Walking Man Live

To help bring awareness to the musicians of Long Island, this blog will post interviews with several Long Island bands from all genres and style. If you know of any lostealing-jane-bitter-end-shot.jpgcal band that deserves to be our Featured Long Island Band send me an email and I’ll get them here.

To start off, the first band in this series is Stealing Jane from the North Shore of Long Island. Here’s what the band had to say:

When and where did the band start?
Stealing Jane used to be called HyJinX, HyJinX started in the spring of 2001 Bryce, Bunce, Dave, and Matt all started the band to compete in the North Shore High School Battle of the Bands. Pat joint a month after the band started, Vito Joined in March of 06 and Andrew joined this past February after being that bands roadie for over a year.

Bunce was the bands trumpet player for over 6 years till the bands bassist left the band this past winter and in the attempts to keep the line up in the family moved Bunce over to bass and moved Andrew in the Trumpet spot

Who’s in the band now?
Bryce Larsen - Lead Vocals/Guitars
Pat Iannelli -Saxophone/Vocals
Andrew Mericle - Trumpet/Vocals
Brian Bunce - Bass/Vocals
Matt Giordano - Guitar/Vocals
Dave Calzone - Trombone/Vocals
Vito Fraccalvieri - Drums/Percussion

Finish the sentence: Stealing Jane sounds like…
Combining the in-your-face energy of RX Bandits and Less Than Jake, the pop sensibility of Maroon 5 and the soul of a James Brown backup band, Stealing Jane emerges from the fertile breeding ground of Long Island with a fresh new sound sure to make you move.

How often do you play live shows in Long Island?
Out of an average of 10 shows a month I’ll say at least 2 of them are in Long Island.

What does the band think of the Long Island music scene?
What scene? Long Island hasn’t had a music scene in about 4-5 years, these days unfortunately pretty much every band on Long Island is every band for themselves. It sucks because we would love to have more bands that we can go out and promote shows with and do shows with like it was back in the day. Don’t get me wrong I’m sure bands have other bands they are friends with, but its no longer the community it used to be when venues like The Downtown and The Vanderbilt were around. Then there was always a good VFW hall show that all Long Island bands where at; even if they weren’t playing, they were there to support their friends. When WLIR was helping out the scene from above, those where the days.

How does the band promote itself offline?
Our street team is a huge help in this aspect, because they go out and promote at shows and spread the word, We also try and do as many interview as possible, we try and get on college radio as much as we can, we go to support some over our favorite bands local or regional.

If you can describe the perfect show, how would it go?
This is such a tough question to answer, I think a good example would be what our CD release party is shaping out to be… 2 stages with some of the best bands from all over the east coast - bands like Badfish (sublime tribute), and Scotty Don’t. We’ve shared stages with them at least 50 times in the past 4 years, in about 5-6 major markets along the east coast.

We are also to play with a band we all admire a great deal and consider friends of ours, Zox (which if you haven’t checked them out your missing out). Plus another band we have become close with in the Massachusetts scene is Baylock; they are kick ass people and a great band to see live. The entire event is overseen by Mike Maietta a promoter that still knows how to put together an all around successful and fun show. Theres going to be 400 music lovers from all over the east coast gathering on a August day right near a lake to listen to music. Its going to be a great show.

How do you transport your equipment around for shows?
We have a trailer, its not doing to well though. If you’re in a band and you’re looking to get a trailer DO NOT GET YOUR TRAILER AT LOWES, THEY SUCK! It’s doing the job now but with in the next year we are going to need a new one.

Is there any particular venue you enjoy playing at?
Lupo’s in Rhode Island is Awesome
Croc Rock in Allen Town, Pennsylvania
McCoys on Wantagh
Shoreham Rec Center Long Island
The bitter end in NYC
Old Knapps in Vermont

All these venues have 1 really important thing in common, they all have an amazing Staff. I know everyone from the owner to the bartenders and I can tell you they are all great people to work with and make it such awesome experience to make music at they’re venue, these venues also support us in the early stages of our carrier and for that we will never forget them down the road.

