INTERVIEW: HOT LEATHER
KEEPING THE 2000S SYNTH PUNK DREAM ALIVE
Hot Leather makes punk in the native language of the internet. For something like seven years, from Boise to Los Angeles to Atlanta and then back to Los Angeles, Clyde Webb has been writing catchy, lo-fi synth punk tunes that recall the glory days of Myspace and the solitary pop chaos of Atom and His Package. The lyrics are both bleak and bonkers, like a good tweet or a streamer meltdown. His new single “Groundhog Day” is out now.
Hot Leather has played with everyone from hardcore bands to SoundCloud rappers. He used to run a popular meme account. He has delivered pizzas for Domino’s and at one point had a job as a roving audience member for various daytime talk shows. We had a nice chat about all of that and more.
I've actually been kind of writing some synth punk songs, lowkey. I don't know what to do with them. But it made me think about the genre as a whole. There's these different histories of synth punk, and with you it seems like you've honed in on the one that kind of derives from the 2000s. I don't know how you got into this stuff in the first place.
I don't even know how, either, but I think it started with, like—so on Myspace, you know how it would say like, bands that you're influenced by or whatever or like, like top friends and stuff like that?
Yeah.
I think that I was listening to, like, Mindless Self Indulgence. And then I was looking up people who were influenced by them and I found this other band called Cryptorchid Chipmunk.
Never heard of that.
Yeah, they're sick. And then The Emotron was in their top friends. So I checked him out. And then that's where I got it from—mostly I think, it's funny, The Emotron.
I always heard legends of The Emotron, but I never saw him play back then. Our paths never crossed, somehow, but he was almost on some GG Allin tip live, right?
Yeah, I didn't see him when he was doing that, I saw him one time in 2009, maybe, but he was already like—he started doing really slow stuff and got less crazy and more like, animal style. I don't know how to describe it because he had this crazy suit and a bunch of rubber bands on his face. And then I think he was, like, in a chicken coop. It was crazy, but he played this—I think just because he was on tour he played some show that was, like, a local Boise show. And so everyone was confused.
That guy, it seems like he was kind of the king of these small towns. Sometimes I would see his tour routing and there wouldn't be a single major city on the entire thing.
Yeah, he rocks.
Is he still around?
Yeah. Yeah. He's still doing stuff. We have the same birthday too, which is kind of crazy.
So The Emotron—that was your first exposure to a certain kind of thing: solo, freakout, synth punk. Did you feel the need to go backwards and check out some of his influences?
Yeah—Atom and His Package and then mostly contemporaries of his, I guess, like I was really into Best Fwends.
Of course.
So mostly just like stuff like that. And then I guess like, I just listened to those ones. And then I was always into Reggie and The Full Effect and The Rentals and stuff. I'm not really into too much of the stuff that's more like Devo. Or like, stuff that's more abrasive, I guess.
Yeah, there's the Screamers and Suicide end of it, your end of is really more about just straight pop songwriting.
Yeah. I like the other side of it but I’m not really into it as much as the super poppy stuff.
And then when did you start the Hot Leather project?
So it started in 2016. Or maybe 2017, but I tried to do something similar to it when I was in high school. But I couldn't really figure it out. Because, I don't know, for some reason it just didn't click.
Were you trying to make stuff on a computer in high school?
Yeah.
And where did the difficulty arise? Like, you just couldn't crack the code?
Yeah, I don't know. I think I couldn't program anything to make it sound right.
Yeah.
So for a long time I was trying to program punk drums. And I couldn't figure it out at all. And then I was listening to The Blow. And then it just clicked completely. And then I was like, Oh, this is how it's done.
The Blow showed you the way.
Yeah. I don't know. It just happened out of nowhere.
I think a lot of people say this, but occasionally whenever I hear that Lorde song “Royals,” I'm always like, was she listening to The Blow?
Totally.
Again, you know, I'm not the first person to make that observation.
It's kind of crazy when you're listening to music and then you can hear one thing that sounds just like it and then that's all you can think about.
Yeah, like a song in isolation could almost be the influence for an entire band—like, one song.
Yeah, yeah, totally.
So, you cracked the code. Was that in high school, or that was later on?
No, that was like way later. I tried to do something like it in high school, but I couldn't figure it out. Then I just stopped and I just did acoustic punk.
You were fucking with that folk punk shit.
