ForceField ON Fell into their french horn
By Chris Ziegler

PHOTO by JENNIE WARREN

ForceField ON are a California pocket indie-rock symphony—a band so gigantic that guitarist Jesse Wilder once made all seven members submit press photos from individual sessions at the Alex’s Bar photobooth, instead of spending seven hours shuffling seven schedules to get seven people to show up and pose for headshots in someone’s backyard at seven PM. But ForceField ON’s numerical superiority works best instead when all seven share the same stage—a band reinforced with a dedicated brass section (twin trombones!) for a sound borrowing moments from Motown and Merge.

“Or Huey Lewis and the News!” says Jesse—ha but no, and instead they’ll try to remember Tortoise album titles or talk about Harry Nilsson’s surreptitious resurgence of influence (Jesse: “My mom named our cat Nilsson . . . ”) and then the time Harry Nilsson and John Lennon went drunk to the Troubadour with tampons taped to their heads and got thrown out for drunken scuffling and tampon misapplication. (“I always loved that story,” says Jesse. “We need women to ground us, right?”) That’s a backward but natural way for drummer Brandon Laws to explain the band in his own way: “We’re all lifelong Beatles fans,” he says. “That’s an easy connection for me.”

Same for a lot of Elephant 6, who invented new adjectives for indie rock with instrumental scribbles and warm horn sections that took notes from Revolver with depth and diligence—for ForceField ON, says Jesse, it’s like working with a “teeny-tiny orchestra.”

“It feels good to get out of the traditional rock band ‘song song song song song’ thing,” says Brandon. “It’s really a challenge—everybody’s become way more musical.”

Their horn players are the new kids—Matt Guy from Maritime Academy on trombone and Internet-snared Corey Rudolph on other trombone, and then Zach Blair on French horn. But Jesse—who led his first band 10 years ago with Teen Heroes—and Brandon—longtime drummer in the metered funk Slippers—make up half the veteran combo core with John Sisk on guitar and Jake Berrey on bass.

Right now ForceField ON are on the last weeks of last year’s three song demo, the succinct sum of what the band likes most: rock with a dynamic span that runs from pinhole to panorama, piloted by Jesse’s understated vocals. You have to work harder for your space, Brandon says—so the ForceField horns make room between the rhythm and lead guitars, carrying the melody through the instrumental “Bahkeeny Masheeen” or giving Jesse a guardrail for the breaks in “The Con.”

Ten instruments (tamboura to French horn!) between seven guys lets ForceField ON play songs with closing-credits extravagance—five minutes that feel like two in the way Brian Wilson liked, or like Marvin Gaye would play once mid-level executives quit peeking into his studio.

“One of my favorite records is the Marvin Gaye soundtrack to Trouble Man,” says Brandon. “It starts with an orchestra, and then it’s a funk tune, and by the time the vocal drops, it’s so perfect—you’ve been waiting for it. How many times when the vocalist starts are you like, ‘Ehhhhhhh’? Like Rush? Or Led Zeppelin—if Robert Plant kept his mouth shut, man, they’d be awesome.”

FORCEFIELD ON WITH NEW FIDELITY, THE SOFT HANDS AND THE HAPPY HOLLOWS PROSPECTOR | 2400 E SEVENTH ST | LONG BEACH 90804 | 562.438.3839 | MYSPACE.COM/THEPROSPECTORLONGBEACH | THURS 9PM | $5 | 21+