Kitchen Conversations: A Moment With Indie-Rock Band On the Rise, Ultra Q

If this is the first time you’re hearing about Ultra Q, you, my friend, have been missing out. Ultra Q is a four-piece indie-rock band from Oakland, CA consisting of vocalist Jakob Danger Armstrong, bassist Kevin Judd, drummer Chris Malasplina, and guitarist Enzo Malasplina. The four have been friends and bandmates since grade gradeschool and their chemistry can be felt throughout all of their music - all of their individual personalities meshing perfectly to create something even more exciting. So far, they have released two highly-innovative EPs, We’re Starting To Get Along and In a Cave In a Video Game, each a unique, exciting spin on the sounds of indie-alt legends like The Strokes, Interpol, The Cure, and more. Their recent singles teasing their upcoming EP Get Yourself A Friend coming November 19th have all the power and emotion you could ever want from a rock record.

On November 10th, Ultra Q rocked the crowd at Los Angeles’s El Cid into a frenzy with their intensely passionate, fast-paced, and energetic rock music. It was the band’s first live performance since the start of the pandemic back in March of 2020. Adorned in nearly all black with hair spiked and teased up to the heavens, Ultra Q transported audiences back to the good old days of Goth-Rock and Robert Smith. Audiences raged and moshed all night long to the sounds of Ultra Q’s gut-punching drum fills, searingly hot vocals, and jaggedly piercing guitar riffs.

Just moments before the group took the stage by storm, he had a chance to sit down with them and chat about everything from the band’s upcoming EP “Get Yourself A Friend,” their musical inspirations, as well as their Covid hobbies and favorite foods.

[UNPUBLISHED:] So the first thing on our minds is your upcoming EP. What was the inspiration behind this new EP both thematically and musically?

[JAKOB:] Yeah, I mean I would say what we were listening to the most around that time - a lot of the songs were written like two years ago like most of them actually around then. I think a lot of it at the time it was, you know, like Block Party and Future Heads and Ripple and that first Interpol record for sure. But yeah, just kind of like veering into like angular guitar, post-punk thing for that. So that was why we went into the booth to record it, that’s what we were thinking about.

[UNPUBLISHED:] What song are you most excited to share from the EP?

[JAKOB:] Well, I think personally my favorite one at least right now is the one that just came out, “It’s Permanent.” That was like our favorite one I think. Because it was just such a… well when we first made it we were like, is this terrible? Is this garbage? But then over time, we were like oh, this is actually our favorite one, probably. I will say though, I’m mostly really excited for the title track to come out. I love that one too. We also made a really great video for that one.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Yeah! It was super cool. We’d love to know, what was the inspiration behind the music video?

[JAKOB:] We honestly, for “Get Yourself A Friend” had very little to do with that. So the director, his name is Ken, or he goes by Penacky on film.

[KEVIN:] That’s his stage name.

[JAKOB:] Yeah, like a stage name. But he was just like a friend of a friend. Jake (Ultra Q’s manager) just kind of knew his manager or something like that. He was only in the states to do something else like he was only here for a couple of months to do something else. And we were like “Hey, we’re in this band, do you want to make a video?” And he said “Sure.” I went to have lunch with him, we talked about it for like a second, I showed him a couple of video references, and I said “Do whatever you want.” And then he showed up and he had this whole plan

[KEVIN:] It was crazy. It was like a fourteen-hour shoot. And it was the day before he left to go back.

[JAKOB:] Yeah he went back to Japan the next day. Like he didn’t really speak that much English and like his buddy, Jimmy, was there to translate and it was such a fun experience because we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. It turned out to be the coolest thing we’ve ever done.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Would you mind sharing what some of those video references were?

[JAKOB:] Yeah, so, in particular, I knew I really wanted to do the camera swing which is a reference to the “In Between Days” video by The Cure - my favorite band of all time, of course - yeah, so, like in that video they do a really cool camera swing thing. So we put a camcorder on a rope and swung it. We also had one for The 1975’s “Give Yourself A Try.” THat was like one of our favorites - like when that video came out - that was what made me a fan of that band.

