B. BAND PERSONAL INFO AND NEWS
B1. What are the members' birthdates?
- Art Alexakis: April 12, 1962
- Greg Eklund: April 18, 1970
- Craig Montoya: September 14, 1970
B2. Are they, you know... taken?Art is married to Portland native Jenny and has a daughter, Annabella, who was born in 1993. Greg married his longtime girlfriend Ellina on July 6, 1997. Craig married Christel on October 24, 1998. So, yes, they're taken.
B3. Where do they live now?Art still lives in Portland. In late 1997, Greg moved to Los Angeles, California. The same year, Craig moved to Atlanta, Georgia.
B4. What is Alexakis' background?Many of Alexakis' songs are autobiographical or are rooted in his own life experiences.At a very young age, Alexakis' father walked out on the family, leaving Art, his mother, and his two sisters to fend for themselves. Not long after, financial difficulties forced Alexakis' mother to relocate the family to the housing projects of Mar Vista, California, located in Los Angeles near Culver City.
There, Art came in direct contact with the area's criminal and drug culture. Alexakis' brother George died of a drug overdose when Art was 12. A lyric in the song "Heroin Girl" refers to his mother overhearing a police officer describing his brother's death as "just another overdose." About a year later, Art's girlfriend OD'd and was discovered lying face-down in a sewage ditch. Not long after her death, Alexakis attempted suicide by getting stoned, filling his pockets with sand, and jumping off the Santa Monica Pier. He claims the voice of his brother George compelled him to survive.
Regardless, Art's drug addiction continued. Over the next eight years, Art was shuffled around between various family members all over the country. He spent a brief period in Houston, Texas, living with his father, and a period in Roseberg, Oregon, living with his "born-again" sister and her husband. Eventually, he returned to LA to live with his mother. There, a near-fatal cocaine overdose finally pushed him to quit drugs cold turkey.
After cleaning himself up, Art attended UCLA, and eventually earned a film degree. While living in Los Angeles, he organized a band called Shakin' Brave. Shakin' Brave featured a rather rough rock sound, but never really rose above the sea of music in Southern California. Generally frustrated with the music scene in LA, Art and his first wife Anita relocated to San Francisco.
While living in San Francisco, Art stumbled upon a genre of music known as "cow-punk". The sound meshed together the two prevalent forms of music with which he grew up - country and straight-ahead rock-n-roll. Inspired, Alexakis established Shindig Records. Much of this period is explicitly detailed in the album, Deep In the Heart of the Beast In the Sun, which was originally intended as a solo album but gradually developed into a group project under the name Colorfinger.
In 1992, within a single month, Shindig went bankrupt, Colorfinger disbanded, and Art's girlfriend Jenny became pregnant. Seeking a change of scenery, Alexakis moved to Portland, Oregon. There, he married his girlfriend and had a daughter. Though less directly biographical, Everclear's second album, Sparkle and Fade, deals deeply with the themes of escape and redemption that pervaded his life upon leaving San Francisco.
The instability and personal turmoil Alexakis has endured in his lifetime has left him with a wide breadth of subject matter for his songs. "Father of Mine" and "Why I Don't Believe in God" describe his difficult youth. "Heroin Girl" and "Color Pit" touch upon the scars left by his drug addictions.
B5. How do you pronounce "Alexakis"?To: White Lightning (white-lightning@lists.enteract.com)
From: Brent Fusco (gargoyle@usa.net)
Date: Tue, 1 Oct 1996 12:12:04 -0600 (MDT)
Subject: Intro to Greek 101Okay, just to end the speculation, I have it from a very official
source that the correct pronunciation of Alexakis is as follows:First, third, and fourth syllables are stressed - Al ex Ah Kis
Nehalem,
Brent
B6. Who is Steve Birch? What's his connection to the band?Steve Birch was the second guitarist for Everclear during the 97/98 SMFTA tour.
Art met Steve during the Colorfinger days. Steve's band Sprinkler shared the bill with Colorfinger at a show in Portland. When Art left San Francisco and moved to Portland, he bumped into Steve again, and they became friends. By then, Steve had quit Sprinkler and was focusing on graphic design work.
Steve did the artwork for the White Trash Hell import EP, and assisted Art on the artwork for Sparkle and Fade and So Much for the Afterglow.
Since the SMFTA tour, Steve has gone back to graphic design work, and is playing in a new band around the Portland area.
B7. Is Art starting a label? Can I send him my band's tape?Sometime in the near future, Art is planning on starting his own label, called Popularity Recordings. It will be distributed by another major label, not by Capitol Records.
--
(From Wall of Sound):"It'll cause some tension," Alexakis acknowledges, though he's quick to add that Everclear will remain on Capitol. "I love the business," the singer says of his decision to branch out. "I think it's fun. I like all those other aspects that come with making the records . . . And I think it would be fun to work with other bands."
--According to the Oregonian, a newspaper in Portland, the first considered for Popularity was Marigold. However, this story was reported in early 1998 - no telling if it's still true.
If you want to send your demo for Art to hear, send it to:
Everclear
Attn: Art Alexakis
P.O. Box 15055
Portland, OR 97215
B8. Why did the band cancel shows in Australia in April of 1998?Over the course of three consecutive shows, the band suffered a series of mishaps. In Wollongong, someone threw a shoe that hit Art in the face, knocking loose a few teeth. The next night in Melbourne, someone threw a lit explosive on stage, which injured one of Everclear's roadies. At the next show at the Gold Coast, someone stole Craig's acoustic bass.
(After the show, two people were arrested and charged with theft. The bass was eventually recovered and returned.)
These events, along with the general exhaustion from having played six months of shows without a real break, pushed the band to cancel the last three dates and return home.
Media reports in Australia insisted that the band was breaking up. However, this was obviously not the case. Everclear subsequently went on a full US tour, and continues to thrive as a band at the present date.
B9. Art's doing a solo album. Is Everclear breaking up?At the moment, that answer is "no". The current plan is for Art to release his solo album some time late in 1999, possibly followed by a brief solo tour. SMFTA's continuing success in 1999 and Art's throat surgery in June of 1999 has delayed completion of the album.
Art plans on recording another album with Everclear sometime in 2000.
B10. Who were the guys that toured with Everclear in 1998-1999?Starting in late 1998, Everclear picked up three musicians to tour with them in order to fill out the band's sound. They included guitarist David LoPrinzi (aka Davey Nipples), percussionist Brian Lehfeldt (who was also Greg's drum tech), and keyboardist James Beaton.
B11. I hear that Art appeared in a movie. Is that true?Yep - Art makes a cameo appearance in a movie called "Committed", which features Heather Graham.
He appears in a mock band called Arturo Y Los Distoros, peforming a "Tejano version" of "El Distorto de Melodica". As of yet, the film has not yet been released, but is rumored to be debuting in the fall of 1999.
Art has also written a screenplay, titled "Aiming Low". He has described the movie as a "dark comedy ... with very sexual themes", and plans to film it as a "lo-fi indie movie".
[Return to Everclear FAQ]