Music
The best kept secret in music
Press
Joseph Janisse has a strange voice that's almost an out-of-body experience. He's also the drummer with this Toronto trio, alongside guitarist Ray Zilli and bassist Dave Markham. Their sound aspires to The Beatles' "Strawberry Fields Forever," but has its own atmosphere that mixes psychedelia and modern prog with a penchant for jamming. Their music has soul - in the widest sense of the term. Try it. You may be surprised at how unashamedly individual Rocketface sound, daring to slap down convention and conformity. - Classic Rock Magazine July 2006
From the “indie” label that debuted The Trews and Boy, may we present to you - Rocketface!
Dirty, the lead single recently conquered the Top 20 on the Canadian Rock Charts!
The high energy video is in regular rotation at MuchMusic & MuchLOUD!
Dirty can be heard on XM, Galaxie, Sirius and MaxTrax digital music networks across North America!
Rocketface's self-titled, debut album was recently released in France through Bad Reputation Records!
Rocketface have played with The Trews, C'Mon, Grady, Danko Jones, The Illuminati, Diamond Nights, The Psychedelic Furs and Kid Rock just to name a few.
Dirty has been licensend for a variety of TV uses, including a steamy new TV show entitled Falcon Beach and the popular teen TV show Degrassi – The Next Generation.
Recorded with noted producer, Matt Dematteo, whose dossier includes Danko Jones, Mobile and Hawksley Workman.
For more info visit www.rocketfacemusic.com & www.myspace.com/rocketface
- Bumstead Productions
Rocketface, one of Canada's best kept secrets are currently on a cross-country tour with Bumstead label-mates The Trews. WIth 'Dirty' their single and video, tearing up airwaves and MuchMusic, Rocketface will soon be a household name!
IN CONCERT February 25th @ The Commodore
- straight.com - feb 16 2006
Now in their mid twenties, the dream of three high school friends is coming true as Rocketface embarks on their largest tour so far to promote their self titled debut album.
The three-piece rock and roll band consisting of Windsor, Ontario natives, lead singer/drummer Joseph Janisse, guitarist Ray Zilli, and bassist David Markham packed up their van and set out on the road last weekend on a tour across Western Canada opening for The Trews.
Janisse, who describes his writing style as a 'self help thing' where he reflects on past experiences, started soley as the lead singer for the group but after a handful of drummers couldn't produce the sound the trio was looking for, the front man went back to his roots and got behind the kit.
"Since the band came together in this incarnation about a year and a half ago we have really taken off and gotten things done," said Janisse.
The disc was sent to a variety of rock radio stations and after feedback from DJ's and the crowd reaction after playing some shows the band realized the high-energy third track 'Dirty' would be their first single.
Now with Dirty currently in the Top 30 on Canadian rock radio stations and a video for the same song playing on MuchMusic the band is happy with where they are standing.
"We are not exactly where we would like to be just yet but at least we have reached this amount of success through our music alone and not because we are connected to a major label with a whack load of cash and major connections," said Janisse. "We have a grassroots thing going on where we want the music to do the work for us."
The singer said he hopes to spread the word and get the music out to the people during the month long tour. "We hope that our music gets picked up over the course of the tour and that the fans spread the wor because in this industry without that support system you just don't make it," he said. - Lindsay La Fraugh, Thunder Bay's Source
It's a concept rarely seen since the glory days of Genesis: the singing drummer. Although it sounds as though it could be a catastrophe in the wrong hands or with the wrong band (even Phil Collins left the kit behind eventually), Toronto's Rocketface have been pulling it off for years. It all came about because the trio just weren't able to find a skinsman who fit.
"We couldn't find a person that we saw eye-to-eye with - one that had the abilities and the commitment, all those things," explains Rocketface frontman/drummer Joseph Janisse. "The fact of the matter is that I did all the writing from behind the drum kit, and when it came time to try out drummers, the feel was never quite right.
"Since the chemistry between the three of us when I'm playing drums has always been good, it just worked. We were afraid to do it that way originally because it's not the usual form, but once we decided to do it, things started going in the right direction on all levels.
Rocketface have definitely been headed in the right direction lately. They just got off a national tour supporting The Trews, only to head right back out on tour again, this time opening for Seether. However, the difference between the two audiences - one for good time Canadian radio rock, one for angry angst-metal - was noticable.
"The thing is, with metal fans - some metal fans, that is - it's metal and metal only, you know?" says Janisse. "For people like that, we're not winning them over because we're not metal enough for them.
"We're a little bit more diverse than that. But we're definitely picking them out of the audience, that's for sure. We're a breath of fresh air."
This isn't even taking their sharp-styled, suit-jacket-and-tie aesthetic into account. ("We don't like to go up and dress like squeegee kids," snorts Janisse.) But with so much diversity and originality, doesn't one run the risk of not finding a mainstream niche? Given that Rocketface are already flipping off musical normalcy with their singing drummer, they don't seem to care much about conforming to the usual standards.
"It's not that I don't want to be popular," Janisse concedes. "I'm not afraid of popularity, and at the same time I don't care about popularity."
