Posted on 03/27/2009
Chin Chin, I don't think I've ever said this to anyone before, so I'm kind of nervous, but (deep breath, hold it together): I love you. It all began on a warm summer's day at McCarren Pool in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Well that's not true. It really began almost two years ago when I foolishly dismissed your style as ‘not my thing’ on MySpace. But much like another live band beloved by the Okayplayer family, what doesn't come through via computer speakers was made abundantly clear on a live stage.

At McCarren, the stage was packed with musicians playing almost as recklessly as the audience was dancing, horn players, guitarists, percussion of all sorts and toddlers. On the floor of the pool were a bunch of half-naked hipsters tossing beachballs, eating vegan dogs, dancing like it was Taylor Dane’s retirement party and a young boy in a Pampers Pull-up led them all on his trombone. "Chin Chin love the kids!" keyboardist and lead vocalist Wilder Zoby exclaimed, and the raucous shout back from the crowd proved that we were all glad to indulge our inner child that day. After seeing the orgy induced by M.I.A. just a few weeks earlier at McCarren, I didn't think any sight could top the masses of bodies grinding in unison to her global club sound. But, on the other end of the spectrum were these vintage styled gentlemen blasting beats bright as sunshine and grooves nasty as they want to be, tricking the usually jaded, detached masses of Williamsburg to...enjoy themselves. Such is the magic of Chin squared.

The long and short of it, drummer and vocalist Torbitt Schwartz and Wilder are brothers, genetically, not culturally, and Jeremy Wilms is a sick bassist who cut his musical teeth in Atlanta before finding the guys up North through other musician friends. Since 2001, this talented core trio has worked with some of the best artists around including Antibalas, Ornette Coleman and El-P, which has put them in contact with their tight horn section, guitarist Tada Hirano and multi-instrumentalist Yusuke Yamamoto. When not lifting Chin Chin's groovy lounge music to booty-shaking funk, Torbitt and Jeremy as production partners work on TV commercials, produce Big Mono , a project with New School of Jazz and Contemporary Music comrade Jesse Boykins III (who notably received a 90 in OKP's reviews), and pretty much get their hands on anything in the world of music that's not "morally reprehensible that pays."



I caught up with the guys in D.U.M.B.O., Brooklyn at "Its the Sound" studio owned by Torbitt and Jeremy, only to relocate to nearby Rebar for a longer chinwag. The louder, but casual environs only made sense for a band whose presentation is well-coiffed and precise on the outside, but pleasantly relaxed and fun on the inside. Besides, with a few beers in them, they’d be liable to say anything.

OKP: How did Chin Chin come to be?

Torbitt: It started really as something super-casual. A place where I was dj'ing - maybe I wasn't even dj'ing on the regular at Black Betty yet - but a bar that I would play at fairly frequently in one capacity or another asked to me to start bringing in something on like Thursdays and Fridays or something like that, so Wilder - I had another band at the time -and Wilder and I just started doing it with another bass player. Very ad hoc, like really kind of loose jams.

Wilder: When it started, the guy that was dj'ing the other night, Jaleel [Bunton, drummer for TV on the Radio], Torbitt and he had a band together. And he's from Louisville, we're all from Louisville, so we'd all moved up here and re-convened up here. So it started off as just kind of an extra-curricular activity for him.

OKP: Do all you guys play other instruments because the other night [at the record release at Union Pool], you guys all rotated for the encore?

Torbitt: [Wilder] started as a drummer, switched to vocals and keys. I went to the same music school [Wilder] did as a guitar player and Jeremy, well yeah, we all played stuff. We all make music all the time that's just us, so like I'll make stuff that's me playing every instrument and Wilder makes stuff that's him playing every instrument and Jeremy same.

OKP: How does that work when you collaborate for Chin Chin stuff? Do you write as a team or does someone come with arrangements and someone else with lyrics?

