Garage T. Rashington III

Interview With Garage T. Rashington III

SBS:  Welcome to our pages!  Whether you’ve been here with us in some way before, or you’re brand-new to the site, it’s probably best to get an introduction from you so that we get everyone on the same page to start.  Tell us a little bit about the history of your music, and what’s happening with it lately!?!

GTR3:  Let’s let it all hang out, shall we?  Here are the basic facts, an opening track.  The name’s Garage T. Rashington III, a.k.a. GTR3, a.k.a. the Triple Trash Mechanic.  Originally from nowhere, I’m currently residing in Kentucky which is just as lonely.  I suppose I’ll head back to nowhere soon, but for now it’s nice to see trees and things.  As a connoisseur of the fine arts, oddly enough, I am neither fine nor an artist.  I simply spew out sounds and record them.  There’s no need to label these sounds “music,” and there’s certainly no need to label me an “artist.”  It just is what it is and I am what I am.  In 2023 and 2024, I released six albums of what I call “slop.”  To slop an album together means to write, record, mix, and release it quickly without second guessing yourself along the way.  Is this a good idea?  Probably not, but here’s the thing: Everyone always says, “quality over quantity.”  Since I tend to go against the grain, so to speak, I attempted, in ‘23 and ‘24, to place quantity way ahead of quality.  Why?  Because statistically, if there’s enough quantity, there will be quality within.  Even a monkey could create quality given enough time.  Anyway, that experiment is over.  I’m moving on and slowing down.  The next batch of albums will be acoustic-based which is where my strengths lie, although it pains me to weigh strengths above weaknesses.  I’d like to work with weaknesses instead of play on strengths any day of the week, but alas, you gotta give the people want they want.  That’s what legends supposedly do.

SBS:  Let’s talk about the before and after of where you’re currently at.  What’s something about the music that you’re making now that you don’t think you could have done five years ago, and what’s something you think you’ll be able to do with your music five years from now that you can’t do today?  How have you grown as an artist/band, and what steps do you take to continue your artistic evolution?

GTR3:  Fun fact: I am 56242-and-a-half years old.  Therefore, five years ago seems like yesterday to me.  It’s all relative.  So to even the playing field with this question, I am going to pretend you asked about 500 years ago and five hundred years from now.  Back in 1525, life as a creator was quite different.  I worked as a traveling minstrel creating sounds, juggling swords, and reciting poetry in various languages.  Traveling from slum to slum all over the galaxy, I barely made ends meet and it wasn’t my true calling.  Now that technology has developed and since I’ve found a portal to nowhere, I can focus on my true passion of sound creation gladly leaving behind the dangers of sword tricks and the tediousness of mastering different languages.  500 years from now, I plan to continue my current endeavors but I’d like to do so in a neighboring universe.

SBS:  If you were to assess the overall health of the independent music scene right now, what would you say?  What are the positives and the negatives about the current state of independent music, and what do you feel like artists & bands can do to contribute to the community & help it grow beyond the music being made?  If you’re not actively looking to listen to the music of other independent artists/bands, is it really all that fair to expect anyone would listen to yours?  How do you help the scene around you grow?

GTR3:  Every time I see a new review up at SBS, I not only read it, I also check out some of the tunes being discussed.  Then, in an astonishing move of miraculous courage and time-consuming manipulation, I click the “like” button.  Does anyone other than Jer@SBS even notice this?  It’s a small way to show support.  Maybe if others hopped on and did the same, the SBS community could flourish.  What can I say?  I’m a dreamer.  Do better, y’all.

SBS:  What do you consider to be the biggest accomplishment or achievement you’ve had with your music to-date?  How do you personally measure your own success – is that something that even can be measured?  Is it awards, accolades, chart position…or is your definition of success based on something entirely different?  Should success, however you define it, be something that artists are continually focused on – or is success something that naturally occurs in the course of doing what you love to do?

GTR3:  Success is subjective, but since I have been creating sounds for 56240-and-a-half years (I started on my second birthday), I’d like to think that the sheer longevity of it all makes me successful.  Has anyone else been rocking that long?  I think not.

SBS:  When you’re working on something brand-new, and something about it just doesn’t feel like it’s coming together the way that you think it should, how do you know when it’s time to give up on it, or how do you know that it’s time to dig in even harder and find a way to make it work?  Are there distinct red flags you can hear when something’s not working?  What are the signs you look for that tell you to stop forcing the material?  What would actually encourage you to keep going with the process instead?

GTR3:  Ideas are wonderful.  Every single one of them.  Good ones, bad ones, whatever.  They are literally magic.  Sure, the band Phish possesses the ability to create ideas, but have you ever seen an actual fish present one?  Or a bear?  Or a termite?  We are the only earthly beings capable of such brain power.  As a fan of the human mind, I will gladly support any and all ideas as long as they aren’t hurtful to others in some way.  For this reason, I never let an idea die.  Sometimes they come out perfect.  Sometimes they need tweaking.  Sometimes they end up completely different in the end, but I cherish every last one of ‘em.

SBS:  One of the points of general consensus in the art of making music, is that we all get our sound from somewhere…we hear what we like, then more often than not, we take tiny pieces of what we love to find our own voice & approach to go on and make music in our own way.  Essentially, what I’m saying is that it’s absolutely natural to be inspired by other artists/bands, and almost every artist/band ends up having that inspiration show up in their own work in some way, shape, or form.  What the real key is though, is retaining your own organic perspective – you still wanna be original too, right?  So how do you go about doing that?  Are there artists or bands that you know have been an influence on your style & sound?  How were you able to incorporate that influence without becoming too noticeably derivative and still be yourself?  Should we embrace and celebrate our influences more than we do?  It’s almost like we try not to admit influences exist in the pursuit of being original, but it’s like, bruh…if it’s there, we can hear it.  We all borrow something from those that came before us to some extent, don’t we?

