In the year 2000, Hollowphonic’s heady psychedelic fuzzscapes made them a hot commodity. Critics spooged over their albums Phonic 50mg and Majestic. They scored gigs opening for Super Furry Animals, Manic Street Preachers, and Low. And then… poof? The group has been MIA for the last three years until a drunk at Sneaky Dee’s asked Evan Dickson if he was the guy who smashed a sink at some party. Evan parlayed the accusation into an interview once he realized the drunk was Hollowphonic’s Brad Ketchen.<!--more-->

You got to play with some fairly big bands. Let’s hear a good tour anecdote. Preferably something that’s embarrassing for somebody.

Well, we only had Toronto opening spots not a full tour, so the anecdotes are minimal. We found out the night of the opening of the Low show which was a Thursday (after seeing Mogwai on the Tuesday and the Wednesday) that we were opening for the Manic Street Preachers that Saturday! We never met the Manics even though we had adjoining backstage rooms. I was never a fan but their road crew was cool and asked if we wanted to meet them. They had a security guard at their door and we were never allowed in. I remember reading in NME that the Manic’s had their own port-a-toilets at their Glastonbury gig for the members of their band only.

Low were nice and the Super Furry’s were really cool guys. I’m always embarrassing myself by saying the wrong thing or making a bad joke. Aidan from Arab Strap gave me an ‘are you for real’ look one night drinking with them after their show. Think there’s more (embarrassing) anecdotes in just attending shows than playing them.

Between those opener gigs and your critical success Hollowphonic must have built some strong momentum back in the early 00’s. How did the band end up by the wayside three years ago?

Unfortunately the label folded that initially released 50mg so it was hard to keep the momentum from a retail perspective. So I ended up re-releasing 50mg and releasing an EP myself under my Pharmasound imprint. We only had distribution through No Distribution from Halifax (which didn’t help with FACTOR applications, “Distributor: No Distribution”). We started selling records again in the States through ToneVendor/Claire Records.

What have you been doing during your hiatus?

The Hollowphonic hiatus resulted in my electro side project In Support of Living that soon grew into a band, so things were shelved with ‘Phonic for a bit. We are currently finishing the In Support of Living record and collaborating with film artists and doing film score work.

Your big comeback show was last November. How did it go? Were you nervous?

It was at the Silver Dollar. Always great playing Dan Burke’s shows. I wasn’t nervous at all and we played really well. For one, I am really confident with the people I play with - John, Cal and Justin. Also, it’s about a third of the gear I have to bring compared to an In Support of Living show and with fewer to no tech issues.

What do you plan on doing differently this time around?

Hollowphonic used to have a lot of electronics/loops and so forth. ‘Cause I’m doing that in ISOL I’m sticking to a 4 piece rock set up. A little heavier this time around and more upbeat than the Majestic EP or most of the material on Phonic 50mg.

What’s on the Hollowhorizon? Any new albums?

We just completed recording our first new song “Underground” that will be included on the Toronto club night Eat Your Greens compilation due for release Feb 10. You can stream a shortened version of it on our MySpace: www.myspace.com/hollowphonic. New record hopefully by spring time.