Nico Stai

Former frontman for Los Angeles based bands Tinpaco (London Records) and The Bonnie Stai. He first started performing solo in between band projects. Appearing in local clubs like The Echo, Spaceland, Silverlake Lounge, and Hotel Cafe, his intensely raw and emotionally charged performances quickly sparked the rise of a fast growing following in the Los Angeles area. Word of mouth spread and due to demand, some 8-track home recordings were put together and released under the name: THE VIVA DEAD E.P. The E.P. immediately started to sell out both online and at shows and went as far as garnering radio play in Japan's Yellowbeat FM and L.A.'s very own Indie 103.1 F.M.

In early October 2006, PARK LOS ANGELES, his first full length, was released under his own label Dead Pony Records, again, selling out online and garnering radio play on Indie 103.1 FM and Radio Paradise. Little Radio.com, Insomnia Radio and also leading to a live performance on Brent Bolthouse's Feel My Heat show on Indie 103.1. Nico Stai performed at this years Noise Pop festival in San francisco, sharing the stage with Dios Malos and Jonah Matranga and also performed two showcases at SXSW music convention in Austin, Texas.

Your album "Park Los Angeles" has been out for a few months now. Can you tell us about it?
Nico: It was something that was self released and put it out in October of last year. I think October 5th was the release party for it... Its an album that's been a long time in the making. Some of the recordings were done in between my other 2 bands, The Bonnie Stai and Tinpaco. Some of the recordings were done as far back as like 2 - 3 years ago and some of the other recordings were more recent, so it was bit of a mismatch I guess. The hardest part about it was the mastering process of it, cause I had a lot of things that I had just finished recording and then had a lot of stuff that was recorded like 2 or 3 years before that. So we had to go in there and put it all together and make it seem like an album in its entirety. so I have no idea if we matched it or not!

Andy's House is from a band from A LONG time ago, like before Tinpaco. It was called April Afterall with Symon Coak of Tinpaco too. Every once in a while there's a track from older projects that kinda pops up. I'm going through that a lot now. I got a lot of new material that I'm working on and a lot of titles of songs for the new stuff that I'm starting to record and work on. I also come across old songs. I got hundreds and hundreds of minutes worth in hard drives of old shit. But then I just get stressed out because there'll be like 35 titles that I wanna work on.

How's the response been so far?
Response has been amazing. Its been really really good and its been really organic. We're not really trying to hit anyone over the head with it, we're not sending it to anyone, we're not doing anything with it. Its a lot of just word of mouth, a lot of people showing up at shows and airplay on Indie 103. Just a huge response from Europe and everywhere else.

Your CD just sold out. Are you planning on reprinting it?
We just did a reprint... we just got them actually! But the last couple of shows we were out of cds which kinda sucked cause there were a lot of people there! This girl came up to me at the last Viper Room show and says "Hey I got 2 of your cds today!" I'm like "really!? I didn't know we had any!" she says "Really? what do you mean?" she pulls these out, I'm like "that's not my cd, honey."

You did a couple showcases at SxSw. How did that go?
It went really good. SxSw is kinda hectic and kinda crazy, but its a lot of fun. There were people there to see us and it was just really cool. SxSw was an amazing experience. Its just fucking packed and there's a lot of people there! I ran into a lot of friends. I ran into Richard Swift in the middle of the street. You see people there you don't see for a long time and its just good music, good bands, you know? Good times.

What's the story with the biggest band in Korea being at your show?
Its a band called Yoon Band that was in the crowd at this show we did at SxSw. After we got off stage they came up to us and approached me and my manager. They were really into it and asked us to open up for like this sold out show that they had over here in Los Angeles. I guess they're just massive over there in Korea and we got to play the show in that Wiltern Theatre in LA and it was just packed and it was really cool! It was a fun experience. It was all Korean kids too!

Were they into it?
Yeah! They really dug it! They started doing like the clap along to some of the songs and they were doing it on the down beat rather then the up beat. <laughs> It was really cool though.

Any plans on getting a full band together for this project?
I'm auditioning people right now, but I definitely wanted to lay the foundation for a while. Its really refreshing to just go up there with an acoustic and it really pushes you with your writing and with your harmonies and with your progressions and its kinda what its really about. All the loud shit and all the whatever, its fun, its cool but I dunno... I really just wanted to pull the essence of the experience of things first and get it really honed before I started throwing things on top. A lot of times in bands, its kinda frustrating because you don't really get that chance to hone all the essence of it and just start doing things that like sometimes when it needed a bit more... honing? <laughs> Used the word 5 times now!

Any bands influence you when you were first starting out?
I listened to everything from like Bruce Springsteen to The Cure to The Ramones. Definitely went though the whole Guns and Roses type thing. I still think that's an amazing record, Appetite For Destruction. I grew up in Europe in Spain so I was listening to a lot of local rock bands but that are really not known anywhere else outside of that. When I was a very very young kid I was really into Elvis Presley. Like, my dad would listen to it when he was shaving and stuff. From the get go I was always really into writing things. I got a guitar from this buddy of mine, that he never used. I didn't even know how to tune the fucking thing, so I'd just use one string and just kinda come up with melodies. I was just learning how to play certain things, learning how to play really good. I couldn't even strum three chords but I could play certain riffs really good.

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For more info, show updates and music
check out Nico Stai on Myspace.com
www.myspace.com/nicostai