What they’ve been building up to
Local hard-core veterans Brick by Brick looking forward to CD release
On Friday night, Brick By Brick is releasing “Hive Mentality,” its seventh LP. To celebrate, the Troy hardcore band is playing a show at Upstate Concert Hall. Curiously, Brick By Brick isn’t headlining the show, instead ceding that slot to Marylandbased Dying Fetus.
You’d think that being a wellestablished local act with a 15-year history in the hard-core scene that hosting your own album release show would be a no-brainer. But, as Brick By Brick’s guitarist and founder Mike Valente explained, there’s a logic behind it.
“I don’t think we’re a headliner per se,” he noted, referencing that past headlining tours culminating in sparsely attended shows have served as a “little bit of a reality check.”
“I’d rather open up; headlining is a responsibility” in terms of pushing ticket sales and driving media attention, Valente continued. “When you headline, when you’re done, everybody leaves. I like to get out and see people [after Brick By Brick’s sets], have drinks and enjoy the last act.”
And with this show synced to the unveiling of the new CD, Valente is particularly enthusiastic to get off-
stage and soak up the audience’s reaction. For Valente, “Hive Mentality” is special, the product of six months’ hard work and what he feels was the band’s best recording sessions to date.
After the band’s usual studio couldn’t accommodate the band, Brick By Brick ended up recording at Overit Studios in Albany.
“When we went in, we were used to doing it on a real low budget,” he said. “But Overit was phenomenal. I felt like a rock star.
“We were thrown into this fire and had to make it work,” Valente continued. “But Jason [Bourdeau, the album’s producer] just knows sounds and he wouldn’t let us settle.”
In addition to testing the band’s musical growth, the work on “Hive Mentality” also showed just how far Brick By Brick has come up in the national and international hard-core scene. The album features guest spots from Vincent Bennett of popular metal-core band the Acacia Strain, Tony Foresta of thrash supergroup Iron Reagan and Jessica Pimenta, a singer and actress best known for playing Maria Ruiz on the Netflix series “Orange is the New Black.”
Brick By Brick has established these connections with major genre acts over the past decade, as it embarked on national tours and got booked on international metal festivals. Valente, the only original remaining member of the band, feels that this was made possible by both an adherence to the band’s original mission and the combination of the current lineup’s bond and ability to embark on long-distance tours.
“We first got together as a bunch of friends sitting at a bar,” Valente recalled. “I used to be in [local metal band] the Bruise Bros. and at that time, it wasn’t what we had started as. I wanted to get back to our metal, hard-core roots.
“I’m friends with these people [in the current incarnation]. We have a good camaraderie in the band, so it’s not hard to keep this going,” he continued. “It’s just persistence. We were locked into the local scene with the old lineup. We couldn’t take two to three weeks off to tour.”
In addition to playing in Brick By Brick,
Valente is also a local metal promoter through Upstate Black N’ Blue Productions. Started as a way to exert some control of the show booking process after being burned by dishonest promoters, becoming a promoter has allowed him to stay plugged into 518 hard-core through its various changes.
Despite changes in venues and styles, Valente feels that the local metal scene is the same, fundamentally.
“It’s definitely a labor of love; I’m not making money on this thing,” he said. “The local scene, it ebbs and flows, but the local scene has a steady foundation. The kids will always find a place to play.
“It’s about the fun,” Valente added. “The shows I attend, the shows I book, the shows I play, they’re all big parties. The primary focus is to have fun. If it’s not fun, I wouldn’t do it.”