by JOHNSON CUMMINS

Kid Millions' cell phone blurts out a helluva lotta white noise. Oneida are travelling through mountainous climes and our interview borders on exhausting. "Hello... are you there? Can you repeat the question? What? How did we get our name?"

Thing is, there's very little light for drummer Mr. Millions to shed on his band's sound anyway. Their latest record, The Wedding, borders on genius, with the psych-folk of starter "Eiger" quickly falling prey to the unrelenting Six Finger Satellite beat of "Lavender" before gear-jamming into the raga feel of "Spirits."

Not only are they able to re-invent themselves with each track, but these Brooklynites are as prolific as they come, averaging at least one release a year over the past decade. "We don't make any money from the band and we all have day jobs, but if you really love playing music, you're just going to do it," Millions says.

The benefits of owning a studio shine through in Oneida's songwriting, and they also manage to differentiate their studio sound from the live sound. "There are definitely two sides of this band," he notes. "People don't get a live show when they buy the record and sometimes that disappoints them. On record, we're definitely more distilled or restrained because we're really crafting in that environment." When I ask Millions about the other side of the coin, he nonchallantly answers, "When we play live, we take people's heads off. It's completely full-on and relentless. People may hate it and walk out, but we offer something that people have not seen before."

With the rise of bands like Comets on Fire and Oneida labelmates Black Mountain, the word "psychedelic" is being bandied about more and more. Oneida have been slapped with the tag more than a couple of times, but if you strip the word down to its essence of progressive music (another misused term) with little reliance on the done-to-death pop format, they could wear the psych tag like a comfortable old shoe. Millions is well aware of his band's placement under the massive umbrella of psychedelic, but thinks the term is misleading.

"We aren't really formalists like a lot of so-called ‘psych' bands. We're just part of a long line of people who are curious and always trying to do new things, be it making a psych record like Anthem of the Moon, recording a dancehall song or working with strings. I guess we're psychedelic to a certain extent, but we're not a bunch of dudes wearing ponchos and beating on bongos - although I guess we could do that too. Psych is just one thing we do, but we're not limited to it."

Given that Millions' phone is cutting out at an increasingly rapid rate, I know the interview won't last much longer, and I guess Millions senses the same when he drops this bomb: "What I'm really into right now is extreme sports, and I think the typical Oneida fan is usually into extreme sports as well. I think we are bringing extreme sports to a lot of people and we have established a kinship there - (click)."

With Kinski, Oakley Hall at la Sala Rossa
on Sunday, Aug. 21, 9 p.m., $12

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