Pleased To Meet Me: G.I. JINX
Introduce yourself… (Where are you from, what band do you play in etc..)
MF: My name is Michael Farsky, I live in Montreal and play in the band G.I. Jinx.
SP: I am Steve Peavey and I play guitar in G.I. Jinx. At this point Montreal is the city I've lived in the longest.
CD: My name is Carlo. I’m a gemini and I play guitar and bass with the jinxers.
AA: I’m Anna Arrobas, I sing and play guitar in G.I. Jinx, born and raised in MTL.
FM: My name is Félix Morel and I play drums in G.I. Jinx. I have been playing in bands and recording since 1994.
Why do you play music?
MF: Makes me feel really good.
SP: I play music to escape mostly.
CD: I love how listening to music can sometimes induce an altered state of consciousness. Creating music can facilitate the same experience for me and then there’s the same answer Michael gave--I like feeling good and playing music makes me feel good, especially with this band.
AA: I love how music has the power to capture emotions and can influence how people feel, and capturing emotions in songs is important to me. I think it’s really beautiful to be able to connect with people in that way.
FM: Because music is my lifelong passion and it brings me joy and catharsis in this fucked up world we live in.
What was a major influence on you as an Artist/Band?
MF: MuchMusic.
SP: For some reason, hearing Minor Threat at the age of 14 gave me permission to pursue playing in bands. Or at least it presented a more doable path, up to that point I had been lurking through heavy metal. But when Filler hit my ears I was all in. Figuring out how to include this activity has been a necessity.
CD: I grew up listening to the radio and to records and tapes my brothers had. That’s how I learned about music. There was a mixtape my brother’s friend gave me when I was very young that had Spacemen 3, Palace Music, Vince Guaraldi, Red Crayola, and others on it … and a Pink Floyd song from the soundtrack to the film “More”. That tape had a huge impact on me and shaped my appreciation for music but I still didn’t really understand how music worked. It wasn’t until I moved to Montreal for university that I started playing music.
AA: My dad was in the band Men Without Hats so growing up he showed me so many different styles of music, and he always encouraged me to play and write songs. My taste in music is all over the place but for this band in particular, Niagra from Destroy All Monsters was a huge influence vocally. Early Allison Shaw from Cranes, The album Self-Non-self was an album that really stood out to me when I started my first bands.
FM: For this project in particular me and Steve formed this band as a conduit to explore our shared interest in the dumbest, loudest aspect of punk adjacent sludge rock. We wanted to sound kind of like Kilslug or Flipper, the bummer band on a punk rock bill. Of course the addition of the other band members influenced that direction to create the beast that is now G.I. Jinx.
What’s a favourite book or film?
MF: Austin Powers.
SP: VALIS by Phillip K. Dick.
CD: Richard Brautigan’s “The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966” is a great book for me. I’ve worked in libraries for nearly 20 years and I read this book early into my career. I appreciated the metaphor for the library as a refuge.
AA: I read more graphic novels than books. The Crow by James O’Barr.
FM: I will always have a soft spot for The Shining. Maybe because I read the Stephen King book first or maybe because I accidentally caught the ‘twin girls with a bloody axe and corpses’ scene when I was a kid. I don’t know what was more traumatic: the actual scene or my parents both screaming at me to not look at the TV and go back to sleep.
Do you prefer the recording process or performing live?
MF: Both are stressful but if I could only do one it’d be recording.
SP: They each have their pros and cons. You can love and hate both in their own special ways. Situational awareness is a must.
CD: I’m somewhere in-between but generally prefer the studio and composing over recording or performing live. With performing live, it feels like I'm sprinting to the end of the set and I never have a chance to catch my breath and then with recording, it’s difficult for me because I’m not a very skilled player and I feel like my best takes are usually the ones where we didn’t record.
AA: I love performing live and sharing the songs we worked so hard on with other human beings in person.
FM: They can both be rewarding or stressful depending on the situation and vibe. Some bands I played with throughout my ‘career’ shined live and others were more successful on recordings.
What would be a dream collaboration?
MF: Recording music with my late father.
SP: In all seriousness, it's fucking cool to play music with Félix Morel for more than a decade. High-School me is quite chuffed.
CD: I’d like to play music with Alex Zhang Hungtai. Maybe he’ll play sax with us one day. Or Mozart.
AA: Being in G.I.Jinx is pretty much a dream to me, I was a huge No Negative fan so being in a band comprised of all remaining members in MTL is epic. I’d love to write a ballad with Glenn Danzig.
FM: I feel we already have a very full sound without much room for more musicians but I would love to collaborate again with Paul Gordon Phillips (Omegas, Playboy) on bass clarinet. He did some choice overdubs on a bunch of No Negative songs that brought them to the next level. He is also a very righteous human being.
Describe a favourite album.
