S04 - Jonah Matranga on Far's Water & Solutions

Riot Act

Despite only ever achieving limited commercials success, Sacramento California’s Far have had a profound influence on a wide range of rock bands including Biffy Clyro, Incubus, Thursday, Jimmy Eat World, Finch, Funeral For a Friend and Deftones. With the release of their forth full-length album Water & Solutions in 1998, Far created their ultimate musical statement, a concise blend of emotive hooks and hardcore sonics that before sadly splitting up barely a year later.

Remfry say down with Far frontman Jonah Matranga to discuss the making of the album, how it came to have such a profound influence on what became the burgeoning emo movement of the mid 2000s and the reasons that Water & Solutions doesn’t suffer from the crass commercialisation of sincerity that plagued that scene. Whilst Far split up shortly after W&S was released, it was merely the beginning for Matranga, who went on to form a number of other projects including Onelinedrawing, New End Original, Gratitude, I is Another and Camorra. Alongside Nick Cave, Bruce Springsteen, PJ Harvey and David Bowie, Matranga was one of the 5 artists we highlighted back on Episode 00 in our ‘Venn Diagram of Riot Act’ episode.