Giving up the Ghost: Totally Crushed Out vs. Seahaven
By Ryan Pangilinan

Southern California’s Seahaven is a relatively new band that has garnered a lot of attention in a short amount of time with their debut EP, “Ghost” (Creator-Destructor). Not to say that it’s unwarranted. Seahaven’s dark-tinged brand of post-hardcore recalls the best parts of bands like Brand New, Hot Water Music and Thursday.

Unlike some of their peers, Seahaven isn’t beginning their journey with an awkward growing period, but instead have offered a cohesive and well thought out ideas for their record.

Recently, vocalist/guitarist, Kyle Soto, sat down with Totally Crushed Out to discuss the finer points of being a new indie rock sensation. 

In brief, how did Seahaven form?

My friend I hadn’t seen in years (Michael) and I had met up one day to catch up on life and we ended up finishing a song. We then got my good friend Eric involved on bass and the narc at our high school on drums (James Ex-Final Fight). Everything progressed fairly quickly from there.

“Ghost” has a consistent thematic narrative, which you don’t really hear in many debut recordings. Was this something that was conscious when you were writing songs?

It wasn’t a conscious decision at all. It all just fell into place. When you write a group of songs during a certain period of time, it all just finds a way to come together cohesively.

You guys are on Creator-Destructor, which has primarily been the home for metal bands. How did you decide on working with Ben Murray?

While in the studio for ‘Ghost’ we got an email from Ben saying he wanted to put out our stuff. Which was quite coincidental because two days prior we had seen our now friends/labelmates Troubled Coast’s ‘100 Miles from Home’ at Amoeba in Berkley. We had talked about how cool it would be if we could work with Ben/Creator-Destructor for our debut release. So all worked out well.

When I got the press material for “Ghost,” I was reading a lot of reviews that compares you guys to Manchester Orchestra, Brand New, and Crime In Stereo, but I hear a lot more of latter-era Hot Water Music and bands of that ilk. From your perspective as the band, what bands/media has influenced your songwriting?

Honestly it’s all across the board. All of us come from pretty diverse musical backgrounds, so it all just kind of meshed together.

The dates for your West Coast tour have just been announced; do you have any additional touring plans that you can allude to?

For now we have a “Creator-Destructor Weekend” planned Oct.15-17 (SF, Sac, Fresno). Other than that this winter we will hopefully be embarking on our first full U.S. tour, until then we’ll have sporadic weekend trips here and there.

Are there any plans to follow up “Ghost” soon?

Hopefully we’ll get into the studio around March/April and hopefully have an LP ready for Summer.

Sehaven’s debut, “Ghost” is available on Creator-Destructor Records. More info on the band can be found at their Myspace.