Words by Anagricel Duran
New York City’s Niagara bar – an 80-person sweatbox in the East Village – is hallowed ground. In the ‘00s, it’s where an ascending Strokes hung out; before that in the ‘80s, the space was previously known as A7, a hotbed for the city’s punk and hardcore scenes – as the venue’s website proudly boasts, a spray painted message outside read: “Out of town bands remember where you are!”
Now, in February 2024, Been Stellar step up to the plate. They bustle through the crowd to get to the stage packed with friends, family and fans who are there to celebrate huge news: the announcement of their debut album and signing to Dirty Hit. It’s a venue they’ve long outgrown and the room hums with that knowledge: a giddy punter sidles up to NME to proudly declare that “this is the last time we’ll hear ‘Kids 1995’ in a small venue like this”.
Been Stellar are a band that are acutely aware of where they are. Their debut album ‘Scream From New York, NY’ (released June 14) sees the band searching deep within it and exploring new personal territories while providing sketches of scenes they’ve experienced in the city. Instead of regurgitating 2000’s New York City rock, Been Stellar have meshed shoegaze and post-punk sounds to create their own signature sound.
A couple of days before their celebratory show, NME meets with the quintet – comprising Sam Slocum (vocals), Skyler Knapp (guitars), Nando Dale (guitars), Nico Brunstein (bass) and Laila Wayans (drums) – at a pub a few blocks away from the Niagara. They sip on their pints of Guinness and reflect on the irony of their situation: they’re a New York band where none of the members were raised in the Big Apple.
Time spent within, however, paired with the intensity of a global pandemic have caused the five bandmates to become like family in their new home. “Being in this band is about really digging into ourselves and discovering a new place with one another,” says Knapp. “Our perspective of New York is each other.”
Slocum and Knapp made their way to the city from Michigan, while Wayans and Brunstein arrived from California and Dale from Brazil by way of Sydney. Slocum and Knapp met in high school, eventually forming Been Stellar when they met the other three members while attending New York University.
They’ve experienced the same pitfalls as their contemporaries. Comparisons to the indie pioneers who once walked the same streets – Interpol, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and The Strokes – are inescapable, if somewhat inaccurate, for any group that is trying to make it in the city that never sleeps. Been Stellar, as they tell NME today, have learned to push through.
“We’ve probably gotten a Strokes reference at every show we’ve played, which we don’t mind anymore,” says Brunstein, with his arms folded over a copy of George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London. “There was a point where we hated it, but we are a New York five-piece, that’s just what you’re gonna get.”
They’ve learned to use those comparisons to become “introspective with our writing process and create things we love”. During the pandemic, the band ingrained this into their ethos, realising that instead of blending into the city and its sounds from yesteryear, they could use it and its elements as fuel for their musical inspiration.
In 2022, Been Stellar released their self-titled EP which put the NME 100 alumni on even more radars. On ‘Manhattan Youth’ they acknowledge speak of the city that’s “locked in the momеnts with our only truth”; on ‘Ohm’, there’s rawness in vivid detail: “Calvin’s ad on Houston / Falafel man sitting in a cart underneath / A cricket game blares from his phone / Soda cans sweat in the August heat”.
But subvert all you like, you’ll still find yourself in a playlist called ‘Meet Me In The Bathroom Take 2’ on Spotify, a fact that makes the band visibly cringe. So how do they pave the way within a scene that is so immersed in nostalgia?
“Your influences are in your DNA. You shouldn’t be thinking about it, it’s going to be there regardless,” shares Slocum. “The main thing for us is to write stuff that we would genuinely want to listen to. It is very easy to fall into those influences, which is not necessarily a bad thing but we just try to block all of that noise out and ask ourselves ‘What would we want to be listening to?’” adds Brunstein.
“Also, what would make us excited as a band? There is always a void for a band you wish existed so we are constantly trying to be that band because you’d be stoked about it,” says Knapp.
“If you want to do something you love, you will find a way” – Laila Wayans
The guitarist also mentions the significance of giving back to the city’s rich musical culture, explaining that there is an attempt to fill big shoes. The only way to give back, he says, is by working hard and creating something that serves as an addition “to the already very big, loud noise that New York makes”.
