ZECHS MARQUISE

EL PASO Show on May 10th for a great cause

Thu, 02 May 2013 21:18:04 -0600

Lock Jaw Night Vision live video from Milan, Italy

Tue, 26 Feb 2013 22:34:59 -0600

Zechs Marquise Live & Interview from Zagreb Croatia

Fri, 14 Dec 2012 12:54:43 -0600

Zechs Marquise live clip and interview from their show at Purgeraj in Zagreb, Croatia.

State IE: Zechs Marquise Live Review - Dublin and Belfast Ireland

Thu, 06 Dec 2012 12:48:00 -0600

Zechs Marquise in Ireland

I enjoyed their show at the Workman’s Club so much that I found myself compelled to catch Zechs Marquise (video session above) live again. So I did. I went to see them play the Speakeasy in Belfast too. Both shows were excellent. A band who aren’t especially well know in Ireland, although signed to Sargent House/ Rodriguez Lopez Produtions they feature Marcel (The Mars Volta) on drums and Marfred Rodriguez Lopez on bass. Their older sibling may be revered multi-instrumentalist Omar Rodriguez Lopez (The Mars Volta, At the Drive In, Bosnian Rainbows) but we’re not here to talk about that right now. There was a generous crowd for the Workman’s Club show with help from Youth of a Nation promotions and support from No Spill Blood. Zechs Marquise successfully held the crowd’s attention and drew others in from the bar outside. If you weren’t a fan at the beginning of the night you were by the end of it, they really won the venue over.

It was the show at the Speakeasy in Belfast that really stood out. I ventured up, still a bit sad after the final Richter Collective party only to be met with an experience that would lift anyone’s spirits. Despite the fact that only a handful of people were there, it was Zechs Marquise’s last night of a 6 week tour and they gave it everything. To the point where the drummer, Marcel, broke the last two cymbals he had. What a finale. If you haven’t heard their album Getting Paid yet then I urge you to check it out. They are currently working on a Motown covers album and are due to release an album’s worth of new material in 2013. - Niamh Hegarty

Zechs Marquise Live from Budapest & Last Week of European Tour

Fri, 16 Nov 2012 19:56:40 -0600

Zechs Marquise recorded live at A38 in Budapest, Hungary on the 12th of November 2012. Don’t miss Zechs still on Tour now in Europe.

ZECHS MARQUISE
Nov 17, 2012 - Kristiansand, Norway @ Haandverkeren
Nov 19, 2012 - Chemnitz, Germany @ AJZ
Nov 20, 2012 - Brno, Czech Republic@ Fleda
Nov 21, 2012 - Graz, Austria @ Forum Stadtpark
Nov 23, 2012 - Dublin, Ireland @ Workman’s Club w/ No Spill Blood
Nov 24, 2012 - Galway, Ireland @ Roisin Dubh
Nov 25, 2012 - Belfast, N. Ireland @ Speakeasy Bar

SEE ALL SHOW DETAILS HERE

Zechs Marquise "Guajira" Live Studio Session from Brighton UK

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 11:25:35 -0600

Zechs Marquise performing live while in Brighton, UK the track Guajira from the album Getting Paid video courtesy of Bowlegs Music. - Don’t miss Zechs on tour NOW see all dates here.

Sight/Sound/Rhythm: Interview with Marcel Rodriguez Lopez

Tue, 06 Nov 2012 15:50:00 -0600

Marcel Rodriguez Lopez is a Grammy Award winning multi-instrumentalist best known for his percussion and keyboard playing with the progressive rock group The Mars Volta, though this is just the tip of the iceberg as far as his musical accomplishments are concerned.

He is also the drummer and recording engineer for the group Zechs Marquise, which features two of his brothers, Marfred and Riko, as well as Marcos Smith and Matt Wilkson. Their most recent album entitled Getting Paid is out now on Sargent House/RLP. In addition to this Marcel records electronic music under the name Eureka the Butcher and has played on around eighteen releases by his brother Omar Rodriguez Lopez since 2006. The dude is prolific.

SIGHT/SOUND/RHYTHM caught up with Marcel before a Zechs Marquise show in Leeds, UK to talk about musical development, studio recording and technology within his music.

I think this is the first time you’ve been here with Zechs Marquise. How’s the European tour going so far?

It’s been great so far. It’s not at all like touring in the States. In the states it’s a lot harder. Over here the promoters are nicer and more hospitable and the venues are nicer. We’ve had places to stay every night and food, whereas in the states you’re basically on your own, you know. You get to the next place and they pretty much act like you’re doing them a favor by being there. Whereas over here they’re a lot more grateful and realize that it’s a two way street. That it takes both parties to make a great show and for people to have a good time.

Back home, when we do come across nice promoters we always make it a point to go up to them and say thank you for making it a good night for us, because it’s really easy for it to just go bad, basically.

Absolutely. I’ve been at venues before where promoters have just disappeared, or sometimes haven’t bothered to show up at all.

Yeah, we’ve had promoters straight out tell us that they have other shows going on that night and that they’re going to those other shows. So they just stop by to show face and then they leave and we don’t see them for the rest of the night, then we end up getting paid from somebody else who they’ve delegated that responsibility to.

Is this something that is still happening?

Yeah, but luckily we’ve started playing bigger venues and more people are coming out to see us, so we’re starting to find that people are a little nicer, but even then it can be hit or miss, you know.

Would I be right in assuming you guys have been together for around nine years or so at this point?

