STUCK ON PLANET EARTH

By Alex Hudson
Remember those massive mud fights from Woodstock '94, when Green Day got pelted with a barrage of dirt bombs? The new video from Ontario alt-rock outfit Stuck on Planet Earth finds the group suffering a similar fate.

The video for "Better" begins as a fairly straightforward performance clip, as the band perform the atmospherically heavy tune while different takes are layered on top of one another. Things start getting messy in the second chorus, as the band members get doused in mud.

See the band's upcoming live schedule here. - EXCLAIM!

The members of Stuck On Planet Earth sit huddled around a small lunch table inside a local bakery in Vaughan, Ontario. The aromas of espresso and fresh bread fill the room. As people filter through the doorway, gusts of frigid air trailing behind them, the boys begin to tell me about what it’s like being a rock band from this particular suburb.

A predominantly Italian Canadian neighbourhood, there is a certain stigma associated with Vaughan. Having self-dubbed itself “the city above Toronto,” it’s no surprise that this affluent suburb has garnered itself quite the reputation over the years. A place where sports cars line the driveways of most local homes and children rock designer sweat socks, it’s a very interesting take on the classic idea of keeping up with the Jones’.

“It’s definitely not a place that many band’s openly admit to being from,” says bassist Al Capo. Built on the backs of Italian immigrants who primarily amassed their fortunes in the construction industry during the 1970s, many came here to retire in the early 90s. While it has since become a sprawling family community, looking around, there are the obvious stereotypes: greasy old dudes wearing imported leather dress shoes and gold crucifixes’ around their necks, young, over-privileged daughters with designer handbags and daddy’s credit card. It’s all here, but despite outside perceptions, these guys don’t quite seem to fit.



“Don’t get me wrong, we’ve all been very lucky to grow-up here,” says Capo, “but I think it can be easy to feel like an outsider anywhere you live.” As teenagers, all three members of SOPE (an acronym they commonly go by) were into punk rock and grunge, something that contrasted pretty harshly against the backdrop of the neighbourhood.

“When we were growing up, kids were defined by the music they listened to,” says guitarist Adam Bianchi. “There were the guys who were really into dance music and then there were the guys that were into gangster rap, which was pretty big at the time. For us as a couple of kids who were discovering bands like Nirvana, The Clash and even Killing Joke for the first time, that automatically pushed us to the fringes; nobody cared what we were up to.”

Last summer, when the boys from SOPE played to 20,000 people at The Rogers Centre after being hand picked by the CFL to represent the Toronto Argonauts in the Rock The Grey Cup Contest, people finally started to take notice. Despite having narrowly lost that contest, they bounced back mere months later to take the CBC R-30 Countdown by storm. Their latest single “Fast Forward,” which shot to the number 1 spot, topped the charts for 8 straight weeks (the maximum the station allows) beating out Canadian indie rock darlings like Arcade Fire, The Pack A.D. and July Talk, in the process. The song also topped the charts on Sirius XM’s The Verge.



“We were all pretty surprised when we started charting on the CBC,” says Bianchi. “Sound wise, we’ve explored a song like “Fast Forward” before, so it wasn’t completely new to us, but there was something about that particular track that just seemed to resonate with people this time around.”

After securing the top spot, the comments began to come in. People wanted to know who the hell these guys were and where they came from, and rightfully so. These days, it’s hard enough for bands with record deals to cut through the noise and infiltrate our headspace, so it’s surprising when a band you’ve never heard of comes out of the gates that strong. But, like many bands that seemingly pop up into public consciousness over night, they’ve been laying the groundwork in total obscurity for years. Seven years to be exact.

Back at home in Vaughan, everything happens inside the confines of their somewhat notorious rehearsal space, “The Shop”. I’m told it’s something like a clubhouse where beyond the music, their friends come to congregate for frequent parties and girls have been known to spend the night. As we each make our way there, our cars trailing one behind the other in a single file fashion, I follow them into an industrial area slightly south of where we met.

They call it “The Shop” because the space they inhabit is located in the upstairs offices of an auto repair shop owned by Adam’s family. As a new immigrant to the country, Adam’s grandfather built the business from scratch in the 1970s.

Upon entering, the room immediately resonates; the walls are still covered in original wood paneling. Spotlights, which were recently installed, burn hot as hell onto the tops of our heads as we stand directly beneath them in the centre of the room. They tell me that both the furniture and their gear are an assortment of shit they’ve collected over the years, but it’s an impressive set up nonetheless. Although he doesn’t say much, drummer Andrew Testa, muses about a time when, short on cash and unable to afford professional equipment, the SOPE boys had no choice but to “pimp him out” to a friend’s cover band so that they could use his gear to rehearse.

