Barebones Entertainment got the opportunity to have a cross country sit down with vocalist Brian Mazzaferri from Chicago band, I Fight Dragons. This exciting band is made up of Brian Mazzaferri on lead vocals and guitar, Packy Lundholm on lead guitar and back up vocals, Hari Rao on bass, Chad Van Dahm on Drums, and, game master, Bill Prokopow on rock band guitar, keyboards, NES, and Nintendo Control Center. Take a look below to see all of the fun we had with this band.
Me: You have a very unique style to your music, I’ve heard it called 8 bit and Nerdcore, but what do you guys consider it to be?
Brian: You know, we enjoy being a part of all sorts of different classifications, most often I’d say we call ourselves chiptune-rock
Me: What inspired you guys to include the NES effects in your music?
Brian: It was a bit of happenstance actually, when Bill and I were making a demo for the first IFD song, “Heads Up, Hearts Down,” I thought it would be neat if the intro sounded like the chorus was coming out of a Nintendo. Then I did some more research and stumbled upon the whole chiptune scene, and from there I knew it was the sound I’d been looking for.
Me: Do you sample games in your songs to get the effects?
Brian: Actually, we don’t sample games for our songs; we create new music on the old soundcards. Primarily we use the original Game Boy (DMG) and the NES
Me: I’ll touch on this just slightly, Are you all big gamers? What games are you currently playing or looking forward to?
Brian: Yes and no, we love playing games but are often too busy these days to play a whole lot. Bill plays more FPS games like Left4Dead and Team Fortress 2, I’m more into RTS games, I was playing a lot of StarCraft 2 for a while. We also do some casual XBOX gaming in our van while on the road, Sonic Racing and stuff like that.
Me: I believe during your song “Money” at Warped you used the effects during the solo, in other instances I have seen a rap done as well. How do you decide what way you are going to go with it?
Brian: Lol, well one time for fun I dropped the first verse of Kool Moe Dee’s “I Go To Work” into the breakdown, it was never intended to be a repeated thing, I just did it for fun once. However, people ask for it sometimes, so whenever we hear people yell and ask I tend to do it.
Me: How was Warped for you guys? What were you able to take away from it?
Brian: It was amazing. Going so far and getting to meet so many new fans and hang out with other bands was a blast. We got no sleep whatsoever and worked our asses off and just generally had the time of our lives. Also any time you play 41 shows in 51 days it helps keep you in great shape musically.
Me: What is your favorite song to play in your set and why?
Brian: It changes, at the moment though it’s probably KABOOM!. I love coming out of the gates full force and slamming it as hard as we can.
Me: Did you have a lot of people come out that already knew your Band or do you feel that you made more fans?
Brian: I think it was a pretty healthy mix, we met LOTS of new kids and that was amazing, but our hardcore fans were there too, our Advance Guard street team members came and helped us promote our set as well.
Me: I was at the Dallas show and remember an isosceles triangle. What was this like to see from up on stage?
Brian: Well two sides were the same length, so it was awesome.
Me: I know every band wants to say every show was great, but what was your favorite stop on the tour and why?
Brian: Hmmmm, it’s hard to pick one, but our set in San Francisco was unexpectedly amazing. Denver and Chicago were kickass and we knew they were going to be. NYC was amazing too. Toronto was awesome because the heavens opened up right as we finished our set.
Me: I heard you got to know another band on the tour that I’ve had the pleasure to be my first interview for the blog, The Silver Comet. What do you have to say about getting to know them and their music (if you were able to hear them play at all)?
Brian: They’re great guys! I got to catch their set a couple times and they’re great players too, we had a lot of fun hanging out with them this summer.
Me: What were some crazy moments from this tour?
Brian: I’d say our craziest on stage moment was in Toronto. Like I said, the heavens opened during the last 30 seconds of our set and starting pouring rain and raging but we just kept playing until they shut the whole Warped down and the crowd went nuts and it was insane.
Me: Speaking of tours, I saw a mention of another one being planned. Can you tell us about any places you are planning to make it to?
Brian: This will be a pretty standard US tour with a Canada date or two, but we don’t have any specific dates to announce just yet. It will likely be in the November-December time frame.
Me: If you could go on tour with anyone who would it be and why?
Brian: Hmmm, I’d say Weezer or Fountains of Wayne because they’re 2 of our favorite bands.
Me: Are there any plans to work on another album soon?
Brian: Yes. We’re actually thinking about that exact thing now and how we’d like to go about it.
Me: “Save World Get Girl” is a fun video what inspired that video? Are there more official music videos being planned, since “The Geeks Will Inherit the Earth” was only a lyric video?
Brian: Thanks! That video was actually commissioned by Nintendo for use on the 3DS Nintendo Video platform. We do have another video for our song cRaZie$ that will hopefully be coming out in the next couple months as well.
After a very successful showing at Warped and another tour on the rise the future is looking quite brilliant for this chiptune band. The only request I have is there be a Dallas show on this next tour! Keep coming out with great music guys, and we’ll keep listening. Thanks for taking the time to sit down with us and talk a little bit. Video below is the previously mentioned “Save World Get Girl” video, enjoy and go like this band!
GAME OVER
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