Something like that. The first few years were pretty rough. We had another drummer but that didn’t work out. I was playing keys back then but I only really consider the band to be what it is now since we’ve had this line up. With the exception of Riko joining the band, we’ve probably been as we are now for around four years or so, with me on drums that is. Riko’s been playing keys for Zechs for almost two years. Before that it was all the parts without the keys.

When we were recording Getting Paid, I was doing all of the keyboard parts and they were coming out really great, but because we didn’t have a dedicated keyboard player we ended up putting the parts really low in the mix. We didn’t want to make it a dominant thing because we didn’t know how we were going to do it live, but it turned out that everyone loved the parts so much that we decided they needed to stay.

For most bands in rock music, the keys are just fluff in the background to give it a little atmosphere, when actually keyboards and synthesisers are incredibly powerful. They have their place right there in rock music, regardless of what someone like Ted Nugent thinks about them. You know, it’s like, if Santana isn’t rock and roll, or using organs, then you tell me what is!

I was going to say exactly the same thing…

Yeah, it’s crazy! So we had recorded the parts and the keys were super low in the mix until we put them up nice and loud, which is exactly where they should be. Right about that same time we started hearing our brother Riko, who was probably around eighteen years old then, playing piano more around the house and we instantly thought, ‘he’s got it!’. He just needed a little practice along with some guidance and experience. So from then on me and Riko would just sit there and practice the songs for hours and hours whilst everyone else was working at their day jobs or doing their own thing.

He ended up playing his first show with us in February 2011 and it’s been great since then. He’s a fast learner and everyone who’s seen us play, including our friends and my other band mates, they’re always quick to point out how good of a job he’s doing. He wants to impress his older brothers and friends and he’s a hard worker.

When you were recording Getting Paid had you thought about going back to find another drummer?

Well before I switched to drums, we were actually looking for another drummer to join because I was wanting to go back to playing keys. There’s definitely a certain style that I had on keys which suits what we do and we didn’t know anyone who had that same feel. We figured that it would be easier in El Paso for us to find another drummer than another keyboard player. Once we’d auditioned a couple of drummers we realised that it just wasn’t going to cut it and that I had to be on drums, because there was a certain dynamic that came with it. The other drummer we used to have had great energy and endurance but he didn’t have any focus, and so basically whether we had a good or a bad show depended on how tight he played, so it was always a gamble, you know.

Once I started getting my chops up and my endurance on drums we just realised that we had to do it this way, because there was a certain energy that came from it, especially with Marfred being my brother and playing bass. We’re a year and nine months apart to the day and we basically consider ourselves to be twins. We’ve been through all of the same things together and there’s just something there that we couldn’t deny.

You and your brothers seem to be all pretty heavily immersed in music. Was playing actively encouraged when you were growing up?

Absolutely! Our dad plays salsa music and he sings, plays guitar, percussion etc… and my mom was a great singer, so they would always encourage us when we were younger. Music was always around in the house and my brother Omar has always been in bands for as long as I can remember. A lot of parents don’t let their kids practise with bands at their houses but my parents always encouraged it. It started with Omar. Instead of going to college he went and toured when he was seventeen and they said, you know, “if this is what you want to do then go for it”. Then when I graduated from high school I knew that I wanted to tour and that they would be OK with it. At that point I didn’t have the means to do it yet, so I just thought that maybe I’ll just go to college for a little bit to make my parents happy in the meantime, but I didn’t know what it was that I wanted to study. I didn’t know any theory so I took some classes just to kind of [pauses]… please my parents and please myself basically, but I failed all of those classes. I was terrible at it and was in there with kids who had been playing orchestral music since they were very young, and who could all read music, which I couldn’t. I could play and knew a lot about records but they didn’t care about that. That lasted for a semester and then I quit and joined a band with Ralph Jasso, who had just left The Mars Volta as their second bass player. After that I got a call from my brother Omar asking me if I wanted to join The Mars Volta on percussion and since then I’ve been touring none stop, which is when the real schooling started.

Did anything you learned whilst studying help you at all?

When I was going to school for music I was learning theory but I didn’t understand it, though I kept the books and carried on reading. Even now I still can’t read rhythm. I can read melody but it takes me forever. So I had these little building blocks there, but it was when I joined The Mars Volta that I started talking to Juan (Alderete) about music. Juan’s the same in that he taught himself and then went to school for a while. He can’t sight read or anything like that but the ideas are there, you know. So from talking to him, and for a little while when we had Adrian (Terrazas-Gonzalez) on sax, who’s a total jazz dude, almost to a fault, I learned a lot from them.

I guess it’s been a mix of everything, from all of the great drummers that we had in the band, to my brother playing guitar, to being in studios and seeing how recordings are done. All of these go hand in hand with how I’m able to lay down my own musical ideas.

So have you been pretty hands on with recording Zechs Marquise?

Yeah. I’d been in a lot of studios and bought my own mics and eventually took the task of basically being the engineer for the band. Once I’d joined The Mars Volta everything opened up and I really started to learn from a lot of different people.

You mentioned all of the great drummers in The Mars Volta that you’ve played along side. Have you found that some of those influences have come out in your own playing and has your approach to drumming changed as a result of that exposure?

For sure. I remember when Jon (Theodore) was in the band, he had that great Bonham feel to his playing and it was amazing to watch him every night. Then after Jon we got Blake (Fleming) back in the group, who had been the original drummer, and he used to give lessons. I didn’t even know how to hold sticks properly before he joined! He showed me how to do it and it felt weird but I just kept on practising. Blake got fired around 2006 and so we had Deantoni Parks join for a tour, and I remember thinking that this guy has got the craziest style, different from the other guys, but I liked it. There was something unique about it. I couldn’t pick up on anything he was doing because it was so fucking crazy! [laughs]

After that tour Deantoni left and Thomas Pridgen joined up, and even though he plays fast the ideas weren’t as abstract as D’s. From watching Thomas and through hanging out, because we’re the same age, he started showing me how to build up my chops with rudiments. Then little things would come together and start to make sense from what I’d seen Deantoni doing.

