Interview With 'Amycanbe'

Firstly, introduce yourself/yourselves and tell us a little bit about the band and how you came to be?

Hi! We are from Italy and started playing together 12 years ago. in the beginning we were very Folk/Acoustic oriented, very few drums, with 2 guitars and winds but after some time we started experimenting with electronics and devices expanding the line up and moving towards different sounds and arrangements solutions, in other words having fun!

What were you all up too prior to the band, was this always the chosen path or did you have other dreams and aspirations?

I started playing flute when I was 11 but this was almost a stretch, then I bought my first bass when I was 16, after some time playing with my brother and some friends I met Marco. Brought some guitars, finally he met Francesca and asked to join the “band” (although there was no band..no name at the time !!) after this the puzzle was almost complete.

Tell us about your latest EP/Album and why our readers should check it out.

It is called 'Wolf' and I think (as always happens) it is the most interesting work we've done so far, it is the balanced mix beetwen our electronic body and romantic soul, for us it was a challenge and we struggled a lot to complete it because 2 bandmates decided to leave the band just before we started the recording sessions, and our future was uncertain to say the least. But we got on with job, recorded the album in 3 (the “original line up” as we usually call it..joking..) with a very BIG help from Matta so much so that after the mix he joined the band and now is a key part of the live setup.

Have you ever come face to face with someone within the music scene who has left you awestruck and why?

There are a lot of bands that left me awestruck and the reason is often the same.”How do they write such beautiful songs??” we can't just talk about this: you have great songs or you haven’t, no needs of balloons or fireworks… those can help.. but you should play a great song with just an acoustic guitar too, if it works you’re safe. I mean bands like Mercury Rev, Wilco, Stereolab...but we've not met them so far! We met some very good ones as support bands instead, like Sophia or Skin or The Devastations....

If we were to head out to one of your live shows what can ourselves and others expect?

The first thing you should expect a crazy woman dancing like a shaman with a mic in front of her then 3 guys behind her that try to fill the space and frequencies with a lot of different musical instruments. We try to recreate the sound we made in the studio, but often songs are re-arranged and it is not rare so switch instruments during the set. I play mostly guitars and some bass, Marco takes care of drumming and piano, Matta does everything else and more with laptop/samplers/synths and some other bass, a bit complicated for our sound engineer ( yes..he HATES us… :D )

If you had one artist/band that you could go on tour with tomorrow who would it be and why?

Too many to list here hehe, I’d really like to share a tour with Massive Attack, too much??!?

The reason is because they did and still are doing some of the most interesting "Pop" music of the last 25 years....( or more I dont remember! :-) )and on stage they are amazing remaining so independent at the same time too! They seem to do just what they want how they want, and I love it!

You can spend an hour with a musical icon living or dead, who would you pick, why and what would you speak about?

My God, this is insane. I could say the most trivial thing… John Lennon…because I love the use of chords he made on almost every one of his songs, there should be a secret somewhere shouldn't it? and I could finally ask him …what’s so special about Yoko?!

And finally and most importantly is Die Hard a Christmas Movie.

This is a question for our manager who is from the 80s! ...he said: yes it is! I want to trust him.

Check out their video for 'Buffalos'

Website - http://www.amycanbe.it

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/Amycanbe/