Music

HPX 2011 Questionnaire: Cousins

by Nicole Villeneuve

Halifax’s Cousins are a favourite around town; the duo, with Aaron Mangle at the helm, create some of the most accessible yet underground-friendly pop to come from the edge of the Atlantic. In July, we named their most recent single one of the best of the month , and it sounds like we’ll have a lot more new stuff soon—Mangle says just at the tail end of finishing recording a new album.

We caught him on the phone before we got to his fair city and ran our Halifax Pop Explosion 2011 Questionnaire by him.

AUX: What would be in your HPX survival kit?

Aaron Mangle: Tiger Balm. I always get a sore neck when I stand around or go to a show or dance or something. So I usually keep Tiger Balm with me. It calms the pain.

Who are you most looking forward to seeing at the festival?

Ooh. Great question. Oh, Jennifer Castle. I always catch like, two songs when I go to see her. So hopefully this time I see the whole thing. Or at least more than two songs.

As someone who lives in Halifax, tell us something you love about the city?

I like my backyard a lot. And I like the smell [of the city]. When we come back if you’ve been away or something, and you come into town like over the bridge, you smell it. And it doesn’t always smell good, but I always like the smell, even if it’s bad.

Why is your show the show that people should go see?

If I wasn’t in Cousins, I would go to see the shows we’re playing as well. I think ours are going to be the best. Not necessarily our set, but the show overall. All the bands together, I think it’s strong. Like overall. As a package.

Who is your favourite Halifax band or artist, and why?

There’s a new band I really like called Dream Friends. They should be playing this festival if they’re not. This is a hard question! Let’s leave it at that. I think they’re my favourite current Halifax band. They’re good.

What’s happening for the band after HPX?

Finishing the album, and we’re going to go do some recording with a band near Parrsboro called Construction and Destruction. I think they’re the best band in Canada. We’re going to do a split with them sometime. But they have a studio in their house, and that’s where they record all their stuff. So we’ll do a couple songs with them. And we’ll hopefully do some recording with Jay Crocker. He lives on the south shore now. He’s got a home studio too, and invited us to do some recording. And that’s it! I think. Planning. We’re going to be planning.

Cousins play at Gus’ Pub this afternoon at 12:30pm.