!!! have mostly relocated to New York City, but they remain the heaviest groove-band from Sacramento since Karate Party. Guitarist Mario Andreoni (who used to be in the Popesmashers!) speaks during a sleepless evening at work.

What style of dancer are you?
I have no style. Other than a kid watching Michael Jackson and the Jackson five. But I’m nowhere near that–I don’t know anybody who can dance like that! I’m 35, and I was really young in the ’70s, and that was what I kind of grew up around-disco and soul.
What kind of effect did growing up in Sacramento have on you and the band?
I feel like it kept us close—it was like a family. We end up hanging out together all the time–we’d be in the van for an eighteen hour drive, then get to the venue and still hang out together. I was always told that was odd. But I don’t know any different.
Do you guys have psychic powers between you yet?
Ten years of inside jokes.
Your own language.
And it’s just not funny to anybody else.
Kind of an Amon Duul thing.
The Popesmashers were actually all going to move to Kansas, but after that dissolved, New York was the place we all wanted to go.
Are you going to grow old with these guys?
I definitely see maintaining a relationship with everybody. What kind of music are you going to make in fifty years? I feel like a lot of material we’re working on is better than ever–songwriting is one thing that if it’s something you’ve done and love doing, I don’t see how you can ever stop. Coltrane is such a huge influence–he created something that went way beyond technique, and he never stopped listening ot people. He was never like dismissive, like ‘That hot guy in town doesn’t have anything I can learn from.’ That’s fundamentally what’s kept us going: ‘Check this out–this Explorer Series record, the way this person is playing this little thing,’ or like watching a band and there’s one little element that’s really exciting about them. Of course we still do a lot of shit-talking–
You come off pretty nice.
Oh my god, I don’t know–I try to–you know. There’s enough of us we can just talk out of our ass to each other. Keep it self-contained. Keep each other in check.
So what was the last thing you learned from someone else?
Music-geek-wise, I’ve been listening to Rod Stewart a lot. And the Faces–I feel like the drummer’s technique–the way he opens a song and pushes things along is amazing. I write around a lot of loops and sometimes totally forget that aspect of live playing.
What’s the biggest misconception about you guys?
That we just created the band to dance–that that’s our only objective in life. What brought us together was to play music with a strong groove, and that was about it–it wasn’t like a set agenda. You get known for something and then try and break out–but there’s so many possibilities with dance music. When we play together, everything just kind of falls into a certain groove–it could be noise stuff, if it has something to it. Like riding the edges, trying to find the edges–that’s really what the band has been about since we started. And when we started, at least in our neck of the woods, we stuck out–like whatever we were, we’d be known as a dance band. Though we’re just musicians like any others.
Guys who like Rod Stewart and Amon Duul.
Yeah, anybody that spends any time with us finds that we’re not necessarily just listening to house music in the van.
It was strange how aggressive and political people tried to get about dancing for a while.
I remember coming out of the punk scene and that was always real aggressive: ‘This is who we are, and this is what you do when we do this.’ But it’s how people react that’s the natural thing about music. That’s how I dance–there’s nobody telling me to dance. That’s making it politicized and it’s not supposed to be that way. I hate it when I go someplace and there’s already a bunch of people just waiting for their chance to get on stage and do whatever and be wacky. I hate that–I really do. I feel like it’s if I was into like Skinny Puppy and everybody in the audience looked just like me–it’d drive me nuts.
Like some obligation people feel to dance that doesn’t really exist?
If I watch old Bill Withers footage, that makes me feel like coming out of my skin. Maybe you don’t feel like dancing, but it makes you elated. It overwhelms you. And that’s what we want to do–some people get that from sitting down and watching somebody do acoustic songs, some get it from crazy noise. I just got so bored with the whole ‘This is what we do and this is what you’re supposed to do at our shows.’ It’s just like: create the environment, and whatever happens happens. We play a lot of fests over the summer in Europe and end up in front of thousands of people, and most of them don’t know who we are. It’s always interesting to see how they react. That’s the raw reaction.
What do they do?
Some people hate it. We opened up for Franz Ferdinand in Glasgow and nobody wanted to hear us. People were in the front row with their heads down–just waiting.
What’s the last musical genre you’ve never been able to get into?
There’s two that leap to mind: opera and drum and bass. I don’t get drum and bass and opera just never really hits me. I love classical and I love things that come from opera–sort of the baroque style–but it always bores me to tears. And drum and bass–I never hear what’s great about it or jungle or any of that stuff. It’s a musical genre that totally goes beyond me.
Maybe someone can make you an opera mix.
I would love it if someone was like, ‘This is the definitive drum and bass comp!’ Like so I’d know that these guys were the cream of the crop and then I’d hate it still, so I could just put the whole thing to bed.