Don't worry. The New York scene is back to normal.
Matt Stinchcomb, guitarist/vocalist for the flourishing NYC-based French Kicks, seems pleased. Slowly exhaling Camel smoke, he leans against the band's oversized maroon Ram 3500 as ashes occasionally hit his craggy black sports jacket. Four days into their current tour, the French Kicks have just arrived in Chapel Hill.
Matt takes another drag. "The music scene in New York two years ago was crazy," he calmly recollects.
That's when the Strokes got huge, a frenzy of people nationwide took notice and, suddenly, the "new sound of New York" became "it."
"The thing is," Stinchcomb explains, "there actually wasn't any rock movement at all. Most of those bands had already been playing for years."
For some though, it's still all too easy to dismiss the French Kicks as just another one of those journalistically conceived, "Rock Is Back" New York bands. Yet, fused with subtle three part harmonies, clever backbeats and seamlessly mellow bass lines, as well as skillfully enmeshed keyboards and guitars, their music far transcends the constricting holds of this pseudo-genre they don't think they ever were a part of in the first place. And it's not the fame, the press or even their growing fan base that matters most to them.
They look like rock stars, but they don't live the typical rock star life. There's no glitz, no fits of hotel destruction, no drug and alcohol binges. There won't be any either. It's been a trend upwards for the Kicks. Bigger shows. Better venues. Video on MTV. Recent appearance on Last Call with Carson. But at the same time, they've turned down big-time shoots with photographers telling them how to dress; magazine interviews that would falsely represent them. It's an issue of integrity: "We have standards," vocalist and former drummer Nick Stumpf insists. "If we lose those, then we are fucked."
They're in a familiar zone. It's real life, but not really. Touring's got its own pace, its own momentum, like everyday motions, sub-existing in an atypical world. This show is normal so far: arrive at the venue, stretch and breath. Having no roadies, they unpack the van themselves, sound check, and then chill out in their usually dismal dressing room until show time. "This place is actually pretty luxurious," bassist Lawrence Stumpf observes as he sits on one of the two faded love seats, pressed precariously against the cracked paneled walls that seem ready to cave-in at any moment. The French Kicks have always been optimistic, even when the walls actually did start to give way.
In October 2001, between tours and while recording their refreshing first full-length release, One Time Bells, the French Kicks had nothing. No homes, no clothes, barely enough food to survive. "When you don't have stuff though," Nick posits with melancholic intonations that parallel his deep and sinuous singing voice, "You can focus on what you really care about." The Kicks simply care about writing and performing the best songs they possibly can.
Their philosophy works: One Time Bells is chock-full of inexplicably catchy and well-written tunes like the eerily angelic and at times, Pink Floydian "Down Now," and the beautifully distorted rock anthem "1985." Their stage presence is a blend of modesty and rebellion: While Nick coyly leans backward, mic pressed close to his mouth, and his brother Lawrence barely moves, Matt and Josh Wise (Guitar/Keyboard/Vocals) frantically shred their guitars as drummer Hugh McIntosh plays precisely out of control.
While it's far from a packed house this night, the French Kicks still play as if it is. "No matter the size, it's hard not to react to an audience," Matt says as he changes the strings on his sunburst Gibson. Unlike this show, however, their crowds are generally growing, the hype is starting to catch up with them.
While they wouldn't mind taking this thing as far it'll go, they don't ask for all that much. "I'd like to own a nice small house somewhere pretty and do this for a living," Matt muses after the show. "Just be comfortable." The van eventually rolls out of town en route to Atlanta.
New York might be back to normal, but the French Kicks won't ever be close to that.
-Scott Hechinger
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