Caniko Tucci is a Motern Media No-Jokes band, featuring Matt Farley as the sole member.
Farley introduced the new band on the October 15, 2019 episode of the Motern Media Infomercial Podcast, three days after the release of its debut album These Are The Forces. Since then, as Caniko Tucci, he has released two more albums, Frantic Frenzy and A Genre of Different Wonders.
Origins
In 2019, Farley had composed several musical sketches for The Big Heist’s second album, Tightrope. However, a few of those would get used for Wednesday Night Chronicles, the debut album from Brennan McFarley (the songwriting duo of Farley and Doug “Froggy” Brennan). Unsatisfied with leaving the remaining sketches unused, Farley began to flesh them out for a new project.
The name “Caniko Tucci” came from Farley mishearing his wife Elizabeth and their younger son making up the name “Caniko Tushy”. With a slight name change, Farley adopted the moniker and decided to release his new songs under it.
At the same time, Farley’s older song was slightly injured from a school incident, and the Farley parents became frustrated at the lack of accountability from the administration. Farley took inspiration from the situation, coming up with a mythology where people in positions of power had “succumbed to the ancient forces of evil.” This created the lore for the character of Caniko Tucci: A musician trying to uncover and battle against the dark forces.
These Are The Forces (2019)
The debut Caniko Tucci album, These Are The Forces, came out on October 15, 2019, with Farley teasing its release on Twitter in the days beforehand. It is the third and final part of The Ancient Forces Trilogy, which began with Matt Motern Manly Man’s I Forgot What I Was Gonna Say and followed with Brennan McFarley’s Wednesday Night Chronicles. The album contains the finished versions of the remaining recordings from the Tightrope/Wednesday Night Chronicles sessions, and introduced a more guitar-heavy sound which took influence from Brennan’s playing style.
Around the time of Brennan McFarley’s The Beyond, which came out in September 2020, fans on Twitter asked if Caniko Tucci had come from the mythical place. Farley did not confirm or deny this, but said that — in the Motern Media universe — The Beyond was originally going to be a Caniko Tucci project until Motern Media gave it to Brennan McFarley. (This is, of course, all fictional.)
Frantic Frenzy (2020)
On Wednesday, December 23, 2020, Farley tweeted that Caniko Tucci was back in the studio, and that he was set to record 50 songs before the following Sunday, December 26. The resulting album, Frantic Frenzy, contained 41 of those songs, and was released on December 26, although Spotify delayed posting the album until January 1, 2021.
Farley had dedicated himself to recording a new album during the 2020 Christmas holiday season, after writing and releasing two albums for The Guy Who Sings Songs About Cities and Towns (Delaware, Oh Yeah! and Rhode Island Places Fun!) He derived the song ideas from a list of words and phrases that he felt would work as titles, and then recorded as many as possible over his self-imposed four-day timeline.
This album was also part of Farley’s Road to 24,000 project, which he began in December 2020 just after he had reached the 21,000 song milestone.
Some fans theorized the remaining nine songs from Farley’s scheduled fifty would come out as an EP. However, it is likely that Farley never got around to recording more than the 41 tracks on the album, and therefore no other tracks from the Frantic Frenzy sessions remain.
A Genre of Different Wonders (2025)
As part of Farley’s plan to put out on release every month throughout 2025, he chose to record as Caniko Tucci for March’s project. A Genre of Different Wonders came out on March 17, 2025, contained five tracks, and included collaborations with Brennan and Tom Scalzo.
Future
With the end of No-Jokes albums as of June 2026, according to Farley’s Twitter account, the likelihood of Caniko Tucci releasing new music is quite slim.
Discography
| Year | # | Album | Tracks/Run Time | Release Date |
| 2019 | 1 | These Are The Forces | 9 (28:12) | October 12, 2019 |
| 2020 | 2 | Frantic Frenzy | 41 (1:06:00) | December 26, 2020 |
| 2025 | 3 | A Genre of Different Wonders | 5 (13:24) | March 17, 2025 |