Freshman is a Q&A interview series spotlighting rising talents in the scene. The first Freshman feature kicks off with Milo Christ, a three-piece indie rock band that just dropped their debut EP, Milo Christ Goes On Tour 2027.

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Milo Christ haven’t seen each other in a while. The band — Vasily on bass and vocals, Aditya on drums and Jean Yves on vocals and guitar — first came together in high school in Kuala Lumpur. None of them are Malaysian, but it was here that they formed the band, wrote songs about growing up here and played their first shows. It’s left them with a bit of an identity crisis: how do you place a band whose roots are in a city they no longer live in? These days, the three are scattered across different continents, divided by oceans, time zones and the weight of adult life.

When I first approached them for an interview, we had trouble finding a time that worked for everyone. Someone was always working (me), or someone else had to stay up in the middle of the night (them). After a few back-and-forths, we finally settled on 9:00 PM Malaysia time. Over Google Meet, we talked about their high school life, their debut EP, Milo Christ Goes On Tour 2027 and what they found surprising about KL gig culture.

The EP blends midwest emo with early 2000s indie rock, touching on themes like messy relationships, the quiet panic of doomscrolling and starting a fight in a bar. There’s a playful absurdity in their lyrics — take, for example, the line: “You’re my motorboat baby and / I’m on a jetski.” But beneath the humor is something heartfelt. The EP carries a vivid, communal feeling, largely because it was made by a group of friends who grew up together. And that’s really the goal of this series. Freshman offers a look into the early days of bands putting their first work into the world — works often filled with naivety, fun and flashes of what’s to come. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Farhira: Hello! Where are you guys right now?

Vasily: I’m in KL, and JY’s in Chicago. So is Aditya.

Jean-Yves: Yeah I’m in Chicago right now. I’m tired. I know I was the one who scheduled this, but the time difference messed me up. I had to wake up early for this but I’m glad I did. (laughs)

Farhira: What time is it now in Chicago?

Jean-Yves: It’s 8 a.m. It makes communication difficult sometimes, especially when we’re trying to set up band meetings and stuff that we’re in completely different time zones.

Farhira: You guys met in high school, right? Do you remember how you became friends?

Jean-Yves: I don’t really remember the meeting. It was kind of a blur. But I met Vasily in ninth grade in Chinese class. He showed up and I was like, “Who’s this kid? What’s he about?” He was a stranger at first, and then we got closer. That’s how I remember it.

Farhira: So, when did Milo Christ officially start?

Vasily: I’ll try to estimate. Me and JY wrote some songs, and Aditya joined in. We were just messing around with music for fun. We used to be in a band called Pink Dog. Then we thought, “Let’s do it again.” So we went to a studio in Setapak, the Mezzo Forte Studio, and we recorded a bunch of songs for fun. Only two of them still exist. The rest were just random or joke songs. We even had a track called Hamster High School.

Farhira: What’s that about?

Vasily: It’s literally about hamsters in high school. Boys who are hamsters. That demo never came out. I was supposed to mix it, but we weren’t that good yet. But a couple of years later, we kept talking about it, kept practicing. Then we came back during this break and did it again, this time with more structure. You grow, you gain more knowledge, and the difference in who we are now compared to back then is insane.

Farhira: So what’s the story behind the band name Milo Christ?

Aditya: I think we came up with it three years ago. We were on the way back from Mezzo Forte and we passed a Mamak restaurant. Then we get Milo Ais. I think either JY or Vasily had the epiphany with the name Milo Christ. I honestly don’t know where the “Christ” part came from though.

Jean-Yves: The way I remember it, and not to call you a liar, Aditya, but I remember the three of us at the mamak, and we all had three Milo Ais. We were trying to think of a band name. I think Vasily said something like “Milo Thrice” and then I suggested “Milo Christ”. We spent like a week arguing between Milo Thrice and Milo Christ. I just thought Milo Christ sounded cooler. Still do. But yeah, no deep meaning.

Farhira: Okay, so how do you like your Milo Ais?

Aditya: Kurang manis. 

Jean-Yves: That’s also how he likes his water too. Ais Kosong, kurang manis. That’s what he orders, all the time.

Aditya: Sometimes I mess up my mamak orders though. I get the words mixed up.

Farhira: Do you consider the band to be a Midwest emo band? That’s how a lot of people describe your sound. Was that intentional?

