greetings and salutations. Thank you for joining us. My name is johnny nato and you’ve entered into embrace your storm. We’ve got another exciting, awesome episode for you. Before we get to it, uh, don’t forget to create an account account on the website. Send us your emails hello at embraceyourstormcom yeah, there’s dashes in the domain name and also check out the other podcast called Soundbite, and it’s a reaction podcast that comes out daily. Listening to a new metal song every day.
So, with that being said, thank you all for joining us, and today we are speaking with Catherine Capozzi, because I’m going to Americanize her name. And, catherine, thanks for coming on today. Oh, thank you for asking me, no, no, it’s my pleasure to have you on, so, but before we get into, we got into a lot, like I do with all my guests before the podcast. So before we get too far into everything, how did you stumble into guitar? How did you find that as your creative outlet?
0:01:06 – Speaker 2
Oh, wow, you know what? Let me think way back, I don’t know. I’ve always just loved guitar, and from way back when I’ve always. When I was little, I had bongos that was from my cousin, so I was banging on stuff. And then at the time that I went to school which I won’t tell you what years those were, but when I was younger, they, um, they had a good musical music program. I, I took violin and uh, and I was still was just like, oh you know, I would like, you know, I, my younger brother, my brother who was a year younger than me, but it was like sometimes he would also get like a little plastic guitar.
I’d be like, hey, I want to play guitar um so from there, I just kind of like I always wanted to do all the things and, uh, that’s how I fell into guitar and so I think, um, you know, I remember that I used to walk from where I live to my guitar lessons and my brother, who is no longer with us, but he used to walk me to my guitar lessons and it was uh, you know I had a very strict at old Italian teacher was a former Marine and oh geez yeah, that was a, it was a quite, quite the thing, but um, but you know, I just loved guitar, studied it and just wanted to always do it, and so that’s kind of how I fell into it.
0:02:33 – Speaker 1
Catherine, I just got an image of your guitar teacher being like but my fingers hurt what your fingers hurt, he was very, oh yeah, at least it was like you know drop and give me 20 if you’re going to make a mistake.
0:02:48 – Speaker 2
Okay, so, but that was like you know, but it was, I loved it. It was great.
0:02:57 – Speaker 1
So were there any like guitarists? Then that does it, because usually you’re someone’s like, influenced by like someone else, right, but it doesn’t sound like that for you. So did you find a guitarist later on where you’re like oh yeah, like that’s?
0:03:09 – Speaker 2
that’s what I’m talking about I mean that’s a great question, because for me, I think, because my family, you know, I have obviously an italian background. I’m like second generation on my grandfather’s side you know. So I think growing up there was a couple of things. Music was always present. There was all these old Italian records.
And I don’t I don’t think that you know people were. My great grandfather played mandolin not that I’ve ever heard him play because I think it was well beyond playing by the time you know I was born. But there was always music was everywhere. You know all the family gatherings, everybody did the tarantella, everybody you know. So it was kind of like it was just something that I think I wanted to make music with, something. I don’t know that there was no guitar player necessarily that stood out for me, but I remember that my, my grandparents had a record that um tony matola, it was roman guitar and that I loved the sound.
I mean it’s weird, but it was like it was. You know, they had all the old opera records and all that like really old stuff that you will never, ever hear again, ever, because I mean you know it. Just so they had this record and for some reason I gravitated towards it. I loved it and I kept like wanting to hear it and um, and I love the sounds, I love that, that. So I think that was probably. Maybe tony mottola might have been my first you know guitar player that I like, but then you know, of course, I moved into, like you know, all the rock stuff, allman brothers, you know all the rock stuff, allman Brothers, you know, oh yeah, dwayne, allman Hell, yeah, all that stuff you know.
But also classical guitar, because I started out on classical guitar and I you know Andres Segovia, I used to do all, andres Segovia you know, exercises.
0:04:59 – Speaker 1
So did a lot of that kind of come over into your rock, playing the kind of classical approach and stuff, yes, yes, that and violin, violin kind of come over into your rock, playing the kind of classical approach and stuff.
0:05:06 – Speaker 2
Yes, yes, that. And violin, violin also. My violin teacher got mad at me because he was like, when I I wanted to play drums and guitar in addition to violin and he was like you want to be a rock star, you don’t want it, because he wanted me to be like I don’t know and I didn’t like him. So which is you know?
0:05:21 – Speaker 1
that’s you’re even more. You’re like no I don’t want a violin dude. Yeah, exactly, you know, that’s the even more you’re like no, I don’t want a violin dude.
0:05:27 – Speaker 2
Yeah, exactly, you know, to be honest, I love the violin is a beautiful instrument, it’s the closest thing to a human voice that you’re going to get, and I think that that follows me into, uh, how I compose, especially with my, my group, axe Monkey, which is, uh, I guess that’s awesome name Axe monkey.
Yeah, axe monkey is my you know band, which is like, okay, I’ve worked with a lot of vocalists, but guess what? Now the guitar is the voice and I have two drummers and it’s a mix of rock and metal and cinematic mayhem and the guitar is the voice, you know and. I’m about to release, you know, an EP soon called metal monkey, based on a movie I did several years ago called what metal girls are into.
