Omaha, Neb., indie rockers Cursive have been making music for the last 17 years. Successfully weathering lineup changes and a couple of hiatuses, the core of founding members Tim Kasher and Matt Maginn, alongside 12-year vet Ted Stevens, has spent the last few years perfecting the concept album. Their latest, I Am Gemini, is the band’s seventh full-length release and one that tells the tale of twin brothers Cassius and Pollock. It’s classic stuff, filled with angels and devils, and the ultimate struggle for a soul.
While the album’s themes are steeped in high drama, the band itself is cruising along, perfecting its highly touted live show in workmanlike fashion.
“Things are going well,” Stevens said from a tour break recently. “We’re out on the road with Minus the Bear, and we’re having a grand ole time.”
Cursive opens for the Seattle proggers at the House of Blues on Sunday night. The band is coming to the end of the Gemini run and will take a much-deserved break before starting the entire process over again.
“There’s a period coming soon where we’ll take some time off,” Stevens said. “We’ll have some downtime where everyone does their own thing, and then we’ll get back together and start writing again.”
While the core trio of the band is constantly redefining the group’s sound, Stevens said they’re always focused once they get in the studio.
“It always depends on what the material sounds like,” Stevens said. “This time, we knew that we wanted something a little more stripped-down and hard-rock sounding, and we wanted it to be a little more sparse in the instrumentation and arrangements. But we also knew we wanted a riff-rock record. There are always goals.”
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It’s likely the next album will continue the current run of Cursive’s conceptual releases, but for now, they’re having too much fun to think that far ahead.
“The crew we have right now is great,” Stevens said. “And I think we’re really doing justice to the catalog. We all get along and play so well together, and that does a lot for a band. So many times, you only have one of the two, and that makes for unhappy people. But we’re at a great spot and have a happy band.”