Jeremy: There's kind of two patterns I think that we're in and recently it's been way more from scratch and we've all been sort of not playing the instruments we might play live. Like we'll set up a bunch of synths and maybe drum machines and just kind of write like kind of off whatever drum patterns come up and sort of improvise for a long time and then go ahead, listen to it and in those improvisations there might even be something that's like a solid song, like full verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge. That happens. That's one way.

Wilder: For lack of a better word, we all like to jam. So one way of writing for us definitely throughout the time that this band has been together is us just getting together and just cold, just jamming and playing and then something will come up.

Torbitt: When a part sticks, we'll flush it out.

Jeremy: There's also been- Wilder will bring in things that might not be like totally done, but they pretty much have a verse and a chorus and maybe just need a bass line and some kind of minor arrangements so that's the other way…All of us sort of bring stuff in, but mostly Wilder, if there's something that does come in as a full formed idea, it's more Wilder bringing it in. But most of the stuff is…

Torbitt: …kind of workshopped.

Jeremy: Yeah, like I would say most of it is workshopped from nothing.

OKP: The sound that you have now, during those jam sessions, did you find yourselves leaning toward this dance-y, electronic sound in what you all were bringing to the table or did you find that later?

Jeremy: I think at the beginning, it was way more rock-y.

Torbitt: And more electronic. A lot more electronic. Like when we started, I was using like a half electronic, or actually mostly electronic, drum set. And having that stuff break on gigs, I was like, 'All right. Fuck this. I'll use real drums.' That way if the power goes out-

OKP: You still got a show.

Wilder: There was one night, I remember you were using a kick drum as electronic-

Torbitt: No, I had a bass amp where my kick drum was supposed to be. I had a bass amp and I just had a little trigger.

Wilder: And it didn't work one night, so there was no bass drum at all and that's the night we were like…

Torbitt: …I'm never doing that again.

Jeremy: And the songs were also, like, I feel like our sense of humor now is still completely intact, but it's gotten way more like sort of way more underneath, whereas at that point we were just like literally writing really fucking stupid, like funny songs. I mean, they were good musically, it was good, but it's like sort of surrealist, absurdist, sophomore-

Torbitt: We did at one point kind of, and I think we've gotten comfortable enough now where we might be revisiting this, but at one point I feel like we definitely did make a conscious decision live to really try and keep the energy up and not play much slow stuff. That was like a real conscious decision to try and make like the party happen. To be like, 'Alright, we've only got 45 minutes to spend with these people. We want them jumping up and down.'

Wilder: It's fun to make people dance. I like to dance.

OKP: I saw.

Wilder’s dancing…Let’s just say when you’re watching someone on a small stage sing and play keyboard, you wouldn’t think there’d be room for much movement, but Wilder finds a way. It’s a little Aunt Ree-Ree, a little Jack Black, but all good. Along with his suit and bowtie, you almost feel ashamed to not reciprocate at least half the energy he gives you from the stage. Some of the more fanatical fans do just that as I witnessed the next time I saw Chin Chin live in the East Village. Two young NYU types stood against the stage spastically snapping their fingers to the rhythm like Beat poets who’d missed the memo. Another large man found a way to thrash to their lounge sound, even keeping his lady friend shocked into stillness. Chin Chin is one of the few bands that can even make straight men dance like they have no sense. But you don’t feel self-conscious letting go. It’s a welcoming, come as you are party that manages to stand out amid a trendy, style-over-substance New York indie scene.



Jeremy: I feel like most of the indie scene, especially when it gets into the thing of like dance music, it’s like everyone sort of like is either a) making fun of it and trying to be like this reverse irony thing or b) just being like dark and sort of brooding, but yet we want to make you dance like sort of punk, sort of aloofness in a weird way and it’s – we’re not like that at all. We’re like, ‘We want to party with the audience. We want to party with you.’ And not in any kind of like elitist way or any kind of cynical or any kind of ironic way, just like in a straight up we want to make people have a good time…I feel like we, I would say 9 times out of 10, we do a good job of winning people over. Biker night in Birmingham, Alabama on tour did not go so well. But-

OKP: It was actually biker night?

