Little Joy to the world

Little Joy is (from left) Fabrizio Moretti, Rodrigo Amarante and Binki Shapiro. (Credit: Autumn de Wilde)

According to singer Rodrigo Amarante, when he decided to spend his hiatus away from Brazilian rock outfit Los Hermanos in Los Angeles with singer Binki Shapiro and Strokes drummer Fabrizio Moretti, he wasn't expecting to come out the other side with a new band, Little Joy, and a self-titled debut album. 

"Back then, it just felt like our little thing that we were doing there, and it felt good," Amarante said. "It was about celebrating our friendship, which was new and felt really fresh and good, and the music that we were writing together was the celebration, like a portrait of what was happening. It felt like our little thing in the sense it was not a planned project." 

Amarante, who will be bringing Little Joy to New Jersey with shows Friday (Nov. 14) at Maxwell's in Hoboken and Saturday (Nov. 15) at the Wonder Bar in Asbury Park, recently spoke with Metromix Jersey Shore.  

Your band's originally from Brazil, and Fab's music is really associated with New York City. How did the move to Los Angeles for both you guys influence the sound of this new band?
I think at first we didn't realize how that really played a part on (our) writing. But after a while, we really had to admit that the city, the vibe and the people here really, I think, influenced us -- not on a conscious level, I think, but it was just a more relaxed thing. And I think it's hard to separate the fact that we were here by chance and we didn't have like a concept for writing the songs or a name of a band. ... That's why the songs are sometimes quite different from each other. And, the California vibe is kind of close to this, writing without a lot of head and more of (the) heart. 

The music definitely has a very laid-back, very relaxed feel to it. When you guys play live, is the show relaxed or do you guys going to rock out a bit, since the touring band is expanded to five people?
The songs, when we play them live, they certainly get a little bit more of a punch or something, but the mellow moments are there. I mean, the arrangements are pretty close to what's on the album, and it's got the same spectrum, I'd say -- slow moments and up moments. And then we have a new song that's like an upbeat song and another cover that we decided to play that's a little bit more up, but I feel like listening to the album, it's mellower than watching us play. 

Oh, OK. What's the cover you guys are doing?
It's a Helen Shapiro song called "Walkin' Back to Happiness," I think that's the name of the song, and Binki's singing it; it's pretty fun. 

How does it feel now, to go from being well-known and acclaimed in Brazil to hitting the clubs and playing intimate gigs in the U.S.?
It's pretty good, I think, because for me particularly, this has been -- I wouldn't say voluntarily because I feel like I didn't choose things, things just happened -- but it's kind of an exile for me, and it has a very good vibe of being in a place where nobody really knows me and expects anything from me. So, this start-again feel is really good, I think, for everything -- for writing and for playing. And to feel like we're starting from scratch again, we're going to do a van tour and we're not going to have all the comforts of a big tour, it feels good, actually. It's funny, it feels good, it feels fun, you know? 

We did a little tour with Megapuss a month ago, where it was pretty much like that. It was just us, we had to tune the instruments, put them onstage, and it felt good. ... it's almost like it made me remember how I would, on a big tour, get annoyed by details, silly stuff, just maybe because there were so many people responsible for so many things and I didn't really understand what was going on. And when you're by yourself, it feels more like a circus, where you're close to everybody that's involved and if something goes wrong it's just your fault and you're not really allowed to get annoyed. You just have to fix it and go on. It's a pretty good feeling. 

I can imagine. Now, are you guys viewing this as a side project or as something more than that?
I don't really know how to label it and, to be honest, I don't know if there's a point in doing that. Of course, the Strokes are a huge band and a great band, and so for Fab it sure is, from the outside, a side project. But, once we're in it, and I'm sure Fab will say that, it just feels like our band. This feels like my band, that's all I care (about) right now, and my heart is fully in it.