Hospital stay didn’t keep Cave Singers frontman down
It’s only been a few months since the Cave Singers’ frontman, Pete Quirk, was forced to trade in his tour bus for a tiny hospital room, but he’s already making light of the situation. “The new album will be about the Cleveland hospital system and how thorough they are,” the singer-guitarist jokes on the line with the Straight from his Seattle home.
Quirk blames “three months of epic nights” for landing him in the ER. Understandably, he seems relieved to have the ordeal—and, hopefully, his binge-drinking days—behind him. After all, there’s work to be done. Despite having released No Witch in February, the band is already focused on its fourth record and is busy trying to jell with a new collaborator, Cameron Elliott. “It’s different playing with another person,” says Quirk of adding a fourth man to the creative process. “But this local Seattle guy is our friend, and I like hanging out with him, so we’ve got him playing some bass and some other stuff and it’s kind of groovier now. We’re broadening our horizons.” Bringing bass into the mix should be nerve-racking for a band that’s been so guitar-focused, but Quirk treats it as a minor footnote in the group’s four-year evolution. After recording No Witch with studio wizard Randall Dunn (Black Mountain, Sunn O))), Boris), the Cave Singers aren’t shy about experimenting with their throwback folk-rock vibe.