In my opinion D’s the best drummer in the world. There are other dudes who can do all sorts of crazy shit but no one out there has the ideas that he has. Someone once said that he’s like the Basquiat of drums, you know. To use art as a metaphor, he’s not just a painter, or he’s not just a sculptor, he’s everything. He’s on some other planet and nobody is there with him.

Totally! I remember seeing the Refused TV footage of you playing with Omar’s group at The Troubadour in LA and some of the stuff D’s playing on there is ridiculous.

Yeah! [laughs] There’s one song where there’s a young guy in the audience who’s watching him play and D does something and the guy’s mouth just falls open with amazement. That’s what it’s like every night playing with him. He just throws shit out there to keep you on your toes and is constantly changing it up. He’s the one drummer who really listens to what I’m doing on the keys. I could never tell if he could hear me or not but I’d start doing something and then he starts matching up with me, so he’s always right there with whatever it is I’m doing.

There were moments at that show when D’s going crazy and Juan’s looking over at Omar, like, ‘I don’t know where we are, I’m just trying to keep the time’. After the show, Juan said, “I had no idea where D was at but you were right there with him”, but I had just broken it down into rudiments and patterns and then added the additional notes, you know. For me, I was looking at it more from a drumming perspective and the melody was just embellishing it.

I suppose a lot of that comes back to you having a shared background in both playing keys and drums.

Absolutely. When we hang out we don’t really talk about drums, and when we’re on tour he doesn’t really practise drums all that much. He’ll be sat working on his music and composing, and I do exactly the same thing. I sometimes forget that I have to be playing in an hour because my focus is elsewhere.

Some people who only play drums are able to dedicate their time to becoming the best player that they can be. I’d love to be able to do that but the reality is that I also have to play keys and I have to record, as well as making electronic music. I’m constantly learning more about the technology, and how crazy things are with Midi; open source controllers; touch screen controllers, iPads… It just gets you thinking differently.

I definitely don’t shy away from recording an idea and then chopping it up in order to come up with something that I wouldn’t necessarily have played naturally. I’m then forced to actually have to figure out how to play it on a keyboard.

It’s definitely an interesting approach towards creating new ideas. From listening to Eureka the Butcher it’s clear how important a role technology plays within the music you create.

The tools are so powerful nowadays but most people tend to just scratch the surface with what they’re capable of doing. There’s a tendency to let the technology just do the work for you. It’s the same thing that happened with auto tune, where it was initially used when a singer was either a little flat or a little sharp. You could go back and fix the notes, but then it was taken to an extreme and everyone started using it. Which is fine when it’s just a few people doing it, but once everyone is then it’s a sign that people are getting lazy. It all sounds the same after a while.

Totally! Switching topics for a moment, I think you’ve played on around eighteen of Omar’s solo records…

[laughs] I have no idea. Sounds about right.

When I hear them I always imagine there’s a very fast turnaround time with getting them done. Is that usually the case or is there a lengthier process involved in putting them together?

Some of them take a while to come out after being recorded but essentially the songs are all done in a couple of takes. When I first started doing it I definitely found that way of working a little overwhelming. I was thinking, I can’t do this. I wanted time to actually figure it all out but I realized that there’s something special about acting upon your first instincts with music as opposed to putting too much thought into it. Eventually it does make you grow and now it’s made it easier for me to get those ideas out.

That’s not to say that I won’t spend time thinking about musical ideas from now on, because somethings you just have to take time to figure out what it is you’re doing, but there are times when it’s better to be more spontaneous. Omar’s definitely more spontaneous with how he works and the foundation of each track is done in just a few hours. We might not come back to the track to do overdubs for a while but when we do it’s right back into that same mentality of just getting it done as quickly as possible.

Do you also apply the same approach when you’re working on keyboard and synth parts?

I usually spend more time getting synth sounds. I usually have an Access Virus synth on tour with me and I’d sit in my hotel room, or on the bus, just getting a whole bunch of new sounds that I could use. Whether they’re harsh leads, pads or bass sounds, I would just familiarise myself with them so that when the time came to record that I had a palette to work from.

Me and Omar have a great rapport with regards to describing sounds, as far synthesisers are concerned. He might say, “okay, give me something with sprinkles”, and I’d know exactly what he would mean from these kind of abstract descriptions. Engineers in the studio would just laugh, but I knew what he was talking about.

What’s the one thing that you find particularly challenging as musician?

Consistency. Especially as a drummer. Some drummers can just get up and play and they sound great. I have to practise all day everyday and I still fuck up all the time, which can be kind of embarrassing, but I’ll be the first one to admit it. Like I said, I’m more than just a drummer. Which is not to take anything away from drummers, but I’m also working on writing and playing keys, too.

I feel like I have to struggle with playing. For everyday that I don’t practise it’s like losing two days of practise, you know.

Absolutely! I have times when I’ll have a run of great practises followed by a couple of really bad ones.

Right! Exactly! And that’s how it goes with Zechs rehearsals. The band will sound great one day and then we’ll have one where it’s terrible. It’s sometimes just a matter of taking a day off and then we’ll come back and it’ll sound amazing. We had a bunch of bad one’s recently so I’m hoping tonight is good! [laughs]

I’m sure it will be. Thanks for taking the time out to do this.

