Fat Lady Sang: The Sharpest Dressed Guys at the Taqueria
Photography by Sierra Skinner.
words by sierra skinner.
We have reached a moment in time in which every band sounds like another band.
That’s not an entirely bad thing, as long as the source material is solid. But, it does make a band like Fat Lady Sang especially novel. What they do feels like pure invention. Complex, invigorating, and of course, loud. And, they stand alone. Relentless, yet precise. Holding a torch for the aspiring disruptors, and always properly dressed for the occasion
Visually, they’re more of a mod boyband thing, something reminiscent of The Beatles. Until they strike that first chord, at least. Then it becomes something that might’ve eviscerated them faster than Yoko. Their sound is gritty, and angular. A sink-your-teeth-in kind of rock that is seldom braved by the modern masses, but that these guys execute with such surgical precision.
It’s a case study in musical identity and subversion of perception. But, they would never say it that way even if true. In fact, they’re notorious for seldom saying anything serious. Because there’s no need to explain yourself when your performances regularly leave onlookers speechless.
I have seen these guys play probably at least half a dozen times by now. A shitty dive bar in Orange County, a Boyle Heights backyard, just about every single DIY venue left standing in the greater Los Angeles area, even my own birthday party. I keep coming back for more, because at the end of every set I still find myself exclaiming What the fuck? every single time.
And I still haven’t figured it out.
With the imminent release of their first full-length album and the kick-off of their East Coast tour with fellow LA rock legends Punxsutawney on the way, I saw it as the prime opportunity to ask all my unanswered questions. And when they invited me to meet them at their local (and apparently drummer/band sweetheart, John’s favorite) taqueria? I did so without hesitation.
And then these fuckers all pulled up in full suits at noon on an eighty-degree day. The perfect foreshadowing of the conversational battle of wits about to ensue. To their credit, apparently the suits are kinda the whole point.
This interview is a branch of Sierra Skinner’s semi-monthly column, Scene LA, making the ongoing case for LA’s DIY music and arts scene.
Akio: Me and Sam had this idea to, like, be in a super performative art band where it was not really focused on the music but like- suits, and how stupid and ridiculous we look on stage. It’s more of an art performance than it is about the music. So then we were like, ‘well, let’s write a song for it!’ and it just turned into a super cool song.
Sam: It only came to fruition when we met John, basically.
Akio: And we asked Kenzo if he wanted to play bass, and he was like yeah. It was a long courtship process
So the suits came first. You wanted a reason to wear suits.
Sam: Pretty much. Yup.
And you accidentally made a really good song.
[Collective shrug and murmurs of agreement]
Kenzo: It’s hard not to when you have the suit on.
So now you can’t make music without the suits?
Sam: Superman without his cape is just a nerd in tights.
This makes sense.
Akio: And Sam has always been my Lois Lane.
Kenzo: And I guess John, you’d probably be…..
John, without hesitation: Grogu.
And when did this all happen?
Sam: We played our first show July 11th, 2023.
Kenzo: Weird he remembers…..
Akio & John: Awwwwww
Kenzo: He must’ve been reading his diary earlier. I finally did it, diary.
You guys do have such a specific sound, one that’s pretty rare around here. Was it hard finding an audience for that, or do you feel like that came about pretty naturally?
Sam: Actually, we found our audience. They’re in San Francisco.
John: That’s true. That’s very true.
Sam: And like, outside of LA and Southern California people are way more receptive. Here, there’s the big zeitgeist screamo boom, and people are less interested in shit that doesn’t kind of fall into the mold. If you don’t either sound like Smashing Pumpkins or insert-long-screamo-band-name-wtih-no-spaces…
But that’s kind of the beauty of it. You guys bring something unexpected and high energy to any lineup, which LA really needs in the midst of this shoegaze-pocalypse.
Akio: Yeah, no one can follow us up. But maybe Punxsutawney can.
Sam: They’re good I’ve heard. Strong rhythm section. (Author’s note: Sam is also the drummer in Punxsutawney. A damn good one at that. So this, while said in his characteristic facetious tone, is entirely true.)
Eh, yeah, I guess you could say that. What about the writing process-is that usually pretty collaborative?
Kenzo: No, not at all.
Akio: We each show up with the song pretty much already written. Whoever sings the song is the one who wrote the song, that’s pretty much how it goes.
Sam: Someone will bring in the bones of a song, and everyone kinda writes their own parts from there.
