Asbury Park just got finished having their world rocked by Bruce Springsteen at Light of 2015. On Monday the post-LOD hangover, Morningside Lane, a band that subscribes to The Boss’ lyrical storytelling and rousing, emotional, anthem musicality take the stage at the Wonder Bar, in the city that Bruce built. The foursome from North Jersey caught up with us to talk about their music, the Asbury scene and an international tour.
Morningside Lane Is: Marc Del Giudice, Jon Khan, Alexander Del Giudice, Jake Donofrio
The Story of Our Name: There’s really not much behind our name. It originates from a street in our town where our parents grew up that’s kind of the connecting street between the two towns we’re divided by. First starting out with the band, we were discussing what we should call it, after one or two possibilities, while driving on Morningside Lane, the name seemed to tell a story and stuck, and the rest is history.
We’re based out of: Fort Lee/Palisades Park in Bergen County, NJ. Right across the George Washington Bridge from NYC.
Any new music coming out: We have a couple of plans to release new music very soon with our label Super Sick Records based out of the UK. Looking to start recording around June, for a summer release.
You’ve seen us before [in other bands]: Morningside Lane has been our first band, and we’ve stuck to it since the start.
Our sound has been likened to: We’ve been most compared to a modern punk Springsteen which is always a nice compliment to us, we’ve also been compared to The Killers, Foxy Shazam, and The Gaslight Anthem.
Can you talk about the artists that have inspired you? Also, what people in your life have inspired you to create music?
There are many different artists we feed off of being artists writing original music, usually it’s whatever we’re listening to at the moment. It really changes. But our inspiration stems from Bruce Springsteen, Elvis, Bob Dylan, and James Brown.
What is one of your favorite and/or most outrageous moments you’ve had performing with Morningside Lane?
There’s one moment that really stick out as the funniest, this was at Court Tavern in New Brunswick where our former keyboardist was so drunk he actually puked on stage into someone’s cup of beer, he grabbed it, puked and didn’t miss a note. Still blown away how he did that.
There are so many bands out there in the Asbury scene to check out — outside of your sound, which no one else really has, what do you think separates Morningside Lane rom everyone else?
There are many great bands in the Asbury scene right now, and it’s pretty overwhelming to have our sound in this group of artists, but what separates us from others in our opinion would be the diversity of the material we have and how we break down our live shows. When you’re there we want to make you feel like you got your $10 worth, so we’ll put 150 percent into every show, even if we’re playing to 10 people.
If someone read this interview and never heard you before, but decided to check you out, what song would you recommend they listen to in order to understand what Morningside Lane is all about?
If someone was checking us out for the very first time I would show them ‘Mellow Drama,’ ‘Jazz Dance,’ ‘Other Sons,’ ‘Blood, Sweat, and Tears’ or ‘He’s A Good Kid.’
What can the people coming out to see you guys perform expect to see from you guys in terms of a live experience?
You can expect a whole lot of in your face rock and roll that you won’t be able to take your eyes off of.
What’s on the horizon for Morningside Lane in 2015?
As the years go by things are getting crazier and crazier for us, but you can expect a whole UK tour starting on May 25th, a new record, and a whole bunch of live shows. We’re also trying to record a live EP too eventually as well for everyone to listen to.
Morningside Lane performs with Des & The Swagmatics and We Are Ghosts Now at Happy Mondays at The Wonder Bar in Asbury Park, New Jersey. There is no cover.
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Bill Bodkin is the Owner, Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of Pop-Break. Most importantly, however, he is the proud father of a beautiful daughter, Sophie. He is beyond excited that Pop-Break will be six years old in 2015 as this site has come a long, long way from the day he launched in it in his bachelor pad at the Jersey Shore. He can be read every Monday for the Happy Mondays Interview Series as well as his weekly reviews on Law & Order: SVU, Mad Men and Hannibal. His goal, once again, is to write 500 stories this year (a goal he accomplished in 2014). He is a graduate of Rutgers University with a degree in Journalism & English. Follow him on Twitter: @PopBreakDotCom
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