Crystal Visions

2022 | Rock

— track 6: “Crystal Eyes”

Kenton James: I remember in the early 90s, I didn't really listen to music as a kid, just whatever my family listened to. My older brother, Kenneth Jr. used to record onto tape from the radio, from Kool 92 KKLS out of Rapid City. I think it was his mixtape from the summer of '96 or '97, I heard "Cathy's Clown," [by the Everly Brothers] and if you can imagine hearing that on AM radio back then, it was so beautiful and haunting. I could not stop listening to it. I swear we listened to that song every night that summer. Profound impact on me. And of course back then, if you can't afford a tape or a CD of the band, there's no Spotify so we had to listen to the radio and soon as the song came on, like, "Ooo! It's the Everly Brothers!" Hit play and record [on the cassette player], and get a little of the DJ in the beginning and the end. I love the harmonies. I don't think there's any band or duo that can match Everly Brothers. If anyone wants to argue me, they can follow us on Isanti and hit me up in the DMs. I'll argue you. Throw your best at me. Come at me. John and Paul. Beach Boys. So yeah, harmonies are a big part of Isanti. Next album we'll utilize Cain more, have him sing more songs so that I can do harmonies with him. At some point we'll hit Jacob [laughs].

Jacob Vande Vegte: I just like being behind the drums. No microphones please.

Kenton James: But at our shows you'll see him singing.

Cain Rotert: He's got it in his heart.

Kenton James: I like to push [Cain and Jacob] to their boundaries and they're always successful. I'm really proud of them. Sometimes I feel like the cool uncle. Watching them progress as musicians has been amazing.

Cain Rotert: Kent is a terrible influence. I didn't really give a shit about gear until I joined Isanti, and now I'm on Sweetwater all the time. I'm like, "Ooo, look at that. That is vintage. That's so old. Oh man." I'm turning into a fucking dork.

Kenton James: A cool dork! With reverb.

Jacob Vande Vegte: I'm not a gearhead, really. Kent's got a really nice drum set that he lets me use, so that's always good.

Cain Rotert: I'm using all of Kent's gear. None of my own gear [laughs].

Kenton James: It's just part of the package if you join the band: I like Gretsch guitars, Fender Strats, Höfner basses, Fender amps, Ludwig drums. We have to thank my brother Keldon too, he lets us use his Vox AC30 [amplifier]. But yeah, I could probably come off gear-snobby but I'm not. I'm very humble [laughs].

//\\//\\//

Jacob Vande Vegte: I've been playing drums for a long time, since I was 12 or 13, I'm 25 now. I started playing with a bunch of middle school friends just doing covers of Misfits songs and that kind of thing. Came up playing punk rock and a lot of Nirvana. I grew up in Sioux Falls, started playing in a band called Androgynous Squash at Total Drag. That's where I kind of got connected with the scene. That's where I met Cain and Kent. Total Drag just kind of brought things together.

Cain Rotert: I grew up in Salem. I didn't start playing guitar seriously until a few years ago. I started playing drums. In fifth grade, I went out for middle school band, wanted to hit the fucking snare drum. Then I went up to marching band in high school, and played trap set in jazz band. And then I switched to bass guitar in jazz band in high school, but I never got good at it, but nobody else even knew how to hold it, so I was a shoo-in. And I couldn't read sheet music, so I'd have to tab it out. And then I got into a few bands in Sioux Falls. I was in Motel for Astronauts and Carl Limo. Both bands lasted like, less than a year. Then I pretty much just had to start playing guitar to have a band. Me and Jacob started a band called Thought Patrol, so that's when I made the move to guitar.

Jacob Vande Vegte: His wife plays bass guitar. She's fucking awesome.

Cain Rotert: Yeah, Tiana plays bass in Thought Patrol.

[Thought Patrol’s debut self-titled album was released on June 2, 2023]

Kenton James: Well, I'm a lot older than these boys. I started guitar when I was 12. Then around 2001 I got really serious about guitar, joined jazz band in high school, learned a bunch of cool jazz chords that I still utilize today. And then my brother and I started our first band in 2004, that was called The Lilacs. We went until about 2010 and then broke up. Then I started Sons of Sans Arc in 2011 with my wife on drums, and my brother played bass. We did that until about 2019. That band, we did some tours, we toured Italy, which was great. And then my wife had to quit because she was in college getting her master's degree, and my brother had to take a little break. I think 2020 was when [Isanti] started, I was recording in my basement, I released three albums. After the third album, I met Cain, slid into his DMs, and asked him to join the Isanti. And then Jacob was kind of hanging around outside of the DM. One thing led to another, sparks flew, Isanti grew. This is really a brotherhood of sorts. I have not been doing my other band, Sons of Sans Arc, I've fully committed to this group right now. They still have Thought Patrol going on, they're an amazing band. So it's cool that we have — what did we call it, band incest?

