Colorado Springs might not be known for its indie music, but bands like Eros and the Eschaton are trying to change that perception.
“The people that are making waves in the Springs music scene are in the Springs intentionally, for the sake of making a scene,” says Eros keyboardist Mitchell Macura. “Not just to be a part of it, but because they know the importance of being a contributing member of the community, regardless of how it affects their own work.”
Then performing as the Golden Hearts, Eros and the Eschaton started in North Carolina in 2012, when Kate Perdoni and Adam Hawkins, both singers, songwriters and guitarists, started writing music together. The two released their first album while in North Carolina, then went on tour; they moved to Colorado at the end of 2013.
They brought on the rest of the band in the two years that followed. Bassist Ryan Spradlin had been playing in bands in the Springs since he was sixteen, most notably in experimental-rock band El Toro de la Muerte, a staple of the Colorado music world until its split in 2015. Drummer Alex Koshak and keyboardist Macura were in the rock band the Flumps, which they formed in Florence, Macura’s home town, in 2009.
The Golden Hearts got a cease-and-desist letter from the lawyer of the former guitarist of 4 Non Blondes, Hawkins says. “Apparently, he had a band by the same name. We pounded our heads against the wall for a few months before settling on Eros and the Eschaton, which we took from the title of a lecture by Terence McKenna.”
Because the Springs has a smaller music scene than Denver or even Fort Collins, with very few venues in which to perform original music, there is an unusually high level of camaraderie among bands of all genres. The spaces that do highlight local music, including the Cedars Jazz Club, Whitney Electric, Mountain Fold Books, Piano Warehouse and Flux Capacitor, are very active.
And Eros has benefited from having formed at a time when the music scene in the Springs in general was becoming more active than ever.
“Colorado Springs has always been a weird scene because it’s too small to be confined to cliques,” says Spradlin. “So you wind up playing shows with friends regardless of the musical genres, and the shows end up being pretty diverse.”
Between its dream-pop album, 2013’s Home Address for Civil War, and its latest LP, Weight of Matter, Eros and the Eschaton has grown more experimental, particularly in its songwriting. The band got even deeper into Brian Eno, one of its collective main influences, and Koshak drew inspiration from rhythmic outlaws like Can, Suicide and Kraftwerk. “With Home Address, we were really trying to make an album where the lines between each sound were blurred and everything came together to make one sound,” says Hawkins. “We also didn’t consider how we’d play the songs live. With Weight of Matter, it’s a band album. It sounds pretty much like we do live. It sounds like a band playing songs.”
The group’s members maintain that Colorado Springs is the perfect hotbed for experimentation.
“[The city’s] vibrancy is pretty much why I choose to live here,” says Perdoni. “There has always been amazing music here, since I first started playing shows seven or eight years ago. Now there is so much going on it’s crazy. Bands tour through here every single night, playing at places like the Flux and Mountain Fold [Books].”
Eros and the Eschaton
8 p.m. Saturday, August 27, Larimer Lounge, 2721 Larimer Street, $10-$12, 18+, 303-291-1007.