Sure, dude! It’s been fun!

Interview by Dave Jones. Photographs by Daliah Touré & Mat Dale.

Zechs Marquise European Headline Tour Starts October 19, 2012

Fri, 05 Oct 2012 16:07:00 -0600

Zechs Marquise will be heading to Europe for their first Headline tour in October in support of their latest release Getting Paid. Don’t miss your chance to be Mega Slapped.

ZECHS MARQUISE EU TOUR 2012
Oct 19, 2012 - Oberhausen, Germany @ Druckluft
Oct 20, 2012 - Stuttgart, Germany @ Zwoelfzhen
Oct 21, 2012 - Hamburg, Germany @ HafenKlang
Oct 23, 2012 - Antwerp, Belgium @ Trix
Oct 24, 2012 - Arnhem, Netherlands @ Willemeen
Oct 25, 2012 - Offenbach, Germany @ Hafen 2
Oct 26, 2012 - Terneuzen, Netherlands @ De Pit
Oct 27, 2012 - Basingstoke, UK @ Bang Bar
Oct 28, 2012 - Brighton, UK @ The Haunt
Oct 29, 2012 - Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club
Oct 30, 2012 - London, UK @ The Old Blue Last
Oct 31, 2012 - Paris, France @ Espace B
Nov 1, 2012 - Aarau, Switzerland @ Kiff
Nov 2, 2012 - Basel, Switzerland @ Hirscheneck
Nov 3, 2012 - Delemont, Switzerland @ SAS
Nov 4, 2012 - Tarbes, France @ Le Celtic Pub
Nov 5, 2012 - Toulouse, France @ Le Saint des Seins
Nov 6, 2012 - Torino, Italy @ Blah Blah
Nov 7, 2012 - Milan, Italy @ Circolo Magnolia
Nov 8, 2012 - Rome, Italy @ Init
Nov 9, 2012 - Conegliano, Italy @ Appartamento Hoffman
Nov 10, 2012 - Zagreb, Croatia @ Kset
Nov 11, 2012 - Vienna, Austria @ Rhiz
Nov 12, 2012 - Budapest, Hungary @ A38
Nov 13, 2012 - Berlin, Germany @ Marie-Antionette
Nov 14, 2012 - Copenhagen, Denmark @ KB18
Nov 15, 2012 - Trondheim, Norway @ Blaest
Nov 16, 2012 - Oslo, Norway @ Parkteatret
Nov 17, 2012 - Kristiansand, Norway @ Haandverkeren
Nov 19, 2012 - Chemnitz, Germany @ AJZ
Nov 20, 2012 - Brno, Czech Republic@ Fleda
Nov 21, 2012 - Graz, Austria @ Forum Stadtpark
Nov 22, 2012 - Prague, Czeh Republic @ venue TBA
Nov 23, 2012 - Dublin, Ireland @ Workman’s Club w/ No Spill Blood
Nov 24, 2012 - Galway, Ireland @ Roisin Dubh
Nov 25, 2012 - Belfast, N. Ireland @ Speakeasy Bar

CHECK HERE FOR ALL SHOW DETAILS

402 Productions: Live Review & Photos Zechs Marquise at Great American Music Hall 8/7/12

Wed, 15 Aug 2012 13:30:00 -0600

Zechs Marquise played direct support on the show and was the only other band on the bill. Their most recent release, Getting Paid, was one of our top picks in 2011. Their psychedelic jam rock styling mixed with 4/4 hip hop beats which then weave back into mind-warping interludes is completely awe-inspiring. I’m actually fairly disappointed in San Francisco’s lack of coming to shows early, especially at The Great American. The venue’s floor space was maybe a third full when Zechs came on, and the crowd slowly trickled in after that. For those who came late — you missed out. I actually enjoyed “Everlasting Beacon of Light” sans vocals and obviously the mastery that is “Mega Slap” was phenomenal. I wish the crowd had a bit more pep in their step though — Zechs is better enjoyed moving the hips than it is cross-armed.

Written By Nick Wan All photos by David Wajsfelner See Full Slide Show & Review HERE.

EL PASO Show August 15th - We Are Finally Home - Come Celebrate

Thu, 09 Aug 2012 20:24:20 -0600

August 15th - Zechs Marquise return from the road to play their last show before heading off to Europe. Joining us are our family and friends Fang Island, Adebisi Shank, Eureka The Butcher & Sadah Luna, System A and Dang.
LET’S PARTY - Doors at 8pm / 18+

ZECHS LIVE USA
Aug 10, 2012 - West Hollywood, CA @ Troubadour *!!
Aug 11, 2012 - Las Vegas, NV @ LVCS w/ Magic Wands & The Moth & The Flame
Aug 12, 2012 - Phoenix, AZ @ Rhythm Room *!!
Aug 13, 2012 - Tucson, AZ @ Club Congress *!!
Aug 14, 2012 - Albuquerque, NM @ Launchpad *!!
Aug 15, 2012 - El Paso, TX @ The Lowbrow Palace *!!
* w/ Fang Island
!! w/ Adebisi Shank

Oh and LAS VEGAS we will be headlining this show on August 11th!

Zechs Marquise Meet Up with Fang Island & Announce Headline EU Tour Dates

Sat, 28 Jul 2012 16:22:00 -0600

Zechs Marquise will be keeping it live and on the road. Just finishing up their co-headline tour tonight, July 27th in Philadelphia with And So I Watch You From Afar they will then meet up with more Sargent House family for some US shows with Fang Island and Adebisi Shank. Then they head off for their first Headlining European Tour in support of their latest release Getting Paid. Let’s do this.

