944

Musicians

"The name comes from the movie Amélie," says Beans, one half of the Las Vegas-based electronic band Afghan Raiders. After graduating from Green Valley High School, Mikey and Beans (who met in "Foods One" class) worked on separate projects before reconnecting to start the band. Now, between things like thrilling fans with their live shows and putting remixes together for The Faint, they share (at length) their quirks with us.

10:30 a.m. // Beans: It's a bit early for Mikey and me. We have a long day ahead and what better way to kick it off than with a morning cup of coffee? We meet at the local dive for a caffeine rush. Mikey rolls with the Americano and I take it black. Interview with a writer from 944 Magazine. She shows up and the questions start rolling. We talk a little bit about our band's abrupt yet explosive presence on the underground music scene in Las Vegas. We classify ourselves as "electronic," but considering our live show is flooded with singing, dancing, balloons, costumes and an outrageous amount of unchecked energy, you can see how that quickly morphs into unknown territory. The coffee runs dry and that's our cue to head off to lunch.

Noon // Mikey: We arrive at an off-the-wall Mexican fusion joint behind Rebelbooks at UNLV called YaYo Taco. It's one of the few Mexican places in town that actually caters to vegetarians, so it's a hit with Beans, the vegetarian of the group. We dig in on the tofu tacos and we talk a bit more about our interests. We riff on our hero, comedian David Cross, books we're reading since we are total bookworms and our obsession with finding funny, weird and artsy films to watch.

1:30 p.m. // Beans: At Mikey's in-home studio, we're busy working on adding visual elements to upcoming shows, which sample and re-edit of some of our favorite films, documentaries and TV shows, all of which will be projected on a screen behind us during a future performance. Mikey's home studio is where we write, record and produce all of our tracks.

2:30 p.m. // Mikey: We jam out in a very improvised yet formulaic way (about five days a week, three hours a day). Luckily for us, the neighbors don't mind the noise. We wrap things up and decide to head out to a spot that you can only find in Vegas.

5:30 p.m. // Beans: We head to one of our favorite sports in town ... the Pinball Hall of Fame! It's got the world's largest collection of vintage and rare pinball machines, and it's one of the few places in Vegas where five bucks goes a long way. Mikey jumps on the retro Star Trek machine while I kill it on the Wild Wild West machine. Between shots, we talk about our plans to tour to LA, San Francisco, Chicago, New York City, Miami and Austin [for the SXSW Music and Film Conference] in the months to come. Excitement is in the air. We battle it out in an intense air hockey match and I come out victorious with a 7-6 win. All out of quarters, we decide to head our separate ways.

7:00 p.m. // Mikey: I head off on my single-speed, retro '80s road bike to my Bikram yoga class. For those of you who aren't familiar with "hot" yoga, the class consists of 26 semi-technical yoga postures, performed in a room that sits at a very uncomfortable 105 degrees. I'm up for the challenge today and breeze through the 90-minute detoxification. Now I'm totally energized and ready for the night.

11:30 p.m. // Beans: It's show time! We're headlining the monthly Restless Dance Party at Beauty Bar! We are crouched behind their merch booth blowing up balloons that inevitably will be launched into the raging crowd. Once the bags are full, we take the stage and begin to plow through our set. A disco ignites as we rule the stage with Moog synthesizers, tambourine hats and Kawasaki drum machines. Halfway through the sing-a-long hit "Future Thinkers," fans take the dance party onto the stage while we fuse headbanging with electronic madness. A smashed microKORG, a sweaty crowd and very exhausted musicians signify that tonight was truly restless.

All in a day's work.

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