Where did you go to record and distribute your record?
The bands first EP entitled “Say Something” will be out on August 11th, 2007. It will be available at shows, online at Stealing Jane.com, iTunes and several other retailers.

We tracked the record at Audio Magik with our long time friend/mentor George Marshal and mixed it at Cove City Sounds Studios with another good friend and amazing engineer Kieran Pardias. We go to mastering this week with Gene Paul of DP Plus Mastering.

What advice do you have for venues to help better accommodate a band’s performance?
Support local unsigned bands because they can be a great voice box for your business. Its just unfortunate that many venues and promoters don’t take care of the bands that work hard for them to move tickets for shows and promote shows.

Does giving fans free albums or mp3’s help or hurt the band as a whole?
We have handed out over 60,000 cd samplers with 3 songs on there 2 rough studio cuts and 1 love cut. Any time your getting your music out there its always a help. If it wasn’t for production cost we would give all the music away for free.

Do you think the community (government, not-for-profits) should be doing more to help the music scene?
Well, I work for the North Shore Boys and Girls Club in Glen Head and they have had a program there since I was a kid called The Rocklobster. It’s been around for about 8 years now and it is there to support young talented musicians with a dream and to promote an alcohol, smoke and drug free environment. Pat (Saxophone), Andrew (Trumpet), and Amanda Corbo, (Merchandise) run the shows there and have done so for the past 3 years. In the past year, Stealing Jane has become extremely proactive in the climb of this program.

Some of the things we’ve done at the Rocklobster include:

• Events that had attendance of about about 250-300 people
• 2-day music festivals
• Outdoor concerts with 2 stages and 20 bands

We’ve shot two DVD’s at the venue with local bands Code Anchor, The Pledge Drive Sarcasm (now Drama for the Masses), A-life, and Eleven 43. Our clothing sponsor, Nevermore apparel, are having their one year anniversary party there this coming August with all local bands that they support. We try to keep the shows different in format but with one common goal: to support local music.

The Rocklobster is an all ages venue that has events once a month. Its only $7 to get in, $5 if you get them in advance. There are awesome bands that play at a huge stage with an awesome sound system, a light rig and a great staff that keeps the place running.

The venue is located at 200 Glen Head road Glen Head NY 11545.

I can’t forget about another amazing program that we love supporting because they support us so much, The Shoreham Rec center in Shoreham NY, (a part of the North Shore Youth Board). If your in a band and you want to play to the best crowd on Long Island go to Shoreham. Patty is the director there and her assistant Chip are great people to work with and all they ask is that you respect them and their property. They do outdoor events on the beach (Cedar beach) which has such a cool vibe and has given a lot of good memories for us.stealing-jane-bitter-end-shot.jpg

Pick a memorable situation, good or bad, that the band went through, and pick an existing song to describe that situation
I love this question… This whole ride of being a musician has been one with many ups and downs. Some days you feel like your on top of the world, like your rising to the top at a rapid pace and no one or nothing can stop you and other times you feel like you’re never going to make it and you’ll always be a local band and its times like that where you need some inspiration.

Bob Marlery said it best “One good thing about music, when it hits you fell no pain” and the one song that always keeps me positive and motivated is New York, NY by Chronic Future. The Lyric:

“Go get your map and compass and don’t listen to them
And don’t think about how much time you’re fixing to spend
The dirt only ends when the pavement begins
This is your heart your dream
And you’re your only friend so go

You can kick the earth as hard as you want
To show your frustration
Or you can get in your car and kick your foot to the gas
And keep accelerating till you hit your destination
So go”

Always gets me back into the game

Pick one goal for every show you play, what is that goal, and what do you do to try to accomplish it?
People pay money to see a good show and hear some good music. We do everything in our power to make sure at every show people walk away happy and telling friends what a good time they had. If people can forget about life’s problems for the half hour Stealing Jane is on stage and have a good time, we have done our jobs.

Our Websites are
www.stealingjane.com
www.myspace.com/stealingjane
for an online press kit please visit www.sonicbids.com/stealingjane

The CD will be out on August 11th, 2007 under BTO Records.