SEE ALL SHOW DETAILS, UPDATES, TICKET LINKS HERE

ZECHS MARQUISE USA
Jul 29, 2012 - Saint Louis, MO @ Off Broadway *
Jul 30, 2012 - Kansas City, MO @ Czar Bar *
Aug 01, 2012 - Denver, CO @ Larimer Lounge *
Aug 02, 2012 - Salt Lake City, UT @ Vertigo at The Complex *
Aug 03, 2012 - Boise, ID @ Neurolux*
Aug 04, 2012 - Portland, OR @ Hawthorne Theatre *
Aug 05, 2012 - Seattle, WA @ The Crocodile *
Aug 07, 2012 - San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall *
Aug 10, 2012 - West Hollywood, CA @ Troubadour *!!
Aug 11, 2012 - Las Vegas, NV @ LVCS w/ Magic Wands & The Moth & The Flame
Aug 12, 2012 - Phoenix, AZ @ Rhythm Room *!!
Aug 13, 2012 - Tucson, AZ @ Club Congress *!!
Aug 14, 2012 - Albuquerque, NM @ Launchpad *!!
Aug 15, 2012 - El Paso, TX @ The Lowbrow Palace
* w/ Fang Island
!! w/ Adebisi Shank

ZECHS MARQUISE EU TOUR 2012
Oct 19, 2012 - Oberhausen, Germany @ Druckluft
Oct 20, 2012 - Stuttgart, Germany @ Zwoelfzhen
Oct 21, 2012 - Hamburg, Germany @ HafenKlang
Oct 23, 2012 - Antwerp, Belgium @ Trix
Oct 24, 2012 - Arnhem, Netherlands @ Willemeen
Oct 25, 2012 - Offenbach, Germany @ Hafen 2
Oct 26, 2012 - Terneuzen, Netherlands @ De Pit
Oct 27, 2012 - Basingstoke, UK @ Bang Bar
Oct 28, 2012 - Brighton, UK @ The Haunt
Oct 29, 2012 - Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club
Oct 30, 2012 - London, UK @ The Old Blue Last
Oct 31, 2012 - Paris, France @ Espace B
Nov 1, 2012 - Aarau, Switzerland @ Kiff
Nov 2, 2012 - Basel, Switzerland @ Hirscheneck
Nov 3, 2012 - Delemont, Switzerland @ SAS
Nov 4, 2012 - Tarbes, France @ Le Celtic Pub
Nov 5, 2012 - Toulouse, France @ Le Saint des Seins
Nov 6, 2012 - Torino, Italy @ Blah Blah
Nov 7, 2012 - Seregno, Italy @ Tambourine
Nov 8, 2012 - Rome, Italy @ Init
Nov 9, 2012 - Florence, Italy @ Viper Theater
Nov 10, 2012 - Zagreb, Croatia @ Kset
Nov 11, 2012 - Vienna, Austria @ Rhiz
Nov 12, 2012 - Budapest, Hungary @ A38
Nov 13, 2012 - Berlin, Germany @ Marie-Antionette
Nov 14, 2012 - Copenhagen, Denmark @ KB18
Nov 15, 2012 - Trondheim, Norway @ Blaest
Nov 16, 2012 - Oslo, Norway @ Parkteatret
Nov 17, 2012 - Kristiansand, Norway @ Haandverkeren
Nov 20, 2012 - Brno, Czech Republic@ Fleda
Nov 21, 2012 - Graz, Austria @ Forum Stadtpark
Nov 23, 2012 - Dublin, Ireland @ Workman’s Club
Nov 24, 2012 - Galway, Ireland @ Roisin Dubh
Nov 25, 2012 - Belfast, N. Ireland @ Speakeasy Bar

QRO Magazine's Live Review // Zechs Marquise // Louisville, KY

Fri, 20 Jul 2012 12:21:00 -0600

And So I Watch You From Afar and Zechs Marquise both trade in intricate instrumental music that often gets lumped into post-rock by default. However, one listen demonstrates how different these bands are from each other, as well as the rest of the post-rock world. Those with the luxury of catching their current summer co-headlining U.S. tour can witness this firsthand.

Given how intricate and layered the music of these bands is, it would be a shame to see this show at a venue with inferior sound. Luckily, the host on July 17th was Headliners in Louisville, the standard for sound in Kentuckiana. Opening was Interstates, native Louisvillians who specialize in playing very compelling, tight, typical post-rock.

Zechs Marquise was up next, and they immediately let everyone know that things were going to be a little different. Distinctly more funky than anything else that could be called post-rock, their sound bore at least as much resemblance to Frank Zappa having a circus music phase. In reality, it is likely that the only reason that they have ever been called post-rock by anyone is due to their instrumental nature. ‘Prog’ is much more fitting, and not surprising considering that more than half the band are brothers of The Mars Volta’s Omar Rodríguez-López, including drummer Marcel Rodríguez-López, who is himself a member of The Mars Volta (QRO album review). Despite the music being very complex, their playing was as tight as could be, often coming forth in one deep, layered timbre instead of sounding like the work of multiple instruments. - Aaron Fath for QRO Magazine

See Full Review & Slide Show

DON’T MISS ZECHS MARQUISE ON TOUR WITH FANG ISLAND - SEE ALL DATES

Live from Louisville

Wed, 18 Jul 2012 16:07:14 -0600

Zechs Marquise live at Headliner’s Music Hall on July 17, 2012. Audio by 45Sound and video shot by Andy Coles. Check out more videos from this show and more at
45 Sound

Zechs Marquise Air the dirt with Dirty Laundry TV

Thu, 12 Jul 2012 11:41:25 -0600

Zechs Marquise stopped in to the Laundromat while in LA right after their tour with At The Drive In and aired their dirt to Dirty Laundry TV.