"A lot of people in the entertainment industry are inclined towards popularity, and that's why I like the songwriting better - I just want to make music. I think there are lots of other bands who do popularity well, but I can't bring myself to be in a run-of-the-mill, normal, yawn, who-gives-a-fuck sort of band. I definitely don't like playing boring music." - Chartattack.com - May 23 2006
Why isn't there a fuss? These three guys make a solid, hunky, podunk, meat 'n' taters rock n roll like Free or Bad Company used to. In tunes like 'Pack of Lies' and 'Lit' Rocketface boasts big distorted guitar, ass-shakin' bass, super high energy, ultra simple rock riffs, and a passionate, charasmatic lead singer/drummer with an absolutely killer voice. Now they're being managed by Larry Wanagas (former handler of k.d. lang), so they're even developing a styled look: Guitarist Ray is capitalizing on his DeNiro face with a fedora and tie that make him look like a ringer for Johnny Boy from Mean Streets; bassist Dave looks like Bonzo Bonham, and he's in solid black, tie as well; and frontman/singing drummer Joe (his kit is right at the lip of the stage) is resplendent in red pants and scarf, with white belt, cowboy boots and shirt. These guys look good, and they rawk. Go see 'em, okay? 8/10 - UmbrellaMusic - March 2005
Eye music editor Stuart Berman recently enumerated the current post-rawk music audience in these pages: "Metalheads, suburban stoners, glue-sniffing gutter punks, electroclash fashionistas, new-wave spazzes, hoodie skate-rats, indie-rock academics, geriatric Deep Purple fans..." In all that post-everything, hairsplitting segmentation, ain't there room for a tasteful, catchy, cocky rock 'n' roll band? Rocketface singer Joseph Janisse (who doubles on drums) has one of those clear, resounding voices a la Bono and Chris Martin; Dave Markham plays a hard, stinging bass; and Ray Zilli's mondo-distorto guitar will kick yer ass. Songs like "Lit" and "Death Never Dies" are tough, beaty and melodic; Rocketface blast the sort of simple, un-self concious pre-rawk that bands like Free and Bad Company plied with pride way back when. More please. - eye weekly - Howard Druckman 08.19.04
Discography
Rocketface - Rocketface
Released: 2005
Label: The Bumstead Recording Co.
Photos
Feeling a bit camera shy
Bio
Rocketface have quickly captured the attention of new fans with their captivating live show and have created quite a buzz since releasing their self-titled album in 2005.
Dirty, the lead single is breaking at Canadian Rock and the video is receiving airplay at MuchMusic and MuchLOUD!
National tour announced in support of The Trews!
Official Biography:
The music of Toronto-based trio Rocketface connects, transports and engages with understated but unmistakable ballast that only the best rock bands can claim.
The music of Rocketface isn't easily compartmentalized, it's a total experience, one best consumed whole.
The first thing that hits is the jaw-dropping voice of Joseph Janisse. Soaring, otherworldly, occasionally snarling, and larded with emotion, Janisse sounds like a choirboy with bad habits and heavy issues. But that voice is merely part of the equation.
Janisse is also Rocketface's drummer. That's him, on his riser, in the middle of the stage at a gig. Alongside guitarist Ray Zilli and rhythmic co-conspirator, bassist David Markham, Janisse gives Rocketface something most bands would kill for: a unique angle on top of inventive songwriting and awesome musicianship.
"We're into great music, Janisse says. "We don't want to be a band where it's all style over substance.
"Strawberry Fields Forever is a good example of what we're going for," Janisse continues, referencing the Beatles' classic hit. "It's an extremely strange recording but it's a song you can still sing. It's not something you listen to just because you think it's cool. You actually like it for all its strangeness."
"Nine times out of 10 today if you're listening to the radio and the singer isn't singing, you have no idea who the band is," Zilli adds, expanding on Rocketface's modus operandi. "We try to avoid that, and I think we do."
Serious sonic freight is likewise evident in Rocketface songs like Pack of Lies, Lit, and Death Never Dies, the latter a crunching guitar-propelled scorcher that lurches between anthemic chorus and jagged melody line.
Not surprisingly, Rocketface's atmospheric, multi-hued sound intrigued noted producer Matt Dematteo, whose dossier includes work with Big Wreck, Danko Jones, and Hawksley Workman.
Yet despite stylistic bells and whistles, the three members of Rocketface insist their songwriting is strictly organic, the happy (though seldom easy) byproduct of endless jamming, tweaking, polishing, and perfecting.
"With all our music," Zilli explains, "We jam for hours creating an atmosphere and then suddenly out of the air will come a riff like Pack of Lies. Days later while listening back to it we agreed to develop it further."
"Songs start that way," Janisse says, adding that their status as a trio gives them a distinctive dynamic as players. "But songs reach a point where there's a sense of craft and we all agree on it."
"Right," confirms Markham. "Joseph will sing over an idea and then well jam on it more to continue the organic growth, and it goes from there."
The band's innate rapport is almost a given: the three have written and played together off and on since their high school days in Windsor, Ontario, where the menacing power of Motor City rock and soul seems to exist in the ether.
What has kept the band vital and constantly seeking new sonic challenges is an unwavering belief that Rocketface has something meaningful to say and an inimitable way to say it.
"As songwriters, we feel a measure of growth every day. Every day," says Janisse. "If you like music with a psychedelic edge, but that's also totally modern, well, that's what we're about."
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