New Brunswick’s music scene is like a Large Hadron Collider. There’s an ongoing process of repeatedly smashing things together to see what works until something flies off. One such experiment was The Names And Faces, which featured some of Fredericton’s more promising musicians. In 2011 they produced West Of Here, their only album, and a single video that replaced the band with stop-motion pipe-cleaner stand-ins.
“It was about as independent as a single could get,” explains Wesley Simpson, the band’s frontman. “I had, and still have, no background in music promotion or management. I’ve always just written songs and found amazing people who wanted to play them with me. The song is kind of like a super long sentence that repeats itself.
When I told my friend Scott [Bayton] I was thinking about doing a video he kinda jumped on it. We threw around some ideas about it and somehow he landed on trying stop motion. It was his first attempt, and maybe only. I love it though.”
While, at least in retrospect, West Of Here showed great promise, the short-lived band wasn’t meant to be. Simpson moved to Ontario to be closer to family, and the other band members went their separate ways with only a brief reunion for a handful of shows.
Simpson started a new band in Toronto called Grand Falls, Dillon Anthony joined Kill Chicago, Brad Perry joined Grand Theft Bus, Heather Ogilvie started LAPS and Jason Sonier joined Before The War.
“We got back together for a summer tour in 2013, I think it was,” says Simpson. “We played the Tide and Boar in Moncton, the Cedar Tree in Fredericton and the boardwalk for Canada day in Saint John. That was our last show, I believe. We all get along really well, I just felt like I needed to be closer to my family. Distance is often enough to keep people apart.”
While the band may have moved on it’s still not too late to produce stop-motion pipe-cleaner videos from the rest of the album.