All Blood sticks together after surviving a nightmare tour

Justin Baird has a taste for midcentury aesthetics, and the walls of his Hyde Park living room are decorated with prints, mirrors and fixtures from that era. There is an obnoxious red floral-printed couch, and a 1950s art-deco ashtray is placed in every corner of the room.

Baird, keyboardist-guitarist for All Blood, makes use of one of them as he sits on the floor, lighting a cigarette and passing out cans of Natural Ice. Bassist Zach Turner and guitarist Jonathan Brokaw are lounging in matching armchairs, while drummer Zach Campbell — who is in the living room via Baird’s iPhone FaceTime — inhales a plate of scrambled eggs.

With the exception of 30-year-old Campbell, who moved from Lawrence to Kansas City in early 2013, the band members are all 26 and have been friends for years.

All Blood started as Brokaw’s solo project until he brought in the others last October to flesh out the sound. The band is now a collaborative effort, with all four members contributing to the creative process.

When I ask them about the band’s recent tour through the upper Midwest and East Coast, from which they’ve just returned, Turner, Brokaw and Campbell lock eyes and laugh loudly.

“Tour was like being in hell, but the funnest time in hell you’ve ever had,” Turner says. With his red baseball cap, geeky glasses and denim cutoffs, Turner could pass for a summer-camp counselor. “Our van ate shit in rush-hour traffic from Milwaukee to Chicago, so we got towed to that show. We spent two days in a Pep Boys Towing parking lot. We got our tires slashed in Jersey City, and we were broke as fuck.”

Everyone laughs as more awful details are revealed, until Campbell wryly interrupts between mouthfuls of eggs: “I really like how we’re focusing on the positives, guys.” Over the phone, his voice takes on a dadlike tone. ”We haven’t mentioned a single awesome show or anything.”

More laughter and some backtracking, and statements are amended to reflect the good times that were had during All Blood’s recent travels. This good-natured camaraderie seems to be an essential part of how All Blood functions: Whatever unraveled states the members find themselves in, they still find the nerves to stick together and make music.

“No matter how drunk we get, sometimes those are the best times to practice,” Turner admits. “And we practice a lot. Whenever we can. And when we do practice, we practice really hard. We can put personalities to the side and still have a really good time. We all want to make music, and that’s when things get done.”

Campbell agrees, and Baird turns the iPhone around to the room as he speaks: “The nice thing about this band is that it functions in a sort of anarchist kind of way. We’re anarchists. Everyone has a lot of say in the band. Nobody’s ego is overriding anyone. We all try to write the best songs that we possibly can because we want to impress the other members of the band. Then it becomes this collaborative effort to take the blueprint of a song and make it even better.”

That approach was an important part of All Blood’s debut album, The Kids Have No Taste, released in June. Though it doesn’t initially seem like it, the 15 tracks — nearly all of which are under three minutes — are measured in meticulous starbursts. Recorded in Baird’s basement, Taste‘s songs are punctuated by the sounds of glass breaking, someone vomiting and odd yelled phrases apropos of nothing.

“A lot of that was all spur-of-the-moment,” Brokaw says. “We thought about the track listing for the album ahead of time, and we relied on that to kind of bring it together. I think a big part of it is that we’re all used to home recording. We know ourselves, and we know where shit should go.”

But All Blood isn’s as recklessly spontaneous as a first listen to Taste reveals. It was recorded over the course of three months, not three days. The songs, though abrupt, are crafted on the stalwart foundations of pop hooks and catchy melodies. Influences include heavy flavors of 1960s surf pop and ’70s pysch rock smashing into frenetic, fuzzy guitars and abrasive drums. Taste is as fun and danceable as it is gnarly and loud. It’s also a hell of a lot more cohesive than the dudes would have you believe.

“Moving from Lawrence to Kansas City, I was worried that maybe I wasn’t gonna be able to find like-minded musicians,” Campbell says. “They’re nice guys, and that’s important to me. I don’t feel like they’re afraid to do things in an original way. They’re not too scared of being ‘unpunk’ or whatever to write a pop song. I wanted to slap all of them at one point or another, but I’m sure they’ve said the same thing about me. We work together really well, I think.”

Brokaw agrees: “Zach [Campbell] keeps us on track and from killing each other. He’s really the glue that binds us. We love him, that motherfucker.”

Once more, the living room fills with laughter.