While you’re at it, you can also check out the videos from our event back in March at SXSW with White Denim.

We’re going to have some big announcements about our upcoming Toronto Bonfire Sessions really soon including artist announces and info on how you can attend!

All you need to do for your chance to win is leave us a comment on this post telling us who you’d like to see at one of our Bonfire Sessions this year! We’ll pick a winner at random next Tuesday, May 15th.

Check out some photos below and stay tuned for upcoming Bonfire Sessions episodes from Noisey!

Music starts at 1pm with Pangea, followed by Fidlar and Bleached with Crystal Antlers finishing up the day.

To find out where this is all going down, you’ll need to RSVP here before 5pm tonight. It’s super easy and you’ll be glad you did it when you’re enjoying a break from the searing desert sun, sipping a free beer and listening to Crystal Antlers away from the massive Coachella crowds!

What is each of your musical backgrounds and how did you come together as a band?

Kevin (the drummer) started playing  music in the school marching band. He learned to do drum rolls real well.  Andrew & I (guitar & bass/vocals respectively) are both learned on our own for the most part. I can’t speak for Andrew, but I spent just about every afternoon from junior high till the end of high school sitting on the edge of my bed learning Black Flag songs.

Eventually, we all started bands one after another after another until Kevin & I started Crystal Antlers, right around the end of school. Andrew and Damian (who plays percussion when he’s available) also played in numerous punk bands growing up, and even played together with HR from Bad Brains in a band for a second.

In 2009, you released the first of what is supposed to be a series of limited handmade releases? What do you see as the virtue in such releases?

We’ve always made an effort to make any physical product we’ve released special in some way –usually handmade packaging, colored vinyl or some other limited sort of thing. And actually the two releases on Touch & Go (excluding the original CDR of the EP) and the CD version of Two-Way Mirror are the only things we’ve ever released that we didn’t actually manufacture/assemble ourselves.

I’ll admit, in some cases we’ve maybe taken the DIY ethic beyond what’s practical –like painting 250 cassettes, or silk screening/folding/assembling  ALL of the Two-Way Mirror vinyl. But I always remember noticing and appreciating  when bands did stuff like that growing up. That makes it worth while.

How have you changed as a band from your formation to now?

We’ve been in a constant state of change since we began. I don’t think we’ve had a consistent line-up for more than about 9 months at a time. Musically that has helped us grow –each member, regardless of how long  they were involved has brought something new to the band that becomes a part of it.

The most recent incarnation is a much more stripped down than the 4, 5 or 6 piece band that we’ve been in the past. It’s the core of the band, Kevin, Andrew & I. Guitar, Bass & Drums. A trio, which is actually exactly how we started the band.

What has been your greatest touring experience so far?

Many great times on the road, but one experience that still always seems to stand out the most is our first trip around theUSon the Fuck Yeah Fest (FYF) tour.  It was only a few weeks after we’d self-released our first EP, and none of us had really traveled much beyond the West coast and a couple short trips toTexas. We drove out toAustinto meet the rest of the bands in my work van with no seats and didn’t know what we were in for.

We met up with everyone & climbed aboard the old Bluebird school bus everyone had already been traveling in for a week or two. The bus had been converted to run on vegetable oil and was completely filthy and full of bands & comedians we’d didn’t know. Over the next month or so in that bus, those bands and everyone else (Death Set, Team Robespiere, Monotonix, Josh Fadem, Hannibal Burress, Nick Flanagan & more) became like old war buddies, & our best friends.

It was the hardest, most fucked up disorganized nightmare of a tour -as anyone who was there would attest, but because of that it became the most memorable & ultimately the most fun to look back on. It was the perfect way to cut your teeth as a school bus driver.

What musicians/bands are you influenced by from the past and of your peers?

The spirit of the all the old SST stuff (we are fromlong beachafter all) is something we’ve kept with us from our younger days & is also something that continues to be inspirational. We’ve been covering this Minutemen song called “The Struggle” & it seems to be more relevant now than ever.