Torbitt: It was the first time any of us had seen the name Chin Chin ever on a marquee. We pull up to this club in Birmingham and there it is, ‘Monday – Biker Night – Chin Chin.’ And Jeremy was like wishful thinking like, ‘Maybe it’s just like, you know, hipster kids on their lowrider bicycles.’

Jeremy: No, definitely not.

OKP: Like straight hogs and heifers

Jeremy: Straight hogs and heifers.

Wilder: “Get off the stage, faggot.”

OKP: Whoa.

Torbitt: I don’t react well to that. I talk shit, I just start popping shit.

OKP: So how many songs did you actually get through?

Torbitt: No, we did the whole set. And in the end, they were all cool. They didn’t like it at all. They didn’t like us or the music.

Jeremy: But no one beat us up or threatened us. But generally I feel like it does get across. I feel our problem is never playing live in that world, it’s more like in the industry. It’s like people kinda don’t know what to make of us because we’re not trying to sound like, you know, even though we’re friends with TV on the Radio, we’re friends with Antibalas, we’re friends with the Dap Kings, we’re not trying to sound like any of those people.

Torbitt: That’s one of the things that I think is challenging for people…I think production-wise, like it’d be really easy to be like, ‘Okay, let’s cop the shit that, you know, let’s cop some South soul shit on this tune or let’s cop some West End on this tune and like make the claps sound like this.’ And I think in a way, a lot more people might get it that way, but it wouldn’t feel honest.

OKP: So right now all your music is completely self-produced from within the band?

Jeremy: Completely.

OKP: Why have you gone that route instead of bringing in an ‘expert’ or someone who’s been doing it 20/50 years?

Torbitt: I’ve always been the kind of person who’s just like, ‘Oh, I can do that.’

Wilder: Yeah, I don’t even think that thought has ever really crossed – and the opportunity – has just never presented, that just never was even on the map.

Jeremy: I think at this point we’re definitely paddling up our own stream.

Wilder: A general influence, [Torbitt] touched on this earlier, from say like Sly Stone records or Stevie Wonder records or Prince records where he’s playing all the instruments himself and it’s got this…very kinda DIY sense to it. It was done all by somebody sitting in a room by themselves and I think that’s something that all three of us definitely grew up doing…So I think it’s just kind of a graduated version of that…It’s the same as doing it at home with a cassette four track except that we’re a little more grown up. We figured out a way to rent a place and do it with a computer.

As Jamiroquai starts to play on the bar’s sound system…

OKP: You know, Jamiroquai actually reminded me of something. You guys get a lot of random comparisons.

Jeremy: Yes.

OKP: Or maybe just random to me.

Torbitt: and Wilder: Random to us!

OKP: I think I’ve read three things in the past two weeks that were like, ‘They’re like Steely Dan meets…’ and it would just be like Daft Punk or Can or something crazy.

Torbitt: I have never understood why people say that we’re like Hot Chip.

Wilder: It’s weird. I’m surprised that people are so kinda confused about the music we make because it doesn’t seem that confusing to me. For example, I noticed today, the iTunes, I don’t know why I just now noticed this, the iTunes classification is ‘electronic.’ You know and when I think of electronic, I think of house music-

Jeremy: Or like Autechre or some shit.

Wilder: Or like Aphex Twin or some shit like that. To me, that’s electronic. We’re way more R&B than electronic.

Torbitt:I mean, what we’re doing, we make soul music. That’s really what the thing is…and most people because of the context and because of the way that we look, definitely the fact that we make soul music and we’re all white and like or at least the face of the three-piece of the band is white. People don’t know how to deal with it and people don’t have, you know like it’s funny, if you’re a record head and you know records and then…

Jeremy: …it makes sense. It really makes sense.

Torbitt: Then you’re like, ‘Oh well they’re coming out of this and coming out of this and mix in a little bit of this’ and there you go. But most people don’t know that kind of stuff.

Jeremy: They don’t deal with music in that kind of way.

OKP: And iTunes wouldn’t necessarily have that label.

