Review Fix Exclusive: Shade’s Stephane Senecal-Tremblay Talks ‘Brain Suck’ And More

March 24, 2020 Patrick Hickey Jr. Music 0

Review Fix chats with Stephane Senecal-Tremblay, who breaks down the band’s origin, creative process and goals for the future.

Review Fix: How did you get involved in music?

Stephane Senecal-Tremblay: Growing up skateboarding we were all introduced to really good music. I’m not sure where we’d be without having been introduced to those bands at that moment in time. It seemed skateboarding and owning a guitar kind of went hand in hand. 

Review Fix: What’s your creative process like?

Senecal-Tremblay: It all depends where we are as a band. If we’re in car we’re stuck with voice notes on our phones haha. Sing into the phone. We’ve got a great group of us together now so we’ve really been sharing lots of ideas, bringing new riffs, chord progressions in, and then take it from there as a band. Sometimes I’ve got something close to fully formed and it doesn’t take long for us to sort the song out and figure it out. Other times we play off each other and see where things go.

With Brain Suck and the batch of songs recorded with it, it was mostly just Sam and me working on demos of early stage songs and building them up in the studio. The songs obviously had a clear direction, but it really wasn’t until Sam and I were in the studio that we fully decided exactly how things would sound.

Review Fix: What inspires you?

Senecal-Tremblay: Weather and dreams. Sounds a bit cliche but it is what it is. Being at home at night when everybody else is sleeping. It’s a very calming experience haha.

Review Fix: What does music mean to you?

Senecal-Tremblay: Music is my significant other.

Review Fix: What makes this band special?

Senecal-Tremblay: I’m not sure that’s really up to us to decide. The people playing in the band are special to me, and the music we make. Sometimes just how long a song has been kicking around in a “demos” folder makes it special. Why are we special?

Review Fix: How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard you?

Senecal-Tremblay: I’d try not to get too convoluted. The simplest way I could describe our sound would be to say we sound like American 90s and UK 90s put together. 

Review Fix: How are your live shows different from your studio work?

Senecal-Tremblay: The studio is us at work and live shows is us playing. 

Review Fix: What inspired your latest single?

Senecal-Tremblay: I believe it started off by us listening to Big Long Now by Nirvana and wanting to make something similar. Naturally by the end it doesn’t sound a whole lot like it. But the song came from a darker place. Anthem for broken relationships.

Review Fix: What are your goals for 2020?

Senecal-Tremblay: Lots of shows. Lots of music. And lots of writing. 

Review Fix: What’s next?

Senecal-Tremblay: We’re just excited to get our album out… and of course we hope people like it as much as we do.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14317 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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