Bad Brains is a big one for everyone else in the band, & I’m a total devotee to everything Beefheart and Mingus.

Bands we play with can be inspiring too, and it’s cool to see how people who are our peers approach recording in a time now where basically anything Is possible. We’ve been friends with the band Chairlift for a while since we played our first show in NY together, and their recordings always impress.

How would you describe your band to someone who has never heard you?

I never know how to answer this, but you know -it’s rock music. We grew up playing punk, and then started writing more ambitiously and playing beyond our own abilities -in a very visceral way. That’s basically what it is.

Somebody once told me that if you don’t like a Crystal Antlers song just skip to the next one –it’s gonna be a whole different thing.

What does the future hold in store for Crystal Antlers?

I finished building a studio, so hopefully there will be lots more music at much faster pace. Possibly more projects involving the core members and realistically a ton of touring and about 5 more organ players…

You have released material through a number of different labels? What is it that you look for in a record label?

The fist two singles we released were on friend’s labels (Majic Wallet & Backflip), but the EP and numerous other releases actually didn’t have any label on them at all. For our latest batch of releases we decided to add the moniker Recreation Ltd. but it’s really just us in a garage folding record sleeves.  The only “real” label we’ve ever worked with was Touch & Go, which was a great experience, but we all know how that turned out…

I think  if we were to sign with a label again the most important thing would be for us to have a sense that they really cared about what we were doing and would be willing to support us creatively –which is what we felt with Touch and Go.

Oh yeah and a 5 million dollar advance wouldn’t hurt either.

What was it like to work with Michael Belfer (The Sleepers/Tuxedomoon)? What have been some standout experiences in your recording history?

Michael was pretty much my mentor when we started the band and working with him had a huge impact on the way that I approach music –which I didn’t fully realize until recently. We did a ton of recording together, and though very little of it ever was released, it was an important experience. I lost touch with him for a few years but just recently re-connected & we’ve talked about possibly doing some more stuff in the future.

Working with Ikey Owens was & is a great pleasure as well. He filled in on keys for us at a couple shows and ended up producing 2 of our records & touring with us until very recently (until he left us for Jack White L) . Ikey taught us a lot about how to deal with the music industry & how to be productive musicians. Still to this day one of the busiest guys I know.

Can we expect a release of your tour-film Until The Sun Dies?

Expect a release at some point –but it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen in the near future. We’ve been focused on music mostly & the director Michael Reich, has been busy directing a million music videos and TV shows. The film is mostly edited, or at least that’s what I was told by a waitress I met who told me Michael hired her to edit it. I guess now we’re really just waiting on funding to film the final scenes, and a producer who’s willing to jump in head-first.

Your records have consistently featured some really interesting cover art, especially the original release of your self-titled EP, which features Max Ernst’s “The Robbing of the Bride.” Could you speak to some of these pieces and how they complemented your aural aesthetic?

I’d first ran across Max Ernst when I was a kid in a book about the supernatural I’d found on a blanket at the swap meet. At the begging of the section on Birds & their use in cult practices, they had the painting “the robbing of the bride.” That led me to check out more of his art and eventually the Art Institute inChicagowhere they have many Ernst paintings. I had always wanted to use it for an album cover, and the tone seemed to fit with the music on our first EP. Unfortunately, when Touch & Go re-issued it they were not able to use the original artwork, but a friend of a friend named Jefferson Maydaymayday was kind enough to let us use a very interesting piece of his artwork for that version.

We’ve had a lot of good fortune with friends donating artwork to us to use, but of course we were very excited about the artwork from Raymond Pettibon for Two-Way Mirror.  It made a certain sense because of our connection to the lineage of music in the south bay/long beach. –that and I just look at the art and I hear the music, it’s what an artwork should be.

Hmm but where to go next?

