sidebody: a band of friends who experiment

I recently hooked up with Somerville artists Cara Giaimo, Lena Warnke, Martha Schnee, Hava Horowitz, a band of friends who experiment with music, performance, and zine publishing.
They call themselves "sidebody." They are part of the fabric of Somerville, MA.--the" Paris of New England."

As musicians and artists how has it been for you guys living in Somerville—the " Paris of New England?"


“We all feel grateful to live in Somerville. We have a practice space in the basement of Central Street Studios that allows us to keep this project going, and to meet other artists. I love going to shows and getting to know people from overlapping scenes and generations. It’s inspiring and also motivating — we need to make the city more affordable so that artists can live and work here.” (Cara)




“I feel there is a very interesting direct comparison between Paris and Somerville, which is that their prime time is in the past, and they are now slowly falling into a capitalist decay. And there are certain holdovers, specifically older generations, who embody that spirit. I personally feel like I'm learning from those elders to try to keep it alive.” (Lena)




People have described your music as experimental, punk minimalist, do it yourself etc... How do you define yourselves?

“Sidebody is an amalgamation of sound, friendship, silliness, physical space, performance, and making nothing into something.” (Martha)


“Friendship-based vibes. Rocky, snappy tunes that come up with new and crazy theories about the world. Organic, intuitive and fun, and surprisingly complex when you're not expecting it.” (Lena)


“Experimental is right but it’s more like a kid experimenting with a chemistry set — mixing up all our influences and personalities in different shaped beakers, and seeing what freezes or blows up.” (Cara)




Tell us about the performance aspect of your group....is it traditional theatre or something else?




“We do work with all of the fundamental elements of what theater is — the body, the voice, the set, the audience, and the emotional realm of characters. We're really focused as a collective on having some sort of storyline or thematic focus for our performance, which I think is different than a lot of bands… The more we can break down barriers of what a typical music performance looks like — where there's really clearly defined roles of who plays what instrument and who's watching and who's listening — the more fun it is, for us and also the audience.” (Hava)


“It's somewhere between a DIY rock-and-roll basement show performance, and performance art in the tradition of the Dadaists or the surrealists or 60s-style Happenings, where process comes before product.” (Martha)




I am a small press publisher, so I was interested in your zine publications. Years ago --I interviewed noted Somerville writer Pagan Kennedy. She started her career by publishing zines when she lived in Allston. How does this fit in with your artistic mission? Is there a political aspect to them?




“We are a community focused band, and we make music in a communal way. Our zines also embody that. ELFLAND: a zine, for example, brought together neighbors to archive an ephemeral, communal art space that was displaced because of development. We're trying to hold onto a certain time, a certain spirit. Another political aspect is deconstructing individualism — this also relates to the way we write songs, which really is something that we do as a group. Our band and our zines decenter or complicate the idea of the individual maker.” (Lena)




It is hard to make a living as an artist. How do you guys make your daily nut?




We all have jobs that are not sidebody — we piece different and overlapping professional and artistic endeavors together in order to make a living. Cara is a journalist who writes articles and books, Hava is a storytelling and presence coach, Martha is an educator and printmaker, and Lena is a researcher, educator, and photographer. We do find that all this work informs sidebody and vice versa. We called our last album “full time job” as a joke, because while the band feels like a full time job, and sometimes we wish it was, it’s very difficult to imagine making the numbers work.


We all also come from privileged backgrounds, and are very aware of how lucky we are to be able to do this at all. Not everyone is in a position to give so much time and energy to art in a society where it’s not valued the way other work is!



Why should we view and or listen to your work?


“Our work deals with the simple joys and tragedies and small-time aspects of life — like breakups, or like doing nothing. But then we go big as well, so we're kind of stretching across the scales of life. And I think that's really relatable. I think our work is also a celebration of friendship, and I think people want to hear that more.” (Lena)


“I think that we are sharing the possibility that you don't have to be technically excellent in order to make something really interesting. That is something I find super refreshing when I view art. Especially now with AI that can make technically perfect pop songs, or technically perfect digital paintings — I think messiness and the raw material of making is only going to become more interesting and important and vital to art. We're constantly learning new things as a group, whether that's learning to play instruments that we're not familiar with, or sing in styles that we're not familiar with, or use our voices in new ways, or engage in new kinds of audience interaction or bits. We're constantly experimenting. And I think it's just fun to watch a band experiment live. That's an exciting space to be a spectator in, versus going to a show where you know it's gonna be perfect.” (Hava)


“No matter what’s happening in the world, or in your day or your week or your year, making music and art basically always feels good. The professional aspects of being in a band are fun to experience and play around with, but the core of sidebody is about bringing these spontaneous, creative, silly aspects of life to the forefront, and reminding other people that they can do that too.” (Cara)


“You should do whatever you want!” (Martha)