Pissing Neon:
Interview: Sonic Death Rabbit
By Marianne Williams
Sonic Death Rabbit are Cristina Fuentes and Derrick Estrada, a girl and boy who live in a tiny single in a downtown LA hotel and write thrashing, high energy gameboy/synth music with raw, screaming vocals. They perform wild live shows in custom neon finery and full face masks. I stole a sort of sober midnight hour of their Saturday night for a few questions and a jump around snapshot.
Marianne: There are a lot of rabbit bands out there these days. How did you get your name?
Cristina: A telephone conversation. A week before we met we were talking on the phone and I thought he said “sonic death rabbit” even though he said nothing about death, rabbits, or anything. He said, “that sounds like the name of our band” and that was it.
Derrick: I was set on calling it Appetite for Destruction and/or Affection, but Cristina said that was really stupid and too long.
C: No, I liked it! We were just flirting. . . I can’t believe you and I used to date.
D: Yea, it’s kinda gross to think about.
(All pause awkwardly)
M: Weird. Just kidding.
C: I think it’s weird!
M: Really? Because when I first saw you play you were a couple in this angelic ball of fun, love, and hell raising craziness.
C: It still is, but because we’re not in a relationship now we can be much more productive.
D: Yea, she doesn’t hit me anymore when we’re playing shows when she thinks I messed up. But, I’ve been told that people liked that dynamic. Now we just have fun, no stress. We can show the underground how it’s done.
M: It’s still “underground”?
D: Still smoldering. Up from the sewer to the slime of the streets.
C: Oh, dear lord.
M: I love the story of how you met… re-tell me?
D: Cristina heard my music (Baseck) on the interwebs and emailed me about doing some artwork for me. I was in Milwaukee and didn’t have a place to live at the time and couldn’t use the internet much, so I asked her to give me a call. When she did, I realized it was a girl, when I thought it had just been some random dude.
C: Really? I didn’t know that!
D: But it was a random girl instead. We talked on the phone for hours. I loved her music that she sent me, and…
C: You flew me out. We talked on the phone for 2 days and met 5 days later, and a week later we played our first show with Dan (Doormouse).
D: I hid behind a pillar at the airport and I saw a small girl come off the plane with a big keyboard. We hung out by the river and started playing music, then flew to Miami a week later. Ed (Skymall) said we could jump on the show he was playing, so we sat in a bedroom and made our first three songs. We weren’t thinking. She played keyboards and was in a hardcore band, and I played gameboy. We liked metal and electronic music, and when I started djing 14 years ago I played hip hop. There wasn’t any one main influence.
M: Cristina, you just moved back to LA. Do you think you’ll stay?
C: For a while. It was fun doing SDR on my own, but I missed our dynamic a lot. When Derrick told me on the phone to either take over the project entirely or move back, my heart broke and I knew I had to move back. All I really want to do is make music, and I don’t have a better partner than him.
D: Music wise.
C: Music wise, yeah.
M: Well a lot of people are excited that you are back together, music wise.
D: Cristina’s also writing solo gameboy stuff as Wet Mango and we’re throwing a show downtown on April 14. Bizart is playing as Gothic Cholo, and I’m going under Erotic Bean Dip.
M: A night of alter egos. When you perform, you dress up in crazy costumes. Why?
C: It’s harder to dance around by yourself without crazy neon green shit on you.
D: We love sewing and have bins of fabric from a lady who died in the desert, and I get tons of stuff from the fabric district in downtown. We made the first pink bunny suit from my grandmas bed sheets. But Cristina peed on it onstage too many times, on accident.
M: Derrick, when you pee on yourself, is it on purpose or on accident?
D: On accident, but when I pee on other people it’s on purpose.
M: Ok. Any last words for the Citizens out there?
C: Acid makes you stupid and beer makes you sleepy.
D: I beg to differ.
Sonic Death Rabbit can be found at http://myspace.com/sonicdeathrabbit
- MW
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