[KEVIN:] And that’s just like one of the best songs ever.

[JAKOB:] It’s a great, amazing song. And then he also just had a couple of references, just like some of the stuff usually into like early 2000s late 90s music video aesthetic, so he was kind of going for that. And I think he captured it. It was amazing.

[KEVIN:] It was definitely one of the coolest things we’ve ever done. And we’re really happy with the way the video turned out. We’re really grateful to Penacky for making that with us. Yeah, he spent a lot of time on that. We’re really grateful.

[UNPUBLISHED:] It turned out fantastically. Like your other music videos as well - like your “Handheld” video that was just all you guys just running around Los Angeles.

[JAKOB:] Yeah, I love that one.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Yeah, it definitely all fits together perfectly with that early 2000s and 90’s aesthetic all while bringing goth rock back. So what inspired this aesthetic change? Like you started Ultra Q in early 2019 from Mt. Eddy had a few months of glory, and then nothing - thanks to COVID. So what inspired the change in the first place? How do you think COVID influenced further change with Ultra Q?

[JAKOB:] I think at the time, the reason why Mt. Eddy split was that we are all going off to college and we were all doing different things. Like Chris was going to work.

[KEVIN:] Like, we were in high school.

[JAKOB:] Like, we didn’t think we were going to be a band again. Honestly, we all thought we were gonna do something else and, clearly, that’s not what happened and we wanted to be a band again. But our music tastes had changed so much. So, we thought it was fitting to kind of do different things, all the same members, but our tastes changed so much and, you know, we still love Mt. Eddy stuff but that’s just not who we are anymore.

[KEVIN:] Well, I will say though, it wasn’t an overnight thing. It’s much more that all of Ultra Q has made us getting more and more comfortable. Like the songs, every time we put out something new, we just feel better and better. It doesn’t even matter if it’s trash, but it just feels more and more like us and what we want to make. It’s kind of just all part of one big musical journey for Jakob but also really for the whole group.

[JAKOB:] And going into COVID, like we wanted to play shows so bad. And we wanted to make at the time I was really into hardcore like I was listening to Bad Brains and Minor Threat, so we made the In A Cave EP, and that was just like, that was literally just that we really wanted to make something that was really fast and really exciting. Anything you want to add?

[ENZO:] If COVID hadn’t happened, you wouldn’t have been able to get so good at producing. Like you’ve gotta spend a lot of time to like really, really increase - well, first of all, Jakob can write songs at a superhuman rate. Like just a lot of songs.

[JAKOB:] I’ve got a folder with like 50 demos.

[ENZO:] And, secondly, just by meeting people through COVID like all the internet interaction and like being at home all that time spent just working he really likes, the production has exponentially gotten a lot freaking better.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Do you guys have a songwriting process, like is there anything you guys do particularly?

[JAKOB:] I think most of the time, I start off with a demo, or like a riff, or an idea, and then I send it to everyone. Then they’ll give their notes and opinions or Kevin will record a bass part or something of that sort like Enzo will record a guitar part. And then we’ll kind of build off that. Usually, I’d say, I start with a pretty formed idea for the most part.

[ENZO:] Which is really weird.

[KEVIN:] Jakob will just be like “Here’s a thought” and then it’s just a full song. Like it’s already done.

[ENZO:] It’s like he can picture a whole image almost instantaneously.

[KEVIN:] We tend to fill in the cracks I’d say. For the large part of our songwriting process is it’s Jakob writing the core song, Chirs, Enzo, and I filling it out and making it an “Ultra Q song”

[UNPUBLISHED:] I like how you said that - that’s it’s you guys filling out the cracks to make Jakob’s demos into an Ultra Q song - like you’re not just adding sound but your personality to the music. In that regard, is there a space where you find yourself writing more songs like in what environment do you feel the most creative?

