Rok Lok’s website boasts a diverse catalogue, with artists of varying race, gender and sexual orientation. Sonically, Rok Lok has released everything from electro dance punk and politically charged pop to experimental tape-music and—perhaps most coveted at present—lo-fi indie rock.
“Did you hear, indie rock is cool again?” writes Andriani in a recent Rok Lok news update, pushing his most recent 7-inch vinyl record: a split single between his band Dude Japan, who “should appeal to fans of [obscure indie bands] Velocity Girl, Tiger Trap, Further and Superchunk,” and Weed Hounds, who “offer a brand new tune that meshes together the sounds of [pioneering shoegaze acts] My Bloody Valentine, Swirlies and Dinosaur Jr.”
In fact, if there’s one 2010 release that illustrates Long Island’s evolving musical landscape, the Dude Japan/Weed Hounds split 7” is it.
WEED HOUNDS is a young indie four-piece rooted in Massapequa, Wantagh and Patchogue who produce upbeat, shoegaze-tinged dream pop. (Though bassist Patrick Stankard and drummer Darren Nanon currently live in Bushwick, Brooklyn and Astoria, Queens, respectively, the band plays Long Island frequently.) Shortly after posting their demo EP on the Internet as a free download in 2009, the band was praised by Brooklyn-based indie e-zine Impose Magazine and tastemaking music blogs like ChocolateBobka and You Ain’t No Picasso.
Weed Hounds’ influences vary. Singer/guitarist Laura Catalano (who lives in Massapequa and attends CUNY Hunter) got into late-’80s/early-’90s indie rock bands like Pixies, Stereolab and My Bloody Valentine while attending Kellenberg High School. The other three members have backgrounds in punk and hardcore.
Guitarist Nick Rice, who lives in Wantagh and attends Queens College, formerly played in a hardcore/punk band called Agent, and grew up also listening to shoegaze and Britpop acts like Joy Division, My Bloody Valentine and The Smiths. “When you go to school in Queens, it’s easy to listen to [Britpop pioneers] The Stone Roses on cloudy afternoons and fantasize that those project housing buildings are really tower blocks somewhere in Manchester,” he says. Upon first hearing My Bloody Valentine’s landmark album Loveless—quintessential ’90s shoegaze—Rice says, “I could not understand how music like this could possibly be made. I may have been listening to a lot of punk like Minor Threat and Black Flag when I was 15, but hearing that severely intensified my ongoing obsession with all things English.”
Drummer Darren Nanos—also of the aforementioned group Everything Sucks—brings an undeniable punk edge. (He also recorded the band’s demo.) Bassist Patrick Stankard, a junior at NYU, grew up in Massapequa listening to indie rock and melodic LI hardcore like Silent Majority.
The band never meant to simply replicate the sounds of ’90s indie rock, shoegaze and dream pop, but, said Catalano, “it’s easy to hear who influences us.” Catalano says Weed Hounds are different from typical Long Island bands because, sonically, they’re not directly influenced by hardcore or what was left in its wake.
“We also never set out to be part of a scene, which is something I usually associate with Long Island music,” she says. But the band has a repertoire of fellow Long Island indie rockers with whom they regularly share stages. “There are some really great bands here who we’re lucky enough to play with like Polygon, Dude Japan, and Little Lungs,” Rice says. “It’s just very exciting that creativity is alive and flourishing in this part of the world.”
INDEPENDENT ROCK SCENES are dependent on all-ages art spaces, and it seems undeniable that the Long Islander who undertakes the project of establishing a few will meet success. All-ages DIY spaces like Bushwick’s Market Hotel and Ridgewood, Queens’ Silent Barn are what currently push the Brooklyn scene; in New Brunswick, N.J., the DIY basement hotspot Meat Town USA regularly hosts bands from around the country.
“Unfortunately a lot of the venues that were the quintessential Long Island places haven’t lasted throughout the decade,” Straylight Run’s Nolan says. The Downtown—a 450-capacity club in Farmingdale which regularly hosted all-ages shows—played a vital role in developing the aughts-era Long Island music scene, until the club abruptly closed in 2005.
Jason Aaron, 21, grew up in Plainview, attending John F. Kennedy High School and listening to lots of pop-punk from Long Island and New Jersey. At 16, Aaron began booking shows around Long Island under the name Island Booking. Many of the shows Aaron booked were at Merrick’s Temple Beth Am, with Long Island bands like Envy on the Coast and Yes, Virginia. “I came up in the last few years of a music scene that has died off a bit with the closing of The Downtown, and most local halls and temples no longer allowing shows,” he says.
“The Downtown had the same role as Taking Back Sunday or Brand New [in shaping the LI scene],” says Dan Irving, 24, who worked at the venue for its final three years. “It made the scene accessible, and parents were comfortable dropping their kids off there, which is a huge deal, as un-rock ’n’ roll as it sounds.”
Low-key sets from Glassjaw, acoustic sets from The Movielife and Brand New’s Jesse Lacey, and some of Straylight Run’s first shows were standouts. “In defining the Long Island sound, I don’t think any performances came close in importance,” Irving says. He did, however, note that these shows were not exactly the “shining glory” of the venue, which also catered to an older crowd by booking acts like The Zombies, The Wailers, and Squeeze singer Glenn Tilbrook.
THE CURRENT LACK OF ALL-AGES VENUES plagues musicians across Long Island.
“Being an indie rock band on Long Island is difficult if you focus on playing only Long Island,” says Weed Hounds’ Patrick Stankard. Stankard says it’s hard to get billed with bands playing anything other than punk or hardcore, and that the shortage of LI all-ages spaces bums him out. “My little brother and sister are at the age where I started going to local shows on Long Island, and they can’t get into 95 percent of the Weed Hounds shows we play on the Island.”
Slothbear, an experimental rock band from Valley Stream and Roslyn Heights, has hardly played any shows on Long Island that are not in conjunction with SUNY Stony Brook, says member Josh Ginsberg. “The most memorable Long Island gigs we’ve played are at parties, in people’s homes and basements,” he says.