Honey Trap: American Hard Rock with an Old School Vibe
A sticky sweet kind of hard rock is coming out of Queens, New York. Honey Trap, consisting of vocalist Jessica Rendon, guitarist Vasilios Bouras and Angel De Los Santos was named as a reference to the investigative practice of women luring men to reveal information and as a reflection of the trio’s musical mood.
“The music sounds really sweet and sexy, but at the same time it has a hard edge,” said Rendon. “I always liked the phrase ‘honey trap,’ and because it’s a female fronted band too, so it just seemed to fit. I heard the phrase before for a woman figure taking advantage of guys to get information in the military as a honey trap.”
The band started in 2014 when Rendon posted on Craigslist looking for members; Bouras and De Los Santos answered the call.
“I was really impressed with both of these guys because both of them just turned around after I sent them some tracks,” she said. “Within two days Angel was like ‘I’ll meet up!’ right away, and then the next day Vasilios sent a video of him playing two of the songs, and another audition song.”
All three members described their music as a dynamic blend of classic hard rock influenced by all the rock music trends of the times. Rendon cited specifically Led Zeppelin and Rush as an influence on them, aside from their specific tastes.
“We look to late ’60s/’70s rock for the talent of their writing,” said Rendon. “The melodies and the changes and things like that — it’s very technical. We didn’t want to do your basic first chorus, first chorus kind of layout of a song. We like to still have awesome guitar solos or moments in the song where we jam. And ’90s music as well — Chris Cornell was when I started listening to music, so Soundgarden and Alice in Chains had a lot of influence on me as well.”
“I like to think about it as a nice blend of late ’70s and late ’80s rock, where grunge just first started,” said De Los Santos. “So there’s elements of that area rock and also of that old school classic rock.”
“We like to go back and forth, and have dynamics in our music,” Bouras said. “We like to have our heavy songs and our ballads.”
When it comes to the way they write music, Honey Trap has become so in sync that they complement each other’s unique styles.
“Me and Vasilios share a similar songwriting style, and I like how we have different styles of writing, but it blends well,” said De Los Santos. “What I lack in writing, Vasilios makes up for it, and what he lacks I make up for it.”
De Los Santos also doesn’t write the bass lines for the songs like a bassist typically would; he writes them on guitar first.
“As a bassist I don’t like to play just low end group notes to hold the music, especially since there’s one guitarist in the band,” he said. “A lot of bassists that you hear, they just strictly stick to the rhythm section. I guess that’s where most of my writing and influences really come from, just stepping outside the box and not really being a bassist, but complementing the songs and writing what fits.”
Rendon is still in awe of De Los Santos’ talent, saying “I’ve never heard somebody play bass like that, it’s sick — it’s just really, really good.”
For writing the lyrics, Rendon usually feels out the music before writing something that reflects its vibe.
‘Sometimes we do it from a jam. We start writing a song and these guys are playing something, they start jamming,” she said. “Then I listen to it a few times through as they work out the parts. As I listen, I start jotting down notes and I’ll start singing along.”
Rendon lets the words flow from the mood of the music, saying “the melody will just take me back to a time or bring me to a place and that’ll inspire the words.”
When it came time to record their debut EP, Four Play, in 2015, the band traveled all the way to Chicago to record with legendary recording engineer, Steve Albini. All three had nothing but great things to say of their time with him.
“Such a great experience,” said Bouras. “He did it all on analog and you can hear the difference. He was such a hard worker too. We recorded the EP for two days, and he didn’t even take a break. It was such a huge difference than what we were used to recording in some places in New York. It was kind of low budget places we were using for rough recordings.”
“We learned if you’re not working with great people, it really doesn’t matter what the hell you’re using,” De Los Santos said. “He had old school, vintage, trash equipment — but he made it sound amazing because he knew how to work with it and he knew what he was doing.”
One of the biggest challenges Honey Trap has dealt with has been setting themselves apart from all the other up-and-coming acts.
“I feel like technology and the internet is like a blessing and a curse,” Bouras said. “On one hand the internet has made it possible for anybody to get their music out there. The bad thing is that it’s increased the competition so much that anybody can just record.”
Despite the competition, Honey Trap is determined to prove themselves up for the challenge. Rendon explained that they put effort into creating set lists to match the venue and the crowd. Before each show, the band will scope out the venue and get a feel for what a typical crowd would enjoy. As an example, she described how different neighborhoods in the city would change the set list.
“If it’s a Queens rock crowd, at a venue like Blackthorn on Queens Boulevard, verses a Williamsburg crowd on South Barry Street. [The Williamsburg crowds] are going to be more in to folk and so we’ll play more acoustic songs.”
De Los Santos added that on and off stage Honey Trap puts in extra effort to “interact with the audience so much they become a part of your band.” One way they do that is playing the exact same kind of show, no matter the crowd.
“Whether it’s 300 people or 10 people, we try and play the show the same as we would if it were a bigger venue like Madison Square Garden,” Bouras said. “If you can impress just three people, those three people are going to bring two more people to the next show and it’ll grow from there.”
For the rest of 2016, the band is focused on a few different goals, and first up is getting themselves their perfect drummer.
“It might have been easier if all of us had just met,” said Rendon. “The three of us have been together for two and a half years and we’re really close. We have all this chemistry, inside jokes, and we already know what we want for each other. [The drummer] has to not only come prepared to rehearsal, but also has to enjoy just hanging out to four in the morning when we have a gig. Because we always hang out with our fans until the bar closes, we’re the last ones to go home.”
In addition to adding that fourth member, Honey Trap also has plans to shoot new band photos for their website and shoot a music video this fall. Rendon explained that as she is a member of the Player’s Club, a social theater club on Grammercy Park South, she has access to use their theater for it.
“They have a beautiful stage there, and because I’m a member we can use the space, so I want to book that for either late September or late October,” she said. “Whichever song we do it’s going to be an original, so we’ll go into the studio for that and get a sick recording for it.”
For all of the hard work and passion they’re pouring into their music, Honey Trap has no plans of backing down.
“You’re only going to get as much out of it as you put into it,” said De Los Santos. “I’ve done more with this band in a year than I’ve done with any other band. People tell me ‘Oh, you’re not going to make it, keep dreaming,’ but for me I love music. I’m not in this band for fame or to become popular or anything. I’m in this because I love it.”
Originally published on Metal At the Gates, a former metal and hard rock music webzine.