DON’T MISS ZECHS MARQUISE ON TOUR NOW

MTV IGGY // Family Time: Rockers Zechs Marquise on Brotherly Love and Hip-Hop

Sun, 08 Jul 2012 11:51:46 -0600

El Paso-based prog band Zechs Marquise released Our Delicate Stranded Nightmare in 2009 and the much tighter and more original Getting Paid on On Rodriguez Lopez Productions via Sargent House in 2011. Getting Paid received appreciative reviews but the band was often written about in terms of the bassist and the drummer’s older sibling Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and his prog-rock band The Mars Volta. Zechs Marquise contains keyboardist Riko Rodriguez Lopez, bassist/vocalist Marfred Rodriguez-Lopez and drummer Marcel Rodriguez-Lopez, who also plays keys in The Mars Volta.

It’s no coincidence that both bands have similar influences. “We get a lot of comparisons to Mars Volta because of our relation or whatever, but the main difference is that Marcel and I were heavily influenced by hip-hop, where our brother Omar was influenced by punk rock, and salsa. We were influenced by hip-hop and salsa. So, it has that dynamic. We were all in the same house growing up listening to the same music. You influence each other, living together for so long. You develop each others tastes in a weird way,” Marfred Rodriguez-Lopez says over the phone.

One might wonder if there could be any sibling rivalry among this clan of intense prog fiends. In a word: nope. The Rodriguez-Lopez members of The Mars Volta and Zechs Marquise tour with each other and gig with each other. Zechs Marquise opened when Omar Rodriquez Lopez’s earlier band At the Drive-In played a hometown reunion show. When they get done with all of that they take a break, in order to hang out with each other.

They are, in fact, doing exactly this when Marfred Rodriguez-Lopez answers his cell for the interview. The brothers are driving back to Texas with their dad after a weekend spent going to baseball games in Los Angeles. “All of us spend our fair share of time away from home, so it’s nice to get to have these last-minute trips with our dad,” says Marfred Rodriguez-Lopez. Empirically speaking, it is the sweetest thing ever.

Lately, reviews of the Zechs Marquise live show and the slow-building recognition for Getting Paid have be taking the band from status as the little brother of The Mar Volta to a known quantity in its own right. Note to aspiring indie rockers: a little touring had something to do with that. Also, Getting Paid is some fine music. The twelve instrumental tracks fuse funk and prog-rock without being tedious or anachronistic. Cerebral and psychedelic it might be, but it’s also brash and pugnacious: Old music for young heads by young heads. Rodriguez-Lopez confirms the secret ingredient is hip-hop.

“We were listening to these old hip-hop records that we hadn’t listened to in years. You know these bangers where you kind of nod your head and tap your foot? I like the feeling of a lot of these songs. A lot of hip-hop songs have that. That was one of the ways that hip-hop influenced Getting Paid. We liked that swing, that groove,” he says in a phone interview.

In music histort, funk led to hip-hop. But Zechs Marquise reverses the story. “When we were growing up we just listened to a lot of hip-hop as a group. Our love for hip-hop is what got us into old rock records, prog-rock records, soul records, jazz records. Because in hip-hop there is a lot of sampling going on and a lot of it’s from these old records,” Rodriguez-Lopez recalls. In this case, hip-hop led a group of millennial audionauts to funk.

The hip-hop influence is most readily apparent in the album’s swagger and hyper-rhythmic emphasis. It goes beyond funk. (Post-funk?) The band plays Los Angeles often and not-surprisingly they often share a bill with Low-End Theory beat makers like DJ Nobody, The Gaslamp Killer and Mono/Poly.

Knowing that hip-hop has been their Rosetta stone makes the unorthodox way they composed Getting Paid seem less strange. It was recorded twice, cut and mixed to perfection the second time. “We recorded the first time, the writing of the songs. It was good to go. And there was the learning them part for part and then taking them on the road and seeing what we could do with them. And from playing live we noticed different things would happen. And then we went back and took out all the things we didn’t like and rerecorded them. We used touring as a way to test proof the songs and then when we ended up finishing Getting Paid it was something we were absolutely one hundred percent happy with,” the bassist explains.

Still, funk and prog are the meat and bones of the work even if it has hip-hop in its post-modern soul. The band members are inspired by the way Parliament Funkadelic took on rock elements following the experience of plugging into bigger-than-usual speakers once when sharing a bill with a rock band. But Zechs Marquise is more the inverse of that. “We’re guys in a rock band who wanna play funk music,” says Rodriguez-Lopez.

But genre distinctions are kind of beside the point for this group. “A lot of prog rock, especially the bad prog rock, they make it complicated and technical for the sake of making it complicated and technical. There no soul. there’s no life in it. Prog rock is one of our influences, one of the tools in our shed if you will. But it’s not the main thing. We’re more about having a good time and you can see it when we play. We get up there and have fun with each other and smile and laugh. We do take our music seriously, but we like to have a good time with it. We want to make it fun,” Rodriguez-Lopez assures.

This spirit is probably what allowed them to truly find their own sound, despite growing up around, well, the guys from The Mars Volta and At the Drive-In. The first album had more similar influences to The Mars Volta, including psych rock and jazz, but with time their sense of exploration brought them to the independent badassery of their sophomore release.

