BROOKLYN BAND REVIEW: You wanna start by
telling me…Hellooo! We’re starting. You want to start by telling me how the band
started?
In the beginning…
LAGANA: We [TT and TL] were friends for like
ten years. [Two guys] and I were playing together. Shovel Mother [TT’s band]
just broke up, he gave me a call, his exact words were…VISION. ‘Tom, I have a
vision, I want to come jam with you guys, I liked your tape, blah, blah, blah.
TUSCILLO: I had a couple of songs. They had a
couple of things, so I hooked up with them…
LAGANA: We recorded a two-song demo tape.
TUSCILLO: Right, with a drum machine. And I
was always talking to Yuval. When he was with Crispy Brown we played a show
together. When the opportunity came up and we needed a drummer, we gave him a call. He was
actually playing with someone.
And so Yuval came into the
picture…
YUVAL: I was jamming with two girls from Ocean
Parkway. It didn’t go nowhere and [TT] called me up and I was debating whether I
should join or not, thinking that it was going to be somewhere in the vein of Shovel
Mother. I wasn’t into that kind of music at the time. Shovel Mother was
pretty heavy, dark, moody.
TUSCILLO to YUVAL: You were into playing like
in folk bands and stuff. We were all like rock-n-rollers and metal.
YUVAL: Right. I came to the studio. Jammed
with them one time. I saw that they were really cool guys. So it was important to me
besides the music to have guys you felt comfortable with.
And in comes Frank…
YUVAL: But we always had bad luck with this
band. When we first started…Remember when we 1st started? We had one dedicated
follower. One dedicated follower, that came down to see us.
TUSCILLO: It was the worst snowstorm in the
last 10 years. It was like fucken snow all over the place. Who came down to see us!?!
FRANK!
FRANK: Here is what happen. I was rhyming. I
was rapping and they were going into the studio to record. I remember they wanted me to to
to… Horseshoes! Ok. I was looking forward to it cause I was following the
band, you know? So anyway, then Tommy [T] told me that they broke up. So I said all right,
cool. I had an idea to do experimental type of hip-hop. So I called him [TT]. I threw a
couple of ideas at him. He basically said fine. What you’re doing here would fit
perfectly with Exit Hero. So I was like I thought about it. I didn’t think
I’d be able to do it ‘cause I wasn’t playing bass. I started playing bass
when I was 14. I was playing a lot of death metal bands, hard core bands and stuff like
that. And then I didn’t play for like 18 or 20 or 21 or something like that, right?
So for me to pick up a bass again to start playing was just completely out of my mind. But
then I was like, ah fuck it, I’ll give it a shot. So I went down. I learned a couple
of songs, we went into the studio. We started playing and in time we finally started
clicking. That was it.
It’s the music that gets
‘em…
TUSCILLO: Then we had an audition at the Lion’s
Den.
YUVAL: Right, right, right.
FRANK: The first time, we actually, we played
there once. We played the Lion’s Den once and we did bad. We didn’t have
our look together. There were like 15 people.
LAGANA: They didn’t like the draw but
they loved the band, they loved the music.
YUVAL: They loved us. They gave us another
shot. I remember he promised to come down and see us in Brooklyn too. And he came out to
see us at Ruby’s.
All: Right! Right! Right!
YUVAL: He got a blowjob that night too!
All: Ha! Ha! Ha!
LAGANA: He knows who to hang out with!
What’s in a name…
TUSCILLO: What happened was that, um, it was
one of our first songs I had written. It was called Exit Hero. We didn’t have
a name for the band so he [TL] liked it immediately so…
YUVAL: The song, it was about someone that
pretends to be a hero.
TUSCILLO: Right. There’s meaning to it.
It’s like a contradiction. A hero usually stays around and performs the hero-ly
deeds, right?
YUVAL: Right. It was, you know, like a
terrible name. Now it seems very cool.
FRANK: Now it’s cool. We made it cool.
A band of Eighties
Babies…
YUVAL: Four people with four different
influences.
FRANK: As a whole? All right. Let’s just
go around and say it. I grew up listening to Old School Punk, Clash, Pistols,
Ramones. I also listened to a lot of metal when I was 13, 14. I was a big Megadeth
fan, Slayer, Metallica, Testament, all them. And at that time old
school hip-hop was coming. Like Run-DMC, Beastie Boys, KRS One, Public
Enemy.
LAGANA: Everything he just mentioned we were
all into it because it was the mid 80’s, late 80’s.
TUSCILLO: Van Halen, Black Sabbath,
Led Zepplin, and Judas Priest, were the four bands that made an impression
when I was growing up.
