A basement interview with local Cal band Loose Leisure

It’s Friday night and I’m walking down the street looking for the address that lead vocalist and bass guitarist John Forbes sent me. My friend and I pass by a house that emanates a cover of Childish Gambino’s jazzy “Redbone.” My friend looks at me and says “This gotta be it.”

The backyard is decorated with string lights and St. Patrick’s day tributes.  It’s quickly filled with people by the time Loose Leisure starts setting up amps and testing chords. Drummer Lance Ultsch is wearing a knee-length dress and muses that he’s trying to revitalize his dress phase again. The excited crowd pushes me all the way to the front when the set begins. They alternate between original songs and covers of Maroon 5, Arctic Monkeys, Weezer, and more. Those closest to the band––I’m about a foot away from lead guitarist and vocalist Luka Cheney’s guitar pedal––are jumping up and down in tune with the music. The bands’ shirts gradually unbutton the more they play. 

A noise complaint interrupts the music and the crowd is hushed; I take this temporary lull in the performance as an opportunity to talk to the band. We head down to the basement of the house, the site for many of their practices. We settle in and share a cigarette, the smoke swirling slowly in the air. I start off with a deceptively simple question: how would you describe your band? To my surprise, Luka Cheney and drummer Lance Ultsch have a quick catchphrase, “loud, in-time, and have a good time.”

It all started with John Forbes and Luka Cheney meeting at a concert behind the Greek Theater the first week of their freshman year. They started practicing together shortly after. Lance Ultsch knew Luka Cheney from being a fan of his band back in high school in Santa Cruz. They didn’t form Loose Leisure until Lance Ultsch arrived at Cal his freshman year while John Forbes and Luka Cheney were in their junior year.

Lance Ultsch: I always grew up watching [Luka’s] band and when I got into Berkeley, Luka told me their drummer just left [and] we’re looking for another one. I got so stoked. This is a dream situation because this is the best guitarist I ever met.

Loose Leisure’s venues alternate between frats, co-ops, and any group living situation that’s down for live music. We collectively agreed that live music provides an entirely different atmosphere to parties compared to the usual playlists.

Preslee Vanlandingam (B-Side): Does the venue influence how you play?

Luka Cheney: We change our set depending on what we think the crowd is going to like. At a frat or a sorority, it’s going to be more covers whereas [at house parties] it will probably be more original songs. 

Lance Ultsch: If you play live music where people are not into it, rough. We played for a sorority at like twelve on a Sunday, they weren’t digging it at all so we just started fucking around, jamming, and at the end of it I tore my drumset apart and did an acoustic version of “Everlong” and I just danced.

Every band varies when it comes to creating original songs, and I got a little insight into Loose Leisure’s personal process.

PV: What is the process behind creating your original songs?

John Forbes: Luka always starts us off with something on guitar, Lance and I usually figure out the bass and drums, and I’ve written the lyrics to most of our songs.

Lance Ultsch: We make the whole song and then say alright John have fun, come back to us in a week when you’re ready. 

Luka Cheney: That’s the beautiful thing about music. I play a lot of jazz and know a lot of theory so I can organize the musical parts but I don’t have anything to say in terms of lyrics. That’s why it’s nice to have someone like [John]. You need to find people that have different strengths in your band and that’s why this works so well.

John Forbes: There’s a song that’s called “The Magic” that starts with this excited, happy guitar and baseline and it’s really upbeat so that one is more optimistic and making the most of the moment. There’s a song called “The Rain” that’s a heavy, minor-chord, almost jazzy song and that’s the heartbreak song. So my lyrics ebb and flow with what the group puts out music-wise.

I went a bit deeper into John Forbes’ songwriting, especially after his bandmates bragged about his quick turnaround.

PV: What is the subject of or what inspires your songs?

John Forbes: I’m a weird Berkeley philosophy nerd so I write a lot about the human condition and life and heartbreak and trying to make the most of it and dealing with the weird thing that is life that we’re all experiencing as twenty-something-year-olds. For every hundred pages of journal entries, there’s maybe a song I can spit out of it.

Going to these shows, I wonder how bands like Loose Leisure view their involvement. Is it simply a way to enrich their college experience? Are they aiming for something more long-term? 

PV: What does this band mean to you? Is it only meaningful to your college experience or something beyond that?

Luka Cheney: There’s a lot of grinding all day every day at Berkeley. So it’s nice on the weekends to play with the band, it’s a release for me. I love hanging out with these boys, I love playing shows on the weekend, it’s as simple as that. I only do it because it’s fun. It’s an opportunity to show my art and all my hard work. Sometimes I get nervous but I think of it as excitement. The most satisfying thing to me is if we play a show and it sounds better than the last one.

Lance Ultsch: I may be in a unique position [from] these guys because my college experience is Loose Leisure. I just turned twenty a few weeks ago and I’m at a weird crossroads of ‘What do I want to do with my life?’ And it’s nice to know, ‘well I got this band.’ This band has always been there. I’m definitely here to have fun but I also want to play drums forever. I love doing it. I want this to be something more. There’s something about playing music live that’s an unmatched feeling and I don’t want that to ever stop.

John Forbes: The questions of what to do with your life and how to live your life are the most fundamental and have plagued me for almost a decade. Music is the only thing I’m one hundred percent certain that I’m going to do for the rest of my life. It was my dream to play in college, and that dream has come true. We’ll all play music forever no matter what we wind up being. People think they want power and riches and maybe a rock star thinks they want fame but to me, playing [for] a room [of] twenty people is just as important as playing for ten thousand and I’ve done both. It doesn’t make a difference to me because it’s something that can be good forever.

As Berkeley students, they share a fascinating contrast between their area of study and their passion for music. The ‘real world’ can intrude on the dream, and they walk the fine line between practicality and creativity. 

Lance Ultsch: I don’t know what I want to do with my life, but I know I’m having fun here. Obviously, everyone tells you you’re never going to make it as a band and that you gotta have a backup plan.

My friend cuts in, “And the backup option is microbiology?” 

Lance Ultsch: Yeah, that’s some Berkeley shit, ain’t it?

Watching any live performance, I see artists pouring their souls onto the stage. Sometimes drenched in sweat, lost in a guitar solo, or belting out a particularly charged chorus. I always wondered what that feeling is like. Lance phrases it accurately, if not abstractly. 

PV: How would you describe playing live?

Lance Ultsch: It’s a feeling unparalleled to anything else. You can have really good sex and be like that feels incredible, you can take a crazy drug, you can have the best day, or you can play this music for an hour and have the same feeling. It’s euphoric. It’s being in-time. I’m always like wow, I am making this thing. Maybe if you have a kid, you feel the same way or if you’re an engineer and make a car but I don’t plan on having any kids soon and I can’t make any cars, so this is it.

Just then, we got word that the party will, in fact, go on. I learned that these interruptions are a common occurrence.

John Forbes: You want to play as many songs as you can before [cops] show up. My favorite moment ever was when we were playing a gig at my frat and the cops showed up and talked to the guys at the door. They said ‘Do we need to shut down?’ and they said ‘No, you guys sound really good, I heard you from downtown and I just wanted to say good job.’

Follow Loose Leisure’s Instagram to stay up-to-date on their upcoming shows.