Fire Tiger

I recently feel as if I hit the jackpot upon discovering retro rock-pop outfit Fire Tiger. Ever since watching their video for the title track on their debut album, Energy, I haven't been able to get enough of this wonderful act. And, with that said, I was more than ecstatic to sit down and have a talk with them not only about their roots as a band, but also their debut album and future plans.

Alright, just for starters, a little thing I like to do, tell us who you are and what you do.

Tiffany - "Thanks for the interview Steven! I would describe Fire Tiger as a modern retro rock band with heavy 80?s, and some 70?s and 60?s influences. James and I like to write the songs together, music and lyrics.?

Let's talk about your influences. Who really made you pick up your first instrument, wanting to play it?

Tiffany - "Influences? There are so many! Anyone from Phil Collins to Cyndi Lauper, Heart, The Smiths...What about you James?"

James - "My taste is about the same, we like just about everyone from the 80?s, from new wave bands, to hard rock bands, to pop singers. We try to combine everything we like and make something new out of it. I mean, I don't like to name anybody because I don't know where to start. We like a lot of 70?s and 60?s too."

Tiffany - "There's really so many of them. Morrissey's a big influence of mine as a person. We just have so many people. And Michael Jackson. You can't forget him."

James - "So, everyone from Morrissey to Michael Jackson?"

When did you guys first meet?

James - "Tiff and I met at my friend's party years ago, and wound up living in a house together, six of us in the Hollywood Hills, and we lived with our guitarist and our drummer. That's where we started to make the first album. It actually took three years to make Energy, our debut album which came out this year. And we're moving onto the next album, which should be out by early 2015."

Now, when did Fire Tiger, as a band, come together as a whole?

Tiffany - "I think 2011? Are you asking where the name came from?"

Well, that was actually my next question, but, yea, where did the name come from?

James - "We were kind of looking for a double name, those used to be really popular. You know, like Duran Duran, Oingo Boingo, Tears For Fears, Mr Mister, A-Ha??

Now, I've listened to a lot of your music, and I have a question about that. Do you listen to mainstream sounds of today, or do you mainly stick to the 80s?

Tiffany - "Well, we really like the 60s and 70s quite a bit. Boston, Supertramp are some of our favorite bands. The Beatles."

James - "Most of the artists we like from the 80s are rock carryovers from the 70s like Genesis, Tom Petty, Jefferson Starship, Pink Floyd, too many to name? We kind of lump those decades together, the 60s, 70s, and 80s. In the 90s I feel like there were a few geniuses, don't get me wrong, but I feel like music took a downturn. I like some music today, and Tiff probably likes more music today, but in general we feel like the 90s never went away with songs being about, 'Look at me and how dark I am,' versus something more universal and outside of yourself."

I recently read an article that said not a single album went platinum this year in 2014. From the 60s up until the 90s a lot of albums went platinum. How do you guys feel that albums won't sell anymore?

James - "Well, I have a very strong opinion about this - that it's only partially because of streaming and download technology?"

Tiffany - "There was that technology in the 80s, you could just record the song on a tape off the radio."

James - "But it's more because of the overall low quality of most mainstream music today. I wish the record industry had more of an open mind, to maybe go back and look at what styles of songwriting really sold. Those past decades that we love were also the most commercially successful. I think the decline in sales had more to do with: What do people look for when they want to buy a record? They want to buy a record they can hold in their hand and go, 'Wow, this is a great record. I love every song. I'm going to grow old with these songs.' You know, they want something that lasts, not something that sounds like something else this month, and then is forgotten about next month. Which I feel that much of music today has turned into."

And, on that note, let's talk about your debut album, "Energy". A lot of artists, for their debut, try to get a collection of songs together that'll show off who they are and what they do. Is that what you guys tried to do?

Tiffany - "All the lyrics do represent us, because we are human and we feel this way, so other people might feel this way. Are you talking about the lyrics?"

Anything and everything, from the sound to the lyrics.

Tiffany - "Yea, every song is different. Sometimes, I put myself in another person's shoes and write the song that way. So, I guess it has nothing to do with me. I don't know if that was the answer...?

James - "Was that the answer? What was the question again?"

Tiffany - "I think it was, 'Does the music represent you?'"

James - "Does it represent us as people, or?"

Well, everything you said was great, but the original question was does your debut album push out the main themes and messages of the band?

Tiffany - "Oh, the messages of the band. We are all over the place. This is like a counseling experience. I don't know. Who am I? Why am I who I am? Yea, they do represent us. Next question!"

