Alien Boy Dreams About A Guitar Rock Takeover With All Of Their Friends
“Dreams and queer feelings,” the spray-painted banner Alien Boy hung as their backdrop during a series of shows in 2018. For better or worse, the phrase has become the band’s calling card—a mission statement that acts as Alien Boy’s dictionary definition. Formed in 2015, the Portland-based band is the brainchild of songwriter and guitarist Sonia Weber and drummer Derek McNeil. With a sound that borrows from the early days of guitar-driven alternative rock and lyrics that matter-of-factly address heavy emotions and low-slung sentiments, Alien Boy manages a level of earnestness usually reserved for Live Aid contributors. That amount of passion would swallow any other band, putting them at an uncomfortably cool distance from their audience. But, Weber’s penchant for deep dive lyrical references gives listeners the intimacy of an inside joke only a select few know.
Alien Boy released their newest single, “Wondering Still,” this summer. The band describes the song as “written from a place of false clarity— understanding nothing and everything all at once.” The song dips into early pop-punk pioneers like Jawbreaker but never fully strips off the heavy coat of raw emotion donned by the group's earlier catalog. Thus far, Alien Boy has managed to freely move around the spectrum of guitar-driven alternative sub-genres without ever sounding out of step with who they have declared themselves to be.
The band embarked on a multi-leg tour this summer, stopping at The Manor in Caldwell, Idaho, in July to play a house show with Seattle’s Supercruch and local punk trio Blix. We were able to catch up with Alien Boy after the show to chat about the band’s latest single, their sound, and the evolution of their ever-present slogan.
Photo by April Massey
AM: You are part of a wave of bands unapologetically drawing on late ‘80s and early ‘90s nostalgia in both sound and lyrical reference. What do you think has caused the resurgence in popularity? What from that period influences you the most?
Sonia: My influences are Jawbreaker, Oasis, The Smiths, My Bloody Valentine, and The Wipers. There has always been guitar rock; it is not as mainstream now. That is not why I chose to do it; it is just what I like. But I think that is why there is a wave of bands coming back to it because it has not been as prevalent as before. And, it is cool.
Derek: Retro things tend to come in cycles, and I think right now, there is a retro of ‘80s retro from the early 2000s. It is a double retro that is happening in a very cool way.
Caleb: There are only so many ways to play guitar, and I think they figured out the best way to do it in that time frame.
Sonia: We are driven by being such big fans of that kind of music. There is a lot of other music I am a fan of that I do not necessarily want to play. Being a musician means that I am a music fan, and our band is a big representation of that. I just really like music and the culture around music. I like watching videos and listening to podcasts about music. I just like everything about it, and that is what influences our band sounding the way it does.
AM: Do you think it is societal as well? Does that time feel like a better place to be?
Sonia: Interesting, I have not thought about that. I feel that way about music sometimes. I wish there was more money invested into rock music and more space for it, but I do not want to be in the ‘80s or the ‘90s.
AM: Unlike some of your contemporaries, your lyrics unironically reference heavily emotional subject matter. Has it always been your intention to write in that way?
Photo by April Massey
Sonia: Yes, definitely. All of my favorite bands write that way. That comes back to being a fan of music and wanting to make music that I would be a fan of. I had a lot of conversations in my early 20s about writing intentionally vague music. I am just not interested in that. The idea that music can be emotive if it is not direct, but I would rather it be “this is what I am saying.” That is how I connect to music, and that is how I want people to connect to my music. It is what it is. I do not need it to be poetic; it can just be how I talk.
AM: Do you think being more obvious in your writing has allowed fans to make a deeper connection to your music?
Sonia: Yes. There have always been people who have been receptive to that since we have been a band, but just recently, there have been multiple people approaching me about their connection to our music. I would like to think that that is why. For me, the lyrics are what I need to be focusing on. My other intent is to make great guitar rock. I want to make the kind of guitar music that I love. For our listeners, I feel like it is either “oh, I like this guitar music, “ or it is “ I hear what you are saying, and this is something I can relate to.” But I do not really know. Someone came to the show tonight with an Alien Boy tattoo, which is f– crazy, but those things are not happening enough that I can say 100% how people interact with the music.
AM: Was that a first for you, someone showing up with a tattoo of your logo?
Sonia: It is the third, but the other two people are our friends. This was the first person we did not know. It is f– insane to say that three people have Alien Boy tattoos.
AM: In 2018, you played a series of shows with the phrase “dreams and queer feelings” hung behind you. That phrase ended up becoming a sort of mission statement for the band. Is that still true today?
Sonia: Yes, absolutely.
Elian: Emulating that and translating it to other people.
Sonia: I spray-painted that banner in my parent's driveway. The paint bled through the fabric and was stuck on my parent’s driveway for a long time. I sent the rough mix of our first record, Sleeping Lessons, to an old student of mine, and he commented that every song referenced dreams. That is something that still happens. Dreams are a big link for me to keep in touch with my emotions. Dreaming and fantasizing are so much a part of the writing process for me. I do not want us to be just a gay band. When you think about bands like The Cure, they have so many beautiful love songs and so many fantasies and dreams. I just want it to feel like that. But it is for queer people, and it is about queer feelings. It is all of that floating together. I came up with the phrase one day, and it felt like the most sincere version of everything. It is not about me being heartbroken or upset about my exes; it is genuine queer feeling and the fantasy and dreams around it.
