By Evelyn Flores & Erika Nunez, Photos By Gabrielle Davila Ortiz
“Weed, struggle, and riffs,” says Jacodie of Scrutiny when asked to describe the band’s music in three words. No explanation necessary.
Scrutiny’s no-skip, self-titled EP was released on Spotify last year on 9/11, the name inspired by the band’s surrounding environment when they formed during the pandemic.
“When you have people that have such fiery personalities in the fucking hardcore scene over here, I just felt like a lot of tension was building up… It just seemed to kind of fit the environment more or less… seeing the state of hardcore throughout COVID and throughout the, I don’t know, layered misunderstandings of social media, kind of like led us to that name.”
The band currently consists of Jacodie Big Mountain on vocals, Bren Medina on bass, Yari on guitar, and Chuck Flysure on drums along with a former band member, Ruben Marin, who’s worth noting for the major role he played in the writing of the band’s first EP including crowd-favorite “Faceplant” featuring James Villa of Dredge.
Jacodie describes how Ruben leaving the band due to scheduling conflicts presented some difficulty in finding another member who would fit the “Scrutiny mold.” However, Bren was a natural fit, Jacodie describes.
“Bren has always been there… and we’re just all really big fans of their work. They brought a lot of, like, really neat songwriting ideas to the band. A lot of the best bridges on our newest release are pretty much all Bren. They came up with all that shit [and] plays bass hard as fuck.”
Jacodie also affably describes their guitarist and drummer. “Lance does sound for Hitsville,” an immersive Motown tribute at the Rio Hotel & Casino, “I think that’s pretty cool.” Their drummer, Chuck, “is adorable. Chuck’s the cute one,” says Jacodie, “If we were a boy band, Chuck’s the cute one. He also has probably the biggest head, not ego-wise, but like sheer… circumference.”
He notes how Chuck’s father, an OBGYN, delivered Piper Ferrari from another must-listen-to local hardcore band, Roman Candle. Her younger sister was also named after him. Oh yeah, Las Vegas is small.
Originally from Anaheim, California, Jacodie moved to Las Vegas at the age of six. His mom was a “punk kid” which shaped his view of the world. He emphasizes that his desire to play music stems from Brian Eno’s No Wave compilation, No New York. “It’s full of people that cannot play instruments at all. It’s like total avant-garde.” He adds “To see that being put on tape and people cherish it and shit. I was like, oh, I can do that. It’s fucking easy.” The No Wave genre is marked by a complete abandonment of usual rock constructs, experimenting with disparate styles. No New York is a defining piece of the No Wave movement, and this comp set Jacodie’s drive to start writing songs in motion. Hearing No Wave music encouraged him to pick up a guitar and learn in a non-traditional way.
“Before that, I was always surrounded by virtuosos who were always really, really good at what they did. And I was like some fuckup punk kid, so it just didn’t seem tangible before that.”
Kept to his guerilla-style ethos, Jacodie adds “To this day, it just always made the imperfections feel more real to me now… Like, you may be able to play this, but you can never play it the way that I can.”
He mentioned that while everyone in the band learned to play music in different ways, they came together smoothly to form their sound.
“We all kind of have our own funky ways of doing things and breaking past that barrier of trying to explain like, oh, you’re supposed to bend slightly on this note, or whatever the fuck, is a little bit of a challenge…other than that, I’d say it’s pretty easy. Most of the time, we bring riffs to each other that we record at home and then piece them together at practice.”
Regarding the songwriting process, we were curious about Scrutiny’s sonic and lyrical inspiration. Regarding lyrics, we mentioned to Jacodie that we weren’t able to find them anywhere.
“They’re purposely not out,” he says amusingly, “interpret it yourself… but yeah, they’re mostly Jay-Z lyrics,” he laughs, “I was having a real, like, creative dry spell just listening to Blueprint a lot. I was like, this guy knows what he’s talking about.” Jacodie clarifies that the lyrics aren’t taken verbatim. “I just took words that he used and stuff that seemed right. Everyone rips off—if you’re not ripping off Jay Z, what you doing?”
