Everest Make 'Peace' Without Genre Labels

Everest are on a journey of self-discovery. The Los Angeles-based rootsy rockers recently launched the east coast leg of their summer tour opening for Minus the Bear, a jaunt that makes for a stylistically odd coupling. "It's an interesting fit musically," Everest frontman Russell Pollard tells Spinner. "Personally, we get along with those guys amazingly. We have a lot of fun with them. But, honestly, I think their audience is totally confused by us."

The Everest sound is not only new to Minus the Bear's fans, it's also pretty new to the band, too. The quintet's whirlwind rise began in 2007 in Pollard's living room following the dissolution of his former band, the more indie pop leaning Alaska! Everest was quickly scooped up by Neil Young for his Warner Bros. imprint, Vapor Records, and, following a high profile tour with Young and Wilco last year, Everest released their second album, 'On Approach,' in May.

"We named the record 'On Approach' because we don't know what we're doing still. We haven't even tapped into what we're capable of yet, because it's new and we haven't done this [kind of music] before."

Because the music is still developing, Pollard has yet to pinpoint a genre in which to neatly place Everest. "People ask me what kind of music we play and I don't know what to call it," he says. "All I know is it's honest and we're exposing ourselves a lot. The main goal that we discovered through touring is that while we're onstage, we transcend all the BS that we deal with. Not just as a band, but also in this day-to-day life. It's a good 45 minutes of peace. That's the only way I can describe it. We're playing for each other really."

When Spinner suggests Pollard could just call Everest's sound "music that Neil Young likes," he laughs and says, "That's it. We'll put a big sticker on our record!"

Check out Everest's tour dates here.