The trick was not to think about it. “Yeah, we did kind of just block it all out and did our own thing, just let ourselves mature musically, figure things out along the way, with no particular thing in mind. I’ve found out that that’s when you begin to falter creatively, when I think about it too hard,” Rodriguez-Lopez reveals. If the group sticks to these methods, and they surely will, it’s the opening of an entirely new book in the musical family’s saga.

By Beverly Bryan

Zechs Marquise Add Another Tour in August with Fang Island & Adebisi Shank

Mon, 18 Jun 2012 15:38:00 -0600

Zechs Marquise will be joining Fang Island’s headline tour promoting their new album Major coming out on July 24th, 2012 on Sargent House. Zechs will be meeting up with them right off the back of our tour with And So I Watch You From Afar . Joining us on a few shows as well will be Sargent House’s other Irish lads Adebisi Shank - P.A.R.T.Y.

ZECHS MARQUISE // FANG ISLAND & ADEBISI SHANK 2012 TOUR
07/29 St. Louis, MO @ Off Broadway *
07/30 Kansas City, MO @ Czar Bar *
08/01 Denver, CO @ Larimer Lounge *
08/03 Boise, ID @ Neurolux *
08/04 Portland, OR @ Hawthorne Theatre *
08/05 Seattle, WA @ The Crocodile *
08/07 San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall *
08/10 Los Angeles, CA @ Troubadour * !!
08/11 Las Vegas, NV @ LVCS
08/12 Phoenix, AZ @ The Rhythm Room * !!
08/13 Tucson, AZ @ Club Congress * !!
08/14 Albuquerque, NM @ Launchpad * !!
08/15 El Paso, TX @ Low Brow Palace

* w/ Fang Island
!! w/ Adebisi Shank

CLICK TO SEE ALL ZECHS MARQUISE SHOW DETAILS & UPDATES

Zechs Marquise: Violitionist Sessions 3 Questions, Live Tracks Free DL and Videos

Mon, 18 Jun 2012 06:39:00 -0600

3 QUESTIONS

ONE: What is the music climate like right now in El Paso, Texas?

Marfred Rodriguez Lopez: I guess it’s random, really.

Matthew Wilkson: It’s super random.

Marcos Smith: There’s definitely not one genre that’s huge right now in El Paso. There’s a couple of venues coming up, so that’s good, but for the most part, it’s not like it’s all rock bands or all hip hop, it’s just a bunch of different…

Marcel Rodriguez Lopez: I think for the first time in, I don’t know, five-plus years there’s two solid places to play on our side of town. We don’t know about the other side of town. We don’t ever go over there.

DJ: What side of town are you on?

Marcel: We’re Central and West Side. Yeah, within the last…I guess they’ve been open for a year, two years, something like that. Before that, it was just wherever you could play, so it was tough to get people to consistently come out. Now it’s gotten to the point where people do go to shows, but they’re still…you know, there’s still something lacking, but at least there’s a lot of bands now coming through. Everyone always stops in El Paso because it’s right where—

Marfred: It’s on the way to Austin, or on the way to LA.

Marcel: So everyone, big bands, small bands, at the very least have a rest day or something there, you know? And now there’s more bands that are starting to actually take advantage of that and play. It’s always super random. Some bands that are really big elsewhere can go there and play a bar and no one will go, and some other band will show up and play the right spot on the right night, and there’ll be three hundred kids or something like that. It’s all kind of random, but it’s definitely getting more consistent now.

Marfred: Yeah.

Marcel: As far as musicians to play with and people that inspire us, not too many. We’ve been playing together for a good while and we don’t really play with other people in town. We love playing with each other…as weird as that sounds.

Marfred: [Laughing] Phrasing! Phrasing!!

Matthew: There’s a lot of good musicians that just play by themselves or create their own music, you know? We’re friends with some guys that do electronic stuff over there that do really, really amazing stuff. They just do it by themselves or something like that, so there’s still a thriving music scene, but not necessarily a whole lot of bands that are coming out of El Paso, like touring-wise. A lot of bands in El Paso just play El Paso, and that’s it, rather than planning tours or selling merch on the road.

DJ: Is that because it’s so far from everything else?

Marcel: I think it’s that, and some people just don’t have that mindset or that work ethic, or else they think that they can, I don’t know…

Marfred: Make it by playing every weekend, just playing El Paso all the time.

Marcel: …that by playing El Paso every week, someone’s going to stumble across them or something. They’re not ready to, you know, take the dive and be broke and not know where you’re staying or where you’re playing or be playing to nobody. That’s something that every band needs to do. There was someone just yesterday who was asking us…they were about to put out their record, and what they should do in order to get a label, management, that type of stuff. The way we did it is we put out our first record and just started touring, you know? People started coming out to shows, and that’s the way that it should be, not trying to get some song on a T-Mobile commercial.

TWO: You’ve just come from SXSW. What motivates you to participate in festivals like that?

Marfred: For a festival like that, you’re allowed to play multiple shows within the span of the festival, especially with the options to do free shows where people can go and watch the show for free, it’s initiative, at least for us a band. It’s like, ‘OK, we’re going to be there for four days. Let’s go play five or six shows—‘

Marcel: —that are almost guaranteed to be a good time, at the very least for the crowd. You’re going to get a crowd where they want to have fun, they’re there eating free food and hanging out with their friends and watching all these different bands that they want to see…At the same time, it’s kind of a downfall because, you know…

Marfred: It’s chaos.

Marcel: Yeah, chaos. Between playing and setting up, we didn’t get to see anything, really. We wanted to see a bunch of stuff. But then also, there’s so many bands that the little that we did see while walking to go load in or whatever, a lot of it just didn’t stand out, you know? There’s definitely…it makes it that much more special when you do stumble across someone you’ve never heard of that just amazes you.