[JAKOB:] Well, I go through like a period of like two weeks where I’ll write like eight or nine songs. And it’s kind of like, what’s the word… it's cyclical. Like I’ll have two weeks where it’s all I’ll think about and I’ll spend all day working on it and I’ll just make a lot of songs. And then it just kind of stops and I hate music for a bit. And then I come back and then I do it again. So, yeah, it’s very cyclical and it’s kind of predictable.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Well, now that we’re here and we’re not at home, finally, what are you most excited about in regards to performing? Like getting back on the road?

[JAKOB:] It doesn’t feel real, honestly. Like it still doesn’t feel like we’re playing a show.

[CHRIS:] I feel like I’m being Punked, like, I’ll just get on the stage and someone will just say “Yeah, this is all for nothing.”

[JAKOB:] Like, I’m definitely in disbelief for sure. It doesn’t feel real. But I’m just excited to play the songs that have been out, like “Some Dice '' for example, have been out for a year, a year and a half and we’ve never played it live before. So I’d say that’s what I’m most excited for at this moment, is to play those ones.

[UNPUBLISHED:] So, also during COVID, although I imagine you spent a majority of your time working on your music, what were some other fun little hobbies that you got into to make the days worth living?

[JAKOB:] I started surfing a lot. For my first job, I was a surf instructor at a surf camp for kids. I hadn’t really surfed in a while so I picked up surfing again and started going a lot.

[KEVIN:] The one thing that I picked up was like a nine to five. Yeah I started working a lot.

[ENZO:] Getting some home improvement skills.

[KEVIN:] Since, like you can’t do that while you’re touring.

[JAKOB:] They all work at the same place.

[KEVIN:] I just quit my job.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Where’d you guys work?

[KEVIN:] We worked in IT. Like an IT outsourcing company. Like fixing computers and stuff, management, IT, asset management, endpoint logistics. And, like, (to Jakob) we started running. For the first six months, we were running every day.

[JAKOB:] Yeah, I started working out a lot, and then I stopped.

[ENZO:] I actually bulked up during the first three months of Covid.

[CHRIS:] Yeah, Enzo was on a kind of a prison diet and workout. I remembered I ordered a doorframe pull-up bar and every day Enzo would be like “uhhhh” in a tank top every time just like “eaaghhh”

[ENZO:] But then I was like “this is gonna be a lot longer than I expected” and I just gave up.

[CHRIS:] I think everybody at the beginning of COVID was like “We’re locked down so I’m gonna get into the best shape of my life.”

[ENZO:] That’s what I told myself. That was the best workout year of my life, that’s for sure.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Is there anything else you like to do in your free-time now that COVID calming down?

[CHRIS:] Snuggling?

[JAKOB:] Surfing, playing baseball, or playing basketball, just trying to be athletic

[ENZO:] Honestly, music is the hobby.

[JAKOB:] Honestly, we’re all just obsessed with the music.

[KEVIN:] The hobby is the dream. Like for this show alone, we probably practiced almost every day for like six weeks. Like this definitely occupies the most brain space for me.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Since we’re kind of in a closet, do you guys have any closet staples you can’t live without?

[JAKOB:] I have a collection of Star Wars T-shirts, a collection of Cure T-shirts, and this one Barhaus T-shirt.

[ENZO:] I have a North Face Puffy.

[CHRIS:] He wears that like every day. And I’ve got a Carhartt jacket that I wear almost every single day that’s in my car.

[KEVIN:] I like my shoes.

[JAKOB:] Oh yeah, Kevin’s a shoe guy.

[ENZO:] How many pairs of shoes do you have, Kevin?

[KEVIN:] I can’t even answer that.

At this point, one of the kitchen staff at the venue came in to grab some cups forcing us to awkwardly shift around to make room. We could barely stifle our laughter at how ridiculous the situation was - to be giving an interview in a kitchen storage room.

[CHRIS:] What a green room.

[KEVIN:] There have been weirder green rooms.

[UNPUBLISHED:] What’s the weirdest one you’ve been in?

[ENZO:] This is definitely one of the weirder ones we’ve had.

[CHRIS:] There was one in Spokane, Washington where I thought it was haunted.

[KEVIN:] Dude, no, it was like real haunted.

[ENZO:] Yeah it was for real haunted. I’d never been in a room like that.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Why? What happened?

