Bio-Feedback

Posted Sep 15, 2007, by Meesh!.


How did you get the idea for your band name?
Ryan: I was falling asleep in health class in high school one day when we were learning about this biofeedback method of relieving stress. Just hearing about it subconsciously made me have this dream that we were playing live and that was our band name, and I guess it makes sense. We're using our instruments as a kind of stress management.
Alfredo: Yea, Ryan uses a lot of instruments for stress relief....haha

Whats your myspace link or any other link you want to give us?
Alfredo: Check us out at Myspace.com/biofeedback. We usually do all our booking from there and basically all our communication with other bands. Its usually me or our manager who runs our stuff.

Who are you and where are you all from?
Ryan: I'm Ryan, I'm a former convict from an Austrailian penitentiary. Oh crap. Sorry. Thats what the guy from the Ouija board told me I was in my past life. Wait...is this a trick question?
Alfredo: Hi. I'm Alfredo one of the lead singers and guitar player from Bio-Feedback. I'm a 6'7 non-smoking capricorn and i have an obsession with girls.
Ryan: We're actually from Lyndhurst, NJ. It's this little middle class suburb outside of NYC. It's fun. If you're a cop. Or a developer. But if you're us it's really not. But who really likes where you live anyway??

How was your band formed?
Alfredo: We all met at an I Love Lucy convention cuz we are all like really big fans of Ricky Ricardo. He's really an amazing dancer. And he's cuban, B. I always try and make my songs sound like him.
Ryan: Oook. Anyway. Yea we actually met some dude Gilberto who was like, "Yo, I got a drumset. I like music. Let's jam." Then he had to sell his drumset because his mom made him or something (we never really found out the truth). But then he was like, "I know this dude who plays drums and he's really good. I think he's chilling at Burger King with his girlfriend if you wanna go talk to him."
Alfredo: Yea George is always complaining about that cuz he thought we were gonna kick his butt or something that day. We just went up to him all serious and were like, "SO. I heard you play drums. When can we come by and jam." He said he was gonna change his identity after that day cause we scared him haha. Thats why he made us call him Nike. We asked him what his name was and he said Nike. He didn't even really like jamming with us that much cuz we were too fast, but we got serious and he started getting into it and he loves it now. Now he lives for the fast. FAST!!!!

What band has influenced you the most?
Ryan: Yeepp Alfredo's gonna have fun with this one.
Alfredo: We are all about the Indigo Girls. Hands down the number one biggest influence on our sound.
Ryan: OK so now for the real answer haha. I dont really know, it changes from time to time. I know when we first got started we were really all about Minor Threat and The Casualties. Lately we've been getting a lot of influence from the more melodic side of hardcore. A lot of Set Your Goals, Lifetime, and Daggermouth.
Alfredo: Seriously though, I personally think that NOFX is the biggest influence on our sound and idealogy. Especially with the fast stuff. Yea incase you didnt notice we are all about fast beats. All the time. We're kinda like if you took Leftover Crack, NOFX, Propagandhi, Sum 41, and Silverstein and put it in a bowl and ate it and then farted while sprinting butt naked through midtown Manhattan at rush hour. Thats basically our sound.


What do you try to have people get out of your music?
Ryan: to be completely honest, the whole thing started out just for us. We were sick of hearing all these crappy bands on the radio and at some of the local shows for a while and we just wanted to make music we could listen to.
Alfredo: Yea dude it's all about fun. We're not just here to have fun, but we give it all at our shows to make sure everyone else has a good time too. It's all about the fans. And girls.

What inspries your lyrics? What are they all about?
Alfredo: It really depends. I usually write about things that are happening around me or in my life. I feel like whats actually happening to yourself helps you find the truth when you write the music. When you dont like the way things are done at your job or how good that chocolate bar tastes on a sunday afternoon. It doesn't matter, its really just all passionate.
Ryan: I write songs when im pissed off. Thats why all the songs that sound really pissed sound that way. I went to california and you could totally see why those pop punk bands sound that way. Everythings bright and sunny and fuzzy bees and stuff. But we get frustrated over here with our fast paced lives and crappy jobs and fast food restraunts on every corner and then our personal issues on top of that. Don't get me wrong, california does have its problems I'm sure, but I dont know, I don't live there. But all that SoCal punk is definitely great and one of the biggest inspirations on our songs.

What makes you different from other bands out there?
Alfredo: Definitely the energy. When we play we make sure we leave it all onstage and interact with the crowd.
Ryan: We just go nuts.
Alfredo: In our town at local shows you find mostly either emo or death metal crazy stuff, so we're right in the middle. We just take more influence from punk and old school hardcore.

Have a CD out? How can we get it?
Ryan: Yea we got a cd of mostly demos called And Deliver Us From Evil. Its not really that great, but its a recording. We are trying to put it on CDBaby but we are kinda slacking and not so sure cuz we're prolli recording again soon.
Alfredo: Yea definitely, we are working on a whole new lineup of songs that we are gonna record and take a little more seriously. But if anybody wants one, just message us on Myspace and we'll send it by mail. The Demo is 5 bucks and it comes with our music video inside the CD. All you have to do is put it in your computer.