YUVAL: My influences are completely different
‘cause I grew up at a little different time like 5 years ahead of these guys, and
plus in Israel the influences come a little bigger from Europe than they do for America.
But, regardless, I was more into studying the drums. When you study there you tend to
study music that’s more study oriented like Jazz music. I use to listen to a lot of
progressive jazz. Like a lot of Bee Bop jazz, and music like Chico Ria.
A song is born…
LAGANA: I’ll have like a riff or
something and a little melody and every one will add their thing to it and that’s
what brings the song to life, you know what I’m saying?
FRANK: It’s more like a song is born, not
forced.
YUVAL: Another important part is if somebody
does come with a song, and comes with his vision… when somebody comes up with an
idea, I’m not gonna come up with something against that, I’m gonna try to work
with him, gonna try to see his vision. Try to see his vision first and then with that, you
know, develop.
TUSCILLO: Like on Saints Parade, [YN]
was in the studio one day, start kicking to these beats, we put our melody to it and
fuckin put some cords into this thing with the guitar line, melody line that we were
playing and shit. We worked around him.
All: Group effort. Group effort.
LAGANA: When it comes to me, I look at songs a
little different then they do. I look at it from a lead guitarist standpoint, you know. I
look at it and feel this is black and white. It’s bland. It’s good, but just
bland, and then I put my color into it and that’s it. My influences and my taste are
a little different the rest of the band, it’s a mix.
What do you have to do to get
attention around here, anyway??….
TUSCILLO: We had the idea of the cover band in
our mind too. We needed to make money and we also wanted to play in our own neighborhood,
but there was no place to play our original music. So, um, we were thinking about
something that would be a little different than the usual bullshit. I didn’t care for
how the original 80’s songs had evolved…
YUVAL: We were at the studio. We should start
a cover band called Kill the 80s!
All: HAHAHAHAHA!
TUSCILLO: That’s exactly how it happened
so we learned stuff like Tainted Love, Flock of what the hell, Run Away. We
started playing Ryan’s Ale House.
YUVAL: The whole summer we had every
Wednesday. The first show we drew like 100 people. They hadn’t seen us in so long.
FRANK: Exactly. The second, third, and fourth
show were fuckin horrendous. Three people. Every time.
YUVAL: We didn’t have a lot of material
at the time. Also for a lot of friends of ours it was hard to get out on Wed nights. We
used to start playing like…
LAGANA: $200 a pop. We were billionaires.
YUVAL: Right. It paid for the Demo tape. That
$200. Two years ago.
Trying to keep the covers as
far away as possible…
FRANK: Originally we had two names for the
band. The cover band was The M-80’s, dressing up, having the whole thing and Exit
Hero would be just dressing normal. Whatever. Then we just said fuck it.
LAGANA: People started confusing us with the The
M-80’s.
FRANK: So we dropped the The M-80’s
and kept the image and that was it.
YUVAL: But one thing we kept that whole time
that was very, very, very important for us to keep originals within the sets and keep the
originals alive. I mean the cover band was supposed to be literally cover. You know. To
raise the money for…
FRANK: Raise money for the CD but still having
fun at the same time.
YUVAL: Then, I mean, it really started picking
up. People started following the band. Our following started growing up a lot, too.
LAGANA: We grew up a lot.
FRANK: Just to throw this in, throughout the
whole time, we were doing these cover shows in the city.
TUSCILLO: Orange Bear.
FRANK: CBGB’s. Yeah. We were doing
the Spiral.
How to make an old song sound
new…
YUVAL: Arrangements. First of all, the
[covers] don’t sound the same as they are on the CD. We didn’t try to pick up
the CD and figure out every solo, every sound and then record the thing. We try to get the
main idea of the song and play.
FRANK: When we looked at it we approached it
as if Exit Hero wrote these songs, you understand what I’m saying? We
didn’t look at it as a cover show. We just look at it as us having fun on stage,
throwing a party.
LAGANA: But we’ll be doing a lot less
covers. Now we have the CD out.
Where to go from here…
BROOKLYN BAND REVIEW: You’ve got the CD.
What’s happening with that now? Are you letting go of the cover songs?
LAGANA: No! Yes and no.
YUVAL: Of course. There’s always expenses
coming out obviously. If we make enough money playing originals we wouldn’t play the
covers. But, unfortunately, that doesn’t happen. So what happens now, we keep on the
covers. We could play to different kinds of audiences.
LAGANA: It’s fun. That’s the most
important thing.
Keep it together for ever and
ever…
BROOKLYN BAND REVIEW: OK. What’s your
driving force behind the whole band? Like what keeps you together? What keeps you going?
LAGANA: Determination.
FRANK: When you see people that fuckin doubt
you, that just drives me fuckin nuts. Or a group of people in the crowd or in the club
that doubt us. Those are our best shows because we step up our performance.
