Punk Rock Season

Here's a view (for the Ukranian webzine "Punk Rock Season") with awesome french punk band Freygolo, made using e-mail.

1. Thanx that you agree to make a view. First of all, please, tell who and when started the band and a short history of Freygolo.
You're welcome, well Freygolo started back in 1997, as a 3 members band. It all started with Francois (the singer/guitar player) that is the only original member still remaining in the band today. Today we're a 6 members band with the same persons since 2005. Belzu, the drummer, is the last guy to join the crew after Fred our former drummer called it quits.

2. What does Freygolo mean and why did you choose this name?
Actually Freygolo doesn't mean anything at all, Freygolo is a small character in the cartoon Captain Future, it looks like a turtle that can change its body appearance, well we just kinda ripped the name off... We chose this name basically because we all like cartoon.

3. What genres and bands did influence you when you started a band and what are your favourites now?
We were all into melodic punk rock like NOFX, No Use For a Name, Millencolin, Pennywise, and some ska punk bands too like Less Than Jake, Mad Caddies, Catch 22 etc... Nowadays we all have different favourite bands ranging from hardcore to pop rock, depending on everyone's taste in music.

4. Who writes music and lyrics in Freygolo?
In general the music is composed by Francois that comes up with an idea of a song, only the basics and everyone puts guitar bass licks, drum breaks and rolls, backing vocals and shit so basically we all write the music. The lyrics are written by the one who sings: that is Francois for most of the songs and also Remi for some songs.

5. Do you often have some quarrels or discussions in the band and is it hard for you to find solution of such problems?
Of course, we have discussions and quarrels but we never fought physically as for now. Sometimes it's hard to find solutions, but we're all the kind of guys to think that there are solutions to every problems, so when troubles come in our way we just figure out a means to get rid of them, and we try to be patient ...

6. Of course, you have some relative and friendly bands. Please, tell something about them.
We've met lots of good bands while touring, Guerilla Poubelle a punk rock band based in Paris, Uncommonmenfrommars, a awesome punk rock band, you must see them live. They're amazing! Authority Zero, the band we toured with in Japan, are like awesome too, check out Sons of Buddha, Coquettish from Japan, they're great (check out black white clothing too their brand amazing stuff), and I could go on forever...

7. What countries did you visit with shows and where did you like it most of all?
Appart from France, we've been to Spain, Germany, United Kingdom, Italy, Switzerland, Czech Republic and Japan.
I'd say we all had a blast in Japan, most of us like Germany a lot too, kids are crazy in Spain too...

8. Are you satisfied with "Stereo Fighters"? Did you get the sound that you wanted?
Yes, we are all satisfied with Stereo Fighters, this must sound like another cliche, but that's our best record to date, we all like the sound even though afterwards you still wonder, like, fuck we should have done this and add this and stuff, but that's the way the cookie crumbles and we are really happy with this record.

9. You're back from your tour around Japan with Authority Zero. What are your impressions about it?

It's been AMAZING! We expected lots of fun, great shows, meeting cool people and we had this and so much more, the shows were crowded every nights.
We played with AZ that are amazing guys: really friendly, nice and funny... We played with Less than Jake, one of the bands we grew up listenning to... What else could we have??

10. There is a very strong ska/punk/hardcore scene in France. Tell something about it, please. Are there some bands that deserve a lot of attention (your point of view)?
According to us, we don't have a very strong ska/punk/hardcore scene in France, lots of bands split because it's hard to make a living out of music down here, especially in punk rock 'cause there are no labels, no good distributors to promote punk rock, and we also desperately need small venues and clubs because such places are so hard to find. We definitely need more infrastrucutures to promote punk rock in France.

11. Are there some political,social, ecological or any other problems that worry you the most? What do you think you can do to help to solve them?
I guess we're all in the band worried about ecological and social problems, even though we're not a socalpolitical punk band, I guess your everyday's acts can make a change on the long run, if everyone trys to pay more attention to his daily acts and neighbours and basically everyone around, maybe, we'll all feel better and get along better.

