Sea Giant finds niche with synth-pop sound

Sea Giant has always consisted of the same two guys – Conor Knowles and Kyler Ferguson – but their sound has been almost restless in its transformation.

Knowles and Ferguson have known each other since childhood. Growing up in Newport, Washington, they played in bands together in high school. Sea Giant started a couple of years ago as an acoustic folk duo. But their music started edging more toward gloomy synth-driven pop – a single keyboard track would breed another and another, and now they’re almost entirely electronic.

Although their soundscapes are richer now, Knowles, 21, and Ferguson, 19, are content with being a two-man operation. Occasionally for live shows, they’ll bring in a drummer, but past attempts to integrate new permanent members proved futile.

“It never worked out,” Knowles said. “Kyler and I are kind of weird. We both have the same personality, and it seemed like whenever we tried to add someone new, it somehow felt wrong.”

Whereas a lot of bands would see that as a hindrance, the guys in Sea Giant consider their exclusivity an asset: They exist on the same artistic wavelength and almost seem to communicate mentally through their music.

“We just liked it that way,” Ferguson said. “It was easier. We got along well and we liked to see how much sound we could get out of just two people.”

That sound recalls the minimalist post-punk of Bauhaus or Siouxsie and the Banshees, with backdrops of sparse, moody organs and keyboards punctuated with the occasional pop hook. Those hooks, though, recall New Order at their poppiest, with squiggly keyboard lines that latch on for dear life to the pulsing electronic rhythms.

Knowles channels the distinct vocal inflections of Spencer Krug of Wolf Parade and Sunset Rubdown, often alternating between a nasally lilt to a whispery, guttural growl in the same line. You can hear a little Ian Curtis in there, too: Knowles points to Joy Division as his favorite band, and name checks the Cure and Depeche Mode as some of their other major influences.

Sea Giant’s newest record is called “Our Dead Age,” a seven-song album (they can’t decide if it’s an EP or an LP) that was recorded over a handful of months in Knowles’ cramped bedroom. Although it’s not their first release, it represents another fresh start for the band – they say their debut EP, which came out last August, “isn’t relevant anymore.”

But they don’t expect to deviate much further from the sound they’ve developed, even though they had to feel around for it. (Now that they’ve evolved from folk to electro-pop, they joke that the next logical conclusion would be a rap career.) By sticking to a strictly electronic landscape, Knowles said they’re actually keeping their playing field wide open.

“We’ve hit on what we want to do,” he said. “The thing with synth-pop is that all of our needs are set up, and we can go anywhere we want.”