Jean-Yves: Me and Vas in particular were really inspired by Midwest emo during our high school freestyle writing days. We definitely wanted to pay homage to it like in the guitar tone, and how Vasily sings sometimes. But I don’t think we’re strictly Midwest emo. This EP has a lot of elements of it, but I think in the future we’ll probably go in a different direction. Maybe less emo, even.

Since we’re a three-piece, any strong influence from one of us really shapes the sound. Like on “Mimo”, the drums are jazzy, almost Afrobeat-inspired, but the guitar is straight-up American Football-style. On “Way of the Warrior” I’m not really playing Midwest-style guitar, and that shifts the whole vibe. Aditya’s jazz background shows through a lot too.

Farhira: So you’ve got a lot of different influences. But if you were to create a moodboard for the EP, what would be on it?

Vasily: Ooh, great question. Did someone say bongos?

Aditya: I’d put a four-quadrant image of a man. In one square he’s really excited, one where he’s crying, one where he’s fighting, and one where he’s just kind of sad at a job.

Jean-Yves: Maybe an empty bottle of beer because of the last song. Also, a loose cigarette. Just one. I was going to say maybe some album covers or a Herbie Hancock vinyl.

Vasily: What about a jetski? Or a handful of sand?

Jean-Yves: Yeah. There’s definitely a sadness that runs through the EP. Maybe something like a broken Xbox controller to show that kind of feeling.

Farhira: Let’s talk about the EP. The title is Milo Christ Goes on Tour in 2027. Is that a kind of manifestation? 

Jean-Yves: Yeah, maybe. That would be great. How feasible it is right now… we’re still figuring that out. But it’s definitely a goal. We want to play more shows in Malaysia, for sure. The title is kind of a direct manifestation, but also just a symbol of the direction we want to go in, you know?

Farhira: But why 2027 specifically?

Jean-Yves: The thing is it’s just time when everything comes together. You can’t go on tour immediately. Even the greats have to wait a bit. I think when we were talking about it, I gave the example of Joe from Subsonic Eye. They were playing for a long time and then they just went on tour in America, which is insane. They’re a wonderful band.

Jean-Yves: It also works out for our graduation timeline. That’s a big deal. We’re all still studying right now. I guess it’s realistic and optimistic. That’s kind of our whole attitude towards this. 

Farhira: How long did you guys take from writing the songs for the EP to completing it?

Jean-Yves: The process of recording this was very hectic, very chaotic, because we had a very limited time together. Me and Aditya were both on our winter breaks for school. I landed here about a week before Aditya, and almost immediately, me and Vasily started writing. We were writing every day for a couple of hours. The EP was supposed to be longer. At first it was going to be nine songs, but we cut a couple as we were writing. I’d say we wrote for about three weeks and then started recording immediately. Aditya had to go back to Chicago and missed the last couple of hours of recording. So yeah, the whole timeline was like five weeks from start to finish.

Farhira: I like the track “Throw Out Your Phone.” It’s a good reminder to log off. Do you remember the moment you realised you were spending too much time on your phone?

Jean-Yves: Yeah, I do. It was just a big thing in my life in general, trying to limit screen time and realising that as a student, when I get stressed out, my phone is where I go. And then it just makes me more stressed out. It’s a cycle. I’m seeking comfort from something that just makes it worse. It’s a very personal song even though it has an intense, upbeat energy. It’s about how technology speeds your life up and makes you worse off for it. My screen time is really bad right now though.

Farhira: What’s your average screen time?

Jean-Yves: Five hours.

Farhira: Five hours is not that bad.

Jean-Yves: It used to be two. I was really happy with that. I worked really hard. I’ll get back to that.

Vasily: Yeah. My screen time is seven hours twenty-five minutes. And then I look at the number and I don’t believe it. March 30 to April 6 average is nine hours, but there’s no way that’s true.

Farhira: Do you guys have favorite corners of the Internet where you don’t feel like it’s rotting your brain? Just fun to be there.

Vasily: I like YouTube.

Farhira: I mean, you can get lost on YouTube too. It can be a brain rot activity.

Vasily: Let me tell you why I like YouTube. It’s because I like a lot of emo and screamo, and there are a lot of live performances recorded on super shitty webcams where you can barely hear it. From like 1997 to 2005. I get lost in that. I watch hours of just live footage.

