I found out about Crazy & The Brains after my interview with Verbal Phantom and Piss Mobb. Vincent “The Owl” told me to check them out and so I did…. I went home and internet stalked them. I remember being in my living room sitting on the couch with my iMac, I pressed play on one of their YouTube videos and out of nowhere my little Mia runs into the room and starts jumping around so I joined her! Yup, I needed to get the scoop on these guys. A few days later I went to a party at Union Republic where they were performing with Verbal and Nizz Sentine. The moment they started, people were on the dance floor going crazy. Their music is very tongue-in cheek, really fun and catchy…I am loving their new video that pokes fun at Lindsay Lohan.
Crazy & The Brains invited me to join them for a private jam session at JC Studios…. so fun!
What are your names? My name is Christopher, Jeffrey, Lawrence and Brett.
How long have you guys been together? C: The four of us have been together for 4 years, and me and Jeff, have been together for like 10 years.
How do you all know each other? J: We (Me and Chris) know each other from kindergarden through 8th grade. and I met Brett at 4 in the morning outside of my college dorm.
You met him at 4am? J: Yea outside my dorm at college, and Lawrence is his brother. L: Brett and I have been brothers for a long time.
Wait you guys are brothers? B: Biological relation.
How would you guys describe your music? C: Its pure shit… L: Total, total, total trash…C: the worst shit you’ve ever heard…HAHA
Ok – im quoting you guys on that! C: It’s punk. It’s the only good punk that exists in 2014.
Wow… thats quite the statement. C: Yea. quote it.
Do you guys all stand behind that statement? (Collectively) Absolutely. C: I dare anyone to challenge that.
How do you guys write your music…whats the creative process? C: My dad writes every song… haha. No, I’ll usually make a song on the acoustic guitar and then I’ll show Jeff, and then we’ll show everyone, or some variation of that…
Do you have a favorite Jersey City hangout spot? L: Keyhole is pretty awesome. B: I always go to my favorite pizza spot Sbarro’s… thats my favorite.
Sbarro’s? C: Theres no Sbarro’s in Jersey City…Yea.. it needs to be in Jersey City. We also like the Newport Mall!
I think you guys are the first people to tell me Newport Mall. C: Well we are always in Spencer’s… You can find us there like pretty much every weekend.
Why what’s there? B: They have a penis shaped lava lamp… they have penis pasta too!
Penis pasta? At the newport mall… So thats your hangout spot? that;s Crazy & The Brains hangout spot? haha. Where did Crazy & The Brains name come from? C: It really doesn’t mean shit. I just needed to name the MySpace page, and in order to put songs on MySpace I needed come up with something to create it and that was the first thing that came to my head, and it stuck.
Its a really good name! Very punk. C: Yea i feel like it suits us.
Do you guys have any projects coming up? C: We have our record, it’ll be coming out next month, and its called Good Lord…we’re actually finishing it this week and its gonna be fucking great.
Are you signed, or is this all independent? C: We are basically independent, we are on a very small label thats run by our friend, its Baldy Longhair Records.
Tell me about this song Ice Cream. What does that mean I want your ice cream? B: It’s a sex song. What do you think?J: It’s like i wanna take you to Torico’s.
Torico’s, HAHA whats your favorite Torico’s flavor? J: Thats even harder than whats your favorite band. C: I think Mint Chocolate Chip is by far the best flavor. L: Lycee
What I like about your music is that it’s really fun and positive… C: Yeah we like to have a positive spin…but that was just a song about sexual desires. L: I thought it was about delicious confection..OHH ITS LIKE A METAPHOR haha
So it’s sort of a child friendly song… like Beyonce riding surfboards. C: Yea instead of saying I wanna fuck you I say I want your ice cream. C: Its gonna be on our new record, but there’s a live version on youtube.
Im telling you when i saw you guys at Union Republic I was like these guys need to be selling out fucking stages, but what do i know? C: Thats what we’ve been saying…
Im not blowing smoke up your asses.. I’m more of a hip-hop head, but your music is fun. Thank you. Seems like a lot of people that like rap like our music, so that’s good.
Do you guys ever think about collaborating and doing a hip-hop/punk song L: We did, we’ve done a couple songs with Verbal Phantom C: A song called Hoot. L: But we will probably do more stuff in the future thats more polished.
Do you ever try to sing too? L: I don’t really have a singing voice at all. C: He screams a lot. He never closes his mouth, really.
Do you scream when you have sex? L: I scream like a mental patient.
What are your musical influences? L: Jazz, R&B, older forms of music, american roots music from like the 50s and 60s… Booker T. & the M.G.’s, Otis Redding, James Brown….
Nice – thats not very punk… L: Well no… but the thing is most of the drum beats that came out of early rock and roll stuff are exactly what the Ramones took and played at full speed and full volume, its a lot of the same rhythms. the basis of punk really came from those beats.
What about you? B: Basically the same thing… Black Sabbath, Iggy Pop. J: i really like the Ramones, and The Clash, I mean I play Xylophone in a punk band!
Why xylophone? J: I feel like our music is happy and peppy so the sound of that fits it. I mean i could play piano but hitting the xylophone is much more fun than playing keys on a piano.
Whats next for you guys? L: Finish the album.
What about tours? C: Yea – but before that we plan on putting out a music video for every song on the album and like a small movie on like the making of the album, and then yea we’ll go on tour… So once the album is done, we’ll book a release show and then base stuff off that what we do next.
What do you guys do to pay the bills? L: Carpenter. B: Just be me. J: I’m a music teacher, for the mentally handicapped…more of a Music Therapist, and I teach at a high school in West Orange.
Thats awesome! and so amazing! I love it!!! OK – any last words!? C: We’re better than your band.
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