Overcalc has big plans. The solo project of Baltimore’s Nick Skrobisz toured with Zombi last year. Now, he’s promoting a split release to come later this year. “I don’t know if you’re familiar with The Three Stooges, but Larry, Curly, and Moe try to get through the same doorway,” Skrobisz told me in an interview earlier this month. “It almost feels like mining cryptocurrencies. It's just like this very arduous thing where I’m working a little bit on this and a little bit on that. I'm trying to be better about it. It's not easy, but it's all I know how to do.”
I spoke to Skrobisz ahead of Overcalc’s upcoming release. We discussed multi-disciplinary art, networking among musicians, and the long tradition of modifying guitars to make electronic music. Skrobisz began by discussing his motivation for designing album covers.
“I think it's important when one is making some sort of statement. I know a lot of artists that don't feel visually inclined and like to outsource that sort of thing,” Skrobisz said.
“I have an upcoming release where I'm collaborating with the guys in a band called Child Bite from Detroit, and they run a silkscreen shop. They do high color counts with five, seven, or more colors. They’re still very skilled at it. My other band, Multicult, they do custom silkscreens. So I gave them some artwork to start with, and they’re going to develop that further into a color silkscreen for the next Overcalc release, which has been in the can now for six or seven months.”
Skrobisz has been networking like crazy. During our interview, he hyped his labelmates, his fellow Baltimore artists, and Zombi, the headliners of last year’s tour. “I did a collaboration record, actually, with Steve Moore of Zombi, who does a lot of solo stuff as well,” Skrobisz said. “It’s such a good time working with Steve. He reached out kind of randomly a few months later. He was like, ‘Hey, you want to come on tour with Zombi?’ That was a huge gift, an honor. It was very nice to get a guarantee and not to be booking every single show. I just have to show up and play.”
Skrobisz relished the opportunity to play a supporting role. “I'm going to be on the phone with the label that’s doing the Child Bite guys for the latest Overcalc release, right after this,” Skrobisz said. Skrobisz gushed about everyone involved in his collaboration with Zombi’s Steve Moore, especially the label Sleeping Giant Glossolalia. “The label that put out that split, Sleeping Giant Glossolalia in New York, they're really great. Most of the Overcalc stuff that's been done and a couple things that are coming will be through that label, and they put out the Steve Moore/Overcalc split. They're really a very unique label,” he said. “They just put out Romleh. They did a Peter Peter Brötzmann record. He’s always putting out the most cool, esoteric stuff that isn't just, with no disrespect, kind of just humdrum like guitar-bass-drums rock bands.”
Overcalc isn’t humdrum. When playing before Zombi, Skrobisz let his eyes drift somewhere else while picking the guitar and operating the loop pedals. “I use a stereo guitar, which basically puts three strings on each side. It's sort of like two three-string guitars you're listening to on each side of the stereo field. It was kind of right at the genesis of this project that I initially had the idea and was like, ‘Mono guitar on top of synth just sounds like you're karaokeing.’ You're smushing it, and it doesn't really sound like it goes together, but with the split guitar, it really weaves itself into electronic music a lot more subtly.”
“You have to sort of wire it up yourself. When you take it apart, it looks really homemade. It’s a fantastic thing, and I hope that I never lose that guitar, because I don't want to build that thing all over.” Skrobisz compared it to the Berlin school of electronic music, the Scottish hauntologists Boards of Canada, and solo records from members of Zombi.
“It’s very informed by some Krautrock tonality,” Skrobisz said of his solo music as Overcalc, “It's weird and probably overly detailed, but I think it scratches an itch that can't be scratched with anything else.” Overcalc rocks harder than any of these influences. His most recent album, 2022’s Fruits of the Decision Tree, recalls math rock at some points. The opening track, “Fruits,” starts with a plucked guitar, then introduces some distorted riffs, and then finishes on a melodic solo. One track, “Rookit,” builds to a crescendo typical of post-rock. “Mid-Nigh” relies on a looped, bassy arpeggio to support the guitar’s twinkly leads.
Next month, his band will open for Pageninetynine, a band considered royalty in the genre. “He does put out guitar-bass-drums bands as well, and I play in a couple of those as well,” Skrobisz said of the label boss at Sleeping Giant Glossolalia. “So, no disrespect to that whole genre if one wants to classify it that way.”
Like Pageninetynine, Skrobisz hails from northern Virginia, although he lives in Baltimore. “I think Baltimore has been a big part of my musical upbringing overall,” Skrobisz said. “I moved here about 18 years ago. I've been all over the 48 states many times, touring in numerous bands, and there’s something very special about Baltimore, especially as a place to live.”
Skrobisz will be fronting Multicult as they open for Pageninetynine. They play Ottobar on Sep. 25.