Interview: Michael Rubin | King Falcon
The NYC based alternative rock duo King Falcon recently released their energetic new single – “Shake, Shake, Shake“. They are ready to keep the rock and roll train moving along. But like many people, they have been hit by the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Coronavirus has slightly altered the bands plan to release songs and tour. Actually, it’s affected the band on a personal level. Singer and guitar player, Michael Rubin tells Sound Vapors that drummer James Terranova had been stricken with the virus as we were discussing the plans to release another single. Rubin says, “It’s a little tricky now because of the Coronavirus. Originally, we were going to release another single that we were going to make a music video for. But James actually had the Coronavirus so James and I haven’t seen each other.. You want to hear something crazy? James got the Coronavirus and he lost his sense of smell. He can’t smell anymore.”
I’ve read that people have lost their sense of taste but this was the first time I had heard of someone losing their sense of smell. I asked Michael if it was a permanent condition. He responded, “It’s been two and half weeks and he still can’t smell. So we don’t know yet. But everyday he’s got to log it and he’s got a couple of things he has to smell. He’s got vanilla extract, cologne and really fragrant stuff. So everyday he has to track if he can smell anything.”
He continued explaining what the band was planning to do in light of these setbacks in regards to the music and a new single. Michael says,”We have one recorded and we want to release it as soon as possible. But we want to make sure the right stuff comes out with it so we’re going to try and make a video and hopefully release all five songs.”
I wondered if the band was going to wait to release all five songs until some of the quarantine restrictions were lifted so they can give it a proper release and tour. He tells me, “I’m not sure if the whole thing will wait for it, for all five songs, but I definitely think two or three of them will. I think James and I will try to put something together. Like a visual to go along with the songs.”
Judging by the sound of Shake, Shake, Shake, I can tell you that I’m pretty excited to hear what else these two have come up with.
Rubin breaks down the timeline of forming, writing and going into the studio, “So November we picked the name of the band. We no idea what it’s going to sound like apart that it’s going to be alt-rock. We don’t know what it’s going to look like. We don’t know who the members are going to be, aside from me and James. Everything is kind of up in the air.”
He continues, “In December we decide to book a plane ticket to go work with a producer group called Heavy – Stuart and Jason – they’re out in L.A. So we book a ticket to go out there for three days. James is the guy that really likes to plan stuff in advance. I am not. :laughs: So he kept trying to get together to write stuff and I was like, don’t worry about it, we’ll get to it, we’ll get to it.”
“It’s the night before we’re supposed to go to L.A. and James and I haven’t written a word or a lick or a key or anything. So we hop on the plane and we go there. We spent a whole day messing around in L.A. Doing what we do. The next day we’re like, crap we only have two days here to write and record the whole song. So we wound up writing the whole song that second day. That night we were getting all of our things together for the studio the next day. Last minute at like 11’o clock we realized there was no drum kit and no engineer at the studio. So we scoured the entirety of downtown L.A. and you might think, “sure go rent something”, right? This was a Sunday night and there was a parade. There was a huge parade down Hollywood Blvd and they shut down like half of L.A. and if you were on one side you pretty much couldn’t get to the other side.”
Michael finishes up this fascinating story, “So we happened to be on the side that had no rental places on it. So we couldn’t do that and everything was closed. We had to be at the studio in like nine hours. James and I called every person that knew any person that could possible know anyone in L.A. and we managed to piece together a drum set. Then we had to figure out what to do about an engineer. James is kind of an engineer, that’s kind of his thing that he does. So he “googled” all the gear that they had at the studio and figured out how to use it. The next day we showed up, James engineered it and played a drum kit that we put together from people around L.A. and we tracked the whole song and then went home.”
I’ve previously written that sometimes you can catch lighting in a bottle or find some magic in times of stress or discomfort. Whatever it was, it clearly worked for these two. The result is catchy, cleverly put together song in “Shake, Shake, Shake”. Check out the song on Spotify
I’ll be keeping my eyes and ears open for new music from King Falcon as it gets released. Go give these guys a listen. Maybe you will feel the same as me.
-Tommy Marz
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