"We love the idea of self-recording and just pumping out music as often as we can."
Out of Westchester, New York, come Imposters. Boasting versatile vocals, upbeat guitar riffs and sharp drum beats, new album Unlawful Assembly was released back in July. With hardcore rock songs such as 'Show Me the Monkey' and soft psych-rock tracks such as 'Lollygagging', its sound is variant, yet still has an overall cohesion.
2020 has been a whirlwind of a year, and we've seen the emergence of a whole array of political music. Jake Albi, vocalist, guitarist and drummer, regards Unlawful Assembly as “a reaction to the first half of 2020.” FUZZY caught up with Albi to chat musical identity, home-recording, and US politics.
FUZZY: What inspired you guys to start the band?
Originally we started as a band called ‘Break Down The Walls’ in 2015 as my previous group had just broken up a month or two prior. Lucky for me, I had been recording a solo album over the span of a few months leading up to that point. So already having a completed LP in my back pocket, the timing was perfect. Instead of releasing under my name, Nick and I named the album ‘BDTW’ and we just rolled with it from there. We later met TJ through Mercy College recording program, as we were all aspiring audio engineers.
FUZZY: Is there an interesting story behind your band's name?
So, like I said previously we started as Break Down The Walls and about a year ago we changed it to Imposters. And while we enjoyed it for the much, much shorter pronunciation, we also feel that musically we don’t stick to one identity. We aim to put out a lot of music over the course of the calendar year so our releases seem to reflect whatever kicks we are on at the time.
FUZZY: What was the influence behind your new album, Unlawful Assembly?
Unlawful Assembly is about the general state of the world, but particularly the United States right now. I don’t want to beat a dead horse and explain each and every thing, but more or less it’s a reaction to the first half of 2020, a lack of common sense or apathy. We each have home studios, so we were able to record it completely isolated from each other (as we had to be). Pro Tools has a cloud system that works pretty well and helps us collaborate efficiently.
FUZZY: How would you describe your music to someone who hasn’t listened to you before?
Every band under the sun is going to say this, but we don’t stick to one sound, genre, or mood. We try to be a band that has something for everyone, a universal appeal, whether it be live or in the studio, but if I had to narrow it down I would say a mix of psychedelic rock and grunge, with some ballads.
FUZZY: Who are your biggest musical influences?
It’s hard for the three of us to really decide together as a band but two from each of us in no order would be the ever so obvious Beatles, Chris Cornell, Elliott Smith, Stephen Stills, Pink Floyd, there’s definitely some Eagles in there.
FUZZY: If you could do a collaboration with any musician, who would it be?
We're going to go modern and say either Ty Segall or King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard because we love the idea of self-recording and just pumping out music as often as we can. At the end of the day, we are all huge music and recording fanatics so being in that world would be a dream come true for us.
FUZZY: As you’re from New York, what would be your dream gig venue?
On the largest and corniest scale: Madison Square Garden; Wembley Stadium - does Pompeii still have shows? Scaling down a bit, more realistically, the Red Rocks Amphitheater in Colorado seems beautiful.
Words by Courtney McLaven.
1st November 2020.
Comments