This summer, Los Angeles punk-leaning four-piece Reckling (led by Kelsey Reckling) is back with a brand new EP entitled Human Nature. Today, the band shares the EP’s latest single, “Verbalize,” a follow-up to their last track, “In My Hair.”
Speaking on “Spitter” and their new EP, Kelsey reveals
“Each song on the EP encompasses a different feeling that I think everyone can relate to or identify with… it’s human nature.
‘Spitter’ is literally about a girl spitting on me because she didn’t like me, but more generally, it’s about persevering through the difficult things in life. The song sorts through my own angry feelings that were brought on by somebody else’s misdirected emotions.
The underlying themes in this EP move through feelings of indecision, guilt, and regret…but writing and playing the songs are a way of finding resolution, forgiveness, and surrender.”
What’s your story as an artist?
I really wanted an electric guitar when I was 12 and my parents got me an acoustic guitar, so I settled for that at first to learn. I took a lesson with this guy who taught me a G chord and an E chord and then he tried to teach me how to play Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer…when I really just wanted to learn Nirvana songs and stuff like that. So that ended and I taught myself the rest of the chords and power chords and bar chords, and I started learning songs by ear. I wrote some songs as a teenager, wrote a lot more at 16, 17, 18. I’d play music with other people and play other people’s songs, but I only showed a few people any of my own music. I lived in a lot of music-oriented towns…Nashville when I was 18, Austin when I was 19-20, and then I moved to LA in 2013 when I was 21. Our first release came out in 2018 when I finally had the guts to put it out there! We didn’t even start playing the songs live until Fall 2019, and once we started, I kinda never looked back. We were on a roll, and then the pandemic happened. So, here we are in 2022 finally releasing our follow-up EP to that 2018 release!
Can you recall the time you decided you wanted to be an artist during your teenage years?
I think when I first found Nirvana and Hole at age 12, it kind of sealed the deal for me. I’ve always used art, music, writing as an outlet since I was a kid, but finding bands or artists whose music, sound, style, lyrics, etc. you connect to…that changes the game. From 12, I got suuuper into music, mostly grunge and punk, but I also got into blues and hip-hop, and kinda anything that had a sound that resonated with me really.
What inspired this last release?
Sound-wise…our first release I wanted to be more true to how I had been recording music my whole life: in my bedroom, lo-fi…but then I always knew for our second release I wanted it to sound more like what I had always imagined it in my head: loud, cutting, big. And I think we succeeded with that. I also wanted it to reflect more on how we sound live. The songs themselves though are always kind of inspired by the difficult situations I’ve been in throughout my life.
What are some things you like to do to recharge your batteries?
Walking always clears my head and resets me. Sometimes I’ll just walk straight down the road and never make any turns until it feels right to turn back and head back the other way. A sort of walking meditation.
Any funny anecdotes from the time you were recording or writing this?
I wish! All of it kind of happened during serious parts of life…writing the songs were all from serious situations that I was trying to navigate, and then we recorded it in the middle of the pandemic where everything felt…pointless or upside down, or no light at the end of the tunnel. But it was fun to record. We did it all in a day at our friend’s studio, and I think it just felt good to be doing something like that during a time where there was no live music or anything.
What’s your favorite lyrics you ever come up with?
That’s a tough one… I think my favorite lyrics as a whole are from “24 Hours” or “In My Hair”. It’s too hard to pick out an individual lyric!
What’s a record that shaped your creativity?
Wild Gift by X ….one of my favorite records of all time. From the title to the album artwork and photography, the lyrics, the vocal melodies, and the music. All-around one of the best.
Who is an artist or band you look up to today?
I’m inspired a lot by my friends’ bands, so I’d say I look up to my friends in a band called Slaughterhouse. They’re from the south bay of LA, and they’re one of the coolest bands in the scene right now. It’s honestly just so refreshing to see a band get up there, do their shit, do it well, and then they’re super nice and down to earth as people. In a world full of assholes, it’s nice to be around people who are genuinely stoked to be there. And they have their own sound and style…I don’t know any other band that sounds like them. They just released their first record called “Fun Factory” and I highly suggest checking it out!
What excites you the most about what you do ?
When people come up to me and say they’ve listened to my music, and that it helped them through something, or that it’s attached to a memory of theirs. It might seem simple, but I think that excites me the most because it always surprises me when people tell me things like that because I release music purely as an outlet and kind of forget that other people will hear it, listen to it, and possibly connect with it,
What is your view on genres and music styles since you mix a lot of them in your music?
Oh man, I’m sooooo bad at it. People always ask me “What does your music sound like?” and I can’t get further then “uhhhh….I don’t know….rock?” Even if people ask me what other bands sound like, I can go super broad, but it’s hard for me to like really narrow in. While I’m inspired so much by bands like X or The Gun Club, I don’t think we sound at all like those bands. I don’t know what we sound like! It’s loud, it’s fast, there’s some screaming, but we also have mid-tempo songs, and I write vocal melodies…so it’s definitely a mix of punk-influenced and something else… you tell me!
How would you describe your act in one word?
Honest