Jean-Yves: The music community on Reddit is actually very supportive most of the time. A lot of people are trying to promote their own stuff. It’s usually very constructive, giving feedback, or just saying they love a song. 

Aditya: YouTube’s good too. Another thing I really like is how big labels post studio sessions. There’s this one called Triple J that does something called “Like a Version” and one that inspired me a lot was Dominic Fike’s cover of “Bags” by Clairo.

Farhira: I want to talk about your other song, “16 Sojus”. I like that you end the EP on a high note. Was that intentional?

Jean-Yves: That whole song is meant to be a fight breaking out at a bar. That’s the story we were trying to tell. It reflects our experiences in high school. The year before COVID was pretty wild. We were going to clubs a lot. That feeling of this one Friday night, everyone’s looking around like, we’re about to go crazy tonight. Anticipation builds, and then it always devolves into chaos. Some people have a great time, some people have a terrible time. That’s what we wanted it to be like. The last minute of the song is just chaos. People yelling, guitar going crazy, drums going crazy. It’s a high note, chaotic, a little ugly, but ultimately a bunch of fun.

Farhira: Are those your friends in the background screaming?

Vasily: Yeah. We had friends come to the studio. Wonderful idea. We begged them to come. We even had to call two girls from high school and beg them like, please come, please come.

Jean-Yves: It’s crazy. Six people is enough. There’s a moment in the middle where Vasily is hyping the crowd up like “put your hands up,” and it sounds like an actual crowd. I was shocked how well it worked. It was out of our comfort zone, but it worked.

Farhira: Did living in Malaysia shape this EP in any way?

Jean-Yves: I’d say it’s very important to this EP, especially “16 Sojus” and probably “Jetski Song” too. They’re the most inspired by our high school experience, and that experience happened here. KL specifically.

Vasily: Yeah, maybe not culturally, but in terms of setting. This is our home. Like JY said, all those experiences happened here.

Farhira: Would you consider yourself a KL-based band?

Vasily: When we were recording the EP, I asked Mokhtar (of Iseekmusic Studio) if Milo Christ counts as a KL band. He said no. He said we’re a hybrid band. Because technically we grew up here, but we don’t necessarily represent all the values. But everything was written and recorded here. All our shows have been here too.

Aditya: I don’t know if we’re like a homegrown KL outfit by any means, but I think what JY said earlier, living in KL definitely shaped what the album was. There are very few other places in the world where we could’ve grown up where we would’ve had the volume and the type of experiences we had. A lot of the songs, even some that aren’t on the album, were written very early into our college life. Some songs are based on stuff from high school, even as far back as when we were 16. Just having memories of that kind of energy, of those chaotic nights as young as 15. I think that’s pretty rare and pretty special. A lot of kids in the US just stay at home, live in the suburbs, drive around, go to Target or whatever. But we were in KL doing all these shenanigans.

Jean-Yves: If I had to pick one city to associate us with, it would be KL. We know a bunch of bands in the scene, we’re friends with them, we played all our shows in KL and recorded all our music there. I know that if we all lived in KL, we’d be super involved in the scene. But I also understand that we’re not there most of the time, so that’s a big part of it. Still, if I had to say where we’re from, it’d be KL.

Farhira: Anything about Malaysia’s gig culture that surprised you?

Jean-Yves: They go hard. People show so much emotion. I saw people crying, falling to their knees in despair. It was really powerful. Honestly, I was like, wow, that’s such a strong reaction to music. In Chicago, people would probably be afraid to do that. I think they’re trying to preserve their aura (laughs). Genuinely, I think people there are afraid to show that something has affected them that deeply. But I’ve seen it multiple times in Malaysia though, to be fair, the shows I went to were like Malaysia screamo shows.

Vasily: All I know is the KL gig culture, so I agree. I feel free to express how I feel, how I move. I see other people doing that too. That’s why I love it.

Farhira: This is my last question. When is your next show?

Aditya: Honestly, I wouldn’t say this summer is realistic. Maybe late June or early July, it’s possible. I’ll probably be back in KL, and the way we do things is, whenever one of us is in KL, we try to make a show happen. That might be a good timeline, but not sure if you guys think differently.

Jean-Yves: Yeah. I won’t be able to go this summer.

Aditya: Never mind. (laughs)

Jean-Yves: We’ll figure something out.