FFWD Weekly
Copyright © 1999. All Rights Reserved
| Music by Mary-Lynn McEwen Eve 6 with The Flys Forget Hendrix, Joplin, Morrison and Jones, who are by now both rotten and obvious. Try instead Nico, who falls off a bicycle and dies, or Stiv Bator, who is smacked by a car, walks away and drops dead hours later, or Kurt Cobain, Andy Wood, Wendy O. Williams, Ian Stewart – well, you start to get the point. A longevity study completed in the mid-’90s showed that celebrities in general and musicians in particular can expect to live short, messy lives, dying somewhere in their early 50s on average. From the vantage of his 19 years on Earth, Tony Fagenson, drummer for Los Angeles trio Eve 6, remains underwhelmed by the odds of his chosen career. But quicker than you can say "Dusty Springfield has become a little bit dustier," Fagenson refutes the parallels of peril. "When they were doing it, rock ’n’ roll was a different thing," he says. "The music industry has changed tremendously since then. There’s a lot of bullshit now, but there was even more then and I don’t think people took as good care of themselves back then. But the lifestyle can be fast and just end in a blaze of glory. That’s the whole rock ’n’ roll thing, I guess, living fast, dying young. "But that era might be coming to an end. People are a bit more sensible now, though I think there’s always gonna be some form, some sort of expression of that youthful passion." And for a kid whose idea of rebelling against his record-producer father and a stepmom who worked for a record company was to not get into music in his youth, this articulate young percussionist finds it a little ironic that he ended up doing a year of college majoring in music industry. But although he chose music as the medium to express the youthful passion to which he refers, Fagenson has no illusions about taking to the stages once held by those decomposing composers. "I think if we were in this position 10 years ago – I’d say yes to being psyched out that we play around Los Angeles, but the thing is all those clubs have completely gone down the tube, and they do this thing called pay to play with like seven bands on every night playing for 20 minutes each, and they all suck. "We’ve pretty much completely disconnected ourselves from the whole L.A. music scene. We just play our own music to our own fans and do it that way because everyone’s so cynical and jaded here that it’s like, ‘Just get away,’" the young drummer explains, sounding just a tad cynical and jaded himself. "Every touring band hates playing L.A. because people just sit back and cross their arms, they can’t let themselves get into the show. I realize there have been incredible historical figures that have played these stages, but I just feel so far away from that now." With the release of their first album, a self-titled number of punchy pop that drives down the centre of the melody highway, Fagenson, 19-year-old singer/bassist Max Collins, and 18-year-old guitarist Jon Siebels are not yet ready to reflect too deeply on future rock history and their place within it. "I think in terms of success we’re always judging in terms of long-term careers. We’re trying to get fans to stick with us even if we don’t have a record being played on the radio or mass popular appeal. We always choose not to alienate our fans. We don’t want to be big, just to have longevity." And untempted by the embrace of excesses on paths of glory that lead but to the grave, Fagenson belies wisdom beyond his years. "I think, really quickly you mature, even though being on the road is kind of a strange bubble, it’s not really reality, you still have to deal with responsibility. I haven’t had time to sit and reflect. Maybe I’ll be a psychological wreck when it’s over. If you start worrying and stressing about your life then you’ll just fall apart." Like Keith Moon, Sid Vicious, Richard Manuel.... |
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