Facing New York
 Photo: Lisa Huey |
The Bay Area’s Facing New York, is the kind of band that eclectic music lovers have been waiting for. Their sound is multi-layered yet concealed with a large array of instruments, Brandon Canchola on Bass and Vocals, Omar Cuellar on Drums, Matthew Fazi on Guitars, Vocals, Keyboards, and drums, Eric Frederic on Vocals, Guitars, and Keyboards. You can’t make this wonderful noise in a hit factory no matter how much money or top producers the wizards of the ‘industry’ throw at the project. Great bands like Facing New York don’t happen because someone paid to make it so.
Fringe: Your first two albums are two of the best records I’ve heard in the last ten years, (2005’s self titled LP and 2004’s Swimming Not Treading EP) what can we expect from your newest record set to drop on October 16th?
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Matt: Wow, thank you very much for the kind words.
For the new record I would say that you can expect a more groove oriented Facing New York. That’s been pretty much number one priority when working on new music this time around, the pulse. We are trying to write stuff that’s bridging the gap better between progressive time-signature type stuff and great songs. We are really going for extremely strong, listenable and immediate. Also, trying to put drums more at the forefront with smart drumming decisions.
With the last album, we made it difficult to invite people into the music because it really took a few good listens and a commitment to allow the songs to grow on you. Looking back we feel like we weren’t making the strongest decisions. We just wanted to get every last thing onto the record at the expense of the listener. It was a good learning experience because we figured out what we did well and didn’t do well as a band.
This time around, we are really trying to play to the strengths of the band and cut the fat in the songs, make every single note important and tasteful and only use the strongest possible ideas. We’ve been using a lot of polyrhythms to trick people too, haha. Something to the effect of establishing a drum pulse in 6 while the guitar is in 5 so that they meet every 30 bars but people naturally follow the drum groove and don’t notice the weird-o guitar on top.
Getting sneaky. We’ve got a way different mindset, where with something like the full length we were trying to do prog epics like Yes, this time we are trying to have a Quincy Jones on “Thriller” approach but in a rock band format. Every melody and part must be the strongest. Or a perfect example of restrained but super tasty parts: “Come Together” by The Beatles. Thinking in that kind of tasteful brain instead of full throttle, everyone playing everything at once.
Fringe: How would you describe Facing New York’s sound?
Matt: I suppose it would be some amalgamation of Zeppelin, Dismemberment Plan, and the Neptunes maybe? Forward-thinking-rock music. I can’t help but to think of the Bay Area whenever I hear the bands music, much in the same way a band like Red Chili Peppers is associated with L.A. or the way the band Cake makes me think of Sacramento. Do you think being tied to a landscape is a good or bad thing for a band?
 Photo: Joshua Uziel (www.uzishots.com) |
Matt: Funny that you should mention that you associate FNY with our area because we were talking about that recently. We think its great to have that kind of association. Lots of bands have sounds very specific to their areas ie: Dismemberment Plan or Fugazi (DC dissonant type bands) or Seattle grunge, some San Diego bands have a sound very specific to San Diego so we are definitely cool with that kind of tie to the bay area. And it seems natural to be influenced by the environment the band was created in. With things like hyphy music and Anticon or bands like Deerhoof pushing the boundaries it feels natural to take some flavor from them.
Fringe: Facing New York played the South By Southwest festival this year. What was that like?
Matt: SXSW was pretty cool. We were fortunate enough to play a great showcase with our label Five One Inc and another label from LA called Eenie Meenie and those bands were really great. We also played one of our best shows at a little dive that we filled with people who have never heard the band before and they were all super-pumped. So all in all it was a very awesome experience. The only bad thing about SXSW or things like that are the egos walking around. Too many haircuts, too much tight pants and not enough good music. That really kills my jive at those types of industry events but it comes with it and you just have to deal.
Fringe: With facing new york receiving so much praise and accolades, do you feel obligated to out do yourselves with each new recording project?
Matt: I think its a bit of a stretch to say we’ve received a lot of praise or accolades in our time as a band. It’s always been an uphill battle to turn new people onto the band or even industry folks.
The only pressure we really feel is to keep pushing ourselves forward and to make stronger music, keep it interesting for ourselves and not repeat anything we’ve already done. It’s a constant quest to strengthen and hone our songwriting abilities and always try to make it our own.
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