[CHRIS:] Well just like, you walk in and - it could have been just the breeze - but it was at this old, old building. I don’t know when it was built, but I don’t know like the 1800s or something like that.

[KEVIN:] Like all these buildings in Spokane are like bricks and all the windows were closed up because of the tax breaks like the industrial revolution and stuff, like it was just in one of those old buildings.

[ENZO:] And it was just kind of ominous and it was in this dark, backroom. And we just all looked at each other like, “Is this the greenroom?”

[KEVIN:] There’s just a lot of closet greenrooms like this. Sometimes it’s like half this size for like two bands.

[UNPUBLISHED:] It’s intimate and cozy you know? Maybe they’ll put you in a bathroom stall next and just have all of you in there.

[KEVIN:] What happens way more often than you think is that we’ll be in a green room like this and there’s just a toilet.

[ENZO:] There was a double toilet once.

[JAKOB:] Yeah, there were like two toilets next to each other, like his and hers toilets.

[KEVIN:] Like you’re gonna hold hands while you’re sitting down.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Now that would have been a great photo op.

[KEVIN:] Yeah, we really talked about it and then just forgot. Was that in Cincinnati too?

[ENZO:] Somewhere around there.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Talk about intimate greenrooms.

[KEVIN:] Yeah, exactly.

[UNPUBLISHED:] If you guys could collaborate with any artist in the world, who would it be?

[JAKOB:] There’s this band I found recently called Traitrs and they have a song called “Thin Flesh” that I love. I don’t know if I’d want to collaborate because I don’t want to impose myself but I just love that band right now.

[ENZO:] Jean Dawson would be cool.

[JAKOB:] Oh yeah. We love that last album, Pixel Bath. That was great.

[CHRIS:] I would love The Strokes or IDLES. That would be cool.

[KEVIN:] True. That’d be pretty awesome.

[JAKOB:] MGMT.

[KEVIN:] I’d die.

[JAKOB:] “Little Dark Ages” is fucking so good. They’ve also done such cool collaborations with other bands and other people.

[KEVIN:] That’s the right answer.

[UNPUBLISHED:] If you guys weren’t doing music, what do you think you’d be doing now?

[ENZO:] Dance.

[ENZO:] I don’t know, probably!

[KEVIN:] No, you’d be painting or something.

[ENZO:] I don’t know, probably. Like paint or video.

[JAKOB:] I think I’d want to make videos. Like I had a lot of fun making the Ultra Q videos so I think I’d like to do stuff like that.

[KEVIN:] Before I joined this band, I was preparing my portfolio to go to a conservatory for singing. So that’s probably what I’d be doing.

[CHRIS:] Probably a chef.

[UNPUBLISHED:] What’s your favorite thing to cook?

[CHRIS:] Probably, uh, I make a good sauce. ’m really good at cooking steaks, and I like pork chops and stuff like that. I like cottage piccata, that’s really good.

[UNPUBLISHED:] What about you guys, what’s your go-to meal?

ENZO:] My go-to meal? Probably box-curry.

[JAKOB:] I like just eggs. I can’t cook for shit so just like cereal, toast.

[KEVIN:] My go-to is having Enzo make me meatballs. It happens very frequently. I can’t cook either.

[ENZO:] I get nervous in front of his (Chris’s) girlfriend because her dad is like a professional chef and like I’ve fucked it up every single time.

[JAKOB:] The pressure was too high.

[CHRIS:] It’s either too bland or too salty either time.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Now is there like a different hangover food that you go to every time?

[CHRIS:] Hashbrowns.

[CHRIS:] We don’t even have to think about that.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Now that we’re getting a bit closer to the show, do you guys have any pre-show hype songs or little rituals that you do?

[JAKOB:] We used to

[KEVIN:] We have many from the past.

[JAKOB:] At our first shows, we used to go into one of our cars and we used to listen to “Consoler, of the Lonely” by The Raconteurs.

[KEVIN:] Volume all the way up, shake the whole car right outside the venue.