Formed in 2006 in Long Beach, CA, Crystal Antlers draws much of their aesthetic from the So Cal DIY scene, while their sound comes from a variety of influences including avant-garde pop, psychedelic rock, and punk. The band has had a rotating lineup since it’s inception, varying from a core power trio of bass, drums, and guitar to larger groups featuring additional instrumentation like percussion and organ.

The band has release two full length LP’s, an EP, and a whole hand full of singles, 7″s, and cassettes with all but two releases being hand produced and packaged by the band themselves in true DIY fashion.

Crytal Antlers is currently hard at work on a new album in their recently completed recording studio that will feature a stripped down sound of the bands original power trio lineup.

Check back later this week for an in-depth Q&A from the band, and if you’re heading down to Coachella this year, don’t miss the JanSport Bonfire Sessions with Crystal Antlers, Bleached, and Fidlar going on during the day on 4/21. You can find more info and RSVP right here!

The auction has since been extended because of an outpouring of donations. New items include some really cool limited addition show posters from Mastodon and Mogwai, a copy of Wilco’s Summerteeth signed by Jeff Tweedy, an autographed copy of the Flaming Lips with Neon Indian LP signed by the man Wayne Coyne himself, and some one of a kind JanSport prototypes. Be the only person on the planet with these monochrome versions of two popular JanSport pack silhouettes!

Items still up for auction include test pressings from Bon Iver and Sufjan Stevens, signed swag from The Tallest Man On Earth and, and a signed framed photo and CD bundle from Vampire Weekend.

Bid now!

We know, it was announced yesterday, but for those that haven’t heard yet this year’s Lollapalooza lineup has been announced and it does not disappoint. The three day festival will be held from August 3rd through 5th in Chicago, IL right smack dab in the middle of the city in Grant Park (home to the big fountain in the opening credits of Married With Children- remember how awesome that show was!?)

This year’s lineup has some obvious and expected big names- The Black Keys, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jack White- but the addition of Black Sabbath was a bit of a surprise, and not in a bad way. We remember seeing Sabbath ten years ago on what was supposed to be their “last tour”, and obviously it wasn’t, but considering the deteriorating condition of some of the band’s members this time around may really might be the last chance to see the band live in the flesh. Ozzy has had his health issues, and guitarist Tony Iommi has been undergoing treatment for lymphoma Also note that Bill Ward, the band’s original drummer will be sitting this one out. See them while you can- it can’t get more epic than ”War Pigs” played to thousands of people singing along.

Also of note is the heavy presence of electronic artists at this year’s festival: Avicii, Justice, and Bassnectar all have headlining spots. On the other end of the spectrum, one of the sets we’re most excited for is another At the Drive In reunion (the band is playing a very small handful of dates together this year, including Coachella.)

Of course, some of the most interesting performances at big festivals are always on the small stages during the day and Lollapalooza  is no different. Some highlights include Bear In Heaven, The War On Drugs, Milo Greene, Dr. Dog, Tune-Yards, Delta Spirit and JanSport Bonfire Sessions alumni The Black Angels.

See the whole line-up here

Also a quick congrats to Kevin Combs for winning the limited edition silk-screened Bonfire Sessions Austin poster signed by members of White Denim, Strange Boys, Bear Hands, and  Fly Golden Eagle. Kevin was at last year’s Bonfire Session in Austin as well and managed to get his poster signed by the Black Angels, so we’re glad we could help start a collection for him!

In addition to awesome music, a bonfire, free BBQ and free beer, you could get your hands on a new JanSport backpack and other exclusive on-site giveaways.

The JanSport Bonfire Sessions in Palm Springs is FREE, but space is limited, so RSVP now at www.jansport.com/bonfiresessions to receive event news before it’s published. RSVP confirmations, secret location information and transportation details to be revealed via email next week so stay tuned!

Follow JanSport on facebook and Twitter for more Bonfire Sessions news.

See you in Palm Springs!