Interview with Andrew MacDonald of GET REAL!
Devin Meaney: Hey Andrew! Please take a minute or two to introduce yourself and your band!
Andrew MacDonald: My name is Andrew MacDonald and I sing and play guitar in a three-piece alternative rock band called Get Real! (note the fancy exclamation mark). Drew Hawboldt plays drums and Jeremy Devoe plays bass. Fun fact, those two cats have the same birthday. Different years though.
DM: How long has Get Real! been a band? And what are some of the inspirations behind the music?
AM: We’ve actually been a band for a pretty short time. Drew and I started playing music together about a year ago. I met Jeremy when he started working at the same company I work for, and he joined on bass shortly after. This would’ve been around June of 2019.
DM: How did you guys come up with the name ''Get Real!''?
AM: Drew and I went through a few different iterations before deciding we liked the name “get real” the best. We were originally going to go by “Backseat Driver”, or “Social Divide”, both of which I still kind of like, to be honest.
Just around the time we started the band, the two of us had both had a falling out with a mutual friend. I think one of the last things that was said in this dialogue was “get real, dude” or something to that effect. Drew brought it up as a potential band name. He also was the one who came up with the idea for the exclamation mark. It’s kind of cheesy, but I like to think of it as the icing on the cake. Hey, that’s one of our lyrics!
DM: How many shows have you played? Any plans on touring, within Nova Scotia or elsewhere?
AM: We’ve played an average of around 2 to 3 shows per month since we started. They’ve been smaller shows for sure, bar shows mostly. We put our all into it. It’s been harder to schedule shows lately since Drew moved to another province temporarily. We still make it work though. As for shows out of province, we may be looking to do some shows in New Brunswick in the coming year.
DM: You informed me over Facebook you record your own music. How long have you been dabbling in sound engineering?
AM: I’ve been recording my own music almost as long as I’ve been playing guitar. I record pretty much everything I play, because I’m too nervous that I’ll improvise a cool guitar riff or a catchy vocal melody and then forget it five minutes later.
I really got into the thick of the whole recording process when I was in high school, making music for my project “Every Other Aspect”. I did a lot of the recording myself, but always had a revolving set of members. A lot of those guys are currently playing in bands around the Halifax area, namely Cyrus Robertson-Orkish (Cyrus R.O Quartet) and Jesse Macleod (Electric Spoonful/Matt Steele and the Corvette Sunset/Rudy & The Pacé Family Orchestra). Taking the stage with those guys was real fun.
DM: How much is it for a copy of your latest EP, and where can a person purchase one?
AM: Right now our EP is on Bandcamp for $3. You can also stream all the tracks on services like Spotify and Apple Music. We’re also working on some physical copies of the EP as well, made DIY style just like every other aspect or our music (I did the self-reference thing again). They’re pretty modest but they do the job well. Because they’re so simple and affordable to make up, we’ll be able to sell them for $3 as well.
For now, there isn’t anywhere online that you can buy the physical copies, but we will be selling them on our site at https://getreal.band once they’re ready. You could also send us an email if you would like to be notified when they’re available!
DM: If given the choice of having two giant penises for arms, or a giant third arm for a penis, which would you choose?
AM: This was a hard one. Really coming in hot with the phrasing here. Anyway, after consulting with my bandmates: all of us, collectively and as separate human beings with our own ideas, thoughts and desires — the third arm option is the way to go. We gotta play our instruments somehow, and I have a feeling that penis arms are not the way to do that. Plus, a third arm lets you have an arm that is always making a fist, ready to take out your enemies. Perfect level, too. Get ’em where it counts.
DM: Any final comments?
AM: I’d have to say thanks for doing this interview with me and the GR! crew. We’ve got a short history but it’s great to have the opportunity to lay out the details of what we’ve been working on.
To the reader, thanks for tuning in! To learn more about the band and what we’re up to, you can check out our website at https://getreal.band, where we just launched a blog to give “updates from the attic”: a glimpse into the recording process of our second EP!
DM: Thanks for talking with me, Andrew!
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