Nicos Gun didn't start out as a band at all. Rather, it started out as a Gorillaz-style studio project that Harry Zelnick was crafting in his free time. Having won a Grammy for work that he did with Ludacris when he was just 17 ("War With God"), Harry Zelnick has since worked with everyone from Kelly Clarkson to 50 Cent. When he started work on his own project, he enlisted the help of Barney McKenna and Nick Bockrath for what was originally going to be part of his own compilation project. "They were just so good, I was like, 'Fuck it -- let's make a band,'" Zelnick explains.
It took another three months before the other guys knew he could even play drums. Until then, they just knew Zelnick as the "beat guy." As for Zelnick, he planned on staying put in the producer's chair. "One night, he was jamming out and we were all like, 'What the fuck?' -- we didn't know he was that good," says Bockrath.
McKenna has cut guitar tracks for The Roots, while Bockrath has done time with American Babies and Elevator Fight (with Lenny Kravitz's daughter Zoe). The two also performed together as Philly indie darlings Cortez, Cortez. But when they combined forces with Zelnick, the pieces started falling into place and they realized they didn't have a group -- they had a gang.

A voice that sounds as pepperminty as it probably smells is the initial reel for Fort Lean, but their urgent riffs and persistent groove make their take on pop laced with Americana totally infectious.