What inspired you to first start making music? And how did you come to be in your current incarnation? Or if you prefer, a brief bio about you.
It all happened by chance, after we saw Lenny Abrahamson’s “Frank” ..a fantastic movie about an impossible rock band led by a crazy singer, performed by Michael Fassbender. We watched it…and then started to think “Well, it’s about making music in absolute freedom, why not? Just real entertainment!”. It was 2015, one day we found ourselves in a room just making improvisations and having fun with beers and wine. After 9 months we had about 25 tracks, ranging from one genre to another. Then, the group took shape. Gianpaolo Rosato (bass), Francesco Degli Innocenti (guitar) and Elisabetta Caiani (Kazoo, voices) joined the “core”, Luca Palazzi (singer) and Francesca Ronconi (Synthesizers). We also added the drum machine (Roland’s Tr-8, played by Luca Palazzi) and other weird instruments (some of them without a real name) that Gianpaolo Rosato sometimes loves to play just to make noise. So we started to really develop the tracks and in about 3 years, thanks also to the work of our producer (Alessandro La Padula), we finished the record, which contains 4 tracks of those “old” sessions completely revised, and 4 tracks recorded with the new line-up.
Provide us with some info about your latest release…
The record is called “Who Are You Exactly?” and it’s a kind of merry-go-round where all the musical styles we always loved are remixed, to create something unique that speaks about our Time.
In some songs it’s the voice of an insane American farmer who speaks, telling his obstinacy to believe in something (a faith, an ideology) which, however, is denied by history. He believes so much in it that he completely losees his reason and eventually invokes Apocalypse. Another part of the album is more personal and talks about growing up in a society like ours, dominated by the free market of global idiocy!
Which ones would you consider your main influences both music-wise & non-music-wise?
Musically, the krautrock’s scene, the beat and the garage of the 60s, the American west coast psychedelia of the 60s and the New York psychedelia, the punk and the dark/new wave (especially Joy Division and The Sound) but also the No Wave, the acid blues of the Doors, Chuck Berry, Captain Beefheart …
Non-musical influences: David Lynch, Ernesto Che Guevara, Gian Maria Volonté, Francis Bacon. Our singer is also a neo-expressionist painter (www.lucapalazzi.com) and the atmosphere of his paintings has somehow influenced our music and our aesthetics. For instance, that Pig that you can find on our artwork and video has been a recurring theme for him, as a symbol of overflowing vitality.
In what way does your sound differ from the rest genre-related artists/bands and why should we listen to your music? In other words, how would you describe your sound?
As a group we are very young, but Francesco and Gianpaolo already had 20 years of experience in other groups (B-Black, Black Sonar) and Elisabetta had been DJing for some time. Francesca did classical piano studies. So, this record merges many stories and a lot of music made and listened to, so it could be very difficult to label us, we can remind something from 60’s psychedelia to 80’s post-punk and industrial, crossing 70’s krautrock. But in the end, it’s all about making good music or not. We think we have done something really inspired and natural.
Please name your 3 desert islands albums, movies & books…
Albums: Abbey Road by The Beatles; Tangerine Dream by Kaleidoscope; Closer by Joy Division.
Movies: David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive; The Exterminating Angel by Bunuel; Apocalypse Now by Francis Ford Coppola.
Books: “Siddhartha” – Herman Hesse. “Martian Chronicles” – Ray Bradbury. “One, No One and One Hundred Thousand” by Luigi Pirandello, “Crime and Punishment” by Fëdor Dostoevskij
Do you prefer studio or performing live and why?
The experience in the studio is fascinating because we live it as another creative phase when new ideas and solutions can significantly change the previous demos. Live performance is an exciting moment when songs take their place “into reality”. But we are still experimenting with it!
Is there any funny-unique story you would like to share with us, always in relation to your music ‘career’?
The first time we went to the rehearsal room, we had no idea what would happen. The only one of us who brought a draft of a “track” (4 seconds of verse and 2 seconds of the refrain) was Luca Palazzi, who had “studied”, even though he never had sung in his life (he was a painter at that time). When we went back home after 2 hours of crazy improvisations, we heard the recordings made with the cell phone and it seemed incredible! Were we those? We had just heard the embryo of Blowjob Your Mind and the recording was so bad that it seemed to come out live from some cellar of some small Polish club of the ’80s. It was a mix of space rock and metal! From there we understood that we could have done something very interesting. We also learned immediately how much it was important to record and later listen to everything we’ve done during improvisations sessions. That’s why sometimes you are making something good without noticing it, it’s a hard but important work to re-build what you have done unconsciously.
Which track of your own would you point out as the most unique and why?
“Snakes” it’s a perfect fusion of our musical worlds. It is like Velvet Underground that meets Chumbawamba, passing through Madonna’s “Material Girl”, 8 minutes of a pure psychedelic ride!
Would you like to share with our readers your future plans?
While we were rehearsing the pieces for the live, like mushrooms, 6 other new songs came out, which seem absolutely epic! When we ‘ll be recording them, it will be something closer to the sound of Nine Inch Nails or the last Portishead album (“Three”), but with a more provocative psychedelic look … let’s hope to start recording by the end of the year!
Free question!!! (Ask yourself a question) you wish to answer and haven’t been given the opportunity…
What mood do the songs “communicate”?
Generally, the pieces are developed in two separate rooms, also because part of the group lives in Florence and the rest in Rome. The Roman part creates the very first drafts, often noise, dark, very dark atmospheres. Then the pieces are flooded with light when Francesco and Elisabetta come in and bring a pinch of healthy garage euphoria! The contrast, in general, makes us moderately optimistic or pessimistic, or maybe just a little bit crazy…
Photo credits: Alessandro Italia (1st one), Gloria Saya (2nd one)
Curated by: Christos Doukakis
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