“We’ve been here for long enough where I feel this deep debt that I always am repaying to this city,” Knapp says. “It’s given me so much and I feel this obligation to give back to it in whatever vague, music or cultural way that is.”
The early 2000s were a blank canvas for the city’s musicians, as documented within the pages of Lizzy Goodman’s oral history Meet Me In The Bathroom. As of late, however, skyrocketing rent prices and steep inflation have been making things hard for the city’s inhabitants, creative or otherwise. Much like in the UK, artists are having to make costly and sometimes devastating choices between stability and pursuing the arts; in February 2024, Bloomberg reported that despite rent prices falling nationwide, NYC’s rental rates went up 18% over the same period in 2023.
Working to become a successful band is hard but Slocum believes that there is an “opening happening” within the scene for those who are willing to take it into their own hands and fight for it.
“If you want to do something you love, you will find a way,” offers Wayans. “I can’t even explain how many harebrained schemes we’ve pulled just to do simple things as a band. I think the people that shine in this scene are the ones that will just do it regardless.”
They’re one of the lucky ones: Been Stellar first found a home with tastemaker label So Young Records and now have joined the Dirty Hit roster alongside The 1975, Bleachers and Beabadoobee.
They landed a shot with the label because of typically rockstar confidence, offering to play the Dirty Hit team a spontaneous gig after a boozy night out. “We went to a show with Jamie [Oborne, Dirty Hit co-founder] and this was our first time meeting him. We were all a bit drunk, so after the show, he’s like, ‘What do we do now?’ and Sam said: ‘We’ll play a show for you guys right now in our basement’”, Knapp explains enthusiastically while laughing at the memory.
“They went to buy beer while we set up the basement… and we killed it!” adds Slocum. Knapp reveals that the next day, he called his mum and told her the story to which she replied: ‘That is probably the stupidest thing you’ve ever done’.
On ‘Scream From New York, NY’, the band share vivid descriptions of a city where sometimes words don’t do the setting justice. They double down on distorted guitars as ideas about disconnection and loneliness lurk throughout the album. Lead single ‘Passing Judgement’, a track that highlights the band’s signature sound, opens with a gritty guitar riff and Slocum’s uniquely piercing vocals and bright tambourine: “Passing judgement without home / Passing judgement without home”, he chants.
Their shows on the NYC scene – at beloved venues Union Pool, KGB Bar and more – earned them support slots with Shame, Fontaines D.C, and Inhaler. In December, they opened for Interpol during one of their homecoming gigs at the Beacon Theatre. A gig they’re pleased with, but can’t deny the oddities: Brunstein reflects on performing for a seated crowd for their first time, while Wayans also points out how it was a full-circle moment, having once covered Interpol’s 2002 hit ‘Obstacle 1’ during their early days.
“Being in this band is about really digging into ourselves” – Skyler Knapp
This week, they’ll play their final shows in arenas as the opening act of The 1975’s current European tour leg. “We’ve gone through so many steps, from playing in people’s living rooms in Baltimore to venues here so this is part of the progression. I’m looking forward to seeing how that all goes down, learning from that and getting better,” says Wayans.
“There’s so many bands that don’t get to the level that we’re at and there’s so many bands that do and it falls apart. I truly try not to have any preconceived ideas as to where this is going,” says Slocum.
Alongside the upcoming release of their debut album, Been Stellar will also be returning to the UK for a string of headlining shows in May. They will play a handful of festivals this summer including The Great Escape, Tramlines Festival, Truck Festival and Latitude Festival for the first full run of summer shows.
“No matter what happens, I know that we’ve proven everything we needed to ourselves, and of course, I want to do this shit for fucking ever,” Slocum continues. “I want to do this shit in the next life or something. I’m so proud of where we’ve gone and I just want to keep my head down and keep doing the same thing.”
Been Stellar’s ‘Scream From New York, NY’ is released June 14 on Dirty Hit
Listen to Been Stellar’s exclusive playlist to accompany The Cover below on Spotify and here on Apple Music
Writer: Anagricel Duran
Photography: Sam Keeler
Styling: Razzi Schlosser
Label: Dirty Hit