Lately, I’ve been noticing a lot more small children around Williamsburg, around 3-4 years old, and I thought “what happened four years ago that could have caused this baby influx?” Then I realized that’s when husband and wife duo Ariel Scherbacovsky and Sagit Shir, better known the electro-pop band as Hank & Cupcakes, settled in Brooklyn and started playing shows that were so sexy that people were hooking up after – and sometimes during! – their sets.
I first saw the dynamic duo when I was leaving work at a local Brooklyn venue, and I was blown away that two people could create such a huge wall of sound – with a powerhouse of a lead singer/drummer in Cupcakes and a sea of pedals masterfully manipulated by bassist Hank, the pair fills each room with an unshakeable electricity. With each successive show, Hank & Cupcakes continue to win over audiences with their infectious hooks that you can’t get out of your head, their groovy beats that make your ass involuntarily shake, and their palpable chemistry that just makes you want to get naked, which is not so coincidentally the name of their debut album.
If you haven’t picked up Hank & Cupcakes album Naked yet, you should – it’s twelve tracks of non-stop energy and songs that stick with you like bubblegum sticks to your hair, but in a fun way. Whether you need to get pumped up for the day, to kickstart a dance party, or to get your hot date to inadvertently start taking off some clothes, Naked provides a stimulating and sensual soundtrack for all these activities. All three of these things tend to happen all at once when you see this commanding couple live.
Though a Hank & Cupcakes crowd stripping during their gigs isn’t anything new, naming their debut Naked has made it more of a rallying call. At a recent New York show, about half-way through a set of new dancehall-ready album cuts, drummer/singer Cupcakes took off her top, stood on her drum kit, magically pulled some black lipstick out of thin air, and wrote ‘GET NAKED!” on her stomach. About five seconds after that, a dude standing near me took off his shirt. More lipstick was thrown into the audience as people around me – both men and women – started taking off their clothes and drawing all over each other’s bodies. At one point, a lady stripped down to her bra and panties and hopped on stage with the band! Before launching into the second half of their set of familiar hook-driven hits, Cupcakes declared, “I want at least one shirt thrown at me right now,” a command that several fans eagerly obeyed before dancing their asses off and sweating off their impromptu body art. After ending their set with their infectious single “Hit,” the crowd cheers and Cupcakes informed their exalted fans, “We’ll be signing nipples at the merch table. Top priority to people with three nipples!” This show hands down was the most memorable shows I have seen all year.
I sat down with the duo in Williamsburg for a brief chat shortly after this epic show.
What was it like recording in Germany as opposed to here in New York and Brooklyn?
Cupcakes: Best fun of our lives. For us it was different for us mentally first of all, regardless of the actual physical difference. We’re in a different country, we don’t have access to emails, we don’t have people calling us, we were completely–
Hank: Isolated.
Cupcakes: Isolated in recording mode, in complete creative mode, which we never do here. We’re always multi-tasking, doing so many things at once. And in terms of the actual studio, it was just different.
Hank: I think because of the distance we had access to a top studio that we would never be able to get a studio like that here – it would be too expensive. And I think that the fact that we came from New York and that we were hooked up through our publishing at BMG, we were able to get a better price, and were just able to get hooked up in a very perfect way.
Cupcakes: Mainly our producer Ludwig Böss was hooked up with the studio, and he was amazing. He had a personal connection with the studio so he got us an amazing price for us.
When I heard that your album was finally about to be released and that it was going to be called Naked, I was like “HA! That makes total sense.” Have you been trying to start this “Get Naked” movement at your shows like at Mercury Lounge last week?
Cupcakes: We did stuff like that before so it was a natural extension.
Hank: It opened a lot of ideas. We weren’t really thinking about it, but then we worked on the teaser and all these ideas came for the promo and everything and it carried over to the shows somehow. You were at [Mercury Lounge], you saw what happened.
Yeah I did!
Hank: That was the first time that happened!
Really?
Cupcakes: There were some women….
Hank: Yeah, they just came on stage. We didn’t even know it was going to happen. We don’t know them.
Cupcakes: People thought they were our friends, but we had no idea who these people are, in a good way. Now we know them and we love them.
