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Thursday, June 20, 2019
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
ARTS

Hippo Campus opened Bonna-
roo’s Saturday evening sets with 
an energetic performance that 
prevailed over the scorching heat. 
The Minnesota band played hits 
from both of their last two albums 
— Landmark which dropped in 
the winter of 2017 and Bambi that 
followed a year later — the sixty-
minute set showing their range as 
a collective, while giving a taste of 
their development from one project 
to the next. After the show, all five 
members of the band (lead guitarist 
Jake Luppen, lead guitarist Nathan 
Stocker, bassist Zach Sutton, drum-
mer Whistler Allen, trumpeter 
DeCarlo Jackson) sat down with 
The Daily to talk about the evolu-
tion of their sound, their first musi-
cal influences and their band’s code 
of conduct in the event of mass hys-
teria.
The Michigan Daily: How does 
playing at a massive festival like 
Bonnaroo compare to a smaller, 
more intimate show?
Zach 
Sutton: 
I 
think 
you 
answered your own question. It’s 
definitely less intimate at a festival. 
At a show, especially at a smaller 

show with a smaller venue, smaller 
attendance, you have the opportu-
nity to be more subtle, more inti-
mate, more … quiet, even, whereas 
at festivals you kind of have to keep 
the ball rolling, keep the energy up. 
I can’t say I prefer one or the other, 
they’re both different. They’re both 
super fun.
Nathan Stocker: One’s a buffet 
and one’s the main course.
TMD: ‘Bambi’ felt like a big 
change from ‘Landmark,’ both 
in terms of the electronic instru-
mentation and the confessional 
themes. Would you say those 
changes are connected?
ZS: Definitely.
NS: Yes. Jake (Luppen)? What do 
you have to say about that?
Jake Luppen: …
ZS: Process, process …
JL: Mmm, I don’t know, what do 
you guys think?
ZS: Well I personally feel like 
there’s a correlation. We spent 
a lot of time separate from each 
other, writing Bambi with our 
computers, outside of the room 
jamming together. And that hap-
pened because of natural changes 
— whether that’s with our producer 
or just learning more about produc-
tion — and then that was reflected 
in the lyrics and in the content 
because we drifted more outside of 
the ‘Basement,’ as we call it.
JL: I think the electronic ele-
ments helped us strip things down 
because everything was so clean. 

It allowed us to strip all the songs 
down to a minimal amount of 
instruments while still allowing 
them to be as loud and aggressive as 
we wanted them to be.
TMD: Do you see that as a 
future direction for Hippo Cam-
pus?
JL: I don’t know, I feel like we’ll 
probably make a record that sounds 
totally different from Bambi next … 
cause we’re in the business of mak-
ing records that sound different.
ZS: That’s right.
JL: Every time.
DeCarlo Jackson: (Mumbling a 
melody) Burr-pa-burr ...
JL: Yeah, something like that.
TMD: Speaking of future proj-
ects, Jake, you recently posted 
on twitter about a future demos 
album. You just released ‘Demos 
1’ a few days ago. What will that 
(future album) be? Will that just 
be ‘Demos 2’?
JL: Well, you know, what natu-
rally follows one is typically two.
(The band laughs)
NS: What normally follows one? 
When I say I have to go to the bath-
room, and they ask which number, I 
say number one.
JL: It’s not demos three.
NS: And when I say I have to go 
to the bathroom a few hours later, 
they don’t ask, they know. He’s 
going number two.
TMD: What track would you 
say you’re the most proud of?
ZS: In our discography?

