On The Up

In the 1950 Fred Zinnemann film The Men, Marlon Brando (in his debut, no less) plays a young infantryman during World War II. After being shot in the back, Brando's character returns home as a paraplegic and must learn to live life with much less ability than he previously had. Fast-forward to today, and The Men (the band this time) are a complete paradox.

Last year saw the release of Open Your Heart. Not the band's first LP, to be sure – the two years past saw two releases – but it has become somewhat of a breakout success. NME, among other music media institutions, hailed it as some of the most fresh and unforgiving punk rock to come out of the US in years. “The whole thing's been awesome, it's really cool to see how well it's done,” guitarist and vocalist Nick Chiericozzi says over the phone. “You know, we started off with a 20-minute cassette tape that we maybe made 30 copies of. So the reaction [for Open Your Heart]'s been great. If it didn't go so well, we wouldn't be coming to Australia, so I think that proves it. I think the record kicked down the door for us in a lot of ways, which is really cool. I haven't thought about it that way, but it's really opened those kinds of opportunities up for us. I think that's what any band or musician really wants, to be able to play their music anywhere and be secure with it.”

If Open Your Heart was their entry into the public consciousness, then 2011's Leave Home was definitely the testing ground for The Men's straightforward and unique style. Recorded more than a year beforehand, Leave Home was the first collection of the band's work to be released on a label (Sacred Bones Records). The gap between recording and release certainly proved a critical juncture for a band that write and tour as prolifically as The Men do. “It took so long because we had never been on a label before,” Chiericozzi explains. “But there was this whole middle period where we were sitting on the album. We felt like we had done enough by ourselves, and we really felt like it was time to get that connection.”

In a more band-centric sense, Chiericozzi also explains that the formation of the current band line-up turned a lot of their processes around. Chiericozzi and Mark Perro had originally taken the effort of writing and recording on themselves, but the inclusion of Rich Samis allowed them much more versatility, because – by Chiericozzi's own admission – they had someone on board who could actually play drums. “We never really switched instruments live, but we did a lot in the studio,” he says. “That's because me and Mark were both writing the songs, so it made sense to have that way of working while writing and recording. I feel like it's a little more subtle now. I certainly don't want to play the drums… well, I can't play the drums,” he laughs. “Rich can, so he gets to play them. But we do incorporate different instrumentation, whether it's percussion things or piano or harmonica, things like that. It's all stuff we play around with in the studio. But live, it's pretty simple. It's like the usual setup: two guitars, bass and drums. It works for us on stage, obviously, and it's probably what we'll bring to Australia.”

The Men will be playing the following dates:

Wednesday 30 January - Goodgod Small Club, Sydney NSW
Thursday 31 January - Beaches Hotel, Wollongong NSW
Friday 1 February - Laneway Festival, Brisbane QLD
Saturday 2 February - Laneway Festival, Sydney NSW
Sunday 3 February - Laneway Festival, Footscray VIC
Wednesday 6 February - Northcote Social Club, Northcote VIC
Friday 8 February - Laneway Festival, Adelaide SA
Saturday 9 February - Laneway Festival, Perth WA