If you could play with any popular band out there, who?
Ryan: Wow this is a no-brainer for us.
Alfredo: Defff! It's always been our dream to open for Indigo Girls.
Ryan: NOFX!!!!!!!!!!! We love NOFX. Definitely my favorite band. And we kinda sound close to them, just harder.
Alfredo: I really want to open for Set Your Goals again. Or Daggermouth cause they are an awesome band.

If you could give advice to a starting band or musician, what would you say?
Alfredo: NEVER GIVE UP!!!! We are never gonna give up cause the way we look at it is that only the best are gonna survive. And put it this way, if someone comes up to you and says your band sucks, ask them where their band is and if they really have a right to make that kind of call. Make sure you practice everything, I mean EVERYTHING. Vocals, playing, moving, writing, and just don't stop.
Ryan: I would say just to be open minded because the more influence you take from other bands actually makes you more of an individual, if that makes any sense. I listen to a lot of different stuff and it makes songwriting a lot of fun. I can listen to Deftones and then change the cd to like NOFX or Leftover Crack or the Beatles or something and it really helps when you're writing.

What do you guys like to do on the road?
Alfredo: Eat. Play shows, watch girls on tv.
Ryan: Me and Nick take a little sip of drinks before every show. Thats what i like to do.
Alfredo: George goes outside and fights gangs in the streets with a camoflauge bandana over his face and a flyswatter.

Got any crazy or wild stories youd like to share?
Ryan: whenever someone asks a band this question, they kinda look at each other and say, "well i dont know. Nothing really. Someone took out a girl's chest the other night, that was pretty cool." Nah. Screw that! We always tell this story about the show we played on New Years in the City a few years ago. This Bush-Bashing anti-militarist band (us) comes out to a bar on New Years and plays a set to 8 skinhead marines with like tribal swastika tattoos and stuff. Then I broke a string. You know how hard it is to break a bass string?? And the only person who would lend me a bass was a lefty bassist. So he took his string off to let me use his string. Then this cracked out Woody Allen looking dude told me to go hang myself with my broken string. I guess we didnt look enough like The Crow cuz this dude was rocking a trenchcoat columbine style and god it just sucked. Oh and he was sporting some 80's style leather pants.
Alfredo: This other time we were about to play a show and what Nick used to like to do was buy 45 bags of M&M's and separate them into color classes. Someone stole all the brown ones so we had to find 140 brown M&M's to fit a wineglass or Nick wouldnt go onstage that night. So me and Ryan broke into this grocery store and there was this redneck Irish dude with an old lady and his son and golden retriever. They tried to beat us up but we dropkicked them and beat them to death with their own shoes............................ It was a shame what happened to that dog....................................................Well. We came back, nick got his M&M's, got onstage, and played a great show.

Do you have any upcoming shows?
Alfredo: We were supposed to do this show a couple months ago with our friends FakeKnife, but it got postponed to October 27th. We've actually been trying to concentrate ..ing our songs and we just bought a tour bus for a tour we are gonna be doing soon so stay tuned on our myspace for more info!!!!

What do you think about UFOs?
Ryan: When I was younger I used to wake up and see bruises that weren't there the day before, and I SWORE to God that I was abducted by a UFO in my sleep and they performed some kind of crazy operation on my body by cutting this little incision on my leg or something. I still wake up in cold sweats.
Alfredo:.......................So. How about them Yankees?
Ryan: I'm being serious. Minus the cold sweat part.
Alfredo: Me? I believe in UFO's. If someone is stupid enough to not believe that there is life somewhere else in this universe they gotta be on drugs.

What were some of your favorite bands growing up?
Alfredo: Beatles. Hands down. If it wasn't for them, I would have never even thought about being in a band. Old school Green Day and Blink-182.
Ryan: I was a big fan of Billy Joel actually when I was younger. I seriously loved the album The Stranger and that's my first recollection of listening to music and wondering how it's made and really admiring it. Then got older and got into Rage Against the Machine, Green Day, and a lot of Blink.
Alfredo: George our drummer listens to a lot of Spanish music and pop punk. He loves the Ataris and the Starting Line and Thursday and The Alkaline Trio. Nick used to listen to a lot of Blink and New Found Glory when he was younger, now he listens to a lot of indie hardcore like Fear Before the March of Flames, the Locust, Blood Brothers, and he's just getting into Lifetime and The Descendents.

What do you think of Big Smile Magazine?
Ryan: It gives me a big woody.
Alfredo: Ditto. Nah but honestly, thanks so much for everything. We really had fun answering these questions and we would love to do it again soon. And to tell you the honest truth, this interview left me with a big smile.
Ryan: It left me with a big woody.

Anything else you want to say to fans or anyone reading this interview?
Alfredo: I just wanna go on record as of right now that finger sniffing is the number one cause of dry heaving and regurgitation.
Ryan: I'm gonna take this one seriously and say stop buying cd's cause all mine got stolen and im really pissed. So don't buy 'em cuz some people from the hood will steal em. (Unless it's ours). Love you!<3