Eating Breakfast for Dinner, and Singing About it

By VICTORIA ADDISON
Executive Editor

The halls of the Hearst Center were rather empty compared to the usual sounds made as students rush to classes on the weekdays.
“Hey guys I think I’m feeling it now…”
“1, 2, 3!”
The silence was soon interrupted by the sound of folk grooves echoing off the walls of the building.
“You got me.”
Enter Jack’s Place. Dim the lights. Show time.
“Like coffee.”
“And I’m buzzin’, buzzin’ for your baby.”
The quintet stood illumined on stage, about to end the final song on their set list.
“You got me, ohhh.”
Applause echoed out from the handful of onlookers as the coffee-inspired ballad came to an end. Saturday night’s rehearsal was a success.

***

The energy in the room was evident on each of their faces. With less than an hour until rehearsal was slated to start, Breaking the Fast was unleashing their quirkiness early.
“So, do you all love breakfast?”
They responded with a flurry of answers.
“Who doesn’t?”
“Yeah, it’s the most important meal of the day.”
“I like coffee. I don’t drink it that much. I prefer tea, but that’s just me.”
“That’s ironic as hell.”
For the five music industry students who make up Breaking the Fast, singing about java is the norm.
“The first four songs that we have right now are breakfast themed, mostly just in the titles. It’s just kind of funny right now- not to say our songs aren’t serious, because they are,” said lead vocalist and guitarist Brittney Glogowski.
A self-identified folk fusion band, Breaking the Fast tries to combine each member’s personal music taste to form one unique sound. With banjo player Matthew Rees offering splashes of folk, Glogowski’s alternative-style vocals, a touch of blues from bassist Joe Benevento, a drummer named Tom Evans who just likes to jam, and Judybelle Camangyan’s added quirkiness from the trombone or ukulele, the group has started to create their own style.
“We don’t really want to describe ourselves as anything. We are Breaking the Fast and it’s like a fusion of who we are,” Camangyan said.
“It’s like just taking an omelet and just throwing tons of seasonings and weird ingredients in it,” Rees chimed in.
Composed of five freshmen from The College of Saint Rose, Breaking the Fast is inching their way into the local music scene. With a handful of performances under their belt and a four-song EP on the way, they group has kept busy since forming in October.
The idea to start a band was sparked by Glogowski and Benevento during a visit to Tierra Coffee Roasters early last semester. That same idea become reality after the duo found three more music industry students to join them.
“We made that decision at Tierra and the five of us found each other in Brubacher lounge,” said Glogowski. “We were having a jam session and we were like OK, we should get serious about this.”
Originally, they thought of calling themselves “Breakfast for Dinner,” but had to scrap the idea due to copyright issues. Thus, Breaking the Fast was born.
“Our friend thought of Breaking the Fast and I think of it just like you can think of breakfast, but like also you can allude that to something else,” said Judybelle Camangyan.
With a breakfast-themed track list ready to go, the band’s first off-campus performance took place at the end of February at The Low Beat on Central Avenue.
“We were definitely prepared for that show, so I think once we like got into it we were pretty comfortable,” said Evans.
The group’s ultimate dream is to play at Rose Rock, a venue that would allow most of the Saint Rose campus to hear their music.
But, for now, they will continue to book shows at Jack’s Place and around the Albany area.
A friend, and fellow freshman, Jared Husky, performed with the band at an open mic night at Jack’s Place last semester.
“I’m glad to say that I am friends with the members of Breaking the Fast. They are all incredibly cool people and extremely talented musicians,” he said.
By senior year, one member of the group wants to be on the road.
“I wanna be touring, like heck yeah,” said Camangyan.
Although the band members are not all from the same area, three of them will be staying in Albany for the summer in their own apartment. The group plans on booking some shows in New Jersey or New York City over the three-month break from classes.
Their band manager, a fellow music industry student, plans on helping them along the way.
“I decided to work with Breaking the Fast because they had a sound that made me smile,” said Patrick Flores, a junior at Saint Rose. “It’s so funny how many times I found myself humming along to their melodies because their songs would be stuck in my head for hours.”
Drawing inspiration from upperclassman bands such as Cobblestone and the Bad Mothers, a band that Flores is a part of, Breaking the Fast believes they have gotten far in the short amount of time they’ve been together.
“Definitely the resources that we have at Saint Rose have helped us a lot,” said Glogowski. “Just being able to practice there and making connections with other band members has gotten us very far in such a short amount of time.”
Yet, hash browns and coffee aside, the five freshmen admit juggling a band isn’t the easiest task to add on top of a busy class schedule.
“I’m a mess,” said Rees when asked about how he’s handling the two.
The solution? Late night rehearsals.
“It’s very stressful,” said Camagyan. “Most of the time it’s night-time practices, from like 9 to 11.”
“It gets stressful because it’s hard for us to find a set practice time every week. We just have to ask each other what fits for you each week,” Glogowski added.
Luckily, Jack’s Place offers a more practical venue for rehearsing, at least compared to the band’s early use of the second floor lounge in Brubacher Hall.
“We were written up once. We were jamming, but it’s a good story. I like it,” said Glogowski.

***

The lead singer stood barefoot, perched on her tip-toes. With eyes closed and a faint smile painted across her face, she strummed her guitar as the final word of the song escaped from her lips.
Then, the instruments were silent. “Hash Browns and Heart Break,” the song they all described as a mixture of breakfast and emotional pain, had ended.
“Are you sweating?” one asked.
“Yeah, I always am,” replied the guy behind the banjo, with strands of his long blonde hair sticking to his forehead.
“It’s a sweaty song,” added another.
With that, the group’s laughter cascaded from the stage inside Jack’s Place until it reached the halls, filling their empty confines once again with a sense of life.