Habit forming

>> The chamber rock confections of Code Pie

YOUS GUYS: Code Pie

by LORRAINE CARPENTER

“Three Wops, Two Jews and a Ukrainian” was briefly under consideration as a name for the band formed by singer Enzo Palermo, guitarist Salvatore Ciolfi, bassist Michel Semienchuk, drummer Vince Varano, trumpet player Eva Boodman and cellist Rebecca Lessard, who eventually settled on Code Pie. Like Stars and Broken Social Scene, the band has its roots in a relatively electronic two-man project that slowly ballooned to the chamber rock act it is today.

“Over the course of a year, we went from being just me and Enzo in his room to a six-piece playing three-minute pop songs,” says Ciolfi. “We never really talked about what the band was supposed to be, it just gradually developed, and I think it’s still developing. I’m not sure we’re where we should be yet.”

In June, Code Pie will release the follow-up to their 2005 album This Habit, which the band was less than satisfied with. “We really didn’t get a good representation of what we are,” Ciofli says. “It sounds a lot more subtle and subdued than we usually are, especially live. We’re way louder than I think most people expect when they hear our first album.”

Their sophomore LP, tentatively titled The Most Trusted Name in Yous, will once again be released domestically on their own imprint, Flagless Records, and distributed by an otherwise all-metal company called PHD, though they’re looking for a different arrangement for the U.S. and Europe. The album is seeing the light of day a whole year later than the band had projected, largely because all the recording and mixing was done at the hugely popular Hotel2Tango, where they sometimes had to wait for two months to score a weekend booking. The fact that four of the band members work full-time day jobs and the other two are still in school didn’t help, and neither did the band’s thoroughly democratic ways—six people working on a mix can certainly exacerbate the process. Then there was the allure of Hotel2Tango’s cable TV and pinball machine, which eventually had to be unplugged to save valuable time with H2T’s Howard Bilerman, and company.

“As befits our chaotic way of doing everything, we worked with almost everybody there. We recorded a lot with Kevin Komoda and we worked with Brian Paulson, who actually mixed most of the record [and the Wedding Present’s 1993 album Hit Parade II, a favourite of Ciofli’s], and we worked with Thierry Amar and we recorded with Howard too,” says Ciofli, admitting that neither Bilerman nor the band can even tell who did what on the finished product. “It was just a revolving door behind the desk, which might have worked in the end—it helped keep things fresh.”

However the band evolves, Ciolfi feels that this record captures the Code Pie that Montrealers have come to know through their live shows, which is precisely what they were aiming for.

“I’m happy with it,” he says. “It’s way more confident, it’s way louder and it’s just more exciting. I think it’s a nice snapshot of us at that moment.”

With Flotilla and Pamplemousse Explosion
at Divan Orange on Tuesday, April 10,
9:30 p.m., pay what you can