GTR3:  We are much more influenced than we like to admit.  Sure, our listening preferences influence us, but consider this: we use the same 12 tones over and over again.  We use and reuse the same old chords and forms and phrasings and so on.  Even when I am in my most experimental sound creation mode, I’m still arranging those 12 notes in various orders.  I think it’s really cool that the big 12 have served us so well for so long.  There’s more to be done with them, and I’ve pretty much dedicated my entire artistic life to manipulating them.

SBS:  Has there ever been a time where you wrote something inside one of your songs…maybe it’s a lyrical line, or maybe it’s a riff of some kind…something that you did, where you surprised yourself?  I like to think we all have a moment or two where we can stand back and be amazed by something we created, and appreciate the fact that maybe, just maybe, we exceeded our own expectations of what we thought we could accomplish – you know what I mean?  Get as specific as you can so the fans out there know what they should be paying attention to when they hear it – what’s your favorite thing that you’ve written on the inside of one of your songs, and why does this particular piece resonate so much to you?

GTR3:  “Lingering Lunch” from my first album is arguably the weirdest song I’ve done to date and it is still one of my favorites just because of the simple fact that it is so chaotic.  I was unsure if my vision would work out, but it did.  Well, it did for me.  I’d imagine most folks would find it grating, but if you listen closely, you’ll notice a pretty intricate playfulness between the vocals and acoustic.  I’m surprised by how this off-the-wall textural idea has stayed with me.  I’d like to do more of this kind of thing in the future.

SBS:  I’ve been having a lot of great debates lately about whether or not everybody that’s making music has the right to be heard…and you’d probably be surprised by how different people seem to feel about this issue.  I know where I stand on it, and I think you can all probably get an idea of what my position would be from this free interview we’re doing here & the way we run things at sleepingbagstudios…but regardless, I’m putting this question out there to you, because I’m interested in YOUR perspective.  Just because you’ve made a song, does that mean people should listen?  If your answer is yes, do your best to explain why you feel that way & why we should make a sincere effort to listen to the music of others.  If your answer is no, explain why you feel that way, but also explain why people should still be listening to your music if that’s the case – what would make your music the exception, and not follow the rule?  Is there any value to an idea that’s not finished, or a song in its demo stages, or maybe something that’s not recorded in a top-shelf studio or with good equipment – somebody still took the time to make that song to the best of their ability with the means they had to create it – should that be listened to, or not?

GTR3:  These days, songs have been cheapened.  There are endless options and they are more or less free.  I hate to sound like an old and cynical geezer, but back when one had to actively seek out a song and pay real money for it, one would tend to appreciate it more.  It’s amazing to me that so many people spend so much time, effort, and money on making music, yet often times, the audience is virtually no one.  However, I’m not bitter about it.  Those songs still matter.  The effort is worth it because self-expression is one of the best tools out there to learn and grow.  For me, the audience can either be five people or 5000000 people.  I don’t really care.  All that matters is that I have found a self-expressive outlet that keeps me sane.

SBS:  There are ups and downs in the dynamics of almost every album we listen to, with very few exceptions.  Even those exceptions, probably still come down to more of a personal preference about what we enjoy about music and how we personally hear it, rather than anything being completely and totally “perfect” – you know what I mean?  Does an album actually need to have some kind of up/down dynamics in terms of what’s appealing to the masses in order for the best of the best songs in a lineup to be fully appreciated?  Wouldn’t every artist & band avoid the ‘down’ side (less accessible/less popular for example) if they could?  Does the ‘down’ side represent something else perhaps, like the story of an album or journey of an artist?  Is the ‘up’ side of a record as potent or noticeable if it doesn’t have a ‘down’ side to go with it?  Would a completely balanced album somehow be boring if it didn’t have the ups/downs that most have?  Do we HAVE to like every single song on a record for it to be considered complete?  Are the dynamics of an album something anyone can really steer in the direction they want to, or are all artists & bands simply going with the strongest material they have created at the time?

GTR3:  You’ve got to take the good with the bad and my good may not be your good and my bad might not be your bad and a bad may be good if I’m in the right state of mind for it and the good might be bad if I listen at the wrong time and good can have bad in it and bad may have a part here and there that is good and something may be good but only in a certain situation and the bad may grow in time to be considered good and…and…I think I’ve made my point!

SBS:  I wanna send out a shout-out to YOU from me personally – I appreciate everyone that has taken the time to talk tunes with me throughout the years, and I appreciate the time YOU have taken with this interview too.  Because this one’s a little different in the sense that it’s been sent out to multiple people and is a little more generic in that regard, I have no doubt whatsoever that we probably didn’t get to talk to you about something you wanted to talk about – so let’s fix that!  This final space is what we call the SBS Open Floor – a spot where you can say anything else you want to say to the people out there.  It can be anything at all…your main websites…something else you want them to know about you and/or your music…your favorite bands in the scene right now…the secret 11 herbs and spices to the Colonel’s secret recipe – you get the idea, and it’s probably best you choose something that suits you rather than take any of my suggestions, but feel free to take the SBS Open Floor for a ride.  Whatever it is you want the people to know, now is the prime time for you to tell’em!  Thanks again for everything – keep in touch!

GTR3:  Thank you.  That’s it.  That’s all that’s left for me to say.  But I’m not just saying it in passing.  I sincerely mean it.  You are an inspiration, a musical encyclopedia, a professional, and a true friend.

Find music by Garage T. Rashington III at Deezer:  https://www.deezer.com/us/artist/196294377

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