Construct Paradise are a progressive metal band from Hartford, Connecticut. They're growing very rapidly in their local scene and consider Periphery, Novelists, Erra, Born of Osiris and Napoleon bands that they sound like. I had the opportunity to sit down with their guitarist, Federico Zuccarelli, for a few quick questions.
How did you guys meet?
I met Kevin [Lange], our vocalist, on a Facebook group, Extended Range Guitar Nerds a few years ago. We messaged each other about guitars, and metal, prog metal. A couple years later, Kevin posted on the same page looking for a 7/8 string guitarist, so I messaged him and drove all the way up to Simsbury to meet up with him, and that's how it started!
Is there a meaning behind the band name?
Construct Paradise basically entails the idea of constructing your own happiness, but it also applies to a lot of other things. It's kind of... As opposed to other people telling you what to think, you should come up with your own thoughts and make your own happiness, no matter where you might end up in life.
What would you consider your biggest accomplishment so far as a band?
I would consider our two singles, "Lucid Dream" and "Haunt Me", our biggest accomplishments so far because they both broke 30,000 views in the past year. Even though it's not that big a number in the grand scheme of things, it's cool to know that 30,000 people listened to a song that you're a part of.
What's one thing that comes with being in a band that you weren't prepared for/didn't expect?
One thing I didn't expect... Having 5 different other opinions other than your own, having to decipher what the band's future is going to be... Everyone likes to fine-tune things so we try to fine-tune everything we put out to the best possible outcome, but sometimes we all have different opinions. But I think that made me more mature in terms of being in a band and dealing with people, whether it's while advertising or promoting my band band or just trying to make music.
What/who influenced you to play guitar?
Whatever first Guitar Hero game I got... (laughs) I can't remember which Guitar Hero it was, but Guitar Hero in general made me think it was really cool to play guitar. But when I actually sat down and started actually playing the guitar, I quickly found Jason Becker and since then he's always been the biggest inspiration to my guitar mentality, because he has a very creative and open-minded flow.
What do you hope people get out of your music? What's the vision behind it?
Break down the mould of who you are as a person and look at it from a different perspective. We all need to look at things from different views and be more open to what's out there. A lot of us just listen to mass mentality over our gut feelings and heartfelt thoughts and emotions... In this age, I feel like it's "not cool" to listen to your gut, so I hope we can encourage people to open their minds. Also, I want to talk about lizard people in my music (laughs).
Your personal favourite song? Released or unreleased?
Oooh, it's a song that we haven't released yet, we're currently filming a music video for it and it's going to be very, very different from what Construct Paradise usually does. For our EP "Suspended Animation," I joined the band late in the writing process, so I just only got to change the structure for one song, and did some leads and solos on a few songs. But I now have a chance to show who I am as a musician, and wrote this entire song for Construct Paradise. We'll be releasing in the months to come, we're trying to release it very soon. I'm so happy, it's going to be really great.
Is there anything else you would like to add, anything people should know about your band?
Ooh we've played on bills with Born Of Osiris, After The Burial, Ice Nine Kills and other bands... Blogs in Japan have written about us, we have reviews on itsdjents.com... Oh! And our website is up! We have merch up too!
Here's a few quick links if you're interested in checking out Construct Paradise!
Suspended Animation EP: iTunes, Amazon Music, Google Play, and Spotify.
Construct Paradise's official pages: website / youtube / facebook / twitter / instagram.
