The two MCs behind Calicove are talking about the aftermath of their last party. It was just last week, in fact, after they played a show.
“We took the party back to our studio in Santa Clara, and we continued to party through the night,” says Douglas “DJ” Williams Jr., who goes by the stage name Amazin. “I’ll tell you this much: I did not wake up until 8 o’clock the next night. PM. No AM stuff. PM. I woke up, and I was like, “OK, I’m going to try.’ But then I was like ‘I can’t move.'”
His partner in the group, Travis Lindsley, a.k.a. Authentic, isn’t even phased by the recovery time. He’s more impressed that Williams pulled it together enough to tidy up the place afterwards.
“Did you clean up?” asks Lindsley.
“I did. You saw that?”
Lindsley shakes his head. “You’re a beast.”
“Party,” says Williams authoritatively. “Then clean.”
These are two guys who know the rules of partying. In Calicove, they’ve mixed rap with big rock power chords on songs like “Party Animal” and “Life of a Rock Star” from their debut mixtape 808s and Rock ‘n’ Roll. Not to mention this year’s catchy anthem “I Wanna Party,” on which they use the p-word dozens of times, rivaling even the longtime record holder for party references, Andrew W.K.’s “Party Hard.”
All of which makes them a natural for Motif’s New Year’s Eve bash; they’ll headline a party that also features five DJs, go-go dancers, champagne and more. Because it’s not just a shtick. They write what they know.
“We party pretty hard,” boasts Williams. And they may be getting a rep for NYE in particular. Last year, they led the bender at Mosaic, the club at the San Jose Sheraton. “The show was downstairs, but they’d booked up the whole hotel. They wanted to do it Vegas style, so everybody who was at the party had a room. After the show, it was crazy. You’d go up into different rooms and hang out and …”
“And do God knows what,” finishes Lindsley. “The party was everywhere.”
Finishing each other’s thoughts comes easy to the Calicove duo, who play live with a full rock outfit but do the songwriting themselves and work with a team of producers on beats. They started the band in 2009, but they met four years earlier, working at a shoe store in Newark’s NewPark Mall. Williams grew up in San Jose; Lindsley is from Hayward. They became friends, and each knew the other did music, but back then they never even talked about working together. Then they lost touch, but reconnected completely by chance in, of all places, Las Vegas.
.Calicove is Ready to Party at Motif for NYE
