On
nights when the barn-like interior of the Alexander Street Pub becomes thick
and humid from wall-to-wall 20somethings in search of booze, casual hook-ups,
and ass-shaking beats, the music of the New York City-based group Bacci makes a kind of gut-level sense. With frontman Pete Bagale slyly
invoking lust while he swings his hips from side to side and strums his
acoustic with determined finesse, DJ Rob Flow putting his whole body into
high-energy dance steps, Chris Northington working
his bass with nimble hands and the reserved air of a seasoned jazz musician,
and drummer Paul Amorese’s fusing of elegance and
drive, it’s no wonder that the band, which originally formed in Rochester in
2002, would pack local audiences in like sardines.
“I’ve
got to be honest,” Bagale says with a chuckle, “it’s
a really good party mix.”
It
must be. The band’s last two Rochester appearances each drew
upwards of 400 people. For the last one, the line outside Milestones went
around the corner and down the block — on a bitterly cold night, no less. The
fire marshal, deeming the club packed to capacity, had to turn people away at
the door.
Amorese offers several explanations for Bacci’s
burgeoning buzz, but none of them totally add up. The band uses the internet
networking community Myspace to draw attention to
shows, and spent more than a year building a following by playing “dinner
music” at non-traditional venues, such as an approachably upscale Monroe Avenue bar. And several
appearances at the Alexander Street Pub put Bacci in
front of larger crowds. But a random sampling of local acts across any genre
would turn up other bands following similar strategies. What explains Bacci’s popularity? It’s a question not easily answered.
Rochester natives Bagale and Amorese, Bacci’s
core members, have common roots that stretch back to
before they began playing together. “Before we even knew each other,” Bagale says, “we both grew up in the same [19th Ward]
neighborhood and both used to ride the same school bus [to Bishop Kearney high
school]. We were like the only white kids on the bus. We both got into the
hip-hop sound that was all around us.”
They
are also both formally trained musicians heavily steeped in jazz since their
youth — a crucial factor in the formation of Bacci,
which arose from the demise of popular local jam-funk outfit Milkhouse. Amorese and Bagale found a common ground with each other that grew into
creative differences with the other band members.
After
Milkhouse broke up, the pair shared an apartment in Rochester for about two years. During
that time, their writing process gelled around their purchase of a sequencer
and the new creative method that it triggered.”Instead
of writing from the guitar every time,” Bagale
explains, “I wanted to write from sequences and base the guitar around that.
Both of us were getting into things like Radiohead
and Bjork. We were impressed with the backdrops to
some of their songs.”
So
they began to approach their songs sideways, creating atmospheres first out of
chord sequences written on bass and keyboard with heavily effected beats and then adding the main guitar, vocal
melody, and backbone rhythms. “Then,” Bagale says,
“maybe we would take a keyboard sound out, but we’d have a guitar based on that
sound.”
By the time they recorded
their debut CD Hey Girl in 2003 here in Rochester, Bagale
and Amorese had already set their sights on
relocating to New York, which they did the
following year. (Amorese has temporarily moved back
to Rochester.) Along the way, fellow RochesterianChris Northington became
the band’s most consistent bassist, and in early 2005 Chappelle’s Show alum Rob Flow approached the band about doing some one-off
gigs with them. The lineup has remained steady since.
At
live shows Flow provides many of the atmospheric touches created on the records
by Amorese and Bagale. His
contribution provides a novel touch. But even considering Bacci’s
skill at putting a fresh twist on its hybridization of jazz, hip-hop, funk, soul,
R&B, and acoustic guitar-based rock, 400 people
pounding doors to see a relatively unknown band remains a bit of a head-scratcher. Certainly, Bagale, who
is the principle songwriter, and Amorese, who has a
heavy hand in the arrangements, aren’t afraid of pop. In fact, their whole aim
with Bacci is to create something listenable — if
you don’t notice the skill this music demands, Bagale
and Amorese feel they’ve done their job.
“We
always try to make our changes interesting to a musical ear,” Amorese says. But, for the general public, that translates
simply as music that has enough of a twist so that “it won’t get dulled over
time.”
Another
factor may also resonate with audiences: in a sense, Bacci’s
music blazes a new trail even as it returns to Amorese
and Bagale’s musical roots. “Everybody takes it from
the beat up,” Bagale says when considering the long
history of combining hip-hop and jazz into new musical forms. “I’m trying to
turn jazz melodies into hooks.”
Audiences
may be after the party atmosphere, but perhaps it’sBacci’s underlying ingenuity that keeps the fans coming
back for more.
Bacci plays Saturday, April 8, at Milestones, 170 East Avenue, 325-6490, at 10
p.m.
$5. 21+.
This article appears in Apr 5-11, 2006.
