By Alicia Romero
Fifteen years after the formation of the iconic American rock band The Strokes, lead guitarist Nick Valensi is on to his latest musical endeavor with the creation of CRX, a band of the same genre, but this time with an LA origin. Monday, November 28th, before the CRX concert at the Doug Fir Lounge, Valensi opened up in an interview about the making of his new project, and how special it is to be working with not only a group of talented musicians, but close friends. The group’s debut album “New Skin” is out now, and CRX is finishing their tour on the west coast ending on December 15th in Albuquerque, NM.
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Are you excited for the concert in Portland tomorrow? Have you been here before?
Nick Valensi: I’m so excited to be in Portland! I’ve been to Portland a dozen times, I love Portland. The very first time I ever went there I went to Jake’s Crab, it’s a seafood restaurant. they’ve got killer crab, and I’m going to eat there before my show.
Nick, how is being primarily on the west coast different from New York?
Valensi: I’m from New York, born and raised in Manhattan, so I’ve got the heart of a New Yorker. However, I’ve been living in LA for about 10 years now, so on the exterior I’ve got a bit of a Los Angeles vibe. But on the inside I’m holding on to the cold, black New Yorker heart that is deep within me.
The difference is that New York is crazy, and just frenetic and the pace is really hurried, and I find it kind of harder to get stuff done in New York because I get consumed with a social life, night life, a lot of partying, a lot of sleeping through the day. In LA, the lifestyle tends to blend itself to early rising, productive days, but that may be just to me. If I had stayed in NY I don’t know if I would’ve had the drive to start this new band, CRX. I don’t know if I
could’ve written the new album. It’s just something about LA–I feel very productive there.
You all have an extensive music background, some of you from being in previous groups. How did you all come together to create CRX?
Valensi: We’ve been friends for a long time. When I first moved to LA 9-10 years ago, the first year or two I didn’t really know anyone here, and it was bit of a difficult transition for me. I just took it upon myself to meet as many people as I could, and hang out with people who I already knew. I knew Josh
Homme a little bit, who produced the CRX record, but he was more of an acquaintance. When I first moved here we started hanging out a lot more. Same with some of the guys in CRX. Ralph the drummer, I met him when I first moved here, and we started jamming together pretty quick.
We didn’t form a band until I started writing songs, because, with The Strokes we had been recording less, and I guess I just had too much down time. I thought it would be really fun to get back on tour, do shows more, not trying to distance myself from The Strokes, but just to have something to do during the downtime. I didn’t really know what I was doing whether it was going to be solo thing, or a band, I just figured if I could write some good songs, and put an album together, then the direction of the project will reveal itself. I started doing that; for almost a year I spent time by myself at home demoing songs on my laptop, practicing my singing, figuring out what I wanted to say with the lyrics. It was something I never tried before. After a year I wrote about 8-9 songs, really more than that, but I demoed about 8-9 songs and then I just reached out to my friends.
Ralph was a really obvious pick for drummer for me, and I always told myself if I need a drummer beside Fab Moretti he’s going to be my guy. Darian the guitar player and I used to hang out in NY in the late 90s; I’ve known him for almost 20 years now. He was friends with John, so I met john when I moved to LA and I found out he was friends with Darian, so the three of us had a friendship for a while. And also Richie I’ve known for a long time, he used to play in the Willows, now he’s in a band called Guards. All these dudes I’ve known for a really long time. When I reached out about the music stuff it wasn’t necessarily to form a band, I just really wanted to play them the demos. They’re my friends, I respect their opinion, what they do musically, and I wanted their feedback on my demos. From there it turned into a collaborative thing, all of a sudden I had people helping me to finish writing the songs that weren’t finished, and to refine the stuff I had already demoed, and it really felt like a band when we started coming together to work on the songs, so we just kind of went with it.
What have been some of your favorite memories together so far?
Valensi: One of the main goals for me when I started CRX was to just have fun and enjoy myself. I wanted the music to be fun, and I wanted people to get a sense of fun when they listen to the record. I think it comes across the most in the live show because, we are five buddies on stage, and traveling across country in a van, and it is kind of an extended party road trip.
Your new album has been described as being influenced by The Cars, Cheap Trick, and Elvis Costello, how would you describe the sound of your new album?
Valensi: One of the bands that really influenced CRX was The Cars, and one of the things I really wanted to take from that cars influence was that when you put the cars on, you put them on to party. You don’t put the cars on to get mopey, or introspective. it’s party music, and I really wanted some of that to come across with CRX.
Who are some of your musical inspirations?
Valensi: On this record, Queens of the Stone age have always been a pretty big influence on me, I really love Josh (Homme) as a guitar player, songwriter, and a singer. And I know it’s weird because he produced this record, and I think it’s appropriate that I cite him as an influence.
This album was produced by Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age. This hasn’t been the first time some members of your band have worked with him, why did you choose him to produce your first album?
Valensi: I’m really lucky I was able to do that. It was really important for me to reach out to Josh because me as a front man and a singer with CRX, Josh is someone who has done that before as well. He wasn’t the singer of his first band–he was the lead guitarist. When that band broke up, he went on to form Queens of the Stone age, and he became the lead singer for that band. And I wanted to talk to him about that experience, because I felt he would be able to provide me a lot of insight. Over the course of a conversation I ended up being like, “Well, dude, I want you to produce this record,” and he was like, “Well, shit, I’ll do it!”.
What makes his work unique to you?
Valensi: Well it made the whole project really fun too because I was in the studio with my friend, and we were able to laugh and make fun of each other. I’m really grateful for having the opportunity to get him on board with the record.
What are your plans for after tour? Can we expect more from CRX as well as The Strokes?
Valensi: Take a little Christmas break, doing some stuff with The Strokes in early January, then just touring more with CRX. I think all of 2017 is split between touring with CRX, trying to write another CRX record, and also writing and recording a Strokes record. And of course trying to find time to be a good dad and be a good husband, and maybe after all that I’ll have time to just chill myself. It’ll be a busy year, but I’m looking forward to it though.
Final question: if you could say anything to your entire fan base right now, what would you say?
Valensi: Thank you. And I’m sorry. I think that sometimes it’s not easy to be a Strokes fan because we don’t play the game that much, and we don’t perform that often, we take long breaks in between albums, and if that has made it hard for someone to be a fan then I’m sorry. At the end of the day I’m really grateful for all the fans, and it’s amazing how much people have stuck with us over the years. Our first album came out 15 years ago, and there were a bunch of kids who loved it, but 15 years later I don’t think any of us expected for all those people to still be with us, and to still be buying our records and coming to see us play. It’s not only those kids from 15 years ago because all of them are now in their 30s and 40s, but it’s also this whole younger generation, and I feel like it’s the children, the younger brothers and sisters, and now they’re all at our shows too. And I’m starting to sound sappy now and a little corny, but I feel the love from all the fans and I’m so grateful for it.
Edited for clarity and length.