TUSCILLO: Every show we step up to some more
than others, it’s like war. I want to annihilate everybody in the whole place.
Totally. It’s like a big bomb going off on stage. Totally.
YUVAL: Uh. I’m kinda mellow in that point
of view, I think there’s a lot of things that truly motivates us. The actual fact
that there is a certain amount of success that we have right now. I think it motivates us
to, you know, hear from a lot of people that you’re good and whatever.
TUSCILLO: We all love music and I can’t
think of anything else in the world we would rather do.
We’re all grown up
now…
FRANK: We believe in the music. We’ve all
gone through a lot of bullshit with a lot of different bands. We believe in what we have
in front of us and we enjoy playing on stage and 95% of the feedback that we get is all
complimentary. Very rarely do we get a bad review.
LAGANA: And also, to let you know, we’re
all above 25 years old and we all have other things already and we’re all not wasting
time. We’re all growing up.
Why, why, why? Why Exit Hero?
YUVAL: I believe in this band more than any
other band I played before. I really do. Why? Over here is more like a group effort.
TUSCILLO: It’s like a family thing.
FRANK: We have trust in each other. We have
faith in each other and we just do it.
LAGANA: The point of this band is, we’re
together. Trust me. It’s one. It sounds stupid the way I say it. We’ve been
through so much shit, so much. That means we could do anything. Together.
We have a dream…
LAGANA: If we could make a living making
records, recording. My dream is to be on the cover of Guitar Magazine.
YUVAL: To be recognized and to be able to make
a nice living.
FRANK: To be a Rock-n-roll band. We want to be
able to support ourselves doing what we love.
LAGANA: I definitely want to become a rock
star.
FRANK: I think we are the best rock-n-roll
band.
What’s your sign, um,
sound?…
BROOKLYN BAND REVIEW: Describe your music.
FRANK: Scroll brush rock-n-roll wolf pack,
baby. Wolf pack.
TUSCILLO: A lot of emotions. Total. Our souls
in every aspect.
FRANK: I’ve gone on stage, I’ve
dealt with bands and I just go through the motions and just, you know, just play the
songs. No problem, whatever. But here, we understand it on a deeper level, on a really
emotional level. We play with a lot of feeling. The songs are actually abstract, you know
what I’m saying?
TUSCILLO: Out of all the songs you’ve
seen us play, right, have you ever seen any other band sweat like us? We are so drenched.
Everything that’s in our bodies is just laid out on stage. It’s the stir of the
waters.
Who’s the audience?…
YUVAL: The audience really, really varies. I
mean there’s a lot of people that come up to us and said that they never listened to
that kind of music before we start playing and there are people that listen to other types
of music, but like us.
Ladies and gentlemen, the
moment we’ve all been waiting for…
BROOKLYN BAND REVIEW: What do you think of
your CD?
FRANK: It sucks ;-) NO!!! I think its fuckin
phenomenal.
TUSCILLO: The way I look at it was, we decided
to have the CD capture how we feel on what we do. How we live our lives collectively and
how we represent that in our music. I think we did a good job in doing that.
FRANK: We always felt that we had a very
energetic live show. So, the way we wanted to have the recording was to come up with
something that catches the energy. There was hard work and planning and focus on a vision,
have it filled with a lot of feelings.
TUSCILLO: The first half of the record is
foggy fine then the other half gets a little darker. The sequence is we’re doing our
thing then a few forks on the road along the way, but in the with Crash, even
still, we’re gonna keep doing it. There is no way you’re going to stop us from
doing it. So there is a brighter day tomorrow.
BROOKLYN BAND REVIEW: What made you feel like
you were ready to make a CD?
TUSCILLO: We had enough material. We were
playing our asses off. We were tight.
YUVAL: We had to start becoming professional.
TUSCILLO: People take you a lot more seriously
with a CD. If we want to get a record deal, the record company doesn’t have to invest
all that money into us to go spend on recording and it’s better for us. It’s
better for them.
FRANK: Plus it would be a big FUCK YOU to
everyone that ever doubted us.
TUSCILLO: The frustrations of doing things you
hate to do all week long. The fuckin jobs. The shit jobs you gotta have and all the
regular living things you have to do. It all comes out on stage too, all the anger and the
fury.
YUVAL: It’s time to present your songs,
your music which is really life, you know. You love that music. So go on stage and you
give all you got. You give all you got because you like doing that. That’s where the
energy comes from. I think the reason why you didn’t get a clear answer is because it
is really hard to describe any music. I’m afraid to categorize it. I don’t want
to say rock-n-roll. I don’t want to say hard core.