MF: Gettin’ Personial by Clinton Machine - Very special, intimate and wild.
SP: Black Ark by Carl Crack. The late 90s at its best. Deeply sad and chaotic down tempo.
CD: Out of the Blue by “Blue” Gene Tyranny. Tyranny was a long time collaborator with Robert Ashley and the pianist for Iggy & The Stooges. Out of the Blue is one of my all time favourite records. Kind of a genre-defying avant-pop electro-acoustic record that gets so funky at times. The last track [A Letter from Home (Out of the Blue)] is quite possibly the most beautiful and meditative tone poem ever recorded.
AA: Murder She Spoke by La Chat, La Chat is my fav female MC. The tracks are so heavy and raw, brings me back to being an angry teenager.
FM: The Feeding Of The 5000 by Crass. I discovered this album when I was a teenage skateboarder who mostly listened to 80’s American thrash metal and hardcore punk. The deconstructed and tribal drumbeats mixed with noisy dissonant guitars blew my mind and left me wanting for more extreme and strange music. It was my gateway to experimental music, krautrock, noise, no wave etc. The lyrics are still relevant as fuck in 2025.
What's your favourite local haunt?
MF: My friend Pat’s living room to watch movies.
SP: Cafe Vito is the place I hit up most. Affogato on Friday afternoon in the summer, don't tempt me with a good time!!
CD: I don’t get out much but Casa del Popolo is still one of my favourite venues.
AA: I love staying home.
FM: My days of going out often are a bit past me and the local bar scene keeps changing so fast so it’s hard to think of something off the top of my head.
What's your strangest experience while performing live?
MF: Locking eyes with myself in a mirror, and realizing I’ve been playing all the music inside-out.
SP: That time in a previous project when Mauro used the toilet in the Firey Furnaces dressing room and didn't flush. Though this was before our set.
CD: I’m drawing a blank and I’m really trying to unpack Michael’s answer.
AA: Nothing to report.
FM: Not that strange but when I was on tour with Fly Pan Am and Godspeed You Black Emperor. I ate a prosciutto sandwich at a road side cafe on our way to Rome and got very nauseous. I had to play the whole show with a bucket next to my hi-hat and I apparently played the whole set a couple BPM too fast because I was on the brink of vomiting. As soon as we finished playing I bolted for the bathroom to puke but it was full so I vomited right outside the front door in front of all these stylish Italian post rock people.
If I were pursuing anything other than music it would be…
MF: Raising a happy family.
SP: Game development, but I am currently working in the industry so... doing pretty much the same. Maybe a better headstart.
CD: I’m more of a part-time musician but if I wasn’t playing music maybe I’d be a more serious long distance runner but I think I’ll always pursue music in some shape or form.
AA: I am pursuing many different things including Cinema, Photography, SFX makeup and writing and playing table top and video game RPGs.
FM: I also do paper and glue collage and hand made graphic design, I could do more of that.. I am also interested in self-sufficient living and farming.
What are some of your favourite aspects of being a musician in Montréal?
MF: Lots of inspiring people, and cool shows happening all the time.
SP: All the big fish we get make for a greater selection/possibilities for new bands. Also genre is less stringently followed, yes there are practitioners but they're eating more than just meat and potatoes.
CD: Montreal is such an easy place to be a musician. Rent and the cost of living is rising, so almost everyone needs to have a full time job or multiple part time gigs, but there’s still cheap rent for studio spaces. This city has so many incredible and supportive people and labels who are based here.
AA: The ecosystem is alive and well, I feel like almost everyone I meet or know is some kind of artist or musician or music fan. There’s lots of support and there’s always stuff going on. I’ve never lived anywhere else so I’m sure I take this for granted.
FM: It feels that there are a lot of opportunities in Montreal for artists whether it’s festivals, bars, labels, promoters, music fans. If you are a bit resourceful you can find your people/scene and thrive as best as you can and have fun.
If you weren’t playing music in (your city here) where would you be ?
MF: I’d be a real estate mogul in a major American city.
SP: Don't know, I have dream locations but I would feel out of place anywhere. Never felt more accepted than I am at this moment. Plus with the Healthcare systems crumbling in the other provinces I'll stay where I am most familiar with it.
CD: I live here for other reasons than music. If I wasn’t playing music in Montreal, I’d most likely still be here.
AA: Somewhere secluded in the forest.
FM: Living like a hermit with my life partner at my cottage in the Eastern Townships. But I actually NEED to play drums so I would probably end up joining a shitty blues bar band and try to make them go psych by name-dropping Pink Floyd a lot.
Any sage advice for young musicians?
MF: Don’t be afraid of spending time alone.
SP: There's no need to run.
CD: Listen to experimental music and support community radio stations.
AA: Make shit instead of just talking about how you’re gonna make shit.
FM: Play and write music with passion and don’t care about what anyone thinks about it.