Yeah, totally. And then I just stopped doing it and started working a bunch. And then, I tried to start something like Hot Leather and it was me and two other people. And the guy who was playing drums, he could only do really fast, like hardcore drums. So me and the other guy were like, “I don't know. I think we might just program the drums instead.” We got rid of the drummer guy and then me and the other guy—I think we just decided, like, Hot Leather would just be me. I'm not really sure why. That was early 2017.
And then were you playing shows shortly after that? I feel like around that time, you kind of got onto the circuit. You'd play these not even punk shows, but these almost like SoundCloud rap kind of shows.
Yeah, that started happening. I played some shows in Boise, because it's where I'm from. And then, someone was putting on this festival in LA and they hit me up and asked me if I wanted to play it. And I was like, yeah, totally. So I played that and the people that I played with were all the SoundCloud emo rap dudes. So I became friends with them and then I moved to LA and then those were just the shows that I played. I feel like Hot Leather fits in with that stuff, but also punk stuff, too. Like a Venn diagram kind of, you know?
Yeah. I mean, the funny thing is that seemingly a lot of these SoundCloud rappers over the years have transitioned into just making more straightforward pop punk music too.
Yeah, totally. Totally.
So, what's the current state of Hot Leather? Some of these new songs have been, you know—your lyrics are always nihilistic. It seems like you're kind of almost doubling down on that energy with these new songs.
I was sleeping on a friend’s couch for a year so it was kind of difficult to write or record but I just moved into a new apartment and I’ve been writing and recording a ton of songs. I have a bunch lined up that I’m gonna drop as singles, and then maybe do a compilation at the end of the year with a Christmas song or something. I want to play more shows, I haven’t really been playing that many lately. It would be cool to make it back to the East Coast or hit the Midwest for the first time. There’s a lot of places I haven’t played as Hot Leather. But my lyrics, when I first started making music, I used to write songs that were sad and depressed. But then I was like, all right, I'm done with this. I'm only going to write positive songs or songs that are just goofy. And, I tried to do that a little bit with Hot Leather. But I always write songs that are depressed. So, I think that's just how it's always going to be.
I feel like a lot of the stuff that I take inspiration from for lyrics are just straightforward things from my life. I really like that dog., I like the way that they write lyrics where it's just like, this is what I did in the day. Yeah, so I try to do stuff like that. But then also I'm into stuff where they're talking about sniffing glue and garage rock kind of stuff, you know? Sometimes I'll try to do stuff like that. But then also sometimes I'm just depressed.
I mean, the songs come out. I think about songs that I write. I might be in a halfway stable place, but the songs that come out reflect some part of myself that clearly I have to neglect in order to stay functional.
Totally.
I don't know about you, but sometimes these lyrics come out way darker than maybe how I'm feeling on a day-to-day basis.
No, for real, and then you're like, I don't know if I should even use these.
Yeah, for sure. You're delivering pizzas right now still no?
I'm making the pizzas.
Oh, nice. Yeah, tell me more about that.
Man, so I started making pizza in 2019, because when I first moved to LA I couldn't find a job at all. So I was doing audience work, like clapping and stuff, and then I started driving for Uber.
Wait—audience work, like, you were getting paid to be in the audience at a daytime talk show or something?
Yeah, totally.
My girlfriend and I recently went to a taping of the Drew Barrymore Show and we were just doing it for the love, but you were making money.
Yeah, it's the shows that are really bad. There was one for Facebook where two people talk about their problems and you have to vote for whether they break up or stay together. That one was crazy. There was another one called The Wheel where these people just spun a wheel and answered trivia questions. There was another one where it was like different comedians answering questions—like it'd be like a trivia question and then different comedians would say what the answer is, but it would be a joke. I don't know, but I'd make like ten dollars an hour and it would be maybe three or four hours just sitting there and clapping and cheering.
That’s not bad. Yeah, I mean, not great. Maybe not bad, either.
Yeah, it was a really interesting thing to do. So, I couldn't find a job for a long time and I was super broke and I posted on Twitter and I was like, before I die penniless and alone and in the gutter does anybody want to give me a job? And then my friend had this pizza truck, so I started making pizza with him and then I moved to Atlanta and made pizza. And then I moved back to LA. I've worked at a couple pizza places. I delivered pizza for Domino's right before I moved to LA.
How was working for Domino's? Was that better or worse than an indie spot?
