Unite Fanzine
James: Give me a little background on the band.
Nick: We were the only ones amongst our friends who weren’t in a band. So we decided to start this joke band called Five Lesbians and a Dildo. It was Jeff on guitar and me on drums. That was it. We played three or four show that were well attended due to the bands name. That was it.
Jeff: At one point we decided to bring it back just in order to make a demo. We needed to add a bass player so we asked Chris. He didn’t seem to be too interested but he did it anyway. We started practicing and suddenly had these great songs. From there we felt like we had something. We changed the name to Bombay because we knew we wouldn’t be taken seriously with the former one. The name Bombay is a tribute to Captain Bombay from the movie ‘The Mighty Ducks’.
James: I liked the name a lot because it left a lot of room for interpretation. Now you’ve basically ruined it for me.
(Laughter)
James: I was always curious as to why anyone would want to start a stupid, joke band.
Nick: Just for the fun of it. We weren’t really taking it seriously.
Jeff: Yeah, that was it. I had written a song called ‘I want your hat’. Just for fun in a sense.
At the time I had just started playing guitar and I wasn’t very good. I just wanted to play more. Nick wanted to take up drumming again. I had always wanted to be in a band. At the time, that was enough for me. But we got better and started writing good songs.
James: Was the name change a response to the fact that you had grown as a band?
Nick: Not really. We were playing so many different styles at the time. We were playing all these different styles. We had songs that sounded Punk. We had one that was in the vein of Iron Maiden. We were all over the map. Suddenly, we just found our niche.
James: When you decided to start Bombay. Was it in any way a chance to escape the limitations or boundaries of Four Fingers?
Jeff: That’s exactly what we wanted to do. This was a chance for me to make music that I couldn’t make in Four Fingers. Bombay is more accepting and open to different sounds and styles. We can be more creative.
James: When you’re involved in more than one band how much of a challenge is it to keep each one separate and unique?
Not hard at all. When we’re playing with Bombay it’s a completely different vibe to that of
Four Fingers.
With Four Fingers there is always a focus on Tohm. (Not in a negative or visual way) Sort of following his lead.
We jam and it just turns into a song.
James: Chris, what was it like transitioning from playing the drums in Four Fingers to bass in Bombay?
Chris: Not at all. In the first place the drums and the bass are very similar instruments.
Nick: He’s basically still the boss in a sense. We’re a very bass led band. Most of the songs we come up with are led by the bass.
James: I understand your recording a full length.
Nick: We’re working on it. (laughs)
James: When I caught your set that night I thought “Here’s the perfect band for a 7 inch record.”
Just a short but intense burst of energy.
Jeff: The idea of a 7 inch sounds great. We’d be down for just about anything but a cassette. (Jeff and Chris’ released a cassette demo with Four Fingers.)
James: You’re looking for a new singer. Why isn’t the current situation working out?
Nick: We’ve wanted to have a quote “Singer” in Bombay since the very beginning. It’s always been a combination of each of us.
Jeff: (Joking) which sucks.
Nick: We just really like the how we work together. The chemistry is great between us.
We’ve been friends forever and to find that fourth person who fits in with that chemistry would be very difficult.
Chris: Someone who got the music and felt what we did.
Jeff: We think the music speaks for itself and we don’t want someone who is just going to sing over it.
James: Getting back to your songs. You’ve got a song called ‘Tits’. It must take balls to write a song called ‘Tits’.
Jeff: I came up with the riff for ‘Tits’. I had written the lyrics for it at four in the morning a long time ago for a band I was in with Tohm (Four Fingers). The song just tells the story of how I love big boobs.
James: Are you planning on taking Bombay on the road like you recently did with Four Fingers?
Jeff: We have in the past played on the same bill as Four Fingers. Our biggest fan base (Bombay) is outside of New Jersey. The feedback at out of state shows has been very good. In New Jersey, nobody gets it. We were the opening band at this house show in Maryland and we got a bigger audience than Four Fingers.
James: On the subject of Four Fingers. You just got off tour recently. Tohm relayed a story earlier today and told me to ask about shitting in the woods.
Jeff: I was in the van playing cards with Chris and out of nowhere I looked at Chris and said “I gotta shit.”
Chris: “Can’t you wait?”
Jeff: “This is happening now!” So we pulled off the highway into this parking lot and I ran into the woods, ripped my pants off and started taking care of business. The thing is we were almost out of toilet paper because Tohm spent the day prior shitting up a storm. Thom’s laughing so hard he almost shits himself. So there I am in the woods with my pants around my ankl
es and the first thing I can think of using is socks. But Chris didn’t want to give me his because his Mom counts his socks.
Chris: She does. She just bought me socks for the school year and said “Don’t wear these until school starts!!!” I had to bring those socks home.
James: Where do you see the band going with your live sets.
Nick: We give off a ton of energy during our sets. We don’t just stand around looking down at our instruments. Chris goes nuts climbing onto amps. Jeff is over there rocking out and I’m doing my best pounding away on the drums. If you give us a chance we think you’ll feel the energy and music we bring.
Jeff: When Chris and I are playing with Four Fingers. It’s more of an angry energy. When we’re playing with Bombay, it’s more of a groove.
Interview and images James Damion.
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Thursday, September 9, 2010
Bombay have been knocking it around for some time now but if you listen to their music or have a chance to see them play live you’ll notice a band that really seems to coming into their own. Musical, noisy and experimental at the same time with influences as varied as their sounds. Taking nods from bands like Jawbreaker, Rites of Spring and Embrace and melding them the likes of Black Sabbath, The Doors and even Sublime. Watching the band live is like peering into a band coming together as they unravel.
I sat down with Jeff, Nick and Eric outside of the Eerie Saloon in Montclair (aka The Depot) and talked about the bands music and growth as trains whizzed by and drunken bar patrons cursed the quiet sky. Here’s what they had to say. JD
