Meet Moontower : Jacob Berger, Tom Carpenter, and Devan Welsh make up the electro-pop band Moontower.

We had the good fortune of connecting with Moontower and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Moontower, how has your perspective on work-life balance evolved over time?
Devan – Pre-pandemic, Moontower usually flips between the live show state and the studio writing/recording/producing state, with a heavy preference for the live show (we really love being on the road). With 2020’s rough timeline, the first half of this year had us busy with livestreams and a virtual tour (all of which was really fun and challenged us to innovate!) The second half of this year allowed us time to craft a larger-sized project (our first album!). The album creation process has required a more divey-ed up studio process that’s typically condensed. Jacob – Sometimes it can feel like there is no balance because as a musician the “life” is often the inspiration for the “work”. Over time we’ve become better at understanding when we’ve taken in enough “life” to have filled our wells enough to create (work), and conversely to know when we’re banging our heads against a wall due to an empty tank. I think it’s one of the great privileges of being a songwriter that your hobbies, the books you read, the people you meet can all be a part of your art (your work). That idea helps remind me to take a break, expand my horizons, and inspires me to prioritize the practice of keeping good balance. Tom – Especially when living with a home studio, it is so easy to work every hour of every day, thinking that you will make magic happen by brute force alone; that’s just not how it works! This year, we tried to take a healthier approach by compartmentalizing steps in a purposeful way. For example, with a “no computers” rule, we first took time to write songs and play them as you would around a campfire. After we had a literal binder full of songs, we holed up in Laguna to sequence them together as a concept. Then, with that roadmap in hand, we locked ourselves in a house on the Colorado River for a month to start the “actual” recordings. Even at the scale of multi-month chunks, dividing a larger goal into smaller checkmarks has helped our creative process so much. 

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
Jacob – It’s never easy but it feels easier surrounded by people I love. I don’t know if this sets us apart, but what feels unique is the brotherhood between us. If it’s not unique for a band then it’s unique for my own life. I think most of the time people who choose to continuously create together might have mutual respect, but there’s not always deep love. We have chosen in so many ways to intertwine our lives – there is a contract of mutualism we’ve signed with one another. Every day we are trying to better understand the part we all play in our larger organism so that we can not only become more efficient but also so that together we can find individual and collective happiness. Tom – As far as our sound, the aspects that make us unique from other artists in our scene are also the things that make us individually unique from each other– whereas Jacob has a really strong background in songwriting and pulls from writers like Billy Joel or Phoebe Bridgers or well-written mainstream pop, Dev has love for analog textures and bands that have heavy instrumental harmony elements like Coldplay and U2. Along with my personal taste for classic 90s house and French electronic music, Moontower’s sound has felt to us like a very defined intersection between all three of those very different tastes. Dev – We started this project with the very odd idea of headlining a major festival set without having released any music online (the point was not releasing music onto DSP’s into a void). That idea didn’t last too long (we eventually caved and released our first single “William” after enough people were bothering us daily on socials to put it out). But that odd idea paved the way for our thought processes going forward – to be left of center. We loved the idea of taking different approaches to artist-facing aspects like record releases (postering campuses in Southern California of a shirtless cowboy for our concept record “Season 1”) the live show (building spandex-covered PVC light totems synchronized to our live set at backyard shows), marketing (passing out free orange juice boxes to concert-goers at shows we wish we could go to), etc. This to me is the strength of the Moontower team! Not only are we willing to work outside of the box, but we’re willing to also put that time and effort in. We’re in this for the long haul and hope to be musicians serving this project for a long, long time.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Jacob – Honestly right now I don’t feel much love for LA, I think I’d advise my friends to join me on a journey out of town. Though I know that’s in many ways a consequence of the times and LA holds such powerful energy for this band and always will. That being said I’d love to show them our house around USC where we held our first shows as Moontower, the taco shop around the corner from our house now, a bluff in the Palisades that’s one of my favorite spots to watch the ocean, and take a drive through the Malibu farmlands to gawk over houses I’d love to own one-day. Tom – Ditto what Jacob said about LA in the absolute present BUT from the perspective of the alternate reality versions of ourselves who are very much not dealing with Covid, I’d have to take my friends to all the places we go to dance. Dance Yourself Clean at The Satellite every Saturday, Funky Sole at the Echo and Electric Feels at the Plex, back when Low End Theory used to be at The Airliner every Wednesday (also Gaslamp’s new one, Airplane Mode at The Hi-Hat). If you can hear an 808 from outside the venue, good chance I’m going to be having a good time inside. Dev – For me, LA was (and still is!) such a refreshing change from my hometown of Baltimore. To have more days of sunlight rather than rain or overcast skies has done wonders for my disposition (I love the sun and warm weather!) That alone was enough for me and I think it has been for my friends who’ve visited too. I do remember seeing the intro scene to John Mayer’s “Where The Light Is, Live in LA” where Mayer’s playing amplified guitar outside on this bluff above the Hollywood Bowl. It overlooks Hollywood (with sights of the Capitol Records building, The Knickerbocker, a fast moving 101 Freeway, the Hollywood sign) and I was just in awe of that (I ended up finding a spot along that road and brought a Strat hooked up to a Fender amp played loudly for hours outside just to see what it felt like). That sight at night is even more breathtaking than during the day (6867 Mulholland Drive is the address and I typically park the car at an empty spot on Sunny Cove, walk alongside Mulholland towards the overlook, and there you can sit on some big rocks and get lost in the view for hours. If those views don’t do it for ya, driving further West on Mulholland is a blast (very hilly and lots of fun turns) and the views are just as cool too (Mulholland Drive straddles the city side and the valley side with plenty of overlooks). My favorite beach spot is El Pescador in Malibu (and even though you’re not technically allowed to, it’s great at night too but just remember to bring a comfy jacket). As far as food – Fat Sals, Yeastie Boys Bagel Trucks, and Men Oh Tokushima Ramen are a must. A blessing about living in an awesome city like LA is there’s always new places to check out. Every square mile is so wildly different from the next.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
Our amazing manager Carina is a multi-faceted genius creator in her own right. Not only is she in music management but also fashion management and she is also a crazy-talented fashion designer and creative director, She has her own company Porch Mgmt. that encompases all her endeavors. Carina and Porch are as much a part of Moontower as the three of us in the “band”, The simplest and most powerful way to describe Carina’s input in Moontower is her sense of duty about being honest with us. As hard as it may be to hear, anything but the truth from your manager is simply unhelpful. Secondly would like to Shoutout Jacob Fishman and his company Glow In The Dirt that he co-owns with our friend Hunter Bryant. Jacob Fishman was one of the first people to come on the Moontower team, and just as Carina is a member of the band, Fish is as much a part of the live show as we in the “band” are. A jack and master of seemingly all trades, Fish is a master builder, set-designer, lighting designer, and director. Fish helps us actualize the projects that without him would only live in our imagination.

Website: thisismoontower.com
Instagram: @thisismoontower
Twitter: @thisismoontower
Facebook: facebook.com/thisismoontower
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/moontower

Image Credits
Personal Photo – Briar Burns Other Photos – Anastasia Velicescu for the first two & Brittany O’brien for the last one