Interview: Fulcrum Of The Stars

Because I'm a killer for live music, and probably spend way too much money attending such shows, I decided to start doing interviews with the musicians (most of them friends) and post them on here.  This guy's got a lot of passion for what he does, so I thought I'd share a bit about his band.  Check it out.


Name: Fulcrum Of The Stars

Members: 

• Jeremy Exelbert (vocals and guitar) was born and raised in New York City, and now lives in Harlem.
• Alex Raderman (Drums) is from Westchester, NY, but has lived in the city for the past 5 years. 
• Madhava (vocals and bass) is originally from Australia, but grew up in Upstate New York, lived in Brooklyn for a few years, and has recently moved Uptown.

FB: When did you first get your start in music?  How did you first get involved in this?

JE: I first started playing music at the age of 10 on Piano- I was pretty good, but it wasn’t the right “sound” for me. At 12, I wanted to play electric guitar, but my mom didn’t let me. Around the age of 14, after quitting Piano, I finally convinced her to get me a guitar, and at 15/16 I started really practicing and taking music seriously.  After High School, I went to Boston University, where I somehow managed to get a degree in Economics without doing much work- reason being, I played music all the time, and got really into songwriting as well.

While in Boston, in addition to playing with a lot of people, jazz bands, rock bands, and one fucking annoying pop singer (who stole my guitar riff and used it for an episode of MTV's Real World), I had a band called James Downtown.  It was with this band that I really started to write my own songs and begin to develop a sound.

After BU, I went to Berklee for a semester to study music seriously.  At this time I was really into Jazz.  I decided I’d rather play professionally than study, so I got a job playing guitar on a cruise ship. I signed a 6 month contract, but 4 months into it, I quit. I was playing top 40’s sets and other people’s songs, which I hated.  After falling in love with this girl who was a guest on one of the cruises, I decided to move back to New York to try to woo her and make it with my original music- the wooing failed.  

When I moved back to New York in summer of 2011, I started performing under my own name and recorded an EP that I finished in early 2012.  The EP that was pretty much for the girl I met on the ship- it didn’t do shit. However, almost immediately after finishing the EP that summer, my sound completely changed and I could not longer go by “Jeremy Exelbert.” The project transcended who I was, and each member had to be an integral part, so I formed a new band and named it Fulcrum of The Stars.

The name comes from a line in a poem that my father wrote.  He passed away when I was 9, so it was kind of a tribute to him. The line in the poem means accepting what the universe has laid out for you, and understanding that certain things are out if your control.  I felt like the lyric/band name really fit the music.

After recording a demo in October, I decided the project needed a stronger, more polished voice than mine. Madhava, who was a friend of mine in another band, really wanted to try singing, and now we’re giving it a shot- I really like the way he sounds and how he gets the lyrics and music. We’ll see what happens, but this band has some serious fucking potential. The drummer, Alex Raderman, is a top drummer in the city and plays in another relatively established Indie Band called “Modern Rivals.”

FB: What musicians inspire you?

JE: Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughan, The Police, St Vincent, Grouplove, and Barney Kessel (this dude is a fucking genius- and probably the greatest jazz guitarist of all time). I also really dig Delta Spirit, this band is awesome. I have a lot of other influences too, but none of them really affect my songwriting too strongly- not to sound like an arrogant dick, but what I write comes from somewhere else, and at times I don’t even feel like it’s me writing it, but rather, something greater than myself. I’d even go as far as to say that I’m discovering someone else’s songs and trying to write them before I forget how they go, and playing them is my way of sharing those songs that I heard- almost like picking apples and than sharing them with your friends….ya dig?

FB: What are you listening to right now?

JE: I’m listening to life..nah that sounds so lame, haha. I’m really into the new Delta Spirit album right now.  I love their arrangements and songwriting.

FB: What inspires you in writing lyrics?

JE: I always write lyrics after the music. For me, the music always dictates what the content will be. To me, a song exists to explain something that words cannot, so words are just the bullet points, but the music is the real fucking substance. My lyrics can cover anything: love, one night stands (this shit can be love too ya know, haha), lost childhood, depression, I have one about a fictional girl’s contemplative suicide, etc. You get the idea… lyrics are written on a need basis.

FB: Describe your music in 3 words:

JE: “Catchy, uncomfortable truth.”

FB: Anything coming up next besides the album this summer?

JE: Anything coming up besides an album? A lot of new shows, and maybe some band t-shirts. Those are pretty cool and I just got a new logo I like, so we’ll see what happens. Life is pretty unpredictable, one moment you can have a band, the next you can be up to your neck in debt. Let’s hope the band is doing well, haha.

Check these dudes out on Bandcamp, fall in love, then come to their show at Wicked Willy's tomorrow night (2/27) at 7PM! (Also, it's ladies night.............)