Influenza with Jeff Excell of Chairs in the Arno
Approach Influenza as a series which serves to help give insight as to where music is born; these are the thoughts, influences and the inspirations directly from the mind of the artist. Here Chairs in the Arno singer Jeff Excell discusses the spirit which brought the band to begin recording music and recalls the inspiration and events leading up to the song “Popsicle,” one of the many from the recent release File Folder.
On “Popsicle”:
Pissed off that most of our favorite bands had broken up, (Figurine, Barcelona, The Rentals), me, Ryan Fly, Jeff Knight and Becca Hsu started writing songs just for ourselves just to keep the carefree sense of music around while popular culture stuck their heads in the emo microwave. We wanted to write songs about lost cats, playing badminton in our back yard, and just having fun in general. Being inspired by the simple guitar workings of one of our musical heroes Jason Korezan, we never got too fancy with our song structures. Lyrically, inspiration never really came in a complicated package either; it was usually something quite plain like losing a pet. The song “Popsicle” sprang from our kitten (named Popsicle) who mysteriously ran away from our house only six months after we had adopted her. Not even a week later our other beloved cat Switters jumped under the wheel of a passing car, completing the feline mass suicide. We were all sad, and I dreamed up some lyrics about the possible scenarios that Popsicle was in after ditching us and put it to an already existing song that we had been playing around with.
Influenza has a sick, sick sound. Sick means “good,” right? I rely on my son for talking points. I’m 58, but after a decade of punishing sobriety I’m trying to reclaim a little youthful recklessness. I’m trying to speak like the young at heart n’ soul. I dig Influenza, though. Majorly.
Sick still means good, or at least it does when I say it (which is pretty much about tw…enty, thirty times a day).
Thank you for the kind words Kathleen, I’m in a strange situation myself…somewhat of a bizarro scenario to yours. I’m now attempting to punish my youthful recklessness with sobriety…or at least that’s one way of approaching the situation. Hope to have some other Influenza glazed buns in the oven for you soon!