Gary James' Interview With Luke Miller Of
Lotus



Lotus has made quite a name for themselves in the last twenty years. Formed in 1999, these guys have toured Japan six times. They've performed at festivals like Bonnaroo, the Rothbury Music Festival, Jam On The River and the All Good Music And Arts Festival to name just a few. Keyboardist Luke Miller spoke to us about his band, Lotus.

Q - Luke, it seems like every Halloween and New Years Eve, Lotus performs a theme related show. What theme did you use this Halloween (2019)?

A - For this year there were actually two Halloween performances since Halloween was on a Thursday. We did ghost-related songs on the 31st and then on that Saturday we were down in Denver and we did like a Flaming Lips theme.

Q - Since the band is an all instrumental band, who does the singing? Do you all take turns?

A - For that show it was like a combination of the percussionist and then I did some vocals on a vocoder and then the guitarist did some vocals on a vocoder pedal.

Q - On October 31st, 2008, Lotus did a show in Philadelphia billed as the "Live Fast, Die Young, The 27 Conspiracy". Each member of the group dressed up. One guy was Kurt Cobain. One guy was Jimi Hendrix. One guy was Brian Jones. One guy was Pig Pen and one guy was Jim Morrison. Who were you that night?

A - I was Kurt Cobain.

Q - Each guy was doing the hit songs of these people?

A - Exactly. We covered songs from each of those people that died at 27.

Q - Where did the idea come from to a show like that?

A - I can't remember. I think it was my idea. Just kind of a one of those legend things you hear about, like why do so many people die this age? I thought it would be an interesting idea to string them all together.

Q - What is the audience reaction to a show like that?

A - I think people enjoy it. They don't exactly know what's coming. It's something new and something unexpected.

Q - As crazy as it might seem, if you took that show theme and did it every night it would most likely be wildly successful.

A - Well, we never wanted to be a one hundred per cent cover band. We like working in covers, but we like performing original music.

Q - You don't hear about many instrumental groups these days. How did you know the idea would work?

A - Honestly, we didn't know it would work. We didn't think we were really strong singers. We preferred to just play instrumentals and we kind of went with it. There's certainly a portion of listeners that need that vocal, but we're trying to do our own thing.

Q - Which came first, the show or the record deal?

A - We never had like a big, proper record deal. We just started touring around, playing places, trying to get a word of mouth going. Next time we'd go back to a city and hopefully there would be more people. Kind of just build it up grass roots style. As we got more people to pay for tickets, we'd rent more lights or whatever. So, it was kind of organic.

Q - How many shows a year are you doing?

A - We've kind of cut it down, so we don't do as much touring as we did back ten years ago. I don't know what the number is now. At it's height it was closer to a hundred. I think it's about half that.

Q - That's probably because you would like to keep the music fresh. You don't want to burn out.

A - Yeah, exactly. And as you get older, people start having families. You can't be the road warrior you were in your twenties.

Official Website: www.LotusVibes.com

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