[dropcap]I[/dropcap]n the 21st Century, a luxury music fans currently posses is the ability to log on and explore the web to discover new and unique music. You can check out the pages of like Vanyaland (shameless plug) on a daily basis, search websites like Bandcamp and Soundcloud to see who’s been posting some killer jams, and even go on social media and give a random band a “like” on their Facebook page. It’s never been easier to keep yourself in the loop and your finger on the pulse. You never know, some day a band can come out of nowhere and write a song that you end up constantly listening to.
Recently, New Paltz, New York, “slop pop” duo Diet Cig have been generating a buzz with their adorably simple song structures and hints of garage rock that encompass their jangly twee sound. Following up their show last night at Great Scott in Allston, Diet Cig will be performing at Aurora in Providence tonight with local indie-folk acts Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Soleilune. Vanyaland had a chat with Alex Luciano and Noah Bowman ahead of tonight’s festivities where we talked about starting out in a small place like New Paltz, their most recent releases, fixing a broken window, and when we can expect their full-length debut to come out.
Rob Duguay: New Paltz is mainly known as a college town, but do you think there are any advantages for a band to start in a small town rather than a place like New York City?
Alex Luciano: Totally. There are so many supportive kids, it’s a smaller community, you get more opportunities to play and to build relationships with other people in bands. It’s really fun playing in a college town.
I can understand where you have your own little community that isn’t too wide ranging and everyone knows each other so you don’t feel like you’re an outcast. So far this year Diet Cig have released the Over Easy EP and the 7-inch double-sided single that has the songs “Sleep Talk” and “Dinner Date.” I really dig the mix of twee pop and garage rock the both of you have going on. Where were the two records made?
Noah Bowman: We did both of them in New Paltz at a place called the Salvation Recording Company with our good friend, producer, and engineer Chris Daly. I’ve always done records with him before the Diet Cig stuff and he’s just great. He knows what to do and how you want it to sound, I’ll whip out my guitar or my pedal and he’ll know how to make it sound right before I plug them in.
It’s a cool relationship when both the artist and producer can instantly see eye to eye when it comes to how they want a record to sound. I think your recordings so far sound really pristine.
Bowman: Thanks.
Diet Cig has been on tour since the beginning of September, so how’s it been going? Didn’t you have to fix a broken window a few weeks ago?
Bowman: Yeah, in Salt Lake City we got our window bashed in.
Did someone try stealing your gear?
Luciano: They only took an acoustic guitar we had that we don’t need for our live set so we were pretty lucky but it was a bummer. It definitely sucked driving eight hours with a plastic bag covering where the window was on the highway. Other than that we’ve had a really amazing tour.
Bowman: Yeah, it been a lot of fun. It’s crazy to think that we’re already near the end of it right now.
Luciano: It’s insane going over to the West Coast where we’ve never been before, meeting all these people who have connected with our music and just the expanse of it all. It’s been really exciting to meet everybody.
It must be fun to be playing in front of new people every night. I’m glad that other than the window incident everything has been going well for you guys. What is the most difficult thing about touring as an up and coming act and what is the most rewarding thing?
Luciano: I think weeknights, like on a Monday night, are tough when you’re up and coming. No matter where you are it’s hard to get everyone out there on Mondays and Tuesdays. I think the best part is all the bands that we get to play with. We get to open for a lot of bands that we really admire, we’ve gotten to open for Diarrhea Planet, LVL UP, Ought and Sheer Mag. We actually even got to open up for The Get Up Kids a couple weeks ago. It’s been really amazing to be able to play with all these awesome bands and that’s my favorite part about going on tour.
Bowman: Yeah, I’d have to agree.
Diet Cig have only released an EP and a double-sided single, so when’s the full-length coming out?
Bowman: Once we can get back from being out on the road our plan after this tour is to sit down and put it all into music instead of just talking about it. Hopefully we’ll have something out by the beginning of next year.
Luciano: Once we get home we’re just going to finish writing the record and it’ll be fun to go back into the studio with Chris [Daly] who’s been away all Summer so it’ll be a cool way to reconnect.
DIET CIG + TOMORROW AND TOMORROW + SOLEILUNE :: Thursday, October 1 at Aurora Providence, 276 Westminter St. in Providence, RI :: 9 p.m., all ages, $7 :: Advance tickets :: Facebook event page