THREE: Do you have a favorite episode of Gundam Wing?

Marfred: Hmm…

Matthew: Marfred’s the Gundam fan.

Marfred: I liked the end of the series a lot just because there was more just the battles and stuff. You got to see more of the robots. The mech stuff is what I liked about the show. The mech design was really cool. I really liked the movie they put out afterwards, too, the…

DJ: Endless Waltz.

Marfred: Yeah, that one was really awesome. I just like the mech design. I like all of that action!

DJ: Do you ever perform under the name Milliardo Peacecraft?

Marcel: No, we haven’t. [Laughs]

Marfred: We should, for secret shows.

DJ: Do you guys like any other anime?

Marfred: Evangelion. That one was great.

Marcel: Evangelion was fucking crazy.

Marfred: RahXephon was cool, too. We liked that one a lot. It’s music-based, so that one was really tight.Cowboy Bebop. Of course, some of the older ones like Ninja Scroll and Akira…

Marcel: What was that one super weird one, with the vampire dude?

DJ: Hellsing?

Marfred: Yeah! That one was super weird. That one was good, too. I liked the Samurai X movies, not so much the Rurouni Kenshin. The TV show was a little lighthearted, at least the first season that they did, but I really liked the movies, like the prequel that they did to that whole series, just because it was, I guess, dark and violent. The Guyver is another good one, too.

Marcel: Legend of the Overfiend…

Marfred: That one’s disgusting. [Laughs] But The Guyver was one of our favorites when we were growing up.

- Interview and transcription by Dale Jones

Zechs Marquise Announce Tour Dates to Co Headline With And So I Watch You From Afar - July 2012

Wed, 30 May 2012 15:25:00 -0600

Zechs Marquise will be touring this Summer with And So I Watch You From Afar our Sargent House brothers from Belfast, Ireland. We met them at SXSW this year and believe us they shred. These shows will be a lot of fun. There may still be a few more shows added so keep an eye out for updates HERE and always make sure to check directly with venue websites for door times/ set times and age restrictions. and thanks Pat Cartelli for that rad art you made up above!

May 26th - El Paso, TX @ Neon Desert Festival

ZECHS MARQUISE & AND SO I WATCH YOU FROM AFAR- 2012
Jun 30th - Anaheim, CA @ Chain Reaction
Jul 1st - San Diego, CA @ The Casbah
Jul 2nd - Phoenix, AZ @ Rhythm Room
Jul 4th - San Antonio, TX @ The White Rabbit
Jul 5th - Houston, TX @ Fitzgerald’s
Jul 6th - Austin, TX @ Red 7
Jul 7th - Dallas, TX @ Club Dada
Jul 8th - Norman, OK @ The Opolis
Jul 10th - St Louis, MO @ The Firebird w/ Gypsyblood
Jul 11th - Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen w/ Gypsyblood
Jul 12th - Lansing, MI @ Mac’s Bar
Jul 13th - Toledo, OH @ Mickey Finns
Jul 14th - Toronto, ON @ Horseshoe Tavern
Jul 16th - Pittsburgh, PA @ Smiling Moose
Jul 17th - Louisville, KY @ Headliner’s Music Hall
Jul 18th - Nashville, TN @ 12th & Porter
Jul 19th - Atlanta, GA @ The Masquerade
Jul 20th - Gainesville, FL @ 1982 Bar
Jul 21st - St Petersburg, FL @ local 662
Jul 22nd - Mobile, AL @ Alabama Music Box
Jul 24th - Chapel Hill, NC @ Local 506
Jul 25th - Baltimore, MD @ Sonar
Jul 26th - Cambridge, MA @ T.T. the Bears
Jul 27th - New York City, NY @ The Studio at Webster Hall w/ Brontide
Jul 28th - Philadelphia, PA @ Kung Fu Necktie w/ Brontide

ALL UPDATED ZECHS MARQUISE SHOWS & DETAILS HERE

Best New Bands: Live Review of Zechs Marquise at Glasslands

Thu, 24 May 2012 12:09:00 -0600

…This show was also another confirmation of how Maps & Atlases have great taste in the supporting bands they bring on tour with them. Sister Crayon, opened, and then there was El Paso psych funk band Zechs Marquise. The core of this band is a trio of brothers; Marcel Rodriguez-Lopez, Marfred Rodriguez-Lopez, and Rikardo Rodriguez-Lopez, who also happen to have another brother by the name of Omar Rodriguez-Lopez, who you may have heard of in relation to The Mars Volta. Drummer Marcel wasn’t at this show, but the drummer that played with them held it down with percussive stealth, not to mention his beard almost passing for a 6^th member of the band.

Regardless of the band’s hairy prowess and higher profile relations, they really brought out some jams, and they brought it hard. They describe their sound as being funk from the future, and if the future of funk is a much heavier, blown out, almost hardcore funk, then that description is pretty accurate. Also, the fact that they’re on Sargent House with the likes of Tera Melos and Chelsea Wolfe makes total sense. Minutes after their set, tweets started popping up in the feed about the band’s impressive set. I think Zechs blew some people’s minds that night.

Zechs Marquise has just announced summer tour dates with And So I Watch You From Afar, so kids across the nation will be able to have their ears blown proper. ” - read the Full show Review by Kelly Knapp

See all future Zechs Marquise scheduled Shows HERE

Zechs Marquise live video of Crushing It from their album Getting Paid courtesy of Altar TV

Wed, 23 May 2012 21:34:12 -0600

Zechs Marquise live video of Crushing It from their album Getting Paid courtesy of Altar TV