Torbitt: Exactly.

Jeremy:‘Record head.’

Torbitt: We all want the freedom to make any kind of song that we want to make and we all listen to tons of different, diverse music and we’re trying to make it, you know, music that’s influenced by one era, but that’s now. We’re making like modern soul music. It’s different than what Musiq Soulchild is making, but it’s still soul music.

Wilder: Yeah and his name has the word ‘soul’ in it.

OKP: How you gonna beat that?

Wilder: I can’t really compete with that. That’s pretty genre-defined.

How to define a band that makes it cool to geek out, yet crafts soulful, space age disco that would make Cee-Lo proud? Who cares? Keep making it and we'll listen. The most recent time I saw Chin Chin was at their packed record release party at yet another pool, this time indoors at Union Pool (also in Williamsburg, BK). Even with its clothes on, the crowd's excitement was palpable. Before launching into a funky set featuring former road dog Jesse Boykins III, we viewed a trippy ballroom dance play out in "Go There With You," the first video from the new album, The Flashing, The Fancing. Though he only briefly makes his presence felt via moonwalk at the start, friend and Def Jux label boss, El-P played a special role in expanding public awareness of Chin Chin.

Jeremy: He’s a true believer and like it’s a fucking big deal for him because his fan base is not like what we should be marketed to. So for someone to step up with that is a fucking huge thing.

Wilder: And he has the desire to diversify his label and that’s about growing. That’s not pigeonholing yourself and for him to say, ‘Yeah this is primarily an independent hip-hop label, but-’

OKP: I like this band.

Wilder: ‘I like this band and it’s my fucking label. If I want to put something out other than hip-hop, I can put something out other than hip-hop.’

Torbitt: If you came up as a hip-hop producer that only listened to hip-hop records, especially in the sampling era, you’d be fucked. So you have to, you know, any producer that’s worth his shit in hip-hop is into a lot of different kinds of music. That’s how, it’s like originally, not originally, but the golden age of it was sample-based music built on constructing shit with all different styles of music.

OKP: It’s kind of like the anti-major label attitude. They’re not going to take that risk.

Jeremy: Exactly and…his label is big enough, but not so big, where that actually is like a risk. On that level, it’s respectable to me.

OKP: You kinda touched on it before like with being outside of New York, but what’s the response to your music? Like, New Yorkers can be so particular because we can go to anything and hear anybody on any given night, so if you have people coming to see Chin Chin, you know they’re there for you. But when you go somewhere else is it more random? Is it kinda like trying to win folks over who have no clue, really?

Wilder: You put on a good show and put out the right amount of energy, it’s hard for somebody to deny having a good time or having a good experience if you do it right.

Torbitt: It’s all about the energy.

Jeremy:Yeah I think in smaller towns it’s like in a way, it’s like, nowadays with the Internet, it’s not like you go to a small town and people are like, ‘I’ve never heard anything like this before.’ Everybody’s heard everything, that’s kind of the way it is nowadays. But I definitely think people will kind of get open. There’s a thing about New York City we’ve been fighting the whole time which is this sort of, and I’m guilty of it too when I go see a band, you’re immediately judging everything because you saw something last night [that was really good]. But at the same time, you never want to be the person in the room that’s like, ‘I can’t get into this because I really don’t like the singer’s haircut.’

OKP: ‘That light’s focused wrong.’

Jeremy: Yeah, exactly, which once the room starts getting taken over by a good thing it’s just like, it doesn’t matter what genre or what you’re doing…It’s like once the room starts going, you’re either with it or you should split…Most people, like even pretty cynical people, the switch will flip and they’ll be like, ‘Okay, this is fun.’

- Candace L.

Watch Chin Chin's video for below. OKP thinks it's quite a fresh vid!


Chin Chin - "Go There With You" from Okayplayer on Vimeo.


To buy Chin Chin's latest effort, The Flashing, The Fancing, click here.

*Photo Credits.  Main photo: Quin Willis.  2 photos inside article: Damien Neva.