![]() “We’re just going to get drunk every night for two months and make a record, and just make songs and songs and songs with all our boys trapped in a house,” Marc says with a laugh. The band will leave behind his Toronto studio for the mountains of Nova Scotia and will record with an expanded lineup under the new name of the Len Crew. Len is set to begin a five-week national tour in October, but Costanzo is already planning the next album sessions. “All these bands hiring B-boys to dance for them in videos and ,” he complains, “and they’ve never been to a B-boy battle in their lives. I’ve got to really believe I’m not pushing my luck.”įor instance, Costanzo is offended when a rock band adds scratch effects to an album merely as a commercial gimmick, attempting to tap into the lucrative beat culture. “For me to explore somewhere, I got to know what I’m doing. “There’s only so far you can take it,” he says. ![]() Mixing pop genres seems to come easily to the band, but Costanzo insists that there are boundaries even Len won’t cross. DeVille of Poison, who provided metal guitar leads on “Feelin’ Alright” and appears in the song’s video. “He was a real good inspiration to us.”Ī less likely collaborator was C.C. “Biz said, don’t worry about what you put on the record, don’t worry about what people say,” Marc recalls. The latter’s slurred, off-center rap on the track “Beautiful Day” is a highlight filled with warmth and humor. Soon they were even inviting such hip-hop heroes as Kurtis Blow and Biz Markie to rap on the album. They were already recording on vintage gear. As his own ears grew tired of straight-ahead punk, Marc began experimenting with beats.Īfter releasing two Len albums independently, Costanzo now orchestrates an excitable blend of rap, funk grooves, indie rock and electronica with lyrics on adolescent love, stepping far away from a mainstream rap sound that he says has grown ever more predictable.ĭuring the making of “You Can’t Stop the Bum Rush,” the musicians realized that their big label connections offered new opportunities. He was already a fan of hip-hop, and when he began recording bands for free at his home studio, Costanzo came into contact with a variety of Canadian DJ talent, including future Len members DJ Moves and D-Rock. “We would try to play our live, and people would come to see us to spit out blood or whatever.” “We would smash our instruments after five minutes onstage, because we didn’t know how to play,” Marc says. Len was named after a high school pal named Lenny (“the funniest dude you every met in your whole life,” says Marc), and specialized in punk-pop. His sister joined the band a year later on vocals. Len began in 1991 mainly as a punk band, back when Marc Costanzo favored heavy boots and bomber jackets. “It had its merits, but I think people are sort of ready to party.” ![]() “In the ‘90s, we went through a lot of angst music, very dark introspective whining,” she says. The band’s unexpected chart success, she adds, may simply reflect a need for positive messages. “The next one, who knows? It all depends on what happens between here and the time we start recording again.” “This album is a happy album and it feels good,” says Sharon, 31, who grew up with her brother in Montreal before the family moved to Toronto 10 years ago. ![]() ![]() Signing with the Work Group label (since absorbed by Epic Records) left Len in a fine mood indeed. While the band does not deny the upbeat vibe of the new album, Sharon Costanzo suggests that it was less an aesthetic choice than simply a reflection of better times for the six-member band, which had enjoyed few substantial rewards beyond a cult following in Canada since forming in 1991. “We all started listening to hip-hop back then, so we were just going back to it.” Looking back to early ‘80s hip-hop seemed a natural solution. “The reason why we listen to a lot of old-school is that new-school hip-hop-besides underground -is so lost,” says Marc Costanzo. ![]()
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