Rage against the machine

Ape Machine guitarist Ian Watts greeted me at the door of a rugged and nondescript home in deep southeast Portland, Ore. I’ve passed the house—near a breakfast joint called Bertie Lou’s—dozens of times, but there’s no way I could’ve guessed what was happening beyond those walls. I took a few steps, and Watts was already directing me to the large mixing board on my left, pointing out a tiny sticker hiding among the rows of knobs: “ape Machine.” The “T” had worn off, and my question behind the band’s name was answered.

As vocalist Caleb Heinze and bassist Brian True (former 30 Foot Fall drummer Damon Delapaz rounds out the lineup) joined us inside Magic Closet Studios’ sound room, I realized that the somewhat low-key nature of this operation sort of mirrored the band’s own philosophy. Ape Machine’s music combines the heavy, wiry riffage of Zep and Sabbath with elements of prog and psych—it’s as messy as it is melodic. It’s sort of landed them in this odd middle ground—not heavy enough for the metal crowd, and too noisy for the casual rocker.

“It’s been a little weird for us,” Watts explained. “It’s been a blessing and a curse. We’re sort of amorphous—we’ve played metal shows and rock shows. I guess the curse is that we don’t really get to be part of a scene.”

Curse might not be the right word. I actually like the fact that Ape Machine operate on the fringe of any scene. Their music certainly doesn’t reflect any exclusion. The band’s latest full-length, Mangled By The Machine, is an ambitious album, built on the loose concept of the evils of man versus technology. The amazing part, however, is the fact that the band recorded the entire thing in one take, with each of the 10 songs flowing into one another.

“Once we decided to make it a concept, we just built it and played the whole thing live every single night from start to finish for 15 days,” Watts said, adding that the band knocked out the album in only two days.

Interestingly enough, the band didn’t record Mangled in its studio, but rather a little farther south, in Oregon City, Ore., with producer/keyboardist Ikey Owens, who’s played on albums by The Mars Volta and Jack White. Owens’ keys are right up front doing battle with Watts’ guitar on the metallic and stoneriffic title track and the noise-blasted album highlight “Ruling With Intent.”

The entire record seems to wage its own war between clearheaded precision and drug-addled recklessness. “It’s more intense in some ways, and more mellow in others,” said Watts. “The song structures are a bit friendlier to those who aren’t as nerdy as ourselves.”

Europe—with its longstanding love affair with prog—has definitely taken to Ape Machine. The band toured there a few years ago, and plans to return this summer. And the members of Ape Machine have, in turn, taken to the European way of treating fellow artists and musicians.

“[Touring Europe] had to have seeped in a bit,” Watts said. “Now we have a different standard. We make sure bands are taken care of when setting up shows. We try to be more European in that respect.”

With the exception of Delapaz, the members of Ape Machine spent their formidable musical years in Sacramento, listening to Sacto legends Far and Deftones. They’ve spent the better part of the last decade in Portland, whose heavy rock scene has exploded in recent years. And while Ape Machine keeps a rather hefty touring schedule, the members admit to playing their current hometown only every few months. But Heinze says—with regard to not playing out much in Portland—that remaining somewhat insular is not necessarily a bad thing.

“I don’t make it out very often,” he said. “It keeps me focused; it keeps me from the party.”