King Sized Bishop-A Prolific Band From LA That You Don’t Want to Let Pass You By-Written By: JW Kondor

RRX: Who are the members of King Sized Bishop and what role do each of you play in the band?

Jacob Shneiderman – Guitar + Vox
Bram Silbert – Drums
Ezra Hecht – Bass + Vox

RRX: How did King Sized Bishop (KSB) and it’s sound come about?

KSB: The founding members of King Sized Bishop, Jacob Shneiderman and Bram Silbert, met while attending a local rock music camp in their hometown of Los Angeles. After bonding over classic rock bands like Led Zeppelin, The Who and Pink Floyd, they became friends and started King Sized Bishop.
Jacob Shneiderman and Bram Silbert recorded their first album, Jamu (2015), when they were fifteen years old. They shared guitar and bass playing responsibilities, while Bram played drums and recorded and mixed all of the songs. Jamu features jams in the likes of The Allman Brothers and The Grateful Dead, while also drawing inspiration from 70s progressive rock bands like Yes, ELP, and King Crimson.

After recording Jamu, King Sized Bishop played live with a variety of bass players, but none of them stayed in the group. Bram’s sister, Stella Silbert, introduced the group to their current bass player, Ezra Hecht. Ezra’s ear for more unusual styles and passion for music transformed the band’s sound greatly. During the band’s rehearsals with him, they would spend hours showing each other new music that they discovered on the internet, spawning a culture centered around curiosity and creativity.
Since 2016, King Sized Bishop has recorded three singles – “Mondo” (2016), “The North Face” (2017), and “Plastic Tongue” (2017) – and three albums – Why Be You, When You Could Be New? (2019), MAJA (2019), and Lifetime Supply (2021).

The three mentioned singles are all longer than seven minutes. They have a heavier sound that is heavily inspired by Black Sabbath’s earlier albums, which remain a huge inspiration for KSB. While still paying homage to their original inspirations, they started to incorporate more distorted guitar sounds, thicker instrumentations, and jazz inspired chord progressions to create a modern, yet eclectic progressive rock/ fusion sound.
Why Be You, When You Could Be New? features two longer tracks by Shneiderman that are similar to the three singles (“Overcast” and “Lathe of Heaven”) as well as two shorter tracks by Silbert. MAJA (released in tandem with Why Be You, When You Could Be New?) is an album of completely improvised jams, similar to King Crimson’s improvisations on their live albums.

King Sized Bishop’s most recent release, Lifetime Supply, was written and recorded during the COVID pandemic. Half of the recording was done in person, while the other half was done remotely. Lifetime Supply features less jamming than KSB’s previous releases, but boasts a richer and more “radio friendly” production style. Shneiderman and Silbert were inspired by the clean, yet sophisticated styles of post/math rock and Midwest emo bands such as Tortoise, Slint, Sunny Day Real Estate, and Sleepy Dog.

King Sized Bishop plans to record another album in the near future, with a more modern sound than their previous releases. Jacob Shneiderman, Bram Silbert, and Ezra Hecht wish to keep expanding their sound through discovering and sharing new music.

RRX: I’ve been telling others that King Sized Bishop is a cross between early Genesis and the Doors. Am I on the right track?

KSB: I could see how you could make that connection. We have that mix of prog rock and pop styles that Genesis has, and the more classic rock/ jam sound of the Doors. We have always thought of ourselves as more of a cross between Black Sabbath and the Allman Brothers. We have been drawing more and more inspiration from modern rock bands like Tortoise and Slint.

RRX: King Sized Bishop is currently on rotation at RadioRadio X, but how else can the readers find King Sized Bishop?

KSB: To purchase and listen to our most recent album, Lifetime Supply:
https://kingsizedbishop.bandcamp.com/album/lifetime-supply-deluxe-edition

LINKS:
linktree: https://linktr.ee/kingsizedbishop bandcamp: https://kingsizedbishop.bandcamp.com/ facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Kingsizedbishop instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kingsizedbishop/ youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqSohJTA09nRb2Ru_F0EKCQ/videos
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