yvynyl

// Interview //

White Bike “I Like You”

As a long-time fan of Oregon’s Tango Alpha Tango, I was pretty stoked to speak with Nathan Trueb and Mirabai Carter-Trueb about the new project they’ve built with some friends over the course of the time since the pandemic. It’s bigger and, dare I say, louder than their name-sake songs. They’ve added more people into the mix such as singer Arianna Anchustegui, Justin Chase from Pure Bathing Culture, and Robin Levy from Yardsss to create something a bit louder but not entirely different than the sweet movements of their original work. While you listen to the newest single coming out tomorrow, Friday, May 14th, have a read of a short interview I had with them the other day.

Mark Schoneveld:

😎 Hi, guys. Mark from @yvynyl 🎧 here. How’s Portland today?

Mirabai Carter-Trueb:

Hi Mark!

Nathan Trueb:

Hey, Mark! Portland is good, finally starting to get some great weather around here.

Mark:

I love Portland in the summer. I’ve spent time there in the summer (awesome) and winter (awesome in a different, wetter way).

Arianna Anchustegui:

Hey Mark! Yeah, Portland is great & bloomed, and beautiful.

Nathan:

The winters are long-feeling, so spring is always a relief

Mark:

At least the winter gives you time to stay inside writing new music, right?

Mirabai:

Yeah, Portlanders love to hibernate and get creative.

Nathan:

That’s why we all have basements here haha

Mark:

Was it a pandemic winter that brought you back to hard rock rips like this new project?

Nathan:

Honestly, the songs came before 2020, and the shutdowns gave us the time to focus on the finishing touches and hunker down and practice together.

Mark:

How did White Bike evolve out of Tango Alpha Tango? Or was it something that was written differently, with different goals in mind?

Mirabai:

We kept the band as our primary quarantine group so we could continue practicing and working on our music. Priorities!!

Mark:

Priorities are important, for sure. Mirabai, what has been the element that you’ve enjoyed the most?

Mirabai:

White Bike started on a summer night around a campfire. We were having a great conversation about who our favorite bands are and how much we all love rock and roll and I just blurted out “we should start a band!” And everyone instantly said yes

Mark:

That makes sense. There’s something magical about campfires, aren’t there? How has this been different than Tango Alpha Tango?

Nathan:

Yeah! The three of us would sing songs together and we really enjoyed Arianna’s voice, and our voices together. So once we decided to actually start a band I started writing songs with the female voices at the forefront of my ideas, which was a lot different than TAT stuff.

Mark:

Arianna, were you in bands before? Or is this something new for you?

Arianna:

I’d performed with a band and friends a few times a couple years prior but before White Bike I haven’t been in anything serious.

I’ve always dreamed of fronting a rock & roll band. I’ve been a songbird my entire life!

Mark:

That’s great. Diving into new opportunities head-first. I dig it. And you’re new to the Portland scene, right?

Mirabai:

I’ve really enjoyed working with a female lead singer and focusing more on vocal harmonies. It’s a new thing for us in this band that we didn’t really do much of in Tango Alpha Tango.

Arianna:

Fairly! I moved here almost four years ago after graduating college in Idaho to work in the music industry. I accepted a job with a local promoter /production company called True West

Mark:

Nice. What neighborhood would you guys call yourselves from now? What are your hot spots in town there?

Looking forward to live music post-pandemic?

Mirabai:

Our main hub is in North Portland (which we lovingly call NoPo here) that’s where Nathan and I live and where we practice in our basement at least once a week. We also hang out in SE at Ari’s bar she works at called Thunderbird. One of our favorite venues through Mississippi Studios is just a few blocks from our house so we used to go there and see shows all the time!

Tango Alpha Tango has also had the pleasure of playing there too and Arianna used to work there pre-pandemic

Arianna:

I worked around various venues in Portland before Covid craziness so I was at a show every night, very much in the music scene…but always wanted to be ON stage

Mark:

As a music writer/critic I can empathize, Adrianna. 😊

Any travel plans when live shows can be a bit more ‘safe’ and doctor-approved?

Arianna:

Absolutely cannot wait for live music to come back! So far we just have plans to play Treefort Music Festival in my hometown of Boise, Idaho in September. We’re really looking forward to it.

Mark:

Have you guys played any East Coast spots yet? TAT or otherwise?

Nathan:

We’ve toured a lot over the years and have never made it further than Texas, save a one-off show here and there.

We would love to though! We actually took a WB band trip to Nashville recently to see the sites

Mark:

I have a burning question. Did you guys know about the ‘white bikes’ project? We see them here in Philly a lot.

Nathan:

Yes, if you mean the memorials put up for fallen cyclists. Being from Portland we see them a lot around town and the name pays homage to that.

Mark:

I’m a big biker myself, so what I saw you named your new band White Bike, I wondered if you had that in mind?

Your songs don’t come off as dark or death-related…

Nathan:

Yeah, it’s evocative, and some have even said macabre, but I think it instantly makes you think of deeper things: life and death, dark and light, things that are underlying themes in all music.

Mark:

Absolutely.

Nathan:

As for our first single, “I Like You”, it’s definitely on the lighter side of the spectrum, but the rest of our songs and future EPs dive into some of those deeper topics

Mark:

Right. “I Like You” doesn’t come off as a death song. Is that just one to dance with?

Nathan:

That was written, in a way, from our first hangs with friends around the fire and just about the dread of getting older, being young, etc.

Mark:

Sitting around the fire. We’ve been doing that a lot here lately. 6 feet apart.

Thanks for taking the time to chat, guys. I’m looking forward to hearing more from the project! And god bless us all for live music!

Arianna:

Thanks, Mark!

Nathan:

Thank you for taking the time, Mark!

Mirabai:

Thanks, Mark! Great talking with you!

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