This Blog is

Saturday 29 June 2013

Cerce Interview


Well shit. Just as I was about to format this interview, I heard it through the grapevine (my Facebook feed) that Boston hardcore act Cerce was no more.  It appears they've parted ways with frontwoman Becca Cadalzo and the remaining members have gone on to form a band called lovechild. A bit of a bummer, but hopefully lovechild will fulfill the promise Cerce showed through their short time together. 

Anywho, I caught up with the now defunct band in a lakeside mansion on tour with The World is an excessively long band name and Dads to talk about their new album (still happening!!!!), poutine, and their beginnings as a pop-rock group. Enjoy.

Introduce yourselves and what you do in the band:
Zach Suskevich: I’m Zack, I play guitar. 
Becca Cadalzo: I’m Becca, I yell. 
Patrick Talesfore: I’m Patrick, I play the drums. 
Zach Weeks: I’m Zach, I play bass guitar. 
Tim Altieri: I’m Tim, I play gerter. 
ZW: [laughs] WHAT? 
TA: Guitar.
Is this the first time you guys have ever been to Canada?
All: Yeah.
ZS: This is our first tour through Canada. We’ve been here three days.
How are you enjoying Canada so far?
PT: Love it.
ZW: Love it.
ZS: I’ve had poutine twice.
So you’re a fan of poutine?
ZS: Yeah. It makes me poop a lot, but I still do it.
So how’s the tour been going so far?
PT: It’s been going really well, I’d say. We started in Boston then came straight to Canada and we’ve done four Canada dates. It’s been good so far…
Is this the beginning of the tour?
PT: Well, we’re about halfway done. We’re only on the road for nine days, and tonight’s our last night in Canada before we go back to the United States. It’s a short tour.
You guys are on tour with bands who are a bit more “mellow” so to speak. How’s the response been to your more abrasive style of music?
ZS: It’s been working out pretty well. I mean, every band puts out a lot of energy and that’s almost all that matters.
ZW: People are definitely responding more so to the energy than to the genres involved.
TA: 10/10, would tour again.
How long have you guys been a band for?
PT: Two years. Pretty much two years exactly.
ZW: Well, we’ve been serious for about a year and a half.
I saw on some website that you guys started as a pop band?
PT: Yes.
ZW: Yeah. Well, that was sort of the original intent. But we were all just friends who started playing music together, and this is what came of it I guess.
That’s wild. How did you start as a pop band and end up on the complete opposite end of the spectrum?
ZW: Well… [to Becca] you wanna answer this?
BC: Pat and I decided we wanted to start a band, and because I’m more of a pop rock singer, we thought it was going to be more of a pop band. But then once we got the lineup together we realized it wasn’t going to be a pop-rock band. [laughs]
PT: Yeah, then we started playing music more in the vein of what we do now. Who knows what’ll come next, I guess.
Speaking of what will come next, you guys are working on a full length?
ZW: Well, since we haven’t been very secretive about it, we might as well tell you that we’re tracking it right now.
ZS: Right now, like, as we speak [laughter].
PT: Well yeah, kind of. Right before we left, we tracked drums and bass, and we’re gonna finish the rest of it when we get back to Boston. It should be out in the fall.
How similar is it to your other stuff?
PT: Well, there’s…
ZW: [frantically] Yes and no. Yes and no. Yes and no.
I see. According to a flier I saw, you guys are currently located in Boston and Philly. How do you make that work?
TA: We’re actually located in even more locations than that.
ZW: Well we’re all from different parts of the country, but we were going to school in Massachusetts when we started the band. Then Tim moved to Philly, which is why we’re sort of located in Philly, I guess.
PT: We play in Philly a lot, it’s kind of like a second home, and we use the power of technology to make it work.
Your S/T EP was released in Canada on A Mountain Far. How did you end up working with those guys?
PT: Matt who runs AMF pretty much just hit us up about a year ago when we released the EP and asked if he could release it in Canada. He’s awesome. He’s here, his band [Foxmoulder] played tonight.
TA: We stayed with him last night in Toronto, and he’s a great guy.
How’s the split with Stresscase coming along?
ZW: That’s actually been in progress since the fall. We were supposed to have it for this tour, but the pressing plants are really backed up so it’s taking a bit longer than we would’ve hoped, but regardless. We’re really excited for when we get it, hopefully it’ll be worth the wait.
ZS: Stresscase are a great band and great people.
BC: Even though we’ve never met them [laughter].
They’ve been cool on the internet?
PT: Yeah. The bass player’s coming to town right?
ZW: Yeah, he’s coming to Boston, so we’re gonna hang out with him. Should be fun.
This question is more for Becca. One thing I enjoy about this band and your vocals in particular is that you don’t try and mask the feminine aspects of your voice. A lot of “female fronted” hardcore or metal vocalists try and sound like dudes, but you make it pretty obvious that you’re a girl. Is that something you were going for, or did you just kind of do your thing?
BC: Yes and no. I mean, I consciously made and effort to be myself and to not change myself, so in that aspect, yeah. That’s how my voice sounds, and that’s my personality, so I wasn’t going to change it just because of the genre we’re playing.
But I mean, you’re like a pop rock singer too, so obviously you’ve had some time to develop your “voice” so to speak.
BC: Yeah, sort of. I mean, I was brought up with opera and classical, but I was trying to be a rock/pop singer for a bit, so I was trying to do that thing, and now I’m here [laughs].
Cool. Last question, is this the nicest house you’ve ever played a show in? (The band was playing a house show at a mansion in north Ajax, right beside a lake that people were swimming in.)
ZW: Yeah, easily. They have a really beautiful house
TA: I took so many sodas…
ZS: This house is a beautiful house and I am no longer afraid to swim.

Alright, thanks a lot guys.

No comments:

Post a Comment