The title track, "Energy", had its own music video. I remember watching that, and it had an extreme retro feel which I fell in love with. Did you look at any other videos from the past to get influence for it?

Tiffany - "Not really. That's how I normally dress, if you're looking at the style of my clothing. It's just a normal outfit I would wear down the street and a roommate filmed it in less than two hours. We just went with the flow. I told him, 'Just keep filming me, and I'll start talking to these mannequins and walk down the street and do whatever I can do.'"

James - "Yea, the video was done in three hours only. Tiff edited it, she?s very talented with that. We have three videos out, Energy, He Has Changed and Green Light, all were self produced with no budget. I don't mean to say by ourselves, sometimes we have filmographers, actors, and other people helping out? They did it trying to help create something we all loved, and that they would be proud of."

Tiffany - "Did we look at any 80s video in the past? That was an accident. I think it just looked 80s just because of the way the street looked and maybe my vest. So, it just accidentally captured that 80s feel. And the mannequins are 80s, too."

I know you already said that your debut album has gotten good reception. Have you had any comments that really stuck out to you?

Tiffany - "Yes. If I could just get a book of all the comments, I love them!

James - "Have you checked out any of them on YouTube or Twitter or anything?"

The one that actually stuck out to me was the one YouTube comment, "Ever since the 90s, music has sucked," not word for word, but they fell in love with you and you gave them faith in humanity or something like that.

Tiffany - "We have a lot of comments that are just way out there, even about 'saving the human race,' [laughs] or 'saving music'. We would certainly never say that about ourselves, but of course we?re very flattered, and really love those compliments so thank you, and keep them coming!?

James - "I think a lot of these comments come from people thinking that music has taken a downturn over the last couple of decades. And they want to bring music back, chords back, melodies back, lyrics that are timeless."

Tiffany - "Melodies that brought out the lyric. There are a lot of great lyrics today from really good indie bands and I just don't know that they're there. You can't tell why he's saying that because there's no melody, there's no chords under the melody, and he's singing in the bathroom far away. It's not like people don't write good lyrics anymore, you just can't tell."

James - "I feel like grunge taught us you could play a couple of chords on a guitar and that's a hit song with the lyrics being, even if they're good, you can't understand them unless you really read into it. And, with rap and EDM, too, the way it's become such an integral part of pop music, you know, it's like where has rock gone? I don't know. It's either you're an indie band or you're a pop artist with urban influences. I don't mind some of it, I just wish that it wasn't so proliferate in our music culture today."

Tiffany - "Taking over, it's taking over."

We talked about album sales previously, but how has "Energy" been selling?

Tiffany - "Wonderful. I want to thank all our fans out there, I want to thank my mom. We've been selling hundreds of songs and albums daily on iTunes and Amazon. Twitter's an excellent marketing tool for us. YouTube really helped us get our music out there. And these numbers keep growing and growing. Every day, every week I check our reports, and every day we're growing in numbers."

Tiffany - "And our Vinyl has been selling really well."

James - "Yeah we sell Vinyls, CDs, and T-shirts from our website, FireTigerMusic.com and ship those out personally everyday which is great."

You guys aren't on label as of yet, so you do all your own physical sales yourself, right?

Tiffany - "A hundred percent. All the advertising is us. For our musical sales, we take a vinyl, we tape it up, try to not get any dog hairs in there, and send it out personally. We go to the post office every day. We get a few orders every time. A majority of the sales we get are on iTunes and Amazon."

Do you every find it hectic doing your own promotion and advertising?

Tiffany - "Do we ever! Yes, we do. And, I can't wait for someone else to take over so we can concentrate on our second album and seek out a tour to go on and everything else we should be doing. It's a big headache, actually, but it does pay off."

I've seen a video or two of you guys playing live on stage and you're pretty energetic. Did you ever have a bad time on stage and did the audience react well?

James - "There was this one? I don't know if it was because the sound engineer just didn't care, but it was our worse sounding in front of unfortunately one of our biggest audiences."

Tiffany - "Thankfully, the next show we hired our own sound guy, Frankie. It was like day and night with the audience feedback. You could actually hear us, we sounded like our CD, which is what we're supposed to sound like. You really can tell from the response. I think the sound engineer might more be important than the lead singer!"

I know you guys already said that you're working on a new album, but do you guys have anything else planned for the future? Tours? Any new singles?

Tiffany - "Well, we hope to work with a label with the resources to get us out there.?

And, now we've come to an end. You can leave any final messages below for fans, friends, loved ones.

Tiffany - "We would just like to thank our family, friends, fans, and you for sticking by our side through these hard times. Thank you so much!"