Like many artists around the world, COVID’s lingering presence rerouted the trajectory of Connecticut-based indie rock act Phatt James. Comprised of guitarist and singer Matt James, drummer Chris Wilson, and bassist Matt Christoforo, the trio’s live performances came to a standstill during COVID lockdowns in 2020. A pesky virus didn’t keep them down, and they instead decided to retreat to the studio for the recording of their debut album Just Begun.

Since the release of Just Begun last May, Phatt James has been anything but idle by performing in the Connecticut and New York area, releasing several music videos, and have already been working on new tracks. Frontman Matt James discussed the band’s learning experience of building a recording studio, a love for 2000s rock, and creating Just Begun.

What were some of the biggest challenges with creating Just Begun?

A lot of the songs on Just Begun have been with us for years. They were special enough to stick around and special enough to make us want to make them the best we could in their final form. This definitely put some pressure on us, especially myself. But, nothing is perfect, so that’s how we worked through that, and of course, giving our all to everything as well. 

Another challenge was just doing everything besides the recording aspect ourselves. Thankfully, we had Trevor Buckingham from Law Records and the band Cydeways help us out with production, but getting the album art and building a studio for instance, we made that happen ourselves. That side of the work often goes unnoticed for independent artists and can be tough when you’re a musician first.  

What is the music scene in Connecticut like? Do you feel heavily connected to it?

The music scene in Connecticut is actually not bad and it’s pretty great, to be honest. You have to be a part of it to know about it for sure, but there are some rising venues that have some great acts come through and awesome opportunities for the local scene. I’m thinking of specifically the Fairfield area, with FTC and Park City Music Hall being some of these great venues. There’s also a great kind of underground scene to be found with some local spots and some more identifiable ones like Cafe Nine in New Haven and The Beeracks in East Haven. 

We definitely feel heavily connected to the scene around here. It seems with the two areas I just described there’s one side being more jam band oriented and more known music and another that’s more DIY raw and original style. I like the idea of contributing to the music scene here by bringing those two sides together. One way I feel we did that was with our album release show. We had Shortwave and Pondview join us in our celebration at Park City Music Hall. I didn’t typically see too many original groups coming through Park City in the local scene that were not more jam-oriented, so to get another style of music coming through felt like a good accomplishment. 

How do you feel that the band has changed from the release of the EP Circle Bent to the album Just Begun?

We’ve become more confident, for sure. It’s like anything, the more you do it, the better you get at it. We’ve definitely started to sink into our little studio and feel comfortable there, so that has an impact. I honestly feel like there hasn’t been a huge change in songwriting because some of those songs on Circle Bent were written when some of the ones on Just Begun were.

What is the songwriting process like for the band? Does it change with each song?

With the songs we have out, it’s often been me bringing an idea or full structure to the table and then working them out with the band. A lot of these songs on the album we played out live all the time, so we changed them up over time and reworked them together. More recently, we’ve been continuing this strategy, but sitting down a little more intently together to pick apart songs and chase ideas together. 

You had come up with the concept for the “Seven Days” music video years before. Did the concept arrive before the song? 

So, the production company we worked with, Kicker Pictures, had been holding onto this idea for a lovesick Cupid music video concept before we even came to them. We originally gave them the album and asked what song they’d like to work with us on. Connor and Matt both agreed on “Seven Days” and unveiled their concept to us on a conference call. It was very euphoric to hear it for the time. We were beyond hyped and excited to work with such creative and talented people. 

Phatt James’ music has been compared to bands like Incubus and Red Hot Chili Peppers. Is there something about the era of 90s and 2000s alternative rock that you particularly connect with? 

Honestly, it is the guitar riffs, the vocal melodies, and just the sonic nature of a lot of those songs. They make sense to me and make me feel the best out of any music. Not to say I don’t like other music because there is modern stuff that hypes me up too, but I don’t know, it just feels like me when I listen to those songs. 

The band decided to build a recording studio during the COVID quarantine. What did you learn during that process, and how did it affect Just Begun? 

We learned a lot through that process and continue to do so. Chris, in particular, learned some carpentry and recording production skills. We have to thank him for capturing the sounds and putting in the work for quality. We also learned it’s great to have the freedom to record whenever, but having a time frame on things and more preparedness might be something we work towards. I think it gave us a beautiful freedom to make the album the best we could. I don’t think we wasted too much time going overboard with perfection, but who knows. 

Where we really could’ve been better is in our communication with Trevor. Being separated by states and connecting through Zoom, it was not always easy to bounce ideas off each other. Luckily we did visit him a number of times to be in person. 

We also should’ve been more connected during the recording process. This was probably a year and a half, but Chris and I just buried our heads into this album, and when we finished recording the music, we hadn’t really sent Trevor much, so he just got bombarded with an album’s worth of tracks to produce. I’m sure that was a lot. But! We made it out and made it happen and we are proud of it!!

What’s next for the band?

We are continuing to record some songs from the same time period as the ones on Circle Bent and also bringing some others in the bank to life. We’ll be caught up soon and we’ll get to these more recent tracks we’ve been working on. I know we’re going to make some more visuals for some songs on the album so look out for that!