Taped to the walls are old tour posters, photos of friends and a vast map of the world. A wooden rooster sits perched on top of a speaker cabinet while two white-erase boards that vaguely outline lyrics, soon to be recorded, hang heavy next to a vertical plaque of a naked woman’s profile.

What makes these guys so intriguing is that for the past year now, they’ve strictly opted to record singles. No EPs. No full-length albums. While their approach seems much more inline with what one might expect from a Hip-Hop artist today, they have established a system that not only looks fresh on a rock band, it works within their means.

“There was a time a few years back, where we were working with our producer, Fil Bucchino, and getting ready to go into the studio to record another EP,” says Bianchi. “Up until that point that’s what we were accustomed to doing because that’s what bands did. We finally had to turn to each other and say: ‘we just can’t afford to do this in this particular way right now, but how can we do it differently?’”



So, they took a step back and took a hard look at what kind of approach made the most sense financially for a band in their position but also for a band in general today. “We landed on the singles idea,” explains Testa, “because a) we don’t have to commit to the process of a full-length recording and b) because we have found from experience, that people often only focus in on the single leaving the other songs to fall by the waste side. Releasing one song at a time, allows us to give each one the attention it deserves.”

On the floor next to Andrew’s feet, there is a box containing every single pair of drumsticks that he has every broken. As he stands back toward me, he fiddles with the controls on their mixing board, which is so old it needs time to warm up before they can rehearse.

While waiting, we all move to an unfinished room next door where a ragged vinyl couch, sunburst orange, rests lopsided on the cold, concrete floor. We sit. Ahead of me at arms reach, cigarette butts overflow from an ashtray onto two coffee tables that have been pushed together. In my peripherals, dozens of cardboard boxes, which clearly contain accounting information that reaches as far back as 1994, are stacked to the ceiling. A thin veil of smoke settles visibly in the air, and a big, dusty television, which I’m told is a new addition to the space, stands like a giant in front of the room’s only window.

This place clearly has a presence. And, while it might not seem like much, it’s the heart and soul of this band. "The shop is pretty much our safe haven,” says Capo. “It facilitates our creativity and has given us a place to hone our skills as musicians. The Shop is definitely the cement that holds this band together. Without it, there would be no SOPE."

As I start to slip inward between the slanted couch pillows, I look around the room and think these guys just get it. These are strange fucking times we live in, and if you want to survive you’ve got to work hard and get great; there’s just no way around it.

“I think we all learned pretty early on that there are very few people who are interested and willing to help you get where you want to go,” says Bianchi. “We are lucky to have a very tight knit team of people around us who really understand this band’s vision. In this industry, it’s really easy to second guess yourself, but there’s just no right or wrong way to do it anymore so we keep our heads down and we keep going.” - VICE NOISEY

With the release of their 4th EP Play Along charting on iTunes, this Toronto trio get ready for a promising 2013.

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By Amil Delic

They are 'Stuck on Planet Earth' (SOPE) for the moment, but a few of the members from this alternative rock threesome wouldn't mind leaving the stratosphere like Felix Baumgartner to explore the universe. Al Capo (bassist/vocals), Adam Bianchi (guitar/vocals) and Andrew Testa (drums) might not have wings but they make up the powerhouse trio has been raising eyebrows in smalls circles across Canada, and parts of the United States thanks to satellite radio. Having gotten their start a little under a decade ago, these north Toronto boys have not given up on their passion and love of music. They recently put out their 4th EP, Play Along which charted on the iTunes alternative chart for over a week during its September 11th release. This band isn't one that just blossomed over the summer and made a good EP that was worth being picked up by 28 campus/community stations nationwide. This has been in the works for over a decade for these guys. Even during the bands inception in early 2001 as Expo, they gained quick popularity in Toronto's high school music circuit scene thanks to their alternative punk style that was beginning to sprout throughout North America with bands like Jimmy Eat World, New Found Glory and MxPx. The guys have matured in many ways since their Expo days adding Andrew Testa to the band and collaborating with now long time producer, Fil Bucchino.

Their release of 'Play Along' on September 11, 2012 can't be explained….And I'm not referring to the release date. This EP plays like an LP because of the content that comes with it and how it's presented by Stuck on Planet Earth. In a lot of instances, we've all experienced at least one of the songs on this EP in different ways. I've lived this EP in every way. But it becomes a challenge when I try to explain it; I've touched it,
...we are always trying to combine something new... felt it and slept with it. We spent nights together at Renison College and on Bricker street in Waterloo, ON. It brought me home after a drunken night, and then pleasured me till I passed out. It had reclining back seats that were big enough for the both of us to pick up some extra traction. To understand what I'm talking about, I'd suggest you listen to this 19 minute relapse of love.

