PELA

Currently, all of us live in the not-so-fashionable waterfront neighborhood of Red Hook – the setting of Hubert Selby Jr.’s Last Exit in Brooklyn. It’s also home to many artists, dock workers, cranes, and shipping containers. We make desperate songs about addiction, isolation, hope, murder, sex, and Mexico. It’s pretty dark stuff, but a lot of people find our songs really catchy. Someone once told us our music is like what might happen if Modest Mouse hitched a ride on U2′s tour bus. We like that. We’re scrappy but our horizons are wide open.

Then there’s the biographical stuff. Our singer and guitarist Billy Swanson was born and raised in Santa Cruz, California. He dropped out of high school at age 16, and then played in a series of bands up and down the west coast, all of which failed. Later Billy moved overseas to Europe where he made a living as a subway busker. He worked in 10 countries, most of which he only stayed in long enough to pay for one way tickets to the next city. During this tour of duty he attempted to play a restaurant in Italy dressed as a pirate, and had his front teeth knocked out in a fist fight. He also lost the tip of his index finger somewhere along of the way.

Eric Sanderson, our bassist, and Nate Martinez, the guitar player, are from New York. They went to the same school upstate, and have been playing music together for almost 10 years. Eric met Billy while he was busking at a Brooklyn subway stop. Eric liked what he heard. The last member of the band was our drummer Tomislav Zovich, though you can call him Tom. He joined up in 2003. Tom’s from New Jersey via Croatia. He received his musical education playing weddings with his dad. (You wouldn’t know it but he plays a mean polka.)

So far, Pela has played at Mercury Lounge, North 6, Southpaw, and a few out-of-town gigs. We were especially down with having the chance to open up for Rainer Maria, The National, The Decemberists, and Earlimart. We’re putting our first EP out early in 2005 on Brassland. There’s been some other stuff, but for that you’ll have to come up and ask…

Band site: www.pelamusic.com

‘SUP says:
Pela just might be New York’s next best band. No. It’s true. We rarely say such things. And when we do say them, peeps, we’re usually right. Like check out our Interpol interview way back in 1974. And the Shins? Did ‘em back in ’88. Legit.

How we met Pela:
The head of their new label, Brassland, saw us once at a show (we think it was Arcade Fire) and handed us Pela’s early EP. Upon first listen, we fell in love. Perfect in the U2/Psychedelic Furs kinda way. If there’s any justice in the world, we’ll have a New-New Wave pajama festival in our apartment with Interpol and The Stills, with Pela opening.