It's been a decade since Coalesce released their last album - in punk and hardcore, a lifetime. And somehow, between 1999's 0:12 Revolution In Just Listening and this year's OX, Coalesce became legends.
"None of us are scenesters. I haven't been a part of the scene for the break when I wasn't doing Coalesce," says guitarist Jes Steineger. "So it didn't make sense to me that people would have increased their interest in Coalesce over that period. Our desire to get back together came from our desire to just hang out, and Coalesce gives us a project and a reason." Since forming in 1994, the band have slowly built an audience for their unique brand of post-hardcore, one that exploded sometime after the band called it a day in 1999. That OX, their highly-anticipated return, should even approach the power of their past work is unexpected; that it should stand alone as a vital piece of aggressive, progressive music is something else entirely.
"When we started writing, we felt like we had only stopped a month ago," says Steineger. "There's a structure to how we go about building stuff and nothing has changed about that." With more eager ears tuned to their output, here's hoping things continue to build naturally for the Kansas City four-piece. At the very least, they take their late-blooming recognition in stride.
"Coalesce are not Metallica. We're talking about our success in very relative terms," laughs Steineger. "The fact that our audience increased means that when I left, we were playing shows in basements to 50 kids, and now most of our shows are in clubs for maybe 300 people, if we're lucky."
"None of us are scenesters. I haven't been a part of the scene for the break when I wasn't doing Coalesce," says guitarist Jes Steineger. "So it didn't make sense to me that people would have increased their interest in Coalesce over that period. Our desire to get back together came from our desire to just hang out, and Coalesce gives us a project and a reason." Since forming in 1994, the band have slowly built an audience for their unique brand of post-hardcore, one that exploded sometime after the band called it a day in 1999. That OX, their highly-anticipated return, should even approach the power of their past work is unexpected; that it should stand alone as a vital piece of aggressive, progressive music is something else entirely.
"When we started writing, we felt like we had only stopped a month ago," says Steineger. "There's a structure to how we go about building stuff and nothing has changed about that." With more eager ears tuned to their output, here's hoping things continue to build naturally for the Kansas City four-piece. At the very least, they take their late-blooming recognition in stride.
"Coalesce are not Metallica. We're talking about our success in very relative terms," laughs Steineger. "The fact that our audience increased means that when I left, we were playing shows in basements to 50 kids, and now most of our shows are in clubs for maybe 300 people, if we're lucky."