What was pulling together a whole album like then? How long has that been in the works?
John: Our desert excursion was really the bulk of the album writing process. That was like, last July.
Sam: Ah yes, our Doors-esque desert excursion.
Akio: It was really more of a U2 thing. We rented this remote spot in Joshua Tree….
John: With no AC.
Sam: Where no one could hear you scream.
It’s impressive that your songs all remain so distinct, so identifiable, even with all of you splitting the writing responsibility. Are there shared inspirations coming into play there?
John: We don’t all agree on main music inspirations. We all listen to pretty different stuff. One of the only things I think we all agree on is Type-O Negative. I’m not sure about Kenzo. Kenzo is awfully quiet.
Kenzo: I like Type-O, dude.
Akio: We all agree that Type-O Negative is the centerpiece of the band.
Respect. How do you decide when a song-or in this case, an album-is ready? Is it a struggle to not overwork it or want to change things?
Sam: It’s honestly so easy for us to not overwork a song. We know when it’s done.
Akio: We experiment live a lot more than we do when we record. If I want to do something weird or different from the recording, I’ll just do it live.
Sam: We kinda have to pay attention to each other, because, like, there aren’t like set amounts of time that we play everything, we usually are flying from the seat of our pants and looking to each other for cues. We know the songs, we know what happens in the song, but it never happens at the same moment.
That’s my favorite part of any FLS set. I never know what to expect. You’re about to be doing quite a lot of that, with this tour coming up. How are you feeling about that?
John: This is our biggest tour we’re about to go on. Our last one was like Southwest, kind of, and that was two years ago. This kinda feels like the first one.
Akio: This tour is gonna be a landmark for us because it’s gonna be a blue hyperlink in our wikipedia page: The East Coast Tour Incident. Right next to The Sonoran Hot Dog Incident.
What the fuck is a Sonoran Hot Dog??
John: It’s a hot dog bun, covered in wet beans, with a hot dog on top and ketchup and onions and tomatoes. It sucks.
So what was the incident?
Akio: Everyone has a different recollection of the story, well actually, just Sam has a different recollection and that’s because he was fucking sleeping. We were recommended to go to this place to get Sonoran hot dogs because that’s what they’re known for. So we go to this place at like, 2 am, we each get our own, its some loaded sloppy trays. Sam is blacked out in the back of the van.
Sam: Because we had been at Blimp’s Airbnb and got hammered as fuck. And that's where that photo [the cover of Beer & Peanuts] was taken. I ripped my shirt off, and a strobe light came on, and I started dancing.
Akio: I took it because I was afraid he’d hurt himself. So anyways, we wake him up, we hand him the hot dog, we keep driving to the hotel we’re staying at, we get there and we’re like ‘Sam get u-SAM WHAT THE HELL!” and the dog is just like everywhere. All over the van, all over our suitcases, the seats.
John: My stuff was covered in mustard.
Sam: I never even woke up. You handed a hot dog to a sleeping guy. How could you think that was gonna go fine.
Kenzo: The most damning evidence is that there was a single bite taken out of it. Like he took one bite, was like ‘eughhg!’ and then smeared it all over John’s suitcase.
So FLS is not a straight edge band. Got it.
Sam: No, but we are all London sober.
London Sober??
Sam: Only doing other people’s drugs.
Ok, so, so far we have a list of incriminating incidents for your wikipedia page. Anything else I should note? Hopes, dreams, fears, etc.
Kenzo: Sharks.
Akio: Dinosaurs.
Sam: I fear a society without dancing.
So you fear the plot of Footloose.
Sam: What’s that? I’m not familiar.
I’m cashing in my one serious answer right now. What’s your goal in all of this?
Sam: I would love to just be able to continue to do it the way that we do it now, and not have to pander.
Akio: Yeah, I mean I don’t even know what selling out means anymore.
Kenzo: Just taking the money and switching up on your day ones, probably.
John: Like Sheryl Crow.
Good stuff, guys. Really.
John: Okay, but, do you have enough serious answers? Seriously.
Probably not. Let’s go get beers.
And so we did just that, and it was a beautiful day, because these guys are not only a good set but a good hang too. Vestiges of a bygone generation of rockers who truly know how to relish in the experience of music making and stirring up a little trouble in the process, with a rich discography and an ongoing rich history to boot.
Whatever comes next, album or incident, I know I’ll be tuning in and you should be too.
