Drummer Kaleb Kirby, the son of two musicians, has memories of going to concerts as a child. He’d fall asleep under tables, or on bandstands next to amps. It was just a part of life. He learned music and learned how to adapt to a musician’s lifestyle.
“My mom never really got babysitters,” he says. “As far back as I can remember, I was sitting under the speakers at BB’s. On occasional tours I’ve taken, I can just be zoned out; I have these rituals of how to kill time. It’s like a Buddhist meditation. I grew up in those situations of being alone in bars, smoky atmospheres, and parties. That’s home base.”
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After years of playing in other people’s projects, Kirby is now heading up his own group, Animal Children. It includes Adam Maness on keyboards, Mason Baron on guitar, Bob Deboo on bass, Kristian Baarsvik on alto sax, and Kyle Allen on trumpet. Additional players rotate in for different gigs. With all of the group’s members in demand, it’s challenging for them to find time, but Kirby’s able to make it work.
Animal Children is his priority, his baby, these days. “We have a schedule, we write together, we spend a lot of time on it,” Kirby says. “This band’s an experiment. I write everything out on sheet music. The musicians are at such a high level that at rehearsal it’s just about taking it to the next level, to see what they can do with it. The structure’s decided—what they’re adding is artistic, musical.”
The end result, he says, doesn’t neatly fall into any genre. “I love a lot of jazz, and it walks that line structurally,” he says. “At the same time, as I was writing the record, I was listening to a lot of St. Vincent, Dirty Projectors, a lot of art rock. When you hear the record, you’ll feel that stuff. This is jazz. I’m not 100 percent sure it’s jazz-jazz. It has a current feel to it. I’m excited about that: People say it’s something they haven’t heard.”
The band’s self-titled debut disc, released in April, was produced at Native Sound by David Beeman. At Native Sound, Kirby traded session work for the opportunity to score studio time, and he’s pleased with the results. “We did a lot of cool things recording live in a big isolation room,” Kirby says. “The sound of our recording is like that, a borderline-live show sound, very clean and warm. The way we played is like a live show. That’s the only way we’ve ever played. To separate tracks wouldn’t have worked improvisationally—the music is almost reaction-based, and you need to hear what people are doing in that moment.”
Kirby feels that the band has evolved dramatically. “When it started, I barely wrote anything; it was just a vehicle to make something happen. Now, it feels like every show is a progression,” he says. “The band already knows what the vibe is, which is exciting for me. Honestly, we’ve played some cool festivals and things, but a lot of times it’s about playing to the five or six people at Foam, where the band overpopulates the audience. Then, the cards are off the table. It feels amazing. It’s this incredible vibe, and there are no cares in the world.”
For more information, visit facebook.com/AnimalChildren; to hear some tracks, go to soundcloud.com/animalchildren.
