John Hanifin Band readies for homecoming Date: 1/20/2017 LONGMEADOW – John Hanifin, a Longmeadow native, is the frontman of the John Hanifin Band, which recently released a self-titled extended play (EP) record consisting of seven songs.
The band is set to perform shows in Western Massachusetts this spring and summer during its tour.
The six-piece Alternative/ College band with pop, funk, and rhythm and blues influences consists of Hanifin, Brandon Allen on keyboard and vocals, Springfield native Ashdon Reynolds on drums, Domenic Volpe Davis on bass guitar, Mauricio Andrade on guitar and vocals, and Springfield native Jeremy Turgeon on trumpet.
The band is based in Boston and formed with its current lineup about a year ago.
Hanifin is a product of Longmeadow Public Schools and started playing cello in the fourth grade, he noted. He has a bachelor’s degree of music in cello performance from The Boston Conservatory of Music and a master’s degree from the Longy School of Music of Bard College.
Hanifin, the lead singer and songwriter for the band, who also plays cello and guitar, told Reminder Publications the EP revolves around the theme of life lessons. The band’s single, “Justify,” is about “everyone trying to do the best that they can every day and sometimes you fall short, but that’s all right,” he noted.
Another song, “Syncopate,” is about making a change in one’s life.
“You can’t keep going down the same road and expect a tree branch to knock you off the path – you just got to go and blaze a new trail,” he explained.
The song, “1 & Only,” is a song about relationships that isn’t gender specific to who the speaker is singing the song about, Hanifin noted.
“No matter how old you are all relationships take time and they take effort,” he added. “The thing that I’ve always found with relationships is there’s that moment where you figure maybe you need to let it go or maybe you want to try again, but if you really want a relationship to last you’ve got to go all in. That needs to be your one and only.” Hanifin said
“1 & Only” started as a rock ballad, but later transformed into an acoustic ballad after the suggestion of one of the band’s producers for the EP.
According to the band’s Facebook page, some of its influences include Coldplay, The Beatles, Michael Jackson, Muse, and Steely Dan.
Hanifin said he considers himself lucky to have the backing of his band mates. He primarily writes all the parts to the songs and the arrangement is something Hanifin described as a “true creative process.”
He added, “The arrangment process was a fun one because we were trying to figure out how we could sustain the acoustic value of what we’re doing, but at the same time try to hit a bit more mainstream … It was a very interactive experience between what we want to do and what’s relevant [in the music industry].”
Recording in the studio also brought out an experimental side to the band, Hanifin said.
“Mauricio, my guitarist, did some extraordinary things, in my opinion on this record, by not only playing his parts, but what he used on his pedal board was pretty insane because much of what you hear [that sounds like] synthesizer is guitar. There’s actually no synthesizer on this record at all,” he explained.
One experiment that ended up on the EP was when Davis played through the guitar pedal board and out came “this insane polyphonic bass idea,” which became the solo on the second verse of “Stop Drop & Roll.”
On that same song, Hanifin said the guitar and trumpet have a double line together. The trumpet plays a trill – a quavering vibrato sound – while the guitar compresses his guitar to match the trill. That is one unique moment on the record that Hanifin said is one of his favorites.
The intro to “1 & Only” was taken from a recording in which Andrade was playing something unrelated to what the band was working on and was unaware he was being recorded. Hanifin described this as a “happy mistake.”
Hanifin said the band would be playing in Northampton sometime this spring, either at the Iron Horse Music Hall or the Pearl Street Night Club. The official dates for their tour have yet to be confirmed at this time, but several Western Massachusetts shows this year are slated to take place.
“We’ll also be touring maybe summer from Montreal down to Philadelphia and we are going to stop off in Northampton,” he noted. “We’d also like to do a workshop with the Community Music School of Springfield.”
For more information about the John Hanifin Band visit www.johnhanifinband.com or search for the band on Facebook.
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