Interview: Psychic Agency – Film Grain

Psychic Agency is a Philly-based band led by 21-year-old singer/songwriter and producer, Alex Fichera.

Hey! Can you introduce yourselves and tell me how you formed as a band?

I’m Alex Fichera, the main songwriter and producer behind Psychic Agency. The project started around 2 years ago when I first started college studying music industry at Drexel University. I had a sudden burst of inspiration that grew into an album I released in June 2018 called Blush, and I expanded my band to play live shows around Philadelphia to support the album. The lineup has been somewhat fluid and I’ve been able to collaborate with a few different talented instrumentalists.

I love your new single ‘Film Grain’. Can you give us some insight into the story behind the song?

“Film Grain” was finished in quarantine so the process for recording had to be altered because of those restrictions. I think that restrictions can breed creativity in an interesting way, so with “Film Grain”, not having access to a high end recording studio allowed me to focus my sound and craft a more straightforward pop song, compared to my previous music. It features Alex Parmet on guitar and talkbox, Malek Blalock on bass guitar, and Brandon Nelson on backing vocals. The process of sending takes back and forth had a different energy to getting a full band in a studio for a day and playing off of each other, but I love the way that each part turned out.

The artwork is beautiful! Who created it?

The artwork was shot by my sister, Nina Fichera and edited by myself. My sister is a great visual creative and we were able to get some cool shots right from our backyard using some creative lighting techniques and photo editing.

Can we expect an EP or album from Psychic Agency anytime soon?

There is a new Psychic Agency EP in the works right now and I’d say it’s about 90% done. It’s got some of my favorite tracks I’ve ever written on it, as well as a Prince cover that I completely flipped and made my own. No release date is set in stone, but I’d expect another single in about a month and the full EP in 2-3 months.

If you could collaborate with anyone in the world, who would it be and why?

Picking one person to collaborate with is so hard because I have such a diverse set of influences and interests, but the one person whose career I’ve always looked up to is Pharrell Williams. I think if I got to co-produce something with Pharrell I’d learn so much from him, not only about music, but also about life. There might be people who I’d rather hear singing over my production, like maybe Frank Ocean, but Pharrell will always be the person whose career I look up to the most.

If you could curate a festival, who would the headliners be?

Curating a festival would be a dream. I actually ran a DIY venue out of my basement in Philly where I got to book a lot of great local and touring bands and we were supposed to be a part of a festival that was unfortunately cancelled because of covid. If I got to curate one on a larger scale I’d definitely focus on some female artists that I’ve been listening to nonstop recently like Lolo Zouaï, MUNA, Gavin Turek, and FKA twigs, all artists that should definitely be more well known than they are.