Cain Rotert: Bandcest. [laughs]

//\\//\\//

Kenton James: This is new for me, to work with other people on an album. I had to give up a lot of creative rights and trust these boys to pull it off, and they did wonderful. The first three albums: Isanti I, Isanti II, and Songs from Plum Tree Lane, that's all me alone doing everything. Actually my wife does drums on "Intensified" and "Bliss," and it's definitely her style of drumming. But, this last one [Crystal Visions] was a blast, as a full band effort. The recording experience was great. We recorded it in the basement of my house in Flandreau. We call it Shitty Abbey Road. It's a little, small space. When I think of it, I think of Jacob covered by blankets, and bugs, and spider webs, in our little tight space. [laughs]

One of my favorite songs on [Crystal Visions] is "Crystal Eyes." I actually wasn't going to put it on the album, but Cain's like, "Are we doing 'Crystal Eyes'?" He would ask here and there. And so I was like, "Yeah, you know what, let's just do it." And we did it in a few takes and then Cain came up with an amazing vocal harmony that's reminiscent of how the Everly Brothers did their harmonies and it just changed the dynamics of the song. It's not just me singing the chorus, it's Cain doing three or four different harmonies. It was awesome. Gave me shivers. And then there's a beautiful mistake in there, too. So the song is like G-sharp minor, B major, E major. And Cain, instead of playing B major he was playing F-sharp minor. So he's doing this descending thing while we're ascending. Works out! I thought he was playing something like a Radiohead-type thing, but it's a beautiful mistake that sounded great.

Cain Rotert: It's just my lack of music theory.

Kenton James: Actually, he was playing it at a practice, his progression, his version of it, and I was like, "What is that song?" He kind of looked at me weird like, "This is your fucking song." [laughs] It's probably my favorite song on the album. And I love Jacob's drumming. His drum fills are really awesome in that. Cain and I were cheering him on during the recording of it, and then he did his drum fills and we were like, "Yes! Bro! That's the one!"

Jacob Vande Vegte: It's how we do things. We hype each other and cheer each other on.

Cain Rotert: You can do it, Cain. You got this guitar lick.

Kenton James: And then Cain plays a [Elctro-Harmonix] Mel9 pedal, very orchestral sounds, because we can't afford orchestration.

Cain Rotert: Now everybody knows the secret [laughs].

Kenton James: Yeah, so Cain's our little pedal boy. I don't use a lot live, just maybe a little grit overdrive, a little reverb from the amp. It's nice for once that I can just strum and sing. With Sons of Sans Arc, I had to man everything, so this is like, I can breathe and just have fun on stage.

//\\//\\//

Kenton James: I never know what to say about my lyricism. I'll take stories from a book, I’ll write about nature a lot: moon, stars, sun. And of course love, I've been married for almost 15 years now so that's a hot topic in the band. If it wasn't for my wife, none of this would have been possible. She's the one that pushed me and pushed me. I would never have played in Sioux Falls without her, I would have just gave up, but that's how I met these guys. It's our connection through Total Drag Records.

Cain Rotert: When I first got in the music scene, Total Drag was the music scene. That's where all the shows were. That's where I met my wife. That's where I met, like, every friend that I have. I wouldn't know anybody in Sioux Falls without Total Drag.

Jacob Vande Vegte: Yeah, that's when I started to get into music was when Told Drag came on the scene. 2014, that's when they opened up.

Kenton James: My band, Sons of Sans Arc, was supposed to be one of the first bands to play there, but I caught a horrendous cold and so we couldn't do it. But it was Friends of Cesar Romero and I can't remember the other bands, but it's one of my biggest regrets. I wish I just did it anyways, even with a sore throat. There's nothing like pulling up to Total Drag and seeing Dan and Liz [Nissen], walking in, setting up, they'll take care of you. Whatever you need, they'll do it for you. The hospitality there for local bands is like none other. Pretty much it's our home base. So, big shout-out to Dan and Liz for the Sioux Falls community, because we probably wouldn't be a band without Total Drag.

Jacob Vande Vegte: The Sioux Falls music scene would be set super far back without them.

Cain Rotert: I would have way more money though, because I wouldn't spend it all on fucking records all the time. So curse Dan for that, but I guess it's a wash.