So, um, that’s freaking awesome yeah, so segueing into a lot of stuff. So guitar, uh, violin influenced me and listening to you know a lot of different instruments. I think I love drums, I love percussive, melodic stuff.
0:06:25 – Speaker 1
You listen to a lot of Frank Zappa.
0:06:28 – Speaker 2
I didn’t listen but I do, like I love Frank Zappa, he’s great, yeah, but I mean most of the stuff I listen to is a real, has always been. A wide variety of stuff. I think, yeah, which I think you know. People who have reviewed some of the things that I do are always like oh you know, sometimes in one song you start here and then you go to different places, but it all makes sense because it’s coming to the voice of you know.
0:06:56 – Speaker 1
It’s how I interpret things, you know so no, that’s very cool, like what I was going to circle back to. Are you familiar with Yves Melmstein?
yes so I saw an interview with him. I was never to circle back to. Are you familiar with Enve Malmsteen? Yes, so I saw an interview with him. I was never the biggest fan of his, but once I heard him say this, everything fell into place. And he was like, look, I loved violin as a kid, growing up listening to all the Stravinsky and all that stuff. And he was like, when I picked up a guitar, he’s like I wanted to play it like a violin. And I was like, oh, okay, I said there you go Now. Now that makes a lot more sense, yeah.
0:07:36 – Speaker 2
Yeah, for sure.
0:07:38 – Speaker 1
And so once you heard him say that, I was like, wow, okay and so. So it’s just interesting to hear you saying that, like you loved all these other instruments which you know, eventually, in one way or another, subconsciously, consciously, has a mess not met, not messed with, but created your technique of how you play your instrument Exactly, excuse me.
0:08:05 – Speaker 2
Yeah, no, it’s true, I mean it all influences. I mean, as I said, oh, excuse me traveling and being able to tour and also just the different musical places that I’ve been, as far as people I’ve collaborated with, all that influences, influences, um, everything, everything influences it. I mean I, you know my, my great-grandfather loved opera and I have um a lot of his music that’s in italian and I have like the william tell overture. I have puccini stuff, I have like all this old stuff that when I was younger I’d be like, oh, this is cool, I’m gonna. I mean most of it I couldn’t play because it was just like there, you know, yeah but it was I liked.
You know the beautiful melodic lines and so that kind of carries over into a lot of what I’m doing now. And then you know, through the different musical places, that I’ve been especially because I was in Boston for, you know, many, many years, until I moved back to Connecticut a couple of years ago after my parents passed. But when I was in Boston I had the opportunity to work with a core group of people and I still work with these people because I go back frequently and they’re my bandmates and my friends.
But we have started out with rock and one of my bands was a rocktronica band, so we kind of incorporated elements of electronica into the rock.
0:09:33 – Speaker 1
If you don’t mind me asking what year was that? It sounds ahead of its time.
0:09:38 – Speaker 2
It was 2000, 2001, and we kind of yeah, a little bit we were ahead of the. We were ahead because the stuff I’ve had, you know, uh, libraries, requests and you know different music supervisors, like we’re looking for this rock, electronic and stuff, I’m like, oh yeah, that’s the stuff I did way back when.
Okay, um, and you know, call me 20 years ago yeah, I’ve actually submitted some of it because they’re like it’s still holds, because we were yeah, no, I hear you you know the the singer in our band, christine zufri, who is in france, I mean, and you know she’s a longtime collaborator, but her voice was very operatic in ways and very unique and uh, and so, and yeah, she’s swiss, so we kind of had this very different thing going with. You know had our Tamara Gooding was a drummer. Uh, she had electronic drums, um, you know that is cool. Yeah, so I wanted.
0:10:35 – Speaker 1
I wanted a drummer in the early 2000s. I was in heavy metal band, granted, but I wanted a drummer that would play an electronic drum set in like 1999. Yeah, like, like, cause I, I was just like, dude, your drums are going to sound sick through a PA. Yeah, like, granted, your drum set might look a little silly, but it’s going to sound amazing. Exactly, and it and it does, and you know, it’s like yeah.
0:11:00 – Speaker 2
And so you know, I mean I think, as I said, it’s like things evolve and things move, and from you know, I mean I think, as I said, it’s like things evolve and things move, you know, from like doing rock electronica, because our singer was, you know, french was her first language. Someone asked us to do a set of Edith Piaf at a Bastille Day celebration, which we were like, all right, sure we’ll do it. And that really led to a crazy thing that, you know, took us all around because that’s funny my band, all the queens men.
We toured in europe, but then the band that we morphed into called ziaf. We toured all around europe and, uh, you know, we got to meet, uh, some people that worked with edith pf, including one of her boyfriends who was a very famous French artist, georges Moustaki, so we got to hang out at his place and hear some stories that people would never have heard. If you didn’t Like, this was inner, inner, inner circle.
0:11:58 – Speaker 1
I hear you.