[JAKOB:] Mind you Enzo was like 14 and most of us were like 16. We were little ones.

[KEVIN:] We did that for like a year and a half or like two years.

[JAKOB:] We did that for a while. And then it was “Southern Nights.” That was one of the ones we used to-

[KEVIN:] Oh my god, yeah. We also had “Whisky River” by Willie Nelson. We used to listen to that song, yeah.

[JAKOB:] To be honest now, we don’t have anything.

[KEVIN:] We gotta find a new one.

[ENZO:] I could lead a yoga session.

[KEVIN:] That's the thing, is we’re dead serious.

[JAKOB:] We do a hot yoga session.

[ENZO:] (singing) “It’s getting hot in here…”

[ENZO:] I just saw Nelly

[KEVIN:] You did just see Nelly, at Outside Lands.

[UNPUBLISHED:] You guys went to Outside Lands?

[ENZO:] Yeah, or well I did.

[UNPUBLISHED:] What was the best artist that you saw?

[ENZO:] Probably The Strokes.

[JAKOB:] Yeah that’d be hard to beat.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Along that same line about favorite artists, who do you think your top Spotify Wrapped artists are going to be this year?

[JAKOB:] Probably like The Cure and Interpol.

[ENZO:] Turnstile

[KEVIN:] For me it’s going to be Turnstile and… *pulls out phone to check Spotify*... one moment to load… it’s going to be Turnstile and Slowdive.

[CHRIS:] Probably Turnstile and The Strokes, yeah. Ooh and Metallica.

[KEVIN:] Metallica is always on his wrapped list. Doctor Doga and Deaf Heaven are probably the other big ones on my wrapped list.

[UNPUBLISHED:] What are your go-to Karaoke songs? What songs do you love to scream at the top of your lungs?

[JAKOB:] I’ve actually never sung Karaoke. Oh! But I’ve got an answer: “Paper Hearts” by All American Rejects. When I was a kid I used to know every word of that song. I love that song. Honestly anything off that album, like “Move Along” or just anything off that second record. I would know those ones for sure. Or at least, like the hits.

CHRIS:] I love butchering “Welcome to the Jungle”

[KEVIN:] Enzo will sing Roxanne between sets in front of a crowd of like 200 people. Like he’ll just sing the whole song.

[JAKOB:] He did that before.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Are you going to do that tonight?

[KEVIN:] Enzooooo

[CHRIS:] He could.

[ENZO:] ROXANNE

[KEVIN:] If it’s a duet with Enzo, it’s probably like “BYOB” by System of a Down. But I’ll probably sing “You Belong With Me” by Taylor Swift.

[UNPUBLISHED:] I think you should just mash them all up.

[KEVIN:] Yeah, where is the Taylor Swift x System of a Down show?

[JAKOB:] I would hit that lineup hands down.

[UNPUBLISHED:] We have one last question: What are your dreams for where Ultra Q will be in 5 years.

[KEVIN:] I want to be able to pay rent. We also wanna be playing huge shows.

[JAKOB:] One thing that we’ve realized is that we’re definitely more ambitious than we were before.

[UNPUBLISHED:] I mean paying rent with music, that's a big ambition right there.

[KEVIN:] For real! Like we live in Oakland.

[JAKOB:] I want to put out a lot of music. Right now, short-term goals, I just want to put out an album.

[ENZO:] Soon!

[KEVIN:] Soon.

[JAKOB:] But in five years, I would definitely want to play a show somewhere insane.

[UNPUBLISHED:] Do you have a dream venue?

[JAKOB:] I want to play The Fillmore.

[KEVIN:] But headline. Like we got to play there once.

[JAKOB:] We got to play there once, opening for The Matches.

[KEVIN:] That was a sweet show.

[ENZO:] The Greek down here would be awesome.

[JAKOB:] Ridiculous

[ENZO:] It would be ridonculous.

[KEVIN:] Irving Plaza in New York City.

[JAKOB:] Irving Plaza is a dream venue, for sure.

Make sure to check out Ultra Q’s most recent EP Get Yourself A Friend out on Spotify now!