Kayo Dot.

EIGHT-PIECE, AVANT-METAL ensemble Kayo Dot occupies its own unique corner of the extreme music map. Utilizing violins, horns, and percussion as well as guitars, bass, drums, and vocals, Kayo Dot transcends convention and traverses vast landscapes of emotion. Equal parts doom, free jazz, noise, ambient, classical, and indie, Kayo Dot's spacious, sprawling compositions evoke everything from Sunn0))) to John Coltrane. The band's second opus, Dowsing Anemone With Copper Tongue (Robotic Empire), is a thoroughly overwhelming album, highly recommended for fans of abominable lows and unnatural highs. --Jock Sollud

Kayo Dot explores musical territory beyond that of your last band, Maudlin of the Well. Do you consider Kayo Dot a musical project without limits?

Tobie Driver: At the moment it does have its limits, because we have to take into account the live setting of the band. There are a million things that we could put on tape that we just wouldn't be able to do live because of instrumentation, budget, or setting (which is one of the reasons I did a solo album); this doesn't necessarily mean that we won't reach out into those areas, but the fact that we have to consider them at all is a huge limitation.

Do you have a certain audience in mind for Kayo Dot? Do you hope to reach metal fans that were into Maudlin of the Well and turn them on to new sounds they may have never heard? Or are you more interested in reaching fans of other styles?

One problem that our band has always had was the fact that it appealed a little bit to fans in many genres, but there was always something about the music that was too something about it--too indie rock, too ambient, even too metal. I think there was certainly a point in my life when I thought about sort of leading people down certain musical avenues, but nowadays I'm not interested. Our band's music is just all about doing what's interesting to us, and not worrying about how other people take it. You can never really control how other people see you anyway, and it seems like the more you try, the more it backfires.

The new album, Dowsing Anemone With Copper Tongue, covers so much ground, it seems to touch on the entire spectrum of human emotion. Most bands offer a more one-dimensional listening experience, whether their trip happens to be anger, sadness, joy, or something else. In writing the Kayo Dot music, are there emotional places you deliberately set out to access, or do the notes and rhythms come first and just take on a life of their own?

In a way, what we touched on in this album was more deliberate than we had ever been in the past. ! simply thought it was about time to try working with colors that were unfamiliar to me. There's always room to go even further with that idea, too. Basically, I think Choirs of the Eye perfectly embodies what I had always wanted to express in that sort of astral, mystical, higher-self argot that I have always been talking about, so with Dowsing Anemone it was time to start working with a new one.

Who are some of the musicians who inspire you? Are there any contemporary bands you find inspiration in?