by Dr. Matthew Warnock.

Sal Scoca is a man on a mission. After forming his new band Sweet Cyanide, with fellow Crashbox bassist Angelo Fariello and guitarist Joe Salvatore and drummer Mike Bambace of Moment Theory, Scoca is looking to bring back hard rock to the East Coast scene, something that many fans of the genre will welcome with open arms. With a new album (Sweet Cyanide) out and a fall tour planned, Sweet Cyanide is hitting the airwaves and concert scene in full force. With their unique meld of classic and modern rock styles, featuring high flying guitar solos and an array of vocal harmonies, Scoca and company are looking to bring hard rock back to a scene that has seemingly been overwhelmed with singer-songwriter duos and American Idol impersonators since the turn of the new millennium.

Featuring classic rock inspired guitar hooks, fuzz-laced lead lines and vocal harmony a la Queen, Aerosmith and E.L.O, Sweet Cyanide is forging a name for themselves as one of the bands to watch on the East Coast rock scene. While many new artists and bands are drawing their musical inspiration from the pop saturated sounds of the '70s and '80s, Sweet Cyanide is reaching back and mixing Gospel vocals from the classic Rolling Stones recordings with powerful guitar riffs that could have been written by Angus Young or Jimmy Page in their heydays. By breathing new life into the classic rock genre, the band is not only paying homage to the legendary acts that they grew up listening to, but are taking that music one step further as they inject their personalities and life experiences into every lick, chord and lyric they write.

Riding on the success of their debut album, Scoca and Sweet Cyanide are already looking ahead to their next release and a fall tour of the Midwest and East Coast that is sure to be filled with killer shows wherever the band plays. With a passion for good old fashion rock, a clear vision of how they want to bring that music back to the forefront of today's scene and the drive to make things happen, Sweet Cyanide is ready to burst onto the scene in full force, taking no prisoners along the way.

Matt Warnock: There are a lot of riff-based tunes on your new album, songs that have at least one or two guitar riffs that are strong musical hooks. They're reminiscent of the riff based tunes of bands like Zeppelin, the Stones or AC/DC. I'm wondering do you come up with these riffs first and then write the song around them, or do the lyrics and melody come first and the riffs are written after the fact.

Sal Scoca: It's strange, they both kind of come together at the same time. When I'm writing I make it a conscious thought that the song has a riff that will also be a hook. A lot of the times when I'm writing I'll have a riff or a melody, or even a chorus line, that will trigger the initial idea for the song and then I build around it. But I come from that school of music anyway, so I feel I always have to base my songs around a solid riff for them to work.

Matt: It seems today that the Top 40, pop-rock bands haven't had a lot of that schooling, they haven't paid their dues on the bandstand for years and really sweated it out before they made it big. How important were all the nights spent playing covers and original tunes in bars and out on the road in a van for you when it comes to finding a good hook for a song?

Sal: After years of playing, I've come to realize what turns the fans on. Even if they're not fans that are there to see our band, if we can hit them with a four to the floor beat and a great riff then we're flying. It's simple. It's not brain surgery. A lot of the new bands these days rely too much on studio tricks to sound great. I'm not a fan of really modern, modern music, like what we're hearing right now on the radio. There are great singers out there, but do you really hear any great guitar tunes anymore? They're really killing that big fat guitar tone everyone used to get. Now they try and break it down to fit into the teeny-bop format, which I'm not a big fan of.

Spending years on the road and in clubs really helps sculpt the way I write and perform. The first concert I ever went to was The Kinks. It was later on in their careers, not in their heyday, but I still remember Dave Davies coming out and playing, I know this is clichéd, the opening riff to "You Really Got Me" and it was just magnificent. It was better than anything I'd ever experienced before. I followed that up a few months later by seeing AC/DC live and after that I knew I had to play guitar for the rest of my life.

Matt: Quite a bit of the tunes on the album, I'm thinking of songs like "SLM" and "Heartbreaker," sound autobiographical in nature. Do you draw a lot from events in your life when writing songs, or are they just really cool stories that aren't necessarily about your personal experiences?

Listen to a sample of "American Me" from the album Sweet Cyanide

Sal: Some of it is autobiographical--I'm not gonna lie to you. With "SLM," I've been around long enough to have known some chicks that would fit that mold of the typical rock queen. Other tunes, like "Heartbreaker," are definitely very autobiographical. One of the things I also do is draw from my friends' lives when I'm writing. I cull experiences from those around me and put it into my songs. If my life's too boring that day and I don't have anything to inspire me to write, I'll just rip off an idea from something that's happening to someone I know.

Track Listing for Sweet Cyanide
1. Crash Theory
2. SLM
3. Black N' White
4. American Me
5. Certain Shadows on the Wall
6. Heartbreaker
7. Between Us
8. I Wish U Would
9. Under the Sun
10. When We Were Young

Matt: One of the most effective musical devices on the album is your use of background vocals and multiple-part harmony for the melodies. Who are some of your influences when you're writing the background and harmony parts to these tunes?

Sal: Each song is different but I really like Aerosmith, Queen and E.L.O. for that kind of vocal writing. I discovered E.L.O. later on in my life, it's only been a few years now that I've really gotten into them, but I really dig that style of playing and writing. That was one of the reasons we recorded the album ourselves, to have the ability to experiment with the vocals in the studio.

Matt: Who was the female vocalist who sang backgrounds on "S.L.M."?

