I knew I’d snagged up an interesting interview when monstrously metal trio, The 2416 switched up our meeting location from Burger King to Taco Bell.
They were in the mood for a mid-morning burrito appetizer before lead guitarist Trenton Tarpits was supposed to make them a hearty breakfast back at the pad. I didn’t question their logic. Besides, I’m not one to deny Taco Bell no matter the physical consequences or the time of day.
They refused to give me their real names, but told me I could use their nicknames, which is more fun anyway.
So here you have it, Tarpits on lead guitar, St. Andrew on bass (actually married to Tarpits’ sister, apparently it’s “sickeningly cute”) and Terry Davis Jr. on drums.
Currently on one of Jacksonville’s local labels, Infinitesimal Records, The 2416 joined as one of the label’s first bands.
“We’ve been friends with Jimmy, who’s one of the founders of the label, for a while,” Tarpits said. “We basically started playing with each other’s bands, and we’d record every three months, so we just decided to make a label, naturally.”
Although Tarpits is a Jacksonville Beach native, St. Andrew originally hails from Georgia and Davis comes from Indiana. While the explanation of how they all ended up in Jacksonville remains ambiguous, it’s clear that they have formed a tenacious bond.
“Well of course we all became friends, and then we just started bringing up when we were ever going to start that meal band we’d always talked about,” St. Andrew said. “And then it finally came into fruition.”
All three members live under the same roof in Jacksonville Beach and very much enjoy the same past-times, they said.
“Most of our time is spent making music, recording music, performing music, making art, surfing and skating … and of course watching ‘50s horror flicks and old school kung fu,” Tarpits said.
While they don’t exactly have a lot of bona fide musical influences, [elaborate] they did say they channel most of their musical inspiration through films and art by those such as Salvador Dali.
A creepy 1977 film called “Eraserhead” provoked their name, The 2416, [this needs attribution, please]. The apartment number of one of the main characters, Mary, is 2416, and thus, the band formed its name.
They perform around town often, rocking live shows for the folks of Jacksonville at various venues.
They’ve released two albums to date, “The Great Indoors” and “Bolt Cutter.”
The sound on “The Great Indoors” is pleasantly fuzzy and takes hold of your mind, immersing it in a drunken dream despite your state of sobriety. They saturate each track with surf rock breakdowns and standard 4/4 punk rock beats, leading to a dark psycho-billy nature. Basically it’s like if Tiger Army and the Misfits had a baby and then that baby had sex with Leftover Crack, and then they produced a love child.
Their second album, “Bolt Cutter” signifies a cleaner, more fully-formed transformation, using jazz-drenched drums and sludgy blues guitar riffs to elicit a foot-stomping, fist-pumping reaction from the audience.
Yes, their emphatic beats and unavoidable clamor isn’t exactly my cup of tea (I’m sorry, but I get headaches too easily), it was nice to be able to clearly understand the lyrics, which consist mostly of existentialist dialogue and horror film verbiage. And although talk of politics, religion and social ills are quite synonymous with their genre, they always steer clear from the norm.
“We used to consider ourselves to be a dude rock band, but now it seems like a bunch of indie kids are digging us because they just like to hear different stuff, and that’s cool too,” Tarpits said.
Relatively high in performance energy, they could all agree that they take pride in leading unconventional show experiences and encouraging audience participation.
“At our older shows, we used to implement this game where during the pauses between each track, the audience would have to remove an article of clothing,” St. Andrew said. “Basically we ended up with a bar full of naked people. It was great.”
The trio plans to tour New Zealand next summer through an opportunity through their label, which they often refer to as “the family.”
As for now, they work conventional jobs. The trio works at a natural foods store, Tarpits serves as a pastry chef and the other two wash dishes.
“We seriously want to be making music until the day we stop breathing. We take time with everything, and now that the Jacksonville scene has become quite a bit more solid lately, well, that gives us enough reason to stay and work with it,” St. Andrew said.
Anyone can find the 2416 at myspace.com/the2416. The crew plans to drop a few new tracks on Infinitesimal’s upcoming compilation album, with details like release date to come presently.
When asked what they would like the students at UNF to know about their group, Tarpits said, “Come to the shows! We play so frequently, this is all we care about. I mean, we’re all artists, and this is our art.”
