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Home > Austin Music Source > Archives > 2009 > June > 08 > Entry
Interview: Passion Pit
(Passion Pit at Emo’s in March during South by Southwest. Photo by Benjamin Sklar/For the American-Statesman)
Boston-based indie pop group Passion Pit have had a big year. Feeding on momentum from last year’s much-hyped EP, they released their debut full length, “Manners,” in May to critical acclaim, selling more than 10,000 copies in the first week and landing the band a spot at No. 51 on the Billboard Top 100 album chart. They are in the middle of a non-stop tour that includes sold-out dates in the United States and Europe. They’ll also perform at the Austin City Limits Music Festival in October. We caught up with Passion Pit drummer Nate Donmoyer and keyboardist Ayad Al Adhamy before their recent sold-out show at Emo’s.
American-Statesman: You’ve been selling out shows across the country. Why do you think people are so excited to see you?
Adhamy: People tell them to be excited. We have a really awesome publicist. It’s a word of mouth or word of Internet thing. It’s nothing we’re doing.
Donmoyer: … It’s our first tour through a lot of these towns so it’s still a litmus test, an ‘are these guys worth our time?’ kind of thing. It’ll be a few more tours before they’re actually here to see us.
Adhamy: We met these two girls yesterday in Dallas that said they were doing a Passion Pit Texas tour, coming to all three shows (Dallas, Austin and Houston). I’m really humbled by that.
Donmoyer: They don’t have jobs, so they can follow us around.
‘Manners’ sold more than 10,000 copies in the first week it was released. Were you surprised?
Adhamy: Floored, absolutely floored.
Donmoyer: I was expecting maybe 500.
Adhamy: I had friends e-mailing me, and they were like, oh my god, you’re in the billboard top 100.
Donmoyer: It’s some alternative reality we just clicked into.
Adhamy: We just graduated college and we’re still kids.
Donmoyer: It’s like what’s wrong with the world? Because why would we be in the top 100?
Adhamy: Actually, I disagree, because Eminem is No. 1. If he’s No. 1, then I don’t want to be No. 1. Eminem’s going to hate us now.
What have been listening to while on tour?
Adhamy: One of my favorite things is napping and waking up and seeing Nate driving to classical music and violin concertos. We all have music degrees so we’re pretty knowledgeable about that kind of thing.
Donmoyer: The new Phoenix album has been on repeat for like four months. We wish we made it.
How have you adjusted to the Texas heat?
Adhamy: I grew up in the Middle East, so I would expect to be used to it, but no, I never got used to it. It never gets comfortable. Except there, I can’t walk outside in my glasses. Here I can wear glasses, but it’s so sticky and warm when you’re setting up and carrying gear. It’s good exercise, though.
Donmoyer: In Boston you can drink and it’s freezing, so you don’t really notice. Here it’s four beers and you’re lucky if you don’t pass out on stage. That’s what happened during SXSW. I basically passed out.
Adhamy: I came straight from England (to SXSW) and was kind of stressed out, so when I flew in that morning I said, ‘This is glorious, I’m going to have a whiskey. I’m going to have four whiskeys!” Then you start eating and you have to set up, and the stage was makeshift out of balsa wood or something, like a trampoline. The laptop fell like seven times, keyboards fell, the bassist got hit in the face with the microphone.
Did you have time to see any other bands during SXSW?
Donmoyer: Grizzly Bear. My girlfriend lives in Dallas and she came down. It was the one band we wanted to see, and there were 300 people in line. I thought, what a terrible end to our time at SXSW, sitting outside waiting. I looked at my wrist, at my artist pass, and told the bouncer ‘I’m playing right now, I’m in Grizzly Bear,” and they were like “Oh yeah yeah yeah,” and they cleared a path an everyone just walked to the front of the stage and we watched the whole set.
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