your music inspirations? What is your “go-to” album, the one that you never tire of, that you can listen to over and over? 

 I do listen to and appreciate very different types of music (even when I was very much into metal (still am). But I have also been thinking about this question lately – What exactly is my subconscious inspiration?

I remember in my first metal band, one of my bandmates would always encourage me to listen to bands like Massive Attack, Radiohead, Smashing Pumpkins and Alice in Chains. I also remember he would also frequently mention Dream Pop. But back then, I always ignored him, probably due to being young and closed minded. But even when not being properly exposed to dream pop yet, looking back I realize there was always this dreamy element to my songwriting and ideas, even if only guitars. So it was quite a transformative experience, when given the chance to express more on the vocal side of songwriting with Go With Strangers. To be able to find more of myself in this music project. – Something which I’m ever grateful to my listeners and supporters for.

To answer your question, my music inspiration for Go With Strangers would come from bands like A Perfect Circle, Tesseract, Periphery, Karnivool, Tears For Fears, and definitely Deftones.

An album that I would never tire of – Deftones, “Around The Fur”. But there is also one album that I would always revisit, every once awhile – “Places for Breathing”, by Revis.

What are your future plans for Go With Strangers? Any plans to play live shows? 

 I do hope to still continue with Go With Strangers as an outlet for creative expression.

During the end of 2024, I actually did try roping in a few friends to play live with for Go With Strangers, and it looked promising at first. But some difficulty with our individual schedules arose, so it didn’t really work out. I then started getting busy with finalizing the album and other things. Playing live has always been on my mind, so will see how that goes again.

As a matter of fact.. All of these are also mainly the reason for the title of the album.  “Ave” is an expression of greeting or of leave-taking. A hail, or a farewell. “Reverie” refers to Go With Strangers, my daydream.

Anything else you’d like to share with our listeners? 

You will get through this. We will make it through this.

Ave, and be well.