Purveyors of: BBQ, axe-throwing and dissonance.
File next to: TV Freaks, Waylon Thornton and the Heavy Hands, Family Curse
Playing: Saturday, April 19 at Smiling Buddha (961 College St.) for WL #595
Connoisseurs of Porn are a Toronto-based, three-piece DIY indie/garage/punk/rock band. The Mississauga-raised trio of Grant Spooner, Greg Keefe and Chris Thomas describe themselves as “three pale white men, who play loud, pounding, fuzzy music.” Sam Kadosh kept bugging them to answer his stupid questions. This is what they had to say.
It seems like you guys go back a long way, which came first friendship or music?
Greg: Grant and I were a year apart in high school, but we did not really overlap. He struck me as being a chubby little ball of hate, and he, true to my assumption, didn’t have any particularly nice thoughts in regards to me. A mutual friend invited me to come play with the band he was in with Grant at the the time. Friendship and our musical relationship grew from that. Chris met Grant a couple years later and sweet talked his way into the band (and hearts).
Chris: I sort of forced my way into both. Grant had started working in the dish pit (where I still work) and I had heard of his band before. So I basically begged him to let me try out. I had never met Greg prior to the audition. They let me in and then it took like 3 years before we could even write a decent song. I think that was my fault.
Grant: Yeah, after I met that red-headed lanky fuck I realized he was the only other kid into weird music. We went from there.
What’s the best kind of porn?
Chris: I prefer amateur porn, because they aren’t usually starring guys with 12-inch dongs and women that would never give me the time of day.
Greg: Over-the-top home-video sort of stuff that years of sexual boredom builds into — shaking cameras, middle-age bodies, plastic sheets, used-up-everything.
Grant:Beyond it being free, it all depends how thirsty I am.
Connoisseurs of Porn abbreviated spells COP —how do you feel about Toronto’s police force?
Chris: The COP thing is a total coincidence. Cops have had to deal with me many times throughout my idiot teenage years, I do give them credit for not totally beating the shit out of me. Plus the cops I serve at work generally tip me fairly, so I’m down. I don’t do (many) illegal things anyways.
Greg: Fuck tickets.
Grant: I have no problem with them at all. I stay out of their way, they stay out of mine.
Where did you guys grow up and do you feel like it influences your sound, musically or philosophically?
Chris: We all grew up in Mississauga within a stone’s throw from each other. There isn’t really any music scene in Mississauga, so I think we all had to be influenced by things outside of our city.
Greg: Mississauga. I think at least in part my attraction to the sort of thing we’re doing was (and probably still is) a reaction to being surrounded by a bunch of stuff that really doesn’t resonate with me — which pretty much encapsulates Mississauga. That being said, I think a whole lot of other life-happening-sort-of-stuff has shaped my attitude towards music (and life) more than anything else.
Grant: I grew up in Mississauga. A lot of paved open space and nothing particularly exciting. Spent a lot of time with a pair of headphones and a few decades worth of music.
Are you guys trying to become a big deal or is this still about pissing off your parents?
Chris: I would love to become a “big deal,” that would be great. Realistically though, I don’t know if our music is currently what anything that could be considered mainstream is looking for. My dream isn’t to fill stadiums, I would just like to not have to have a day job.
Greg: It’s more about feeling like a person than anything else. Despite us being pretty good at pissing people off, my Mom is into it.
Grant: My parents have always been behind what we’ve been doing. I think from the very beginning, it was just about making music we felt was ours. As for aspirations for world domination, it would be nice, but unnecessary.
Do you feel like your band would be better if you were American?
Chris: I don’t think being American would change anything for us. That whole “Internet” thing really closes the gap of people being able to hear your stuff. We’re just as likely to become viral or not in Canada.
Greg: If I lived in the South, I would do nothing but eat BBQ. There would be no band.
Grant: I have no idea.