12. Let's talk about your everyday life. What do you do for living?
We all have different jobs, some of us have part time jobs and so called "mac jobs", Belzu's repairing pool , Arno works in a real estate office, Remi as his home studio where he basically record bands (Snapcut Studio).

13. How do you prefer spending your free time? What about some sports?
We 're all different most of us just like to chill out, watch tv, play video games, play our instruments. Most of us like football too,but we are not really big sport guys...

14. When you where kids what did you dream about? Whom did you want to become when you grow up?
I've always wanted to be a musician ever since I heard iron maiden and metallica for the first time when I was 11 or 12 years old. I'm just trying to make this dream come true.

15. If you weren't musicians whom would you like to be?
Nothing else !!!

16. Do you think that people in the band must be like a family or the main thing is the skill in playing musical instruments?
I do think how we get along is really important 'cause on tour emotions can go very high, because of tiredness and you can easily get angry more than in "real life", but obviously good skills are important too so that the band can improve.

17. Does anyone in Freygolo play in any other band?
Remi the trombone player has a side project where he plays all the instruments, it's called An Escape For Louie, Belzu plays in different bands just for fun. I can't remember their names right now

18. How would you describe Freygolo using only one word?
Like "Wow"??

19. Thanx a lot for this view. Good luck!

Tokyo Shibuya (Jp) @ Club Quattro

Same place same hour, let's start again with the same old guys... It's 6 o' clock and we're all backstage in the club quattro in Tokyo. You can tell the voice will quiver and eyes will become wet, tonight is the last show of the tour and you can feel emotion's in the air... no kidding. We spend the hour before the show motivating ourselves, like a egyptian philosopher said: "I, who choose everything in my life, I want to choose the way I'll die too (...) I do want to die on stage under the spotlights "... Anyway, I may not kick the bucket tonight, but one thing's for sure I'm not gonna spare myself tonight!!
It's time to go to work. Jeff climbs up first on stage and if we can trust the cheers of the 600 guys tonight, it doesn't take a genius to figure that out tonight will be a great night. There are nights like these when nothing can go wrong. Judging by the number of FREYGOLO t-shirts worn tonight, you can tell that quite some people saw our past gigs in Tokyo, as a matter of fact people sings along the horns melodies, they shout out the choruses! This is so much fun that Remi ends his trombone part on "wasting my time again" crowdsurfing. The last song is no different than this one, a third of the band is a microphone in the hand standing in the crowd, whereas on stage, Bill from AZ join us for the backing vocals. We've had shows ranging from good to medium average on this tour but tonight this one is the best show we've had !!
Backstage again, we catch our breath a bit but we're not done yet with the japanese crowd.So we just decide to join all the AUTHORITY ZERO on stage for "no regrets" their last song. Everyone is going insane on stage and in the pit, los americanos look happy as can be, it's so good to end up the tour like this !
That's it, this is the end, there's nothing else to do than party now. LESS THAN JAKE join us after their set, for them too it's their last japanese gig, so everyone's kidding around, drinking beers and we take a couple of pictures to immortalize this moment.
We're going to use our last strength in a final restaurant, we're gonna try to make this moment last forever, but everything has an end, it's time to go back to the hotel, our plane takes off 4 hours later.
This is by far our best tour ever, the conditions while touring were amazing, We're gonna miss all the IN n OUT crew, and more generally we're gonna miss Japan. In addition, I can't wait to play again with the guys from Arizona !!