0:12:02 – Speaker 2
It’s not my culture, but we weren’t putting Edith P up on a little pedestal going, am I? She’s amazing. We kind of interpret her through the idea that she was, you know this rocker and we were rockers and we interpreted her spirit, I guess, through our rock lens and uh. So that was quite an experience and and also learning how to we, you, we learned how to play the music scale. These big orchestrations were pared down to piano, drums and voice and guitar and but through our lens, our rock lens. So, you know, we, we got to play these songs. That were some of them. If you think about the arrangements, they were kind of badass rockers.
0:12:49 – Speaker 1
That’s cool.
0:12:50 – Speaker 2
Like how they could be arranged and very complex and so that stuff. All you carry that forward into, especially for doing movie composing and things like that. That really expanded my musical vocabulary.
0:13:09 – Speaker 1
There you go.
0:13:10 – Speaker 2
You know you’re touring in Europe. You’re just in a very different situation than you are here. You’re in buildings that you know. When you walk into the building there’s a story that you can feel just being in there.
0:13:26 – Speaker 1
I hear you yeah.
0:13:30 – Speaker 2
So all that stuff was an awesome experience and I I always say I’m the purveyor of eclectic once-in-a-lifetime experiences because through all that I uh was able to uh, you know, through the singer christine, we we managed to um, find a way into the catacombs of paris that’s cool and we played, uh, we, we wanted to do, you know, some photos down there and some, and we got a tour down there and then we and this is not anything that you, no one, can just go down there and do this, this is completely.
We were not in the uh catacomb museum. I probably should be careful what I say right, don’t do this at home, do not try this at home, because you can’t kids. It’s uh, you know, we we did it with an expert who is now christine’s husband, who, uh, guided us through, um, like that’s funny like a nine hour tour and we played a, the. The highlight of the whole catacomb experience was we played a, um, a concert that was supposed to be the hundred year anniversary of a concert that happened in the catacombs.
Uh, with, uh, you know, uh, the paris orchestra was in the cat that’s crazy with like a, a, um, a poet and, uh, there were three, three main songs that were, or three or two main, uh, musical pieces that they played. One was the, the funeral march by Chopin, and one was the dance macabre, which, uh, so we did that. But then we also did our own set, but it was wacky because it was like a total military operation, where we were walking in the streets of Paris and we knocked on the top of a sewer cover and then the team was like all right, you go. So you had to descend 60 feet.
0:15:20 – Speaker 1
Oh man.
0:15:21 – Speaker 2
Like I said, this is not something you can’t do. This this has to be you know. You need to know what you’re doing.
0:15:28 – Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
0:15:30 – Speaker 2
So anyway, we got, we walked to the main. You know room which is not, it’s not a room, it’s all the catacombs are like a misnomer, is actually like the quarry where they get all the stones to make the buildings. So there was one big, you know carved out space where we did the show and it was. It was definitely unique experience.
0:15:55 – Speaker 1
Man, that is crazy. Definitely unique experience. Man, that is crazy. So, like what, what like got you into, kind of like the metal guitar and metal music. Then if, like, you’re saying your, your, your band, axe, uh, axe, monkey, is kind of like, yeah, it’s like what got you going down that road?
0:16:10 – Speaker 2
I because, once again, it’s just I like that kind of music, I just I like the rhythms, I like the sounds, I like being loud, uh, I think just there’s, you know, some of my favorite uh sounds are this wacky distortion pedal I have, which I know some people be like, oh my god, it’s so annoying. But when I hear it it’s sometimes the way the feedback and the distortion goes. It’s very soothing to me. It’s hard to explain, but that’s so I, I, I really do like that. I like that kind of music. I like the rhythms, uh, I like the musicianship that goes along with it. And and for me, don’t forget I’m not Axe Monkey doesn’t have a vocalist.
So we have a lot more leeway as far as what we can do.
0:17:02 – Speaker 1
I hear you.
0:17:03 – Speaker 2
So it opens up musically, I think, a lot of places I don’t have to have a singer be like I can’t sing in that.
0:17:08 – Speaker 1
Yeah, I can’t hit that note or whatever. No problem, dude, I have 24 frets.
0:17:15 – Speaker 2
Exactly, I mean for me, me, that was kind of like, oh, maybe I need to look at. I’m looking at uh, I used to have the uh, was it the?
0:17:22 – Speaker 1
um, digitech, whammy, wah, which you can oh yeah, and you know, you know what’s funny. I was just talking about that with another guest. He was like you got to get that pedal.
0:17:31 – Speaker 2
It’s amazing, yes, like just because of the detuning and stuff you can do with it yes, it, it’s great I used it on a couple of early Axe Monkey records and then I actually was borrowing the pedal and then I was like I had to give it back, reluctantly.
0:17:45 – Speaker 1
And.
0:17:45 – Speaker 2
I’m like, oh, wait a second. That’s because when I’m trying to recreate some of this stuff, we play this live. I’m like, wait a second. What did I do?
0:17:59 – Speaker 1
And I’m like, oh, you idiot, yes, you use that pedal which you don’t have because you did not buy it. And now I’m thinking I need to go buy that pedal.