Sal: She was a friend of the group. She actually helped us live for a while when we showcased her on a few gigs. I really wanted to use every aspect I could think of when recording this album. Whether it was female vocals, a steel guitar or a kazoo. If it fit the song and would make it better I wanted to use it.

Matt: A lot of the background vocals have a gospel and blues feel to them. Though there's a lot of '80s and '90s rock influence on the record, were you also a fan of gospel and blues when you were growing up?

Sal: I've always been a big fan of Exile on Main Street. That era of the Stones for me was just amazing, and I've always loved how they utilized the female singers on those tunes. So that's where I'm drawing from a lot of the time when I'm working on the background vocals.

Matt: I got that feeling from the album, that vibe of the classic Stones or Zeppelin albums, where it was almost like an orchestra on the record. There are layers of vocals, guitars, keys, whatever it takes to make the song work. Did you have these sounds in your head before you went in to lay down the tracks, or did you come up with these types of things after you heard the playback in the studio for the first time?

Sal: I hear it all in my head as I'm writing a song. I definitely know where I'm going to go with it, whether there's going to be layers of guitars, background vocals, synths, whatever it is I hear. When we get into the studio, we lay down the bare tracks first and then I start adding the layers wherever I hear that fitting into the tune. Like I said, I'm a big fan of E.L.O and Queen, those great '70s bands, I'm a real junkie for that stuff. If I'm given the opportunity to squeeze in a five-part vocal line or a harmonized guitar solo, I'll do it. For me, more is better.

Matt: Since you can't do all of the vocal and instrumental layering on stage, do you have different arrangements of these tunes when you play them live?

Sal: We definitely go with a different mentality when we play live because we try to be high energy and give people a really great show. It's also hard to do five-part harmony with only three vocalists in the band. [Laughs] We usually pick the most important parts and stick to those on stage. We also like to rearrange the tunes a bit for the live shows. They have a whole new life from the way we play them on the CD. We like to jam out a lot too. We'll do uncool things like throw in extended guitar leads during sections of the songs. I like to keep it interesting for the rest of the band when we play live because it's really easy to get bored of playing the same ten tunes, exactly the same way every night.

Matt: Right, I've never really understood why people go to shows and want to hear the songs exactly as they were on the record. It seems to me that the live show should be a different experience for the audience and the band. That was one of the reasons why bands like Aerosmith, Queen, the Stones and Zeppelin put on such great shows. They really jammed out hard and made their concerts a new experience, not just a live version of the records.

Sal: Exactly, definitely our way of thinking about it. I had a friend who went to see Pearl Jam recently and he said "yeah man they sounded just like the record." I don't know if I like that, why would anyone pay money to see that show? Why not just put the record on at home? I can remember seeing Pearl Jam live and they were rippin' it, they kicked ass. Now they sound like their records, well I guess I'll pass on that one. But, we want to give the people more to dig into live. I'm a big fan of the band Extreme, and they would pull off those great harmonies live, but the songs were always different than the recordings. It would excite me to see how they would rearrange their songs to fit that live setting.

Matt: Right now you're based out of New York, which has always had a strong underground and indie rock scene. With the rise of the whole American Idol culture, where bands are being put together in talent contests and board rooms and not in clubs and rehearsal spaces, do you find that the scene has changed recently in NY in response to these things?

Sal: I'm not a huge fan of the American Idol scene and what they're doing. They're sucking the true creativity out of these kids, creativity that could have been used to become true artists. Instead they're sucking it out of them to make this cookie cutter bullshit pop figure. I'm not a big fan of that at all. It's definitely harder to get your name out there and get recognition these days. When you do get some of it you know you've worked your ass off for it and you deserve it, nobody handed that recognition to you. It's great when an educated journalist digs the album, it really means something. I'd rather hear someone like that say they've enjoyed the record than hear it from some kid who only knows Adam Lambert.

Matt: Has it been harder as a rock band to get gigs in New York in recent years, or is the scene so strong that it's still going strong when pop music seems to be taking over everywhere else?

Sal: The New York rock scene is now so underground and indie that you can't even find it anymore. [Laughs] There was a period about five or six years ago when there was a glimmer of hope. There were bands on the scene that were really rockin' out and making some great music. Then all of a sudden there was one summer where everything changed to this singer-songwriter balladeer bullshit. That's pretty much what we're stuck on out here in New York. There are still some bands that are doing the rock rap crossover stuff, but there's not much going on. We'll be on bills at the Mercury Lounge with folk acoustic bands, duets and stuff. It's kind of weird. The scene's really lost its fire. That's one of the reasons why we put this band together, to try and bring back some of that fire to the scene out here. And I have to say our fans here are great. We've got a following in New York that's really allowed us to go out and do our thing, so it's a drag but the fans are still coming to our shows which is really great.

Matt: Now that you've got that fan base developed in New York and the new CD is getting strong reviews, do you have plans to take the band on the road this summer or fall? And are you already writing songs for the next album, or are you still focused on promoting this one at the moment?

Sal: I've already begun tracking for the next CD, but starting in September we're going to be headed to a festival in Cincinnati and opening up for bands like Extreme, L.A. Guns and Kings X. Right now we're trying to continue to build our fan base and are planning a fall tour on our own which should be very cool. We've been getting some great press and radio play across the South and Midwest, so we'll see where that takes us. It's slow, but it's moving along nicely. The band hasn't even been around for a year with this lineup, so I'm looking forward to what the next year has in store.

Links
Sweet Cyanide
Sweet Cyanide on Amazon.com