Who are you in a nutshell?
My name is Aarush Banerjee, and I am a high schooler from Henry M Gunn High School who is passionate about music and want to be more involved in it. I’m the drummer and one of the lyricists in a four piece rock band. I want to spread my music as much as possible and essentially live my life based around my music.
What classes do you teach through QuaranTunes?
I teach drum set lessons through the QuaranTunes platform.
When did you form your band?
Our band, The Purple Hearts’ Club, was formed in the summer between freshman and sophomore year of high school. Since then, we have changed our lead singer and recently released two new singles.
What songs, albums, and/ or groups inspire your music?
Every member of our band has our own unique influences that results in a very diverse pool of knowledge. Some of the groups that influence our music the most include Red Hot Chili Peppers, Foo Fighters, Green Day, Mac DeMarco, and many other artists.
How have you managed to stay connected with your group mates throughout this time?
All the members in our band are good friends and we stay connected through social media and video chats and we work on our songs by working individually and presenting our ideas to our group chat for feedback.
What’s the story with your newest song, Runaways?
One day I went to Amar, our guitarist’s, house for a jam session. We had been practicing all the covers and our upcoming single, Wild Ride, but after a while it got too late for us to play electric so we went up to his room and wrote riffs on the acoustic. Amar was noodling around on the guitar and came up with a triplet fingerstyle riff. After I’d gone home, he sent an audio clip to the group chat of the riff, except fully developed. It blew my mind. The next couple jam sessions were focused on this song. After a lot of improvisation, I had made a driving drum beat for the song. Jad, our bassist, had made up his bass part for the song on a bus ride without his bass. Lyrics were written and revised many times until we brought Jonny, our singer, in for one of the jam sessions and he improvised random words and melodies that blew us away. Most of the lyrics for the song now were from that improvisation. We put al the parts together and made one hell of a song.
Where is the song available?
All major streaming platforms including Spotify, iTunes/Apple Music, Google Play, Deezer, SoundCloud, YouTube Music, and more!