Tokyo Shibuya (Jp) @ Club Quattro

We went back to Tokyo yesterday. This time nobody got sick so we had the 6 hours journey in the van.
One thing not bad with IN N OUT, is that they have free access to almost every shows all over Japan. As we had nothing special to do, we actually ended up drinking beers backstage with MAD CADDIES and BETTER LUCK NEXT TIME that were playing yesterday in Tokyo, and as the more we are the better it is, Dan the SUICIDE MACHINES guitar player join us to cheer! I've had worse day off than this one!!
Once again we're playing in a club quattro tonight. This one looks exactly like the others, it's got the same half circle shaped pit, the same wooden floor and the same fences that separate the stage from the audience.
We're doing the best we can so that it sounds good on stage, as we're doing only one soundcheck for both tonights' and tomorrows' show. Then we leave to visit the streets of Shibuya, which is one of the most living neighborood in Tokyo, we got things to see before the show starts.
We're back at the venue by 6:30pm, the quattro is already crowded. Like every nights we take countless number of pictures with young japanese fans, then Hideki takes us away from our moment of glory to get on stage.
We're back and more motivated than ever tonight, you can feel it from the beginning of the show, which is just amazing. The 500 people here tonight react really well. We're putting up one of the best show of the tour tonight, the athmosphere is really awesome and it's driving us overjoyed.
After the show, we ended up in a restaurant, excited by the great show we had tonight, we're fucking around like naughty kids and with a little help of sake we let all our french attitude shines through. We cheer in every language we know, you can hear someone shouting almost everywhere...
We head back to the hotel late at night, and we're going to try to rest a bit because tomorrow is our last day in Japan and we 'll have to put the same great show over again!!!

Nagoya (Jp) @ Club Quattro

Wake up call at 8 am. Originally we were supposed to have a 6 hour travel in the bus to get to Nagoya... But this was without any regards for the digestive problems of Mitsuru, our "guitar tech hero". After he threw up through the van's window, we changed our plans, we decided to head back to Yokohama and take the bullet train. And I have to say I bless Mitsuru's puke, this train is so fast that it only takes 1 hour and a half to go to Nagoya.
Appart from that, the sun is shining again in Nagoya, we then tidy away our yellow oilskins, and put out the bermudas again to hike in Nagoya before the soundcheck. This club Quattro is almost the exact replica of the one we played in Osaka. We soundcheck ... again, then we kill the time the best we can walking through the streets of the neighborhood.
We start at 7 on the dot, the show is cool, nothing more nothing less. The audience tonight cares a little less about the other bands, and this is also true for AUTHORITY ZERO, I just say to myself that they've all come to see LESS THAN JAKE and that's all.
After the show, the Arizona boys ended up the night in a restaurant, we went back to the hotel. We've all been exhausted and a little sick for 2 days. It would be more than about time we get our second wind, so that we can end this tour with more energy... Let's put it that way, we're more into a last grasp thing than a second wind thing right now !!!

FREYGOLO_Nagoya_Japan

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Tokyo Shinjuku (Jp) @ ACB Hall

Every days on tour just look the same. Moreover when you're playing 2 nights in a raw in the same city, in the same neighbourhood and 10 mins walking away from each venues.
Everybody woke up relatively late today, the consequences of all the late night parties are showing up and we're all feeling tired. We rushed, hardly awaken to the club to soundcheck. The ACB club is one of those small venues we particularly like, it's just made for FREYGOLO. We soundcheck in no time, then we head back to the hotel to rest 'till the show starts. We went back to the club at like 7:30 pm, 4 out of 5 bands already played. The venue is once again quite packed.
A few reggae SUBLIME-like chords later for the band with the unpronounceable name that's playing before us, then we're already next to show that we're not here for tourism, there are no fences between us and the crowd, the show is then more convivial and because of that the crowd is completely insane tonight. They're by far the best audience of the tour. We end up the show in a climax with a stage in a state of mess that equals the one of the pit.We're then leaving the stage for our friends AUTHORITY ZERO, just like we do every nights.
The evening ends up in a japanese restaurant, I'm not staying late, my stomach is starting to od from all the raw fish, I 'll have a bowl of rice and go to bed.

FREYGOLO The Crowd Shinjuku ACB