Koyo
Since forming in 2020, every single second of music
recorded by Koyo has been completely and utterly genuine. Formed in Long
Island, New York by five childhood friends who grew up together-vocalist Joseph
Chiaramonte, guitarists Harold Griffin and TJ Rotolico, bassist Stephen Spanos,
and drummer Salvatore Argento-Koyo's music is the sound of Stony Brook
summers flipping between
Taking Back Sunday
and Silent Majority while driving to the beach, living in songs that
feel just like home.
Three years after their formation-and hot on the heels of a slew of acclaimed EPs-Koyo is now taking their
next step in the hallowed halls of Long Island hardcore with Would You Miss
It?, the band's debut album. Following in the footsteps of the giants of
hardcore, pop-punk, and emo that came before them, Koyo are aware of the weight
a debut album carries, and they've been slowly crafting it since the band's
earliest days. "We really slow-cooked this record," says Chiaramonte. "There
are songs on it that go back as far as being written just after Painting Words
Into Lines came out. Even as we were writing
for Drives Out East, we knew certain
songs had to be allocated for certain things. We'd just
keep them in the bank and develop them over time."
Despite all the planning and tinkering, there's
nothing contrived about Would You Miss
It?, because there's nothing remotely manufactured about Koyo. Every element is
a genuine representation of the people creating it, and the album was concocted
in the most authentic way possible: with five friends, all together, writing
songs. "We have great chemistry as a band and as songwriters," says Griffin. "That's
the beautiful thing about Koyo, that we can sort of fit
into everything. We never try to box ourselves in, because no matter what we
do, it will still be us."
To fully immerse
themselves in the recording process,
Koyo decamped to a barn in rural New Jersey with producer Jon
Markson (Drug Church, Regulate, One Step Closer) and spent six weeks digging
into every detail
of the record. The product
is songs like "You're
On The List (Minus One)," "Message Like A Bomb (ft. Daryl Palumbo)," and
"Anthem," tracks that build upon Koyo's established foundation, but feel
sharper, stronger, and even more singalong ready. "This record was a labor of
love," says Chiaramonte. "Not just because of the work that went into it, but
because of all the life experiences that shaped it. The record was a life-fulfilling, life-affirming thing to make, but it hurt a little bit to make, too."
That's no metaphor. Nearly every day working with Markson
was a marathon 10-hour session with the band poring over every single detail to
ensure their debut album met their expectations. Meanwhile, Griffin was
learning how to walk again after an onstage accident precipitated a major ankle surgery.
"The first week we were at the studio, I was
in a wheelchair with my foot up and could not do anything," says Griffin.
"Three of the songs on the album were written from that wheelchair. I had a physical therapist
a mile away from the studio,
so I learned how to walk while living at this farm for six weeks."
For Chiaramonte's part, the lyric writing process forced
him to dig deep into himself. Musically, Koyo's songs flow out of Griffin
and Rotolico as naturally as a conversation at an all-night diner but, for Chiaramonte, writing lyrics
proved to be a deeply introspective experience. He'd drive somewhere remote and
sit for hours with a notepad until what filled the page was an honest,
open-hearted sentiment. "Life's A Pill" is a prime example, and a perfect
encapsulation of the range of emotion Koyo captures throughout each of the tracks on Would You
Miss It?.
"'That song is about a family member of mine passing away from a drug overdose
when I was on my first full U.S. tour," says Chiaramonte about "Life's A
Pill." "Ultimately, I chose to stay on that tour. I didn't want to grieve. I
didn't want to think about it. It was all so
overwhelming that I just opted to shoulder
how I was feeling, finish
the tour, and deal
with it another day. I found that I started to do that with a lot of things
because I started to tour full time that year. There were so many interpersonal
problems that I was just smothering. That song dives into that. The loss, the
avoidance, and what I was doing mirrored what some people turn to drugs for. It's a giant song about loss and escapism."
Would You Miss It? is the kind of album that could only be made by a group of self-proclaimed genre-obsessives. It's why Koyo can
seamlessly transition from playing the This Is Hardcore festival to opening for
Bayside, because they make perfect sense no matter what bill they're on. That
natural musical dexterity is what fostered collaborations with Glassjaw's Daryl
Palumbo ("Message Like A Bomb"), Vinnie Caruana of The Movielife
("What's Left To Say"), and Vein.FM's Anthony
DiDio ("Flatline Afternoon")
on songs where each part was written specifically with the guest vocalist in
mind. Each person fits right into Koyo's musical language, and expresses the
range of sounds and feelings the band can express at any given time.
Taken in full,
Would You Miss It? is the coming-of-age tale of five friends joining
together to take on the world. Fueled by a love for music, and a shared
creative bond, Koyo sets the bar for the new wave of Long Island bands. As
Chiaramonte notes on "Anthem," a lyrical love letter to Long Island scenes of
the past, present, and future, "the best is yet to come." Pay attention,
because you won't want to miss it.