TMD: Yeah.
ZS: I like “Warmglow” the best. 
It’s different from the rest, and I 
fuck with it. 
NS: I can back that. I like differ-
ent songs for different reasons, you 
can’t really pick one. But that’s sort 
of the point, to reach closer and 
closer to all of them completing a 
puzzle, but it’s never really ending, 
that search for the right pieces.
TMD: Okay, so, you all are 
stranded on a deserted island. 
Something’s 
gone 
terribly 
wrong, it’s just the five of you. 
Who is the first to resort to can-
nibalism and eat the others? 
That or some other depraved 
nonsense.
JL: Zach (Sutton).
ZS: You think I’m gonna —
NS: You’re gonna eat one of us 
first. Yeah.
JL: Zach’s the most violent one.
DJ: Or at least suggest it (canni-
balism), like.
NS: Yeah, you’re like, “Guys, just 
thinking, we’re all hungry.”
ZS: Guys, I would never do that.
NS: It’s not about you never doing 
it, it’s about you being the first one —
ZS: Genuinely, I think it would be 
you, Nathan. You’d be like, “We’ve 
gotta look at the facts.”
NS: The first one to be eaten 
would 
definitely 
be 
Whistler 
(Allen).
Whistler Allen, silent until now, 
smiles.
Whistler Allen: That’s not the 
question.
ZS: Unfortunately, I agree with 
you (Nathan). 
(The band laughs)
NS: Whistler would be eaten 
first. We wouldn’t be able to find 
DeCarlo (Jackson) ‘cause he’d be 
playing trumpet somewhere. 
ZS: ‘Cause he’d have his trumpet, 
undoubtedly.
NS Jake would leave a bread-
crumb trail of shit he brought with 
you.
DJ: Just a whole stack of hotel 
cards.
NS: Zach would be working out 
or something. And I’d be doing 
what I’m doing right now, analyz-
ing all of it … Yeah you know, maybe 
I would do it.
TMD: So what was the transi-
tion like, adding a fifth member 
(Jackson)?
ZS: Seamless.
NS: Yeah, there wasn’t really 
much of one.
JL: (to Jackson) How’d you feel?
DJ: How’d I feel? Man, I felt a 
whole lot of things. It was really 
hard.
JL: Really?
DJ: I mean, it’s a tough group to 

play with, because you can’t over-
play, but if you underplay everyone 
will assume you don’t exist. It was 
a tough in-between to find. At the 
same time, I tried to make the tran-
sition as easy as possible on every-
one else. In the sense that I tried to 
only make things better — I tried 
my best not to get in the way too 
much.
TMD: How did you get started 
with the group? How did you 
integrate or meet?
DJ: Umm, we all went to high 
school, so I’ve known these guys 
since they sucked at writing music.
NS: For the record, we still suck 
at writing music.
DJ: You didn’t let me finish my 
sentence, either.
TMD: Do you guys have any 
artists that you remember latch-
ing onto growing up? Kind of as 
your first influence? Your first 
favorite artist?
NS: Enya.
ZS: Was that? Because that was 
big for me.
NS: Enya was big.
ZS: The first record I bought 
was Black Parade by My Chemical 
Romance.
DJ: Ah.
ZS: And I stand by that as being 
a big influence on everything I do — 
extending past music.
DJ: Fallout Boy Infinity On High. 
Pfff, crazy.
JL: Led Zeppelin had this live 
album called How the West Was 
Won, and I used to listen to that all 
the time.
TMD: Who are your guys’ 
favorite active artists?
ZS: The Brother Brothers. I 
cannot get enough of The Brother 
Brothers.
NS: The Brother Brothers are 
really good.
TMD: I’m not familiar with 
them, what are they like?
ZS: Folk.
NS: Twins.
ZS: They are brothers, come to 
find out. They covered Buck Meek’s 
song on their I think first and only 
record —
NS: No, it’s their second record.
ZS: Second record? Some People I 
Know, something like that … (sing-
ing) “Sam Bridges burned down 
to El Paso / Chasing the sound of 
speed.”
NS: Anyway, anyone else? 
DJ: Oh and Nilüfer Yanya, Nilüfer 
Yanya. Is that how you say it?
NS: (singing) “Mahhhliah, mahhl-
iah.” Great. Great record.
ZS: And Fontaines D.C.
JL: Recently Club Night put out 
a really cool album, about a month 
ago, I think.

Views from ‘Roo 2019: A 
chat with Hippo Campus

MUSIC INTERVIEW

ROLLING STONE

STEPHEN SATARINO 
Daily Film Editor

JONAH MENDELSON
Daily Arts Writer

