The Districts

After having just kicked off the first leg of their tour in Paris, The Districts, a bluesy-rock Philly-based outfit, will be playing all over the US for the next few months with Pine Barons in support of the band’s new record, A Flourish and a Spoil.

The Districts’ new sound yields a certain maturity, despite the fact that the members are all relatively young. I wouldn’t go so far as to call this quality wisdom though. Think lazy vocals tinged with angst and a fuzzy mix between The Black Keys and Arctic Monkeys. The only thing like a bio on their website reads: “We write honest music and are passionate about doing so,” but doesn’t every musician say that at some point? And regardless of the clichés about passion and honesty, it’s hard to deny that these guys are wise beyond their years (or at least, they’ve got us fooled into thinking so), so we reached out to them for a little clarity.

On being a part of Vincent Moon’s notorious La Blogothèque videos…

It was amazing! We watch their videos all the time so it was a huge honor to do it!

On musical and non-musical influences…

I don’t think we have one single songwriter or band that influenced the sound the most, but we all have a wide range of influences from Tom Waits to Dr. Dog. Things that tend to influence you end up doing so without you knowing it. [For us] there were books and authors like Cormac McCarthy, Thom Jones, and Chuck Palahniuk—they kind of seep in subconsciously.

On the soon-to-be-released LP…

[The record] was written over a year’s time, so I wouldn’t say there was one definite thing that was on our minds. We were pretty much just worrying if we’d get the whole thing done in time, since we had only nine days with producer John Congleton (who has recorded the likes of St. Vincent, Angel Olsen, and Modest Mouse, to name a few). John let us know that he usually works quickly so it was easy to get into the swing of things.

On their favorite city they’ve played in so far…

Actually, we just played at the 100 Club in London. It was really awesome because it was sold out and a bunch of people were getting rowdy, singing along, and jumping on stage. Although Berlin and Oslo are very beautiful cities…

On crazy and strange things happening at their shows…

When we first opened for Dr. Dog at The Electric Factory, apparently there was a guy who was on ecstasy or something and got naked during our set … he got kicked out after.

THE DISTRICTS W/ PINE BARONS. THU 2.12. THE SINCLAIR, 52 CHURCH ST., CAMBRIDGE. 617.547.5200. 8PM/18+/$13. SINCLAIRCAMBRIDGE.COM. FACEBOOK.COM/THEDISTRICTSBAND