INTERVIEW: New York’s Finest (Tribute to Sting & The Police) Coming To Cohoes 6/15!

New York’s Finest Tribute to Sting & The Police
Oscar Bautista (Guitar)
Mark Rinzel (Vocals and Bass)
Interviewer: Rob Smittix (RadioRadioX)

LIVE at Cohoes Music Hall

SATURDAY June 15h 7:30pm

PURCHASE TICKETS HERE!

Oscar: The Cohoes Music Hall is such a historic place, we’re really excited to perform there.

RRX: The Cohoes Music Hall is the 5th oldest music hall in the entire country.

Mark: Yes, it’s incredible. So when was it built?

RRX: A long time ago.

(All Laugh)

Oscar: I think it was like 1807 or something like that and it has been restored to a certain extent.

Mark: Because I’m a big history geek, I’m reading a book about the construction of the Erie Canal. I
learning about the area up there where they connected The Hudson to Lake Erie. If I’m not wrong
Cohoes translates in Algonquin to shipwrecked canoe.

RRX: No kidding.

Mark: Because of the falls. There are falls up there right?

RRX: There is, we have the 2nd most powerful waterfalls in New York State next to Niagara Falls. Yeah!

Mark: So I guess they lost a lot of canoes. The Algonquins back in the day. If I was truly Sting I would’ve
written a whole song about that. About man’s futility to control nature.

RRX: You guys are from the New York City area?

Oscar: I was born and raised in New York, I currently live in New Jersey but my family… my Mom and
Dad are still there, my sister’s there in Brooklyn, so I’m there all of the time.

Mark: I moved here 27 years ago, when I was like 22. So I’ve been here a while, I live in Brooklyn I’ve
been here all of that time pretty much and I’m raising my family here.

RRX: Nice. So do you always do research on the places that you tour?

Mark: No, that was totally just my ADHD brain like… reading one book and then wanting to buy this book
about the Erie Canal. It frankly has always interested me. It just happened to stick in my head because I
knew we we going to be there in a short while.

RRX: Well, what’s really cool about our location at RadioRadioX and The Cohoes Music Hall is that we
are neighbors. We’re pretty much right next door.

Oscar: That’s great. I did look at your website a little bit, I wasn’t sure if it was just a streaming site or if it
was an actual station in the local area.

RRX: Yeah we’re an online radio station, I think we’re ahead of the times because we don’t need a tower
anymore. 5 out of the last 6 years we’ve won the people’s choice awards for best radio station in town.

Oscar: That’s wonderful, that’s fantastic, congratulations.

RRX: Thanks, so New York’s Finest, which it took me a moment but than I was like oh okay, that
obviously means police. Are any of you in the band actually police officers?

Oscar: No, no, it’s funny because of our name sometimes we get people messaging us asking if we are
police officers, asking if we are with the authorities, you know? We get inquiries asking if they can send

donations our way or something like that to the police department. Or maybe they have some unpleasant
things to say about the police. So I have to clarify and say no we are a tribute band to Sting and The
Police.

RRX: I guess that can go either way but not many people have unpleasant things to say about Sting and
The Police.

Oscar: It’s such a fun catalog to play and to perform. Mark is just an incredible singer and bass player.
Alan Camlet who’s not with us on the line today is a fantastic drummer and producer. We’ve been friends
for so long and it’s a lot of fun when we get together to reproduce these songs.

Mark: And Oscar is fantastic too. We basically started this band on a dare like 14 years ago. I had a
friend who ran this classic album night show. She called me up and she said I’m going to do classic
album night at this club in the west village… what can you put together? It’s going to be in 5 weeks. I had
already been playing with Oscar and Alan in numerous different projects. We had an original band we
used to play in together, we’ve done wedding gigs together. We knew each other.

RRX: Right.

Mark: I could do the first Police record probably with these 2 guys. What’s the name? This was all done
over text. uhhh call it New York’s Finest. And it was just so much fun.

Oscar: It was like hey, let’s do it again.

Mark: We kind of just kept on doing it and here we are so… for me it’s one of my favorite things to do. I
cut my teeth as a kid figuring out how to sing and play the bass at the same time doing this stuff. When I
was a kid, I was kind of aware that they had just broken up but they were still very much a presence. I
had one of those cool older brothers with the cool record collection. He had this big poster of Sting
hanging in his room. I still have the image of that in my head.

RRX: Now he’s got a big poster of you guys.

Mark: Aspirational, you know?

RRX: I was going to ask you about that I saw online that this whole thing started over a dare. aren’t you
glad that you weren’t dared to do like one of Rod Stewarts albums? Because you’d now be touring as a
Rod Stewart tribute band.

Mark: I don’t think I would have the stamina. It depends on what kind of Rod Stewart we’re talking about.
Are we talking about Faces? I don’t know if I’d have the stamina to do that vocally to be honest with you. I
don’t know.

RRX: New York’s Finest goes way back into the catalog with the music from what I’ve seen.

Oscar: Yeah, again we started with that first album. A lot of that album, although you have big hits like
“Roxanne” and “So Lonely,” there are a lot of what we like to call deep cuts. Something like “Truth Hits
Everybody” and “Peanuts” which we used to cover that in the early days when we just knew the first
record before we expanded to the other albums and into Stings catalog. So we do know a lot of deep
cuts. A lot of times, venues ask us for long performances (2 or 3 hours), so now you have to go into the
deep cuts.

RRX: Right.

Mark: Longer than they ever played together.

Oscar: (Laughs) Yeah The Police probably just got up to 90 minutes.

The reunion tour was a little longer. It had been like 20 years since they performed. A lot of those
older songs, I don’t know if they are necessarily familiar to everyone but in the early stages of our band
we certainly cover it.