Has there ever been a time in your life when you've felt that you were in the wrong about something? You never admitted that you were at fault but instead just moved on. This might have been the maturation of your inner self that was never been told or exposed, but instead just kept deep inside. 'Play Along' gives our inner self that opportunity to selfishly reminisce about those times and potentially imagine what things could have been like if you had/n't went in that direction. That direction might have been a girl, a car, a night or something as simple as a career.

When I moved to Toronto for graduate school, I didn't know much about the Canadian music scene or what a CanCon artist really was or how you became one. I knew that there was a lot of music out there and that a lot of it was shit, or just wasn't my cup of tea. But 'Play Along' is the kind of EP that breaks down barriers and just says "fuck it, I'm going in" because I have to learn somehow and someway. The band wasn't sure what kind of reception the EP was going to get from some of their longtime fans….

"We have some shyer fans that are a bit younger. This album has exposed them to things that they have never thought about before...like sex and substance. This EP might open some people in certain ways and I think a lot of people our age would have experienced things like this at some point. " - Al Capo


SOPE's new release Play Along.
With any artist or group, growth is essential in the development of their music, and ones self. The band's single off this EP, "Another" is exactly that as it walks a fine line between comfort and regret, but always seems to make it across safely. The guys know it's a song that will wake some people up, but feel that it's appropriate for the day in age that we live in, "it's in your face and says -- I am thinking about another when I'm with you -- It makes people feel uncomfortable. It makes people feel excited. It makes people remember something from their past. It brings out an emotion in people, whether you like it or not. That was the motive to these song," Capo mentions as he gets comfortable at a quite but elegant Williams coffee pub indowntown Toronto. He continues to go on about the bands style of writing, "to be honest with you, the songs that we write have very tongue and cheeky kind of lyrics. That's not something that we just excepted. We've been excepting this for a very long time. We're not here to write indie sized lyrics that mean nothing at - earshot!

Posted by Shane Macaulay on 2012/08/31
Category: Indie at 8
Tags: Stuck On Planet Earth, Indie, Band, Rock
Airing September 3rd to September 7th at 8pm.

Stuck On Planet Earth is a 3-piece alternative rock band from Vaughan, Ontario, that possess a certain intrigue and raw energy about their live performance that calls on people from the back of the room. It’s that Stuck On Planet Earth feels like they sound, and that’s real. It’s the seedy back-stories about heat and lust, love and loss that this band tells so well, and it’s wrapped up in a gritty, bare bones, from the gut sound, that has them speaking to our most human emotions.

Over the course of the past year Stuck On Planet Earth has toured Eastern Canada four times. Their single “Gone” has garnered high rotation on the college radio circuit, as well as nationally on The Verge / Iceburg XM. Stuck On Planet Earth has also been featured as part of 102.1 The Edge’s Steam Whistle Indie Club, Bookie’s New Music Night, and has been a recommended rising act on The Strombo Show (Corus Network).

Stuck On Planet Earth has opened for the likes of Ill Scarlett, The Johnstones, and The Junction, and has made TV appearances on CHCH’s The Being Frank Show, Rogers TV, TV Cogeco, and City TV.

Their much anticipated 4th EP Play Along, which was produced by long time collaborator Fil Bucchino (Flashlight Brown, The Johnstones, Tricky), will be released this fall, followed by a supporting tour.

Stuck On Planet Earth is a band that will draw you in on their honesty, turn you on with their intensity, and provoke you to feel again.

For more information on Stuck on Planet Earth, check them out on Facebook at www.facebook.com/stuckonplanetearth. - TheRock.fm

Queens TV Interview in Kingston, Ontario sept. 2012 for YGK Fest @ The Mansion - Queens tv

livemusicTO Presents: STUCK ON PLANET EARTH "Play Along" CD Release Event

*Get a copy of "Play Along" with ticket purchase*

With special guests: THE ORGAN THIEVES, TROUBLE & DAUGHTER and USA!USA!USA! (consisting of members of Unearth, Arise and Ruin, Waltham, and Since The Flood)

Friday October 5, 2012 @ Sneaky Dee's
Doors @ 8pm / 19+ Event / tickets @ http://www.ticketscene.ca/events/6970
- Live Music TO

I've been watching these guys. Nice job on this video from their upcoming album, Play Along. Learn more here. - Alan Cross

I've been watching these guys. Nice job on this video from their upcoming album, Play Along. Learn more here. - Alan Cross

SOPE has a new EP entitled Realities. They're kicking things off by offering a free download of the title track. - Alan Cross: A Journal of Musical Things