The Lovely Bad Things are a rock band from La Mirada, California. All close friends that met in high school, the band formed in 2009 when the previous project of brothers Brayden and Camron Ward and friend Tim Hatch had dissolved and Lauren Curtius was asked to start a new band with them. After quickly writing a slew of songs that later became their self-released album “Shark Week”, they played their first show and soon became a staple of the Southern California music scene. They went on to do several cassette releases with Burger Records and released vinyl with Volcom Entertainment. Each a multi-instrumentalist, they became known for dynamic songwriting and catchy hooks as well as switching instruments during live performances. They finished out 2013 with two tours with popular So-Cal group Best Coast and a tour with Nashville shredders Diarrhea Planet. They have lent support to the likes of Dinosaur Jr, The Cribs, Peter Bjorn and John, Los Campesinos, The Thermals, and more. Lovely Bad Things are currently in the process of writing and recording their next full length release.
What were you like in high school? Lauren: I always felt really isolated and nervous all the time around my peers because I’ve always had really bad social anxiety. No one was really mean to me or anything; I was just scared of being myself. I was pretty quiet and I got really good grades, so the teachers always favored me just because I did what I was supposed to and never disrupted the class by talking to anyone. I remember when I met Brayden and Camron and their friends, I started going to shows all the time with them and I started sleeping through a lot of my classes the next day because I was so tired and my teachers would let me! I feel like I had a totally different life and personality outside of school that I was too scared to share with anyone there. No one knew I sang or played guitar or any of those things.
What kinds of things are influencing your music right now? Lauren: For the past few months I’ve been really influenced by the late night conversations I’ve been having with friends—especially my best friend Allyson. It’s hard to explain but I have been incorporating the things we talk about into songs. I have this really long note in my phone that I write in every time we are talking about something really funny and I want to remember it, or our conversation makes me think of a song title or a word or phrase I want to use.
Most embarrassing moment on stage? Lauren: This one time we were playing at a house party in someone’s backyard and we all had a lot to drink. I must’ve had too much because we were playing this song called “Cult Life” and it has this kind of quieter part in the middle where it’s just me playing guitar and singing and for some reason when we got to that part I just thought the song was over so I stopped playing! I looked around and the rest of the band was staring at me and Brayden was like “LAUREN, what are you doing?” I snapped out of it and started playing again after stopping forever and I was so embarrassed after!
If you were a drink, what drink would you be? Brayden: That’s the easiest question I’ve ever been asked. Minute Maid Fruit Punch. When I die I want to be buried in a water tight coffin filled to the brim with Minute Maid Fruit Punch.
What other musicians/bands are you interested in right now? Brayden: Lately I’ve been obsessed with junk from the UK. A lot of Oasis, Blur, Bloc Party, and New Order. Aside from UK stuff, I’m always listening to Modest Mouse. And I’m usually driving around with Lauren so I listen to whatever she’s listening to, which recently has been a lot of Beyonce, Selena, and a band from Nashville called Bully.
What past trends in music do you think should never come back? Brayden: I don’t want to upset anyone, but I would say hair metal. Once you get past laughing at the videos on VH1 Classic, you see how much better your life is without hair metal. I know mine is. I don’t treat women as objects, I don’t ever have to worry about running out of hair spray, I can drink much better whiskey than Jack Daniels, and I’ll never have to fuck burritos like Motley Crue.
What’s your absolute favorite place in the city to be? Camron: As far as our city goes or anywhere near or close to our city I can easily say hands down Disneyland. In a weird way, it puts me at ease. It’s a strange place really. Feels right and wrong all at once; it’s an absolute sensory overload and a total blast on top of all of it. Kind of like a second home in its own way for me. And as far as anywhere in the world, I’ll take the entire pacific north west any day the entire west coast will always have my heart.
Describe your current studio or practice space. Camron: It’s a total mess! Haha, there’s stuff everywhere. And I think we like it that way, haha. We practice in the garage at my folks’ house where we also sometimes throw shows in and we’ve practiced there since the time we started the band. It’s pretty cramped these days with a bunch of knick knacks and guitars and empty bottles of booze and all kinds of stuff because we’ve been writing and working on a ton of new material for our next record. We’ve been in there a lot lately!
Top 3 favorite or most visited websites and why? Camron: I usually only visit one site these days on a regular basis and that’s StumbleUpon.com. If you’ve never used it, basically what it is is a site where you input all of your interests into your profile on there and hit the stumble button and it takes you to a million different websites based on what you like. My favorite thing on there is to stumble the “bizarre and oddities” category its pretty intense and out there. It definitely keeps my ADHD occupied for sure!
What do you want a viewer to walk away with after hearing your music? Tim: For me, the most important thing I want our audience to walk away with after our shows is merch! No, but really I want our audience to be able to have a connection with our music and walk away with a feeling that they were truly apart of the show.
Can you share one of the best or worst reactions you have gotten as a result of your music? Tim: One of the best reactions I have ever received from our music was last year when we played in Dallas on the Best Coast tour. I can guarantee that the majority of the people in that theater had never heard of us before. We must have made a great impression because after the show when we went to load out, there was a large amount of people waiting out back just to talk to us about how much they loved the show and to get their records signed, etc. It was pretty much awesome.
Any upcoming shows or tours we should know about?
Tim: As of right now, we don’t have any tours planned because we want to focus on recording our next album. We have a few upcoming local shows that we are stoked about. We are playing a fest for our good friends over at Lollipop Records. The fest is called Lolipalooza and that’s June 28th at the Echo and Echoplex. Then we are playing July 20th for Viva Pomona. Both fests have a killer lineup.