Eyelash Factory: in Rock they trust
Phil Baranchik believes.
He believes in the six strings of his guitar more than he can express in words. He believes in the power of a single song. And more than anything, he believes in a god of a strange, wild, and wondrous kind: he believes in rock n roll.
“I believe the hand of rock n roll touches the child at the beginning,” said Baranchik in an interview this week. “They have to embrace that life or not.”
Baranchik has had plenty of opportunities to quit believing but the rock n roll dream that began for him as a 12-year-old gone agog at his first rock concert has never died. And he suspects that with his band Eyelash Factory – which holds a music industry showcase at Saint Rocke Saturday night – the dream in some ways has just begun. From the time he met musical cohort and fellow Eyelash Factory guitarist Mike Robson back in 2009, Baranchik fell into the groove he’d been waiting for all his life.
“Just like Elton John and Bernie Taupin or Mick Jaggar and Keith Richards or Steven Tyler and Joe Perry, those guys that had that bond – you have to find that person to really take the music to that next level,” Baranchik said. “And that is what Mike did for me.”
The band calls their sound “modern classic rock” and even in Baranchik’s conversation rock n roll’s pantheon of stars pop up intermittently like various deities. He’s studied it all intensely; his intent is to make old rock, but to make it new.
“Guys like myself, kids who were into Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd and The Who and AC/DC…well, in the late ‘80s and the 90s, a lot of kids missed the boat,” Baranchik said. “Music had changed. It was just a weird time. The thing I love about modern classic rock is it remembers the feeling of Led Zeppelin or the guitar style of Eric Clapton or David Gilmore, but we present it with a modern sensibility.”
He grew up in Chicago and came from a family of performers. His mother was a professional dance choreographer and his grandmother was a flamenco guitarist and dancer. He started playing piano and violin as a young child, but at the age of 15 everything changed when a friend was given a Stratocaster guitar. Baranchik remembers the feel of the guitar in his hands as his friend handed it to him.
“I picked it up and held it and from that moment I just knew, this is it,” he recalled. “Everything changed. It was like Conan finding his sword for the first time. Just unbelievable, I can’t explain it….My friend played it for two days, and I came over and bought it from him. ‘See ya!’”
He played in bands in Chicago but always knew Los Angeles. – home of the music industry – was his future. He came out ten years ago, found the South Bay, and has never looked back. The L.A. music scene is often a brutal one – the pay-to-plays, the capriciousness of the industry – and he experienced all of it, fully. He was in several bands and was offered lead guitar in at least one big name band that shall remain nameless. But he held out for something else, something he could call his own.
“I have never tried to be in someone else’s band,” he said. “I’ve been myself, and go where my music goes…I’m still fighting the good fight. Classic rock is timeless, good songwriting is timeless. A lot of times what LA does to people is suck them up, chew them up, and spit them out, sending them back home to cry to mom and dad. My Chicago roots gave me tough skin. You fall down, you get back up, and keep fighting. You don’t give up.”
Eyelash Factory has been consciously brought along slowly. They’ve only played a half dozen shows; each show, they believe, should be epic. There are always surprises in store, whether it be a bringing in a bagpipe player for a rare (but historically appropriate) cover of “It’s a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock N Roll”) or Led Zeppelin’s violinist for “Baba O’Reilly.”
“We try to make our shows as mysterious, and as big, as possible,” Baranchik said. “Rock n Roll.”
Eyelash Factory plays Feb. 4 at Saint Rocke beginning at 11:30 p.m
