This is the true story of a guy named PHONY who really sounds like Elliot Smith and Kurt Cobain in his music.
Once upon a time there was a guy named Neil Berthier from New Orleans East and he was the singer and guitarist in this grungy punk rock band called Donovon Wolfington that started in 2011. And when his band was breaking up, he started his own solo project and was trying to play shows as Neil. Just Neil. And a promoter told him he had to have a band name, he just had to. So Neil went home and watched an episode of the old Twilight Zone where someone kept saying, “You’re a real phony…a real phony” over and over in that kind of Holden Caulfield way and just Neil became PHONY.
PHONY knocks us out, photo courtesy of Bandcamp
Incidentally, PHONY’s music, while grunge and raw in aesthetics, is actually sweeter and more hauntingly sincere than his minor chords make it seem. The multi-instrumentalist, who does all of his own musical stunts and used to work at Gasa Gasa, had a unique intro to music with a dad who was at Woodstock (hence his love of Hendrix and similar artists) and a mom who adored Billy Joel and Queen. He started playing music with the viola but then tossed it around age 9 for the guitar, then the bass, then drums. “I like to explore angsty stuff in an elegant, sophisticated, and smart way,” PHONY says, speculating on what might be the source of his confectionary sounding sincerity.
This August, the Loyola music program alum dropped “Knock Yourself Out,” an album that was recorded by Ian Farmer at Philadelphia’s Metal Shop that has been gaining momentum very quickly. The album feels immediately satisfying, with poetic tracks pulling you in like “The Shots” and “Peach.” Although his lyrics have all the stylings of an MFA student dragging a ragged copy of Rimbaud around, PHONY insists that writing the music in a song is the first part of his creative process. He hasn’t had a computer in five years and “as far as the songwriting process I just write them on an electric guitar with no amp and remember them and write them in my head.”
“When you get put under pressure and you have a lot of feelings that you have to get out, I’m not going to second guess anything because it’s all real. The thing with lyrics is that people want to say what they have to say today but they underestimate how much a set of notes along with words hits so much harder. You got to ride that line and decide what sounds the best. You’re listening to something — not looking at it.”
One thing you can look at is PHONY running around in a denim dress with leather shoes and no socks in the forest in the video for “Waffle House,” the breakout track from “Knock Yourself Out.” Shot post-Covid with director Ryan Dight, the video is like “Midsommar” with waffles. Part of the beauty of PHONY is his ability to not take himself too seriously — he even has a track that is his cousin telling him he can’t make his show.
Anyone who has been keeping track of PHONY the last several weeks can see a spike in his following which prompts this author to ask him whether he fears or embraces technology and social media.
“It doesn’t freak me out – it’s a logical progression but what is still key and most important in any creative endeavor you are doing is intention and individualism – as long as you are being who you are. For me, if I don’t want to tweet something or post, I’m not doing it and I don’t care. I’m going to keep living my life. There are individual things you can do to set yourself apart but look at the format and work with it as opposed to knocking it. It’s not going away,” he surmises, but says the social media competition is not his priority right now.
“I want to set up my home life to be what I’ve always wanted it to be and I’m trying to build from the inside up and out. I think people do stuff out of step and get their priorities messed up and it will eventually catch up with them. Everything is so quick and rise and die and music has a way of weeding people out. People who get jealous should wait a year because we won’t even know where they are right now. It’s the time you can compare yourself – not being happy. I think the world is a really dark place and ignoring that especially now is a bit hazardous. You can never give up and if you do you are admitting defeat.”
Follow PHONY’s adventures on Instagram and Twitter @1_800_PHONY