Jacodie shared that the inspiration behind the lyrics for the upcoming EP went a little differently. “I guess the influence for that came from a lot of power electronics, especially stuff that kind of came out in the 80s in the UK. I kind of like the whole psychosexual aspects they bring to songwriting and shit. It’s just, it’s really jarring. It’s really vulnerable and I feel like that’s a kind of thing I want to push a little bit for…”
Regarding Scrutiny’s influences, Jacodie notes how everyone in the band listens to such different kinds of music, not even the same genre of hardcore. However, the bands consistent for all of them include Negative Approach, Queens of the Stone Age, and Mayhem.
“We all come from really different backgrounds. Before I was in Scrutiny, I was in Sowithout, before that, I was in a No Wave band. I did black metal. I was in a doom metal band. Chuck, this is his first band…. Bren is also in Diiphen and used to be in Morosis, so their background’s more shoegaze. Same thing with Yari. He was in a bunch of powerviolence bands and shit too. So, it’s kind of just a product of everything we’d already done in the past and bring it all together into one thing, more or less.”
When asked about Scrutiny in general, Jacodie’s motivations aren’t on making it big, but rather contributing to the community.
“When I started this band, I really wanted to bring together the punk scene and the hardcore scene, because it was really separated for a long time. Especially growing up, it felt really weird being the only one at a hardcore show with, like, patches on your jeans or whatever, you know what I mean? Kind of wanting to bridge that gap was a big focus of it, to begin with.”
Jacodie went on to describe a feeling of alienation he has felt before and believes people new to either the punk or hardcore scene might have also felt. However, he does offer a disclaimer that it may just be his own “narcissistic anxiety.”
“It seems like the identities of the cultures, especially in Vegas, just kind of push each other apart. I guess that I would like to see it come together. I just want everyone to feel like they can be a part of this on any level. I don’t want it to feel like there’s an entry fee or a hazing ritual you have to go through to be a part of this.”
Scrutiny being for anyone and everyone, whether you’re new to the scene or not, is your green light to check them out at their next show and stream their upcoming EP.
Jacodie has been in numerous bands, most recently playing guitar for Sowithout, and he spoke to us about how it felt to switch from instrumentals to lead vocals. “There’s not as much responsibility, so that feels nice” he says, jokingly referring to not feeling as inclined to help load in gear. More tangible pressures like forgetting your pedal board or the chords to a song also dissolved as he moved to the microphone. His role in the band also shifts a bit, noting “There’s more of a hands-off approach to being in the band, so that took a little getting used to,” he adds, “but I think we all work in a unit really well.”
Aside from music, Jacodie is also an incredible multimedia designer (@icantfindmyknife). If you’ve worn one of Scrutiny’s shirts, plastered their stickers on your water bottle, or have seen their album artwork, you’ve come across Jacodie’s insane artwork. This isn’t his first time designing for bands. “I’ve been doing art forever,” he tells us, specifically collage work and all the album artwork for his previous band Sowithout.
“The digital art more just kind of came out of necessity… not wanting to commission people to do artwork for Scrutiny and stuff like that. And just kept on doing it from there.”
He mentions he has a huge stack of magazines for his collage work and an entire folder in his phone dedicated to sourced images to use in his next pieces. “It’s kind of become compulsive at this point. If I can’t sleep, I’m just going to do a piece of art.”
The inspiration behind his artwork comes from noise albums that have a “mysterious dirge-y quality to them” that he finds fascinating. Conflict imagery is also a prominent motif in his art that relates to the aggressive nature of the music his work often accompanies.“Visual art for some reason is much more nerve-wracking,” he adds and explains how he’d love to continue making artwork only for himself and his friends’ bands.
Jacodie, a Capricorn, doesn’t relate to the common characteristics of his zodiac sign (workaholic, stoic, money-driven) “No, no, no, no” he says to each. “I’m definitely very negative, but I feel like I’m more driven by fun than anything. I’ve definitely taken jobs that sounded funner over jobs that paid more, and I’ve definitely sacrificed a lot in my life just to have fun. I don’t really regret that.” It’s true, currently, his personal goal is to own a motorcycle.
Scrutiny is going on tour later this year in November and releasing a new self-titled EP, Scrutiny II, in the near future. “It’s all recorded. Pretty much all finished. We’re just waiting for the right time.” Keep in touch with Scrutiny’s music and Jacodie’s artwork on Instagram.
Here’s a playlist of music Jacodie’s into and inspired by:
Scrutiny: Instagram | BandCamp | Spotify
Jacodie’s Art: Instagram
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