Fairmont (band)

Early years

After leaving Pencey Prep, Sabatino signed with Reinforcement Records in 2001 under the moniker Fairmont, initially an acoustic project he compared to Dashboard Confessional. The debut sixteen track album Pretending Greatness Is Awaiting was released on 3 December 2001. Work on the second album Anomie was delayed in March 2003 as three of the members quit the night before recording began. Soon after former Pencey Prep bassist John McGuire joined Fairmont, as well as guitarist Kevin Metz. During that year Fairmont performed locally, at Manhattan's Arlene's Grocery with groups like Fighting Gravity and Val Emmich, and by 2005 Fairmont had done three tours across the United States, again performing locally with Nada Surf and Ted Leo, among others. They also released their third full-length entitled Hell Is Other People, an album heavily influenced by McGuire's fondness of bands like The Replacements and Hüsker Dü. The content of the album was conceptually based on Jean Paul Sartre's play No Exit. It was released jointly by Reinforcement Records and Renfield Records.

Fairmont's fourth full-length Wait & Hope, an up-tempo indie rock album, was released on 12 June 2007. It would be the last to feature McGuire. Longtime friend Teeter Sperber provided vocals for three of the songs; "Fredo," "Dahlia" and "Yearbook." In an interview with Deborah Draisin in Jersey Beat, Sabatino described it as a "very minimal[ist] album," and Jo-Ann Greene of AllMusic called it their "strongest album to date;" going on to say that "...regardless of the downer lyrics, the music within takes the band to never before reached heights." Wait & Hope would also be the last album Fairmont released under its previous indie labels; in 2007 Sabatino founded Mint 400 Records, retroactively releasing earlier Fairmont albums. Keyboardist Christian Kisala joined the group shortly after, while Sabatino was working on new material. Wishing for a female counterpart in the band Sabatino contacted friend Suzie Zeldin, and again Teeter Sperber. Both would appear on the 2008 release Transcendence, produced by Grammy nominee Bryan Russell. The album appears at no. 52 in Gary Wien's book Are You Listening?, a comprehensive list of the top 100 albums of a decade which was compiled from a six-month review of over 2,220 releases. It was followed by a national tour supporting Life Of Agony frontman Keith Caputo starting in August 2008.

Recent work

In 2010, Fairmont released Destruction Creation, and the following year Mint 400 Records compiled a retrospective collection on the first decade of Fairmont releases. The Grand And Grandiose was released in 2013, followed by a live acoustic EP in 2014. Their 2015 album "8 1/2" had Christian Kisala moving from Malletkat to Xylarimba and Vibraphone and as they finished work on 2017's "A Spring Widow" Kisala has switched solely to Vibraphone. The band also saw the addition of Matt Cheplic, a current member of and founder of The Bitter Chills and bassist Mike Burns who formerly played with Sabatino in the 90's group Little Green Men.

Other work

Sam Carradori, Christian Kissala and Neil Sabatino also record as Ted Dancin!. Neil Sabatino has recorded under the moniker Shallows and Mergers & Acquisitions.

Full-length albums

Extended plays

Compilations

Appears On