Elian: It is a mantra. It is the best way to describe our lyrics in the most common sense way. “What are the songs about?” “Oh, they are about dreams and f– queer feelings.” It is a very simple statement that opens a very wide net.
Derek: I always like saying it because it does not read like a catchphrase.
Elian: When Sonia first said it, I knew exactly what it meant, and I felt like it made complete sense for our band.
Caleb: Ditto.
Sonia: This just reminds me we have to get a backdrop again. We used to always have a fog machine and a backdrop, but that slowly petered out because we had so much other stuff to take care of. That is the kind of band I want us to be, one that creates a whole world.
Elian: We are heavily influenced by a lot of early aughts emo and pop-punk bands. My Chemical Romance, Panic At The Disco, Fallout Boy; bands that put a lot into their live shows. We pull a lot from that. We are just trying to create something memorable.
Sonia: We do not have the resources to create that world, but I still want it to exist.
AM: So what does that world of unlimited resources look like for you?
Sonia: Right now, we have a constant pull of resources, and there is a place, a few steps ahead, where we have the time to figure it all out. What we wear, how we move through the set, the backdrop, and the tone of the whole night. I have tried to do all of these things that I love about being in a rock band, but I feel like this one thing is missing that ties it all together that we cannot do until we have more resources and time. There is that one last little touch that brings everything together that I just cannot get to.
Caleb: Time is the main resource. We can make whatever we want; it does not take that much money; it is having the time to do it.
Elian: If we had money, money, and did not have to work our regular jobs and could have band practice every day, then, yeah, we could do whatever we wanted.
Caleb: Well, yeah. But, ultimately, time is the thing. We need a few days uninterrupted to make cool things, but we only get to do that every two years. We would be much more efficient if we could do that all the time.
AM: So that is what that world looks like for you? More time?
Sonia: I am really happy with where the band is currently. All I want in my “big” life is to be able to do just this for a couple of years. I do not need it to be the rest of my life, but just to be able to go all in and really see it through.
AM: Do you feel like you are making music from a place where there is something that is always just out of reach?
Sonia: Kind of, but it does not need to be that sad. There is this feeling of always reaching for the next step. But every time I have gotten to that step, it has been like, “whoa, this is not what I expected it to be.” I am very proud of everything we make, but there is always a feeling of “what could we do if we had a little more time or attention.” I do not mean that for the things we have made, it is more of an outward thinking mentality.
Derek: What could we do next time if we had an extra week.
Sonia: We are just always very rushed.
Elian: We recorded our album, Don’t Know What I Am, in a week. We had a lot of fun, but it was rushed. Towards the end of the recording, it was like, “Okay, we do not have time to relax about this.” I would love to see what having two weeks at a recording studio feels like.
AM: You have described your newest single, “Wondering Still,” as being from a place of false clarity, understanding nothing and everything at the same time. Do you think that is a good metaphor for the current state of society?
Sonia: Yeah! It is definitely not about that, but yes. It is about me being drunk and trying to figure out who I want to make out with. Going back to queer feelings, growing up queer, you feel like the model for the rest of the world is not for you. So instead of getting answers, I feel like I have more questions. Even just about day-to-day stuff, everything is on the table. But, mostly, the song is about partying and the beautiful and amusing things that happen very, very late at night.
Caleb: It is the overtime buzzer beater.
Photo by April Massey
Sonia: You keep saying that, and I do not really get it.
Caleb: Damien Loyd, legendary buzzer beater.
Sonia: Are you saying I am always Damien Loyd at the end of the night?
Caleb: Yeah. At the end of the night, most people would say, “it is the fourth quarter, and I am done. Someone won, and I lost.” But, you will go into three overtimes, and when all hope is lost, something dramatic! Whenever I manage to stay for that moment, I am always slackjawed.
Sonia: That is a good name for an album.
AM: Last question for you. Besides your own, what music is keeping you company on tour right now?
Sonia: We left yesterday; we are not really on tour yet.
AM: Since yesterday, what music have you been listening to?
Elian: First Rodeo.
Sonia: We listen to a lot of our friend’s new records that are not out yet. We are listening to Clover, First Rodeo, the new Strange Ranger record that probably will not be out until next year.
Derek: We are listening to Natural Beauty.
Sonia: What were we listening to earlier?
Elian: Jawbreaker, Supercrush.
Derek: Dogbreth, we love Dogbreth.
Sonia: I will find a new favorite band that has been around for a long time a few times a year, but what has been carrying me the last couple of years are my friend's bands; that has really been it.
Caleb: We stopped at Denny's on the way here, and our server was roasting us for being obviously from Portland. We realized we were all wearing t-shirts from our friend’s bands.
This article has been edited and condensed.