Hank: The merch girl was also improvising, which was great.
Yeah, I saw her on my way out. She was just standing there selling t-shirts and CDs topless. It was awesome. You’ve been touring this past month to support the album. Have people been getting naked at the shows on tour?
Cupcakes: Sometimes it happens in specific places, namely the Bug Jar in Rochester. Usually wild things happen when we play there. And I get a lot of items of clothing thrown at me during the set.
Hank: We encourage it as an act of personal liberation.
So maybe you answered this next question just now, but what’s the craziest thing to happen on tour?
Cupcakes: The craziest thing that happened on tour wasn’t on stage. It was that we were given a key by a friend to sleep in his apartment, but we didn’t know it was a master key for the whole building, and we walked into someone else’s apartment, slept the night in someone else’s house who thankfully wasn’t there. And then our friend came in the morning and saw us walking towards the door of the apartment and was like “Where are you going?” And we said “To your apartment…” and he said, “No I don’t live there!” That was crazy.
Hank: There’s been a lot of things.
Cupcakes: Our wildest show on this past tour was at the Bug Jar in Rochester. We posted a picture of the crowd all painted and not wearing much on our Facebook page. That was the most fun.
Hank: That place has a special tendency of becoming very hot in energy.
What is your dream show?
Cupcakes: I would love to play with Die Antwoord.
Hank: We recently went to a show for a band called Crystal Fighters. They were amazing, and we’d love to open for them.
Cupcakes: Our dream is just to play sold out, big attendance shows. Just a lot of people in the crowd.
Who would you love to play a show with?
Cupcakes: Well we only know the Beatles, so…
Hank: Yeah, and I think they stopped playing shows…
[laughs]Cupcakes: We don’t really know what’s cool right now. We’re out of touch and not really up to date on what’s “in” right now.
Hank: Some people say we should open for Sleigh Bells.
Whoa that’d be a fun show!
Cupcakes: But we don’t really know their music.
Nasa: Do you think it’s important to not pay attention to what everyone else is doing and focus on your own craft?
Cupcakes: It happens to us naturally. We try to not pay attention. We’re not consumed…
Hank: We’re not actively looking for new music and bands. We bump into them every now and then. I wouldn’t say it’s important, but it has its advantages. The disconnection keeps you doing your own thing and keeps you doing something maybe more original, but on the other hand, a lot of these bands are very inspiring and doing very innovative things…
Cupcakes: I think we’re fine not knowing who they are. Like when we started the band, for instance, everyone’s immediate reaction was to compare us to the White Stripes, so we deliberately did not listen to any of their music so that we wouldn’t somehow get influenced by their sound.
You guys are effortlessly stylish.
Cupcakes: Why thank you!
Hank: Sagit is the stylish one.
Where do you guys pull your inspiration from? Do you have any style influences? Like, your hair just looks so awesome!
Cupcakes: Thank you. I just teased it, I twirled it, and I sprayed it and it just worked! We just keep our eyes open. I like to look around and see what’s on the street. There’s no better place to get inspired than on the streets of New York for style. In general, I just like looking and changing…we’re lucky to be living in a neighborhood that has so many secondhand stores so we can afford to change our look all the time. Each item of clothing isn’t expensive so we can play around with it.
Your necklace is all zippers, right?
Cupcakes: This is from a new designer named Adi Hitchcock. She’s amazing. We’ve been playing shows exclusively wearing her jewelry. She just makes zipper necklaces and earrings. We definitely want to give her a shout out. She’s an inspiration for us at the moment. She gives us stuff, we’ve been wearing it during the whole tour, and people have been contacting her and she doesn’t even have a website up yet! People have been emailing her from Georgia and all kinds of locations ‘cause they see us perform in her stuff.
Hank: This necklace is so beautiful and so simple.
What do you guys have coming up next?
Download their “Ain’t No Love” EP on iTunes http://smarturl.it/5qp4sk
http://hankandcupcakes.com/
https://www.facebook.com/HankandCupcakes
https://twitter.com/HankandCupcakes
http://www.youtube.com/user/HankandCupcakes
Story: Rebecca An
Photos: Nasa Hadizadeh