0:18:05 – Speaker 2
So so, what kind of guitar do you use? Well, I have my main guitar. There’s two. One is a 1972 Les Paul Deluxe, which I, of course, had gutted out, not gutted, but I have it rewired so that it’s like wired like a standard and it’s so, it’s it’s. You know. I also have it tuned down to a drop C tuning, so everything.
0:18:28 – Speaker 1
Oh geez Okay.
0:18:29 – Speaker 2
Yeah, and then I have the famous what is it the? Uh, the famous, what is it uh? Well, I played a guitar contest in boston a while back and, um, I guess brian may was putting this on after freddie mercury passed away.
0:18:45 – Speaker 1
it was brian may’s oh, this is in the early 90s then yeah, early 90s.
0:18:49 – Speaker 2
Anyway, it was when, uh uh, tower records held this contest. It was you’re supposed to go play a two minute guitar solo, and then the idea was Brian was going to pick the winner and you’re going to get his guitar.
So, I didn’t want to do it, but my friends were like you should do it. I was like I don’t want to do it and then I, so I practiced like the solo with all my stuff, where I’m like, all right, I guess I’ll, you know, have to bring this pedal and all this. And I worked out this thing. And then when I, the day of the that I had signed up for, I signed up for the very last spot, right Cause it was a tower.
0:19:26 – Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah.
0:19:27 – Speaker 2
And you couldn’t use anything except their gear.
0:19:30 – Speaker 1
Oh man.
0:19:32 – Speaker 2
So I and so when I went up, it was like no-transcript. I was like, yeah, he’s like. And I was like and I’m thinking, well, okay, and he goes, you’re going to have to use this guitar which was a Guild guitar, theirs and I sat down and I knew that they were giving people like a 10-minute warm-up, but they were going to film you for two minutes. And I started playing and the guy was like I’m filming you now. I was like I didn’t warm up and he’s like doesn’t matter. And he started filming me. I don’t know what I played, all I did, I just started playing because I couldn’t play what I practiced.
0:20:37 – Speaker 1
Right, you’re just kind of jamming out, right? I?
0:20:39 – Speaker 2
just started playing and they were like we’re filming you and I was like, okay, so literally then a crowd started gathering and I was like really did not feel comfortable and so, as soon as you know, I just made something up, played for two minutes, handed them the guitar and I was so flustered I walked into the the folk music section no offense to people who are folk music people but I was like this is the last place I would ever walk and I just wanted to get away. And one of the guys who worked there followed me in there and he was a drummer and he’s like he goes. I was here all week and that was really awesome and I was like, oh, thank you, appreciate it. Anyway, he wound up being my drummer, like that’s funny.
So, and then a week later I get a call from tower records and this guy, dave, he’s like hey, he goes. Uh, so you know, you were one of the, the finalists for the the guitar, because brian was going to give his guitar and I was like yeah that’s crazy what do you think of um brian? What do you think of queen? I was like you know they’re you know, because at the time I wasn’t like a huge queen fan, I just right, right and uh, I was like you know, they’re good and he goes all right.
Well, what do you think of brian as a guitar player? No, brian is, you know, kick ass. He goes well. I hope so, because he just picked you to get his guitar and I was like no, brian’s amazing.
0:21:54 – Speaker 1
Oh man, I didn’t say Brian, because he is, he’s a true venison.
0:21:57 – Speaker 2
I mean, I think I was. Just I didn’t know why they were calling me.
0:22:00 – Speaker 1
No, I hear what you’re saying. You’re just kind of like okay, yeah, brian Mays good man, yeah, you know.
0:22:05 – Speaker 2
No, the guy, he’s brilliant. Of course he’s brilliant, I’m just not going to say that right now. So I got Brian Mays Guild guitar and uh dude, that’s freaking crazy and. I, yeah, and he presented it to me and I never thought that I couldn’t figure out, like if he actually did, you know, pick me. But when he gave me the guitar he said something that only another guitar player would say. That was very specific to my playing and I was like.
Oh, he definitely. He picked me because the guy who ran the contest told me that they had narrowed it down to 10.
0:22:40 – Speaker 1
Yeah.
0:22:40 – Speaker 2
And they gave Brian 10 videos. So Brian out of the 10, because it was 104 people that competed originally. That’s crazy they narrowed it down to 10, and then Brian decided that I should get the guitar.
0:22:54 – Speaker 1
That’s pretty freaking awesome.
0:22:56 – Speaker 2
Yeah, and you know what? I didn’t realize what a big deal it was until I saw the Queen movie that came out. My singer, christine, was like it was my trophy guitar, I had it under my bed and she was like you can’t leave that under your bed, you need to play it.
And I was like, but he signed it and so, anyway, I have a special thing over the signature that’s cool, that’s cool, yeah, and uh yeah when she was like you got to take it out and so I toured, I brought it to europe and I didn’t realize like oh oh, people must have went crazy for that guitar. Yeah, oh my god, like yeah, I was during a solo, some somebody tried to, you know, kiss me on stage. I was like all right all right back off.
0:23:35 – Speaker 1
Where’s security? This security? This is weird. This is weird. I had some guy lick my shoes and some other place.
