NORMANS aren’t a band that arrived fully formed — they emerged, almost accidentally, from late‑night conversations on a battered boat in Marina del Rey, from exotica deep dives, from chaos, discipline, and the urge to turn everything up just a little louder. What began as a quarantine distraction quickly revealed its own gravity, pulling Matthew Reid, Michael Perry Rudes and Kyle Souza into a project that feels physical, intentional and defiantly alive. Their new album Faust Demonica pushes that intensity into sharper focus: a record shaped by self‑remembering, subconscious expression and the strange, shifting landscape of Southern California’s underground. In conversation, they’re wry, reflective and occasionally philosophical, the kind of band who’ll cite Gurdjieff, complain about TikTok venues, and casually reveal aristocratic lineage in the same breath.
Mike and I had taken up working on this shitty boat in Marina del Rey during the quarantine times. We spent a lot of time fishing, getting stranded at sea, and talking about music. We were both really on an exotica kick: Eden Ahbez, Martin Denny, Les Baxter—weird sort of ’60s tropical stuff. Anyway, the plan was to make a kind of new-school exotica-sounding record, which we did record a few tracks of, but we found ourselves turning up the volume more and more when we would get in the rehearsal room. NORMANS was always there waiting to come out. At least that’s how I see it.
The first record was pure chaos. I did absolutely everything myself, and it drove me nearly insane. This record, we were very fortunate to work with some talented professionals in some amazing studios. There is no glory in grinding it out alone. Let people have their say, trust the process, and believe what’s being brought forth naturally is the right thing. That’s my advice.
Being in a band and making a record in 2026 is an insanely banal endeavor. The sheer volume of artists and content being generated is nothing short of mind-blowing. Four hundred million terabytes of data is created every day, and with AI that number is sure to go even higher.
That being said, the only real way to derive any satisfaction from this world is to genuinely feel that you have expressed yourself. The record is honest, intentional, and reflects the way our band sounds right now. That’s the long-winded way of saying our own chemistry would be the real influence.
Other people might say Depeche Mode.
This is a big one for me, and I’ll do my best not to sound preachy. Like I mentioned before, being in a band, being an artist, or just being a fucking human being right now comes with a lot of added complexity. You see too much, you feel too much, you think too much.
You are not going to change the world or where things are headed, but you can change the way you interface with it.
The book Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson, or An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man was very inspirational to me. It’s about increasing awareness in everyday life, as well as seeing and transforming mechanical habits. Many of the songs on this record are written from a sort of Fourth Way, self-remembering perspective. Perspective is art’s greatest power, turning individual experience into shared understanding.
Mozart, Rammstein, Eden Ahbez.
Mainly just to see who would show up.
That’s an interesting area of discussion at the moment. Ten years ago, in East L.A., on any given night you could find several amazing shows with great crowds and excellent music. It was always a party.
Since COVID, things have really dropped off—not just in average crowd size, but a lot of the venues were purchased by large corporations that cater to the new TikTok and YouTube acts.
Maybe it’s just my generation aging out of going to shows a few nights a week, or a general lack of interest in heavier music, but it’s certainly a changing landscape.
Venues like Permanent Records Roadhouse, Zebulon, and Non Plus Ultra have been crucial in keeping the scene alive in our neck of the woods.
We all have our own preferences musically, but one thing we do share is a certain attitude when it comes to the way the music comes off. We want maximum impact.
People need to feel it.
Like I mentioned before, working with other people made it much easier to focus on the core intention of the song rather than the technical aspects that can really bog you down and hijack your focus.
That track goes way back to when Mike and I would jam in the garage with just drums and a bass. I wrote the lyrics the same night.
They were supposed to be sort of dumb and silly, but looking back, they hold up and say a lot more than I might have intended at the time. Never underestimate the power of subconscious expression.
We’ve been enjoying these sort of targeted mini-tours. Last year we did several shows just in Texas, and it was awesome. So I imagine there will be more of that, as well as some European dates at some point.
Mike is an unrecognized heir to the 12th Duke of Devonshire.
This is how we finance the majority of our records.
I’m going to go with time travel so I can go back and tell myself not to watch the 2024 Alex Garland film Civil War – It was a terrible movie.
