Patrick Kindlon doesn’t pay any mind to the complexities of the world. The Drug Church vocalist is all too aware of the comings and goings of this place we call home. All you have to do is listen to his strained hollering on any of his band’s albums.
“I’m sorry you’re getting this double chin action. I was supposed to be in Australia right now,” he smiles reclining, a “Sweet Dreams” decorative sign hanging ominously behind him as if to taunt the ensuing chat. “Instead, I’m at my parent’s house for three weeks, so there’s no place to be except this bed.”
You see, Pat is someone who rarely pulls punches. Four albums in and the same stream-of-consciousness stare down he’s toted since 2013’s ‘Paul Walker’ is still grinding. While the sound has morphed from hardcore rough ‘n’ ready, particularly on 2018’s ‘Cheer’ which found melodies and harmonies dancing hand in hand with the ever-present towering wall of distorted youthful vigour, the words still draw blood.
That reckless abandon is what draws the eyes and ears of everyone around Drug Church. Though he’s aware that being in a band comes with its own pitfalls, particularly with the understanding that “we’ve got to hit a stinker once in a while, I guess,” the fact Pat follows it up quickly with “but I don’t think that’s this record” is testament to ‘Hygiene’, Drug Church’s next chapter.
Playing one of the central roles in Drug Church’s story, along with Nick Cogan (guitar), Cory Galusha (guitar), Chris Villeneuve (drums), Patrick Wynne (bass), it’s Pat who puts the thorny words to his band’s musical riot. “While you are the main character of your own life, it’s really just a walk-on part for everybody else,” he says, kneading into the DNA of Drug Church, a band who portray the euphoria and dysphoria of life through vignettes.
On ‘Hygiene’, Pat is also targeting himself. Well, at least the idea of false idols. The crudely titled ‘Piss & Quiet’ features the scathing “don’t believe a thing, from a man on stage”, something people inherently tend to do, even down to resonating with protagonists (and even more often than not, antagonists) from films.
“I think you’ll want to identify with something whether it’s a uniform or a slogan or a human being, and I don’t think any of them are healthy,” he says. “I understand the thirst for it, and I don’t deny that it’s human, and it’s normal – but I don’t think it’s healthy.”
Arguably, searching for answers from a voice on a stage is something that dates back thousands of years. The religious connotations are too easy; it’s far better to draw a line through those and look at the new reality of influencers and artists that elevate themselves onto pedestals built through TikTok tipping and YouTube ads.
“If somebody purports to know all the answers, they most certainly do not.” He continues, “Musicians are just individuals, speaking from their individual experience. They have no more insight into your life than you do into theirs, you know? And they’re only giving you what they opt to present.”
The cleaver ready for swinging, Pat soon lays into a number of his peers. “Not only do they not have an answer, most of them have like a couple of semesters of college and a drug problem,” he chortles. “Why would I trust that person? What insights are possible? How are they going to illuminate something I’ve never thought about before? If there’s something that you can take from their lyrics that applies to you, that’s great. But I would say the spirit of the thing can never be literal because you just can’t know each other like that.”
For all his chagrin to the very nature of this world he inhabits, the truth of the matter is, Pat is a part of this problem. How does that sit with him?
“I do my best to stop them a little bit,” he chews. “I’m not going for likeable. The fellows that go for likeable; they want to be liked by everybody, they want to present well, and they never want to say the wrong thing. Those dudes live in a prison of their own creation because then you’re dealing with a total stranger telling you they’re disappointed in you.”
Water off a duck’s back comes to mind when chatting to Pat. There’s a tempered stubbornness to him that feels like the guarded wall of someone not wanting to be one of the “people who I think are trapped, they have to be Mr Perfect all the time. That’s just not viable.”
Undoubtedly, the internet is a significant cause of such endless perfectionism. Pat’s own social media imprint mostly leads by example, particularly when compared to others in his game who utilise every waking moment to try and connect with the world. There’s even a lighthearted dedicated Twitter account calling themselves The Kincels.
“I don’t blame anybody for taking [the internet] literally. If you are simply an observer, if you’re never the subject of conversation, then I would understand how you could think that people are having sincere battles from the heart,” he says. “But if you’ve ever seen yourself discussed in any sort of way, you realise that everything’s nonsense. You realise that people are full of shit because you just read people’s takes on something that you know a great deal more about, and you just go, oh, wait a second. Nobody knows nothing out here, you know what I mean?”
Pat’s viewpoint comes from being on both sides of the fence. Not only in his Drug Church tenure but also from his preceding work with cult rock band Self Defense Family, not to mention his own comic book work. Which is all to say why he comes across less like a curmudgeon and more like someone who’s been a party to being spoken about, while also having done his fair share of the talking.
“If you apply that to everything, then you start to realise they don’t know about my life, and they don’t know any better about Kanye West’s life, but they talk about it all day. I have to assume that he’s sitting at home looking at his phone and goes, ‘Wow, they really got this one wrong’.”
“I just don’t take people very seriously,” he adds. “Particularly people who are insisting that I take them seriously online.”
It’s all a lot to unpack – especially in a music rag – but it’s all prescient, especially in a world that moves faster than we can dare to even attempt to catch up. As for how this all comes into play – the fast-paced world, the dedication as a musician – well, Pat also has some thoughts on that.
“It’s a debate that I have at times because I devote myself to two things; music and comic books. I devoted myself to them in a very lifetime vocation fashion – and I’ve been satisfied by that because there are so many different challenges to have in those things that you don’t get bored,” he says. “But I don’t necessarily blame somebody who got their fill and is ready to move on to the next challenge in life. It’s difficult for me to relate to.”
This removal of consciousness in the search for a higher plain of living is commendable. Particularly in a world where getting sucked into whatever everyone else has going on is easier than chucking yourself down a slip ‘n’ slide. Hours spent scrolling in bed, inhaling everything and anything. It can all be a bit much. It’s even worse when you think you know what you’re talking about and that the world needs to know what you’ve got to say.
Pat’s master plan on this is getting people to just keep themselves to themselves. The previous professing of “not going for likeable” runs through the truth he wants to holler from his Drug Church platform.
“It used to be if somebody said ‘I don’t know why anybody would want to hear my opinion on that’, I would go, ‘Oh, that sounds insecure. Of course, you matter. Of course, you should want to get your views out in the world’. And now,” he breathes before letting the pendulum swing back down. “I’ve completely flipped on that. When somebody says, ‘I don’t know why anybody would want my opinion on that’. I go, ‘you’re probably fucking right’. I think that’s a good point. What the fuck can I offer to this conversation?”
Pat’s parting words may not seem the most enlightening and certainly wouldn’t make for a good motivational poster. Particularly from someone who confesses his “relationship with music has made me much more forgiving a person.” But when they come with such directness from the voice of a band who so deftly hold the realities of life in their pummelling melodies, well, maybe it does take this not-so-subtle dose of reality to make the world right itself. Or, as Pat smoothly says, “people should just accept that they are noise and they don’t matter.” Sweet dreams, indeed.
Taken from the April issue of Upset. Drug Church’s album ‘Hygiene’ is out now.