0:23:44 – Speaker 2
I’m like you people are weird, but anyway, yeah. So then, but it was still didn’t hit me until I saw the Queen movie a couple of years ago and I was watching the movie and halfway during the movie because the whole movie is he’s playing this guitar. And then at point I think it was like they were at wembley, I don’t know what there was a scene when they were at wembley stadium I was looking, I was like, oh damn, that’s, that’s my guitar.
0:24:04 – Speaker 1
Oh, wow, okay yeah, yeah, I don’t know why I was very delayed, delayed, delayed reaction.
0:24:11 – Speaker 2
But anyway, that’s my, that’s another special guitar, which is a very unique guitar that I use.
0:24:16 – Speaker 1
No, totally I’ve got a set. So it sounds like you plug into a bunch of pedals too. Then I do. Yeah, you have like a pedal board and stuff.
0:24:24 – Speaker 2
I’ve got my pedal board. I play through two amps usually.
0:24:29 – Speaker 1
What do you play Like? What are they?
0:24:31 – Speaker 2
I have my Marshall JCM 800.
0:24:35 – Speaker 1
Okay, old school.
0:24:40 – Speaker 2
Yeah, have a. Uh, my marshall jcm uh 800, okay, old school. Yeah, yes, which is it’s old school. And now, honestly, I don’t want to take it out when I play shows, because it’s just I’m, the tubes are very sensitive and I’m like I hear yeah, you know yeah, yeah um, and then I have a fender um, deluxe. That was nice, so I have like a nice amp, and then I have my dirty sound with my marshall so you use the fender clean and the orange dirty right I do, but now what I actually.
So the clean and the dirty go together as a sound. But then when I want to like have that extra crunch for leads, I have my uh over ocd overdrive pedal oh yeah and another, like I had a fuzz, I have a fuzz factory, so those are all through my clean channel. And then I’ve got like um, you know, just like delay, and uh, a harmonist and my wah pedal through my dirty uh, okay and uh.
And actually I just recently purchased the um, uh, because I’m like, oh, I, you know I can’t my they’re my studios in Boston, but I, when I want to leave and play a show from here, I need to have something here. So I’ve just purchased the um. Boss Katana artist.
0:25:43 – Speaker 1
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
0:25:45 – Speaker 2
And I have to say it’s. I played a show with it and I’m like oh, this can go from. Like you know, my my can keep my heavy distortion at any volume and uh, so I’m kind of excited. I have to explore the amp more, but so far yeah, you can do a lot of crazy stuff.
0:26:02 – Speaker 1
I’ve almost strictly used digital amps my entire guitar. I’ve been playing digital amps since like 94 or 5 when I got the Rocktron Chameleon.
0:26:14 – Speaker 2
Oh, really yeah.
0:26:15 – Speaker 1
Yeah. So I’ve always been in that digital world. I’ve almost never. I did own a Marshall 25th anniversary amp, yeah, but that’s really the only amp I own that was tubed or whatever. Everything I’ve owned was always a digital, like amp, modeling kind of thing.
0:26:33 – Speaker 2
Oh cool.
0:26:34 – Speaker 1
Yeah.
0:26:41 – Speaker 2
You know I was.
0:26:42 – Speaker 1
I don’t know it was. Is it the um uh, kempler or kemper?
0:26:43 – Speaker 2
yeah, there’s kemper and line six like oh, you should try that. And I’m like you know, I don’t know that I want to be at a show and having to look at a little digital delay, like a digital display, to kind of be like oh hey, I can’t, I gotta get this and this and this and I know, um, yeah, I guess I like knobs better to turn.
0:27:00 – Speaker 1
I hear you. No, I, I totally get that like you kind of have to like really nerd out with, like you know, if you get an xfx or whatever it does. It does take a lot of time to like dial them in, but they’re so freaking flexible it’s like you, there’s nothing you can’t do with them like, but you got to take the time to like really dial it in, though, and it takes more effort than just fiddling knobs, or you know what I mean, because there’s so much stupid control in it.
0:27:31 – Speaker 2
It’s you know, you know and I and I appreciate and the thing is it’s kind of like because my band has two drummers, I’m like I need to be able to hear myself on stage when I’m playing, because my drummers are pretty heavy dudes.
0:27:43 – Speaker 1
No, I hear you, I hear you.
0:27:46 – Speaker 2
And my bass player, the bass player that’s in Axe Monkey. I shouldn’t say mine, but my collaborators, my creatives in Axe Monkey are. They’re amazing musicians and our new bass player has nine strings on his bass, so he built that himself. So it’s kind of there’s a real heaviness to the sound. But also I need the flexibility to have some power behind me. You know I was. That’s why I figured this one here. I’m going to give it a chance, but I, you know, I still need. I always like to have the clean and dirty so I have to look at and I and I was telling when I was putting out the words like, oh, I got, I’ll get an amp that’s easy to to carry.
0:28:38 – Speaker 1
I wanted something that was light and loud. That was my criteria there, you go.
0:28:43 – Speaker 2
You know, and I had all everybody wanted to give their two sides. It’s like, well, you got to suck up and just carry this and I’m like you know what? I don’t suck up and carry anything. Exactly it’s like to carry gear up four flights of stairs to my rehearsal studio. I Exactly, I don’t like to carry gear up four flights of stairs to my rehearsal studio.
