Backbone > Ear Whacks

Crooked Candy Sky: Chris Cubeta’s Real World
By Sharon Nichols . Photo by Chris Lopez

Nothing’s more satisfying to a music columnist than unearthing a gifted, young unknown and giving him some ink (aside from getting a groovy cd to spin long after going to press). Here’s the latest and tastiest: 24-year-old Chris Cubeta. And what’s ultimately so attractive about this self-taught local is that he’s so real we need a new word for real.

Despite his years, Cubeta has walked a long road. He’s engineered/co-produced for Golden Earring, engineered for blues legend John Hammond, played with the late Rick Danko and Joey Ramone, and merged with The Migrants. A few months back, he opened for Suzanne Vega at The Chance. Now he’s scraped some solo work together and recorded Sugar Sky at Foil Studios in Poughkeepsie. On this debut, Cubeta is joined by bassist Karl Allweier, guitarist Frank Carillo, and vocalists John Passineau and Danny Lanzetta. (Lanzetta wrote some of the lyrics, but the rest is unfettered Cubeta.)

Sugar Sky sounds hauntingly familiar. Perhaps that’s because Cubeta’s songs emerged from some great musical womb in the ether from which all hit songs emanate and one day return to be re-born. This guy’s tapped into that melodic mind machine and snagged 13 champs. The album has a kicked-back, alt/rock feel—both catchy and casual—featuring Cubeta on guitar, piano, and drums. Cubeta’s vocals are reminiscent of Toad the Wet Sprocket’s Glen Phillips—that sort of unpolished, laid back lull, vibrato-free and completely devoid of pretense. The guy next door sings his soul.

Juxtaposed to his cordial melodies, Cubeta’s lyrics are encrusted with a shocking melancholy; there’s much knife-to-the-head misery expressed by that effortless voice. Cubeta’s downed more than a few gins, smoked more than a few cigarettes, and bedded more than a few lovers in his dance-with-the-devil-man trip around the sun. He doesn’t get overly political or philosophical—just down, dirty, and brutally honest. We can all relate, and that’s the plan.

“I write from experience,” explains Cubeta. “The lyrics are simple, straightforward. I don’t write to be incredibly heady or intellectual, just to be understood.” Cubeta admits that his biggest influences lyrically are Vedder, Dylan, and early Springsteen. “I aspire to be as real as possible. I speak about things that everybody goes through.”

Easy on music, heavy on lyrics, light-hearted in persona, Cubeta is not too uptight on life. He laughs often and is painfully true amidst the woe. “I don’t judge anyone for anything, whether it’s experimenting with drugs, sexuality, the arts, or whatever. To me, it’s all OK. Branching out and experiencing different aspects of life makes for a better society, ultimately. There’s a lot of stigma attached to things that are completely circumstantial; I try to break some of that down through music.”

The album title is Cubeta’s fantasy view of the way he wishes the world could be. “Unfortunately, it’s just not that way, but it’s a pleasant thought that amidst the bullshit, there’s still a sugar sky above us.” The recording opens with “Billy Elliot,” a track inspired by the film about a boy whose art sets him free. “He grew up in a mining town in this masculine, testosterone-driven family, but he had tremendous artistic ability. He ended up a ballet dancer, dancing through the streets of his hometown, which I found incredibly inspiring. It was a total freedom that his art form gave him.... ‘I want my legs to dance like fall afternoons....’ The rest of the song is about things I’ve been through. I haven’t been in the greatest mindset; just coping.”

“Broken Heart”—a hit if discovered—is rhythmic and melodic, with cheerful chord changes à la Gin Blossoms or Better Than Ezra. Lyrically, the song begins with a drink and a failed relationship. “Me with a broken heart again / I wind up in someone else’s head / I’d like to think I’m going down / Can’t put your faith in rainy things / Wind up in someone else’s bed / and I can’t shake this pain from me.”

“There are definitely a lot of songs about drinking on the album,” Cubeta admits. “Booze, loneliness, and sadness. In the past few years I’ve spent a lot of time in bars late at night with friends, meeting people I never would’ve expected. There are different types of people out at four in the morning than at 11am. I found a lot of beauty in it, to be honest. I’ve met some amazing people who’ve really touched me. In these circumstances, there was alcohol involved, and it loosened people up to the point where they could express themselves.” Cubeta laughs. “I’m not condoning drinking or drugs to anyone, but I do to a certain extent. I can’t preach to the choir.”

In “Athena,” Cubeta’s theme is more salient, expressing his disdain for the government. (“Today will mark another year of discontent and atmosphere / let’s celebrate this useless holiday / where soldiers march in Pleasantville and celebrate the right to kill / one more lie and I’ll be on my way.”) “I’m not a big supporter of foreign policy over the last few years, so there’s some stuff pointed toward the nonsensical American rhetoric that’s been going on and the general acceptance that it’s OK to be gung-ho about blowing up the rest of Iraq,” he explains. “I’m bitter about certain actions, so that song’s a bit more angry.” And yet the music is quickly paced, exuberant, and unrestrained.

“I’m an incredibly left wing–minded person, and I hate politics in general,” he says. “I don’t see myself ever being really involved, because when you get to that level, it’s all bullshit. That’s why I make music. It transcends boundaries, whereas politics and organized religion don’t. However, I’m not a huge fan of the left party either. If I had to pick a political view, it would be socialism.”

Interestingly, that’s how Cubeta, his friends, and artistic compatriots are set up at GaluminumFoil, the small company which produced Sugar Sky. It’s a socialist society in which local independent musicians, writers, and photographers band together and share everything; money from cd/book sales gets divided up to whoever needs it. “We stand by that very seriously,” explains Cubeta. “If any of us do make a lot of money or become successful, we plan to keep it that way. It’s the way I wish the world was sometimes.”

Mini-record label/publishing company GaluminumFoil was parented by Cubeta and pal Danny Lanzetta, a novelist and Broadway actor from “Les Miserables,” “Lost in Yonkers,” and TV’s “Brooklyn Bridge.” The goal of gf is to promote independent artists, reinvigorating long-forgotten artistic ideals. Capital is limited at this juncture, so they promote projects one at a time. Last year they released a music/poetry/spoken word collection, GaluminumFoil Presents Live, featuring rocker John Passineau (From Hell to Breakfast); veteran Frank Carillo, who’s currently touring with John Hammond; Cubeta; and spoken word artists Matthew Cavellier (Five Dollars Worth of Ten Cent Pigs, 2002) and Lanzetta (Drunken Angel, 2002). gf’s current focus is Cubeta’s album; up next is Lanzetta’s 2004 spoken word/music release, which listeners can get a nibble of on Sugar Sky. On the track “Sideshow,” Cubeta willingly passed Lanzetta the mike for an unusually passionate, poetic piece with a musical intensity that stands alone on the album.

Cubeta’s recently hooked up with manager Phil Lorito (Cyndi Lauper, Michael Bolton) for one reason only: a bigger record deal will potentially earn more duckage to help out the GaluminumFoil society. They’re remixing a bit of Sugar Sky and writing new tracks before they toss Cubeta out to the Atlantic, Warner Bros. vultures.
“It’s not like we want to sell a million records so we can ride around in fancy cars,” laughs Cubeta. “We want to sell enough so we have a chance to do it again and make more music that ultimately matters to people.”

Cubeta will perform at GaluminumFoil’s Thanksgiving Bash on November 22 at West Strand Grill, Kingston, at 10pm; soak up the diversity for a mere $5. To purchase Sugar Sky or any of GaluminumFoil’s other goodies, or to view submission guidelines for joining gf’s roster of artists, visit www.galuminumfoil.com.