Mark: Within the past 2 years we started incorporating more of the solo Sting stuff but we try to give it
The Police treatment.

Oscar: Exactly.

Mark: We don’t really use any tracks or loops for it or anything like that.

Mark: It’d be interesting to see because he’s doing this tour right now, the Sting 3.0 Tour, which were
actually going to see at the Capitol Theatre Port Chester in October. I’m sure we’ll learn a little bit.

Oscar: I’m hoping to steal some ideas.

RRX: Absolutely. It’s got to be pretty cool checking out Sting. Has Sting gotten wind of your band? How
does that work?

Oscar: A few years ago Andy Summers put out a documentary on the reunion of The Police. It also was
based on his book, which was called ‘One Train Later’ which was basically his autobiography. His
marketing team sort of got wind of us and they said we’d love to invite you to a screening of the movie,
would you promote it? We said oh sure we’ll be happy to post it on our social media and see what that
can do, if it can help at all. I guess Andy Summers is kind of aware but perhaps not Sting.

Mark: Also, he was playing last year at The Ridgefield Playhouse in Connecticut. One of my other
projects, an 80’s band called Jessie’s Girl was playing the night before. I left a note for him in his dressing
room which I hope he read. I posted that and then I think he like that. There’s a little bit of back and forth
with him but we’ve not heard from Sting yet.
Mark: I’m going to try. Because we’re going to see him at the Capitol Theatre… we’ve actually played in
the smaller room there, my other band plays there quite frequently… I’m going to try to get to meet him.

Oscar: Yeah, that’d be amazing, yeah!

Mark: If it’s possible.

RRX: Well, when he does become aware of you, hopefully he doesn’t give you the P. Diddy treatment,
where you have to pay him like $4,000 a day for the rest of your lives.

Mark: (Laughs) We’re not selling any of his recordings. It’s interesting how that works out because the
venues pay the rights organizations like BMI and ASCAP for the rights for us to do it. I’m curious to see if
they start asking for higher rates because so many of these venues are relying more on tributes.

RRX: Bigtime.

Mark: It used to be a minor part of the business and now I know first hand how much that’s changed.

Even though it’s still kind of minor but luckily we’re not out there selling recordings of what we’ve
done.

RRX: I’ve listened to your versions of a lot of the songs that I found online and what you’ve sent me, it
sounds great! Incredible and you guys definitely seem like you put on an amazing show. Thank you for
not being another Grateful Dead of Led Zeppelin cover band.
(Both Laugh)

RRX: There’s way too many of those. There was a night here in town just a month or so ago where there
were actually 2 Doors tributes bands playing in the same area the same night.

Mark: But how did they do? I mean that’s the thing if people are showing up for it, right?

RRX: One was at The Cohoes Music Hall and the other in Schenectady and I think they both did
tremendous.

Mark: Yeah, that’s the thing.

RRX: But I think that you’ve chosen a good band to be a tribute of. I’m sure there are others but I don’t
think that there are too many Sting and Police tributes out there.

Mark: There’s one on the West Coast and there’s one up in Canada, the 2 notable ones that we know of.

Oscar: It’s a challenging catalog. Sting’s music alone… obviously of course it sort of all mixes together as
he wrote a lot of the material to begin with. Both catalogs I would say are challenging to perform and I’d
say that’s why you don’t have as many people lining up to do that kind of a tribute.

Mark: We’ve seen some bands do it but the singer doesn’t play the bass or they may add a keyboard
player. To me… I don’t know.

Mark: That’s cheating.
(All Laugh)

Mark: Oscar for many years was a touring musician with a lot of Broadway shows.

Oscar: In the orchestra pit, yeah.

Mark: In the orchestra pit for Kinky Boots, Beautiful and then he just did Pretty Woman for 2 years and
School of Rock. People would call up and try to book us and I said I can’t Oscar’s away. I would never
dream of subbing anybody, I guess I could find a guitarist who could play these songs but I think the
whole idea is that we’re greater than the sum of our parts. It’s the fact that we have a short-hand
together, with each other. It’s a proper power trio. We also just love being around each other. I’ve been
playing with these guys for over 20 years as musicians and friends. We’re having a great time up there
and I think the audience responds to that. That’s always like the first thing… your energy. I hear… your
voice, the guitar, there’s always these marquis moments during the show where Oscar will rip a solo or Al
will play some fill or something happens. But I think a lot of it is just that people do respond to how tight
we are, not just musically but also interpersonally. There’s chemistry up there. It’s its own form of
lightning in a bottle.

RRX: That definitely makes a big difference or it’s a message in a bottle.
(All Laugh)

Mark: Right, there you go!

RRX: New York’s Finest (Sting and Police Tribute), that’s Saturday June 15th 7:30pm at The Cohoes
Music Hall. Anything else you’d like to say to encourage people to come on out and have a good time?

Oscar: Oh gosh yeah, it’s gonna be a fun time. Everyone will know these songs because they’re all the
hits and more!

Mark: We’re really excited to be up there.

Oscar: Again such a beautiful venue, I’ve personally never been inside but I’ve seen so much great
footage other bands and other acts and little documentaries that are online about The Cohoes music
Hall. It’s a real treat for us to get to play a show at such a historic place.

RRX: Absolutely and don’t forget to ask for Eva Tanguay’s blessing so that your show goes correctly.

Oscar: Is that the ghost?

RRX: Yes, the Queen of Vaudeville.

Oscar: Often performers give offerings for her blessings.

RRX: There’s a video that’s around of the Kiss tribute band KISSTORY and there is some kind of entity
walking across the stage.

Oscar: Oh, my lord!

Mark: No, on my God!

RRX: It exists.

Mark: Alright, so we’ve been warned!