0:28:58 – Speaker 1
I don’t want to do that anymore. Exactly, no, exactly. So like with Axe Monkey, like how did because? How did you get into scoring for films then, because we were talking about that before the interview so like was it kind of like during the time of doing Axe Monkey kind of stuff, or like throughout?
0:29:16 – Speaker 2
your travels. It was always. It was definitely after Ziaf, which was like touring around Europe. But I and I guess that was kind of like how it just kind of started like after that. And Axe Monkey I knew with Axe Monkey it’s like I wanted to have the flexibility to just explore different musical loud soundscapes without having to worry about a vocalist and kind of create these stories. And I think when people heard the first Axe Monkey CD that I did, they said, oh, it’s very cinematic, it’s almost like a soundtrack kind of thing, and the songs that I was making had stories attached to them and I felt like, oh yeah, this is.
You know, it’s almost like Tchaikovsky If you’re listening to the Overture of 1812, there’s a story that goes along with the music, and each of the pieces that I created for Axe Monkey had a story, and so I think from there it was kind of a good segue into doing film stuff and wanting to do film, because you know, there’s a lot of different musical itches that I have, and doing film especially allows me to kind of delve deeper into stuff that well, I would never play any of this live, but I really like these sounds and I really like making these emotions happen, you know in the context of a scene so I
think, um, so I was able to kind of kind of scratch both musical itches, I guess with with being able to kind of segue into film. And I think, as I said, I was working a lot with with my friends in la uh watch over productions and, um, they was working a lot with with my friends in LA uh watch over productions and um, they were doing a lot of different movies, so I was able to score their films and from there there’s a network of people from the different uh uh uh movie festivals that you know.
0:31:26 – Speaker 1
Yeah, no, totally, Cause people would see like oh, music done by so-and-so.
0:31:29 – Speaker 2
Like oh, exactly, you know, and and then they’re gonna reach out to you yes, exactly, and and um, and so that’s kind of kind of you know what started what, you know what started happening, and hopefully people like what I do enough to refer me and uh, and also it doesn’t help that at some of these independent festivals uh, film festivals I did get recognized for the score. So I’ve won several awards for the score for different things that I’ve done so that’s cool I think helps.
and then, uh, you know, and I, as I I love doing that stuff, but I do love performing and and doing, you know, work with uh axe monkey and also, you know, a big thing that I did, uh, which is kind of a project that I uh did a kickstarter for was called bring your women, which combined. It was a multimedia international event show which combined, uh, I guess that my peak experiences from touring in Europe and, um, you know, having uh my, my band, axe Monkey, expanded to like an uh a bigger orchestra, and uh being able to work with vocalists, filmmakers, dancers and poets and uh physical artists, um, I put together this, this show which uh ran in Boston for three times, three different times, and that was kind of combined all the different experiences into one big thing.
0:33:02 – Speaker 1
That’s cool, that’s really cool.
0:33:04 – Speaker 2
Yeah, it was great and so it was a project that if we had a big producer and big financer behind us, that hopefully maybe I’ll do it again, I don’t know level, creating something that was hopefully bigger and outside of ourselves and in a way that kind of told the story of these iconic historic female figures throughout history. That we were just kind of interpreting them in different ways. You know with with my friends and people from you know across the world that I’ve met, and even though we might not have spoke the same language, they wanted to be involved in the project.
0:33:57 – Speaker 1
so it was cool well, they spoke the, uh, the international language which is music. Everyone, everyone knows that language, you know 100 percent. Um so like would you say you’re doing more film, composing or axe monkey stuff like where do you like? Where would you say you?
0:34:16 – Speaker 2
right now, yeah, well, yeah, because I’m working on a movie now, but, yes, definitely film composing, but also like axe monkey. And then another project I have is called fomenko, which is a guitar duo with, uh, rafi sofer, who is, uh, like been my longtime friend from boston and he’s an engineer and a producer out of the studio in boston called q division. But uh, we have a project called fomenko, which is we. We were both like, we both started on nylon string guitar. We’re both rockers. He was his band when we first met in boston. Uh was called the invisible rays, which was also an instrumental psychedelic.
0:34:51 – Speaker 1
That’s funny.
0:34:52 – Speaker 2
So we kind of like we’re like I ran into him like um, you know one of the bike paths in Boston and we’re like, hey, we should play nylon string guitar someday. I was like, yeah, let’s do that.
And then we came up with Fomenko, so we actually just filmed and we’re we’re in the process of recording, uh, I guess our first uh set of music EP that’s cool but we also just recorded a couple of videos Sunday and we’re our idea is that we would like to get into this guitar festival which happens in Mexico called the Zihuatanejo Zihuatanejo International Guitar Festival, which I’ve played twice, but I would love to play with Fomeko. So anyway, there’s that and Fomeko is definitely two nylon string guitars that are exploring the very extremes of nylon string guitar, because we’re kind of-.
0:35:46 – Speaker 1
Yeah, that’s probably pretty intense.