I think it's way worse. They do weird stuff there, too, but It was alright. I just kind of stopped showing up—my tail light on my car stopped working and so they said, like, “Oh, you can't deliver pizza until you get it fixed” and then I just moved to LA and left my car at my parents’ house.
How did you jump forward into actually making them or who are you working for currently?
So right now, I'm working at this place called LaSorted’s which is pretty good. It's in Silverlake and they do sourdough pizza.
Do you have ambition to make your own pizzas?
Yeah, I wanted to do a thing called Flying Clyde's Pizza and I have a logo and stuff for it. I’ve made pizza at home before, too. I have my own dough recipe, sauce recipe.
It seems like punk people making pizza, I've noticed in New York, it’s definitely reached a critical mass.
Oh, yeah, pizza is like the number one punk thing, I think, in terms of food making. Punk is all about community, and pizza is all about community, you know.
Yeah, put that in your zine.
Uh-huh.
Do you have a dream situation where you're playing a Hot Leather show and you also maybe have made some pizza?
That'd be sick. It’d be sick to have a music video where I'm singing and making pizza. I think I should do that or a TikTok, making pizza.
Was making memes beneficial to your early life as Hot Leather in terms of just getting some kind of visibility?
I'm not sure. Probably, but I don't think that it did in a way that, like—I don't think that it's anything substantial. There's people that know me as a funny guy online, but don't know that I make music or anything. But then I think that there's also people who found out about my music and then realized I was funny online.
What happened to the Instagram meme page?
I just got, like, really tired of the name kornfan420. I picked the name because I was an admin on this other meme page on Facebook called “I play korn to my dmt plants” and I wanted something similar to that. But it kind of made it annoying to even listen to Korn because it was, like, too on brand? I kind of chilled out on making memes because I got so burnt out on it. It started feeling just way too repetitive. I still have the Instagram page kornfan420 and I’ll post stuff on it when I remember, but I mostly forget. I feel like any jokes I come up with I’ll post them on Twitter. I’m not sure if I just stopped paying attention, but I feel like the kind of memes I was making died out. The “cool text” memes or “relatable” stuff. I started doing a new thing on TikTok to promote my songs where I’ll take a video of myself looking at the camera and put text from one of my popular tweets. There’s a dude who’s whole thing is doing that and he always turns his head so I do that as an homage. He uses “Kiss From A Rose” by Seal in almost every video too. It rocks. He rocks.
How did you get into that in the first place?
I got into it because I couldn't really play music, so I was making memes about stuff that I would write songs about or bands I liked or subcultures. But also a lot of, like, bullshit jokes too. I was working at this factory and I got crazy carpal tunnel in my wrist.
How did you get carpal tunnel?
Just repetitive motion. I was working at this wood mill, feeding wood into a resaw. And then also I was working on another thing where I was turning pieces of wood over. And so, for eight or nine hours, I would just be turning my wrist to turn pieces of wood over. I couldn't play guitar. So, I wanted to have some creative outlet. I just started making memes. I think that might have been why I started doing Hot Leather too, because I couldn't play guitar. I was just programming stuff.
So you make this shit on Fruity Loops?
Yeah. Yeah, but I program it all in MIDI. And then I have a sequencer that I use that does all the sounds.
Oh yeah, you put it into that QY, the fucking Atom and His Package…
Yeah, totally. That's the same thing. All of the sounds are in that one box.
Yeah.
But I also got a MicroKorg a couple of years ago.
That's a classic, too. That's like the most classic 2000s punk synth.
Yeah, that's why I got it because it’s the sound of the pre-2010, like 2007, that kind of thing.
The MicroKorg was funny. It looked so diminutive, you know, in a band context—there would be all these people with big amp stacks and then there'd be the one person with the little MicroKorg on a keyboard stand.
Yeah, it's so sick.
So, this blog is all about New Music Discovery. Any shit we should be checking out?
The Dallas Cowboys are one of my favorite synth punk bands right now. They’re really fun to listen to. Grand1sle is really good. We have a song coming out soon. Diesel Dudes/Morning Hands are super sick. Diesel Dudes just came out with a new song that really rocks. But I feel like if anyone isn’t listening to The Dallas Cowboys or Grand1sle they should be. Some hardcore bands I’ve been listening to a lot are Invocation, Back To Godhead, and Conservative Military Image. A couple new rappers I like that I haven’t seen anyone talk about are Harlow Road and Surp.