Moes Haven

Moes Haven aren't known for doing things half way. Moes Haven is primarily comprised of Matt Farley and Tom Scalzo (and some guest musicians too). These two prolific guys are straight out of Manchester, NH. In 2006, they decided to take on the ambitious goal of making and recording thirty minutes of music every single day for a year. Each month, the best of the best tracks were rounded up and released on albums titled after that month. (These are available to order from cdbaby). They also made one last album titled Victory is Ours (For Now) with the best songs from the entire project. (Their next release is scheduled for 2012).

One glance at the absurd titles on the track list from Victory is Our (For Now) (like 'Let's Open a Deli!', 'Isn't This Spectacular, Kite Flying', and 'Peter Bogdanovich Can't Stop Talking About Orson Welles'), and you'll be intrigued by their sense of humor. The songs are creative, imaginative, and fun. At some point listening to this cd, it's guaranteed that you will crack a smile. Matt and Tom have a great sense of humor and a great sense of how to craft a song.

Download: Moes Haven A Walk in the Park
Download: Moes Haven Rattletrap

As a new feature on Villains, I've decided to do some short 5 question interviews.

5 Questions with Moes Haven:
How did you and Tom Scalzo meet?
Tom and I lived on the same floor during our freshman year of college. We were both English majors at Providence College in Rhode Island. Class of 2000.

What made you want to start a band?
It soon became evident that we both had a lot of interest in music. He played guitar and I played piano. We were both interested in the music of Bob Dylan and Van Morrison. Within a month of meeting each other, we started writing songs together. We continued writing songs together here and there through the first three years of college. During our senior year, we started writing a lot more. We'd meet once or twice a week for several hours and write and record one song after the other. That's how we developed our fast-paced songwriting style.

Can you describe the first show you played/ last show you played/ best show you played?
We are mostly a "studio band." There have only been three Moes Haven concerts:
We did a Battle of the Bands in college. In keeping with our odd sense of humor, we put on a very strange show which consisted of me on keyboard and Tom on Guitar. We had three girls on stage with us, dressed in uniforms. The girls just sat there and did nothing at all through the entire performance. It left the audience confused, but we still laugh about it.
In 2003 & 2004, I started mailing out CDs to different people and places around the country, which resulted in a coffeehouse in Wisconsin inviting us to play there for $25. Even though it took us two days and $300 in gas to get there, we thought it would be a fun road trip and we played a show in this little coffeehouse for about 12 people.
In 2001, I handed out free CDs at a concert in Boston. One of the people who received a disc ended up emailing me in 2007 and asking if we'd play a gig in his basement. So the most recent show was in "Tim's Basement" in Massachusetts. That happened in May of 2007. Tim and about a dozen of his friends seemed to enjoy the show.
So there have only been three Moes Haven shows. We're open to doing more performances, but we still focus primarily on writing and recording.

Recording 30 minutes of music every day for a year is an ambitious goal. Did you ever feel like you were running out of things to write about?
Yes. It was difficult. Some days, the albums were absolutely terrible. But we believe that the more you write, the more likely it is that you'll eventually write something that's good. We released the best songs from each month on an album named after that month, so as long as we were able to come up with 10-20 good songs per month, we were pleased.

Does Moes Haven have any shows coming up?
No. But we're always open to just about anything that comes our way.


Moes Haven on My Space
CD is available here.