0:35:48 – Speaker 2
Yeah, we’re bringing the elements of like Jimi Hendrix and Paco de Lucia meets Black Sabbath into what we do. Yeah, we’re bringing like the elements of, like jimmy hendrix and paco de lucia meets black so, uh, so it is. It’s kind of uh, you know, it’s another once again, another uh exploration that kind of go back to, goes back to my roots, but it’s expressed in um a different way so yeah, yeah, no, absolutely so.
0:36:12 – Speaker 1
Like what would you say to someone like with this day and age of like, it seems like kind of like the musicianship like kind of industry whatever, but it’s drastically kind of changed where it’s like. You know, it’s not really about gigging, I mean, it is a little bit, but it’s like the landscapes changed a lot. So, like what would you say to like musicians wanting to maybe start a band or even start playing or whatever it is Like what would? What would someone have to do today to get started?
0:36:37 – Speaker 2
I mean, I think it depends on, like, where you are in your life. Ok. So if you’re a younger person that you want to get started which I always you know as I, because I’m in a guitar instructor I teach people of different levels and different ages, teach people of different levels and different ages okay, so I think it’s awesome guitar, uh, or any musical instrument but starting in a, in a situation where you can uh take yourself out of yourself, right, because I I never thought that when I started playing guitar a long time ago that I would get to. The guitar has brought me around the planet. I got to go to places I would never have been to, but because I play guitar, I got to go I got go to places I would never have been to.
But because I play guitar, I got to go. I got to meet people I would never have met. So I think the key thing when you’re starting out is to kind of you know a enjoy what you’re doing. You’re, you’re doing this thing, which is really awesome and a good expression for your yourself, your brain. Don’t do because you want to be famous, don’t do because you. Those are all the wrong reasons to do that, because the difference between, like you, wanting to be a musician and a creative person and an artist that’s in your soul versus somebody who wants to just be a star and there’s nothing against that do you want to be a star? Awesome, but I think that the people who are stars and who want to be stars that there’s a very small pocket of people that get there and there’s a lot that goes into that. But you wanting to be whatever a sound is that you can make out of a guitar, that that does something for you, that resonates with you, and then you can meet other people that you can create with.
That is something I would focus on, not the you got to focus on what you get internally from making these sounds exactly, yeah focus on the external, the external validation of you making those sounds, because, hey, I know people who are freaking amazing musicians and no one’s going to ever hear about them, but that’s because they’re doing it because of a very different reason.
So I think that you have to come at it from a place where, if you, if an instrument or a sound resonates with you and you you want to make that sound cool, now that’s a great starting point. And then if you want to like do it so that you can like make those sounds with other people, that’s awesome. And then you do that. And then you you kind of like from there, like as far as like getting together and being in a band, you know, if you’re all kind of like playing together, making these sounds and making songs and things that you all like, then from there you kind of work together. It’s like you know learning the whole process of like. You know there’s the business of uh, there’s the aspect of of doing music, which is just the creative part, which has nothing to do with the business part, and then there’s the part that’s not so much fun, which is the business, and when you want to take that level, take it out of the basement and like, do something else.
Well then, guess what? Then you become a business and as a business, you’re in charge of your creation, which is your r&d. Whatever you’re creating the stuff, you’re also going to be marketing it.
You’re also going to be budgeting like how you do that, and then you’re going to be negotiating all that stuff, and those are the things that you learn working with people and, hopefully, people that you like and and then you, you know, you take it to those next steps, and I know that creating in today’s world is not the same as it was when I started, you know you, basically you can uh, make a song in your bedroom and then put it out and have it.
Yeah, that’s crazy interwebs yeah you know today, and if you have, if you’re a kid, that’s got like a lot of people that just follow you. For whatever, well, you’re probably gonna get a lot of people just listening, even whether it’s good or bad. Who’s gonna know?
you know yeah, no, yeah, that’s true so there is that, and I think that you know we are. I think there are good points to having this technology being so accessible and out there and there’s, you know, the bad stuff. I don’t I think that that that things like, um, you know everybody’s talking about AI and how that’s kind of interfering or, you know, taking over in some creative aspects, and I feel, which is awful. I don’t think that that’s. I think I know AI is out of the bag as far as, like you know, in the creative world.
I wish that AI would have kind of stayed out of that world a little bit and like done things like hey, windshield, if I’m driving in the sun, can you do something so that there’s an AI chip that can like darken my window and maybe do my taxes? You know, I don’t need you to write me a poem or write me music, Okay.
0:41:27 – Speaker 1
No, I hear you.
0:41:30 – Speaker 2
It’s stuff that you know I can’t do, so that you know we can do stuff that is meaningful and creative. But but I think that you know, as a young person today, I mean, even people are used to filming themselves, and people, yeah, no totally, yeah, absolutely.
0:41:51 – Speaker 1
You know, and it’s yeah, yeah themselves and people.
0:41:53 – Speaker 2
Yeah, no, totally, yeah, absolutely, you know, and it’s yeah, yeah, it’s kind of like oh, I, you know, that’s not what I. I don’t practice taking photos of myself and practice I don’t practice. I know that’s like. You know somebody. It’s like, well, that’s part of it now, and it’s like is it? I don’t know, is it? Maybe that’s the anti you gotta like, because I think I was just alerted to this band called uh Beams, which nobody knows what they look like.
0:42:18 – Speaker 1
That’s funny, that’s funny.
0:42:20 – Speaker 2
They’re definitely like that psychedelic, you know, like jam not jam, but psychedelic.
0:42:25 – Speaker 1
That’s cool.
0:42:27 – Speaker 2
I got to check them out then, yeah, I don’t know what country they’re from. There’s only one person that kind of is named somewhere along the line, but you don’t know. There’s three members in the band. You don’t know who the members are.
0:42:39 – Speaker 1
No, that’s cool, that’s cool it’s crazy.
0:42:43 – Speaker 2
So I mean not crazy, but it’s kind of it’s. I was like, oh, that’s a cool mystique it is because I mean yeah as far as I know, they’re not from. They’re also not from this country. They’re not american yeah, yeah country, uh, so, uh, so it is. It’s kind of cool. It’s like, well, you know to. So there’s, I guess, uh different elements. That’s kind of the anti, I I guess. Video yourself all the time right.
0:43:10 – Speaker 1
yeah, yeah, that’s the anti-establishment right there. Yeah, I guess I mean maybe there’s.
0:43:15 – Speaker 2
There’s probably videos of them, but they wear these ancient masks, not, not not like wrestling things or anything like that. It’s like there’s, I think, a there’s a story that goes behind what they wear. I don’t remember what, but so kind of cool, I guess.
0:43:32 – Speaker 1
Yeah, no, it’s cool. So, Catherine, is there anything else going on that you wanted to talk about?
0:43:39 – Speaker 2
Any projects you have coming out or anything else you wanted to mention, I mean the big thing is, like I said, if I you know, I mean I guess I can mention the movie I’m currently well Spooked is going to be coming out at some point soon, and there’s definitely something cool. There’s the soundtrack that is going to be out I don’t know, it’ll probably be digital and maybe a physical form. I don’t know yet how that’s going to happen or when that’s going to happen. And then, of course, the Endzone 2, once and Future Smash Bl blu-ray releases coming out to you know people who back?
the film and, uh, so, and I, as I am saying, it’s like I’m working on something now that I think the trailer first got out, but I’m, uh, so far I haven’t publicly said that I am scoring it, because I want to get through most of the this film before I actually mention that I’m doing. It actually replaced someone, so I don’t want to. Oh, oh, okay, okay, I see I mean, I think you know there was a certain aesthetic that you know the director, it’s the director’s movie.
0:44:45 – Speaker 1
I’m here, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, totally that’s cool.
0:44:50 – Speaker 2
And then, um, uh, what else? Uh, gosh, there’s a lot. And then the director I was working with in atlanta I know there’s new stuff that they’re hopefully gonna be.
0:45:00 – Speaker 1
So you’re like keep saying real busy filming, uh well, um, it’s not.
0:45:04 – Speaker 2
I mean you go through it, like you know. The truth is, you go through these periods where I’m waiting. I gotta wait for the the stuff to be filmed, and then that’s true you know I was. I was starting to write for some music library stuff. But that’s kind of bottom of the barrel for me right now, because that’s the kind of stuff where you’re like I don’t know what’s going to happen if nobody, if it’s not promoted and nobody buys it. There’s no money coming into my pocket from that.
But that’s another right right, but the big things. I would say that axe monkey. We are going to have a release called Metal Monkey and we are working on stuff now and then Faux Manco, so everything that I’m talking about right now can be you can hear on CatherineCapozzicom.
0:45:46 – Speaker 1
That’s.
0:45:46 – Speaker 2
C-A-T-H-E-R-I-N-E, capozzi, c-a-p, as in Peter, o-z-z-icom, or Axemonkey, a-x-e-m-u-n-k-e-ecom, or Fomenko, which is spelled F-A-U-X-M-E-N-C-Ocom, and so those are the big projects. I think that there will be physical media coming out soon with those things. So not physical, digital, sorry.
0:46:17 – Speaker 1
Yeah, no, no problem, oz. Catherine, it was awesome having you on. I thank you so much for your time and you definitely had a lot of encouraging words, so I appreciate that you coming on and sharing your experience.
0:46:29 – Speaker 2
Well, thank you for asking me. I really appreciate that.
0:46:32 – Speaker 1
Yeah, it’s my pleasure and we’ll have to have you on back some other time when you got anything else new going on and release that comes out, or whatever. We’ll have you back on for sure.
0:46:41 – Speaker 2
You know what, if I can send you some release, I’ll send you some.
0:46:45 – Speaker 1
Absolutely.
0:46:46 – Speaker 2
I’ll send you some Axe Monkey stuff, so you can at least awesome. What’s happening?
0:46:51 – Speaker 1
Yeah, no totally, absolutely, yeah, yeah. So absolutely Send that over and looking forward to hearing it and everyone. Thank you for listening, thank you for downloading and don’t forget to embrace your storm, see ya.