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By Jennifer Palou (Patch Poster) - April 24, 2017 12:41 pm ET
SixTwoSeven who hails from Wuana, has been taking over the WA scene for the past year, surely and prominently. From a mostly theoretical solo project to a full band on the cusp of something much bigger, the start of 2016 saw SixTwoSeven growing from frontman Greg Bilderback, into a quintet that includes two of his brothers. The Seattle band has teamed up with producer and local legend, Jack Endino (Nirvana, Soundgarden) to record the four-song EP Some Other’s Day, which was released last year. We had the chance to catch up with Bilderback from the group, to dive right into the heart of SixTwoSeven.
You have a new album out right now, "Some Other's Day" What can you tell us about the new release? What fueled the inspiration?
MUSE, lol. I mean the songs on the EP for the most part were already conceptually in existence in some form or another, but after seeing MUSE at Key Arena (Seattle) in December of 2015, I just could not sit on the sidelines any longer. I knew it was time to make something happen. So I reached out to Mike (Knapp – Bass) and we got to work. We recorded the album on Mother’s Day weekend, so we were away from our mothers. We titled the EP “Some Other’s Day” and dedicated it to our Mothers.
Was there any specific storyline you had for the song when writing?
Most everything we sing about, is just based off of our regular blue collar, working class experiences. We work day jobs, struggle to make ends meet, get our hearts broken, get passed over for promotions, learn life lessons the hard way, same as anyone else. We try and cover topics that are relevant to us all. I personally don’t feel very connected to stories about making it rain, drinking Cristal, or partying in Limo’s. I’m not up in the club, but if I am you can be sure if I was I’d be holding a $4 well drink in my hand, while trying to gauge if I should have another when I’ve got to be up at 5:30 am for work the next day. We are just like everyone else, so we are your band. We have written songs about divorce, grieving the loss of loved ones, overcoming shame, and growing into yourself as a person. You name it, we have been there too.
When writing music, what are your influences? How long does it typically take you to write a song? Do you keep coming back to the piece and revising?
My influences personally run the gamut. I love everything from Brandie Carlile and Tom Petty, to the Foo Fighters, Weezer and Royal Blood. My guitar solos are 100% the fault of J. Mascis from Dinosaur Jr, he is unreal. I’m also pretty obsessed with Matt Bellamy and Josh Homme, and my new thing is the Pretty Reckless. Ben Shepard is a shredder. The EP songs are old, like 7 or 8 years in the making. So that process was really personal and evolved over a great deal of time. Certainly the arrangements have been revised a time or two by now. I think it’s important to play with a song for a while before putting it on a record. A lot can happen when you start flushing out ideas with other people. We are on a roll lately though, we are creating things so fast it’s hard to keep up. If we weren’t spending 50 hours a week at our day jobs, maybe we could get there sooner.
What are your influences musically and lyrically? Even though this record is all instrumental, for your prior release, where do the lyrics draw from.
Well, “Some Other’s Day” the original release was a 4 song EP with Lyrics, all about the topics I was referring to above. The re-release of the “Deluxe Edition” with the instrumental versions was an afterthought that really only happened because we had an issue with delivery of the original EP from CD Baby to Spotify, and after getting caught in a perpetual customer service loop I just finally concluded that releasing the Deluxe Edition as a digital only for $29 was a much more timely and cost effective solution to getting the music back up there, as opposed to hiring attorney’s or what have you, so yeah, $29 later we were back in business.
What was the recording process like for the new record? Did you self-produce? How long did it take to write and record the album as a whole?
The original idea was to self-produce, but the stems that I recorded myself for the EP were not commercial quality so the decision was made to go back into the studio with legendary Jack Endino and do them again. Working with Jack was amazing. We were in the studio for a total of 4 days from start to finish, but if you consider the time we took demo-ing out those songs on our own, it was the better part of 6 years. We hope not to take that long for the next one…we are way ahead of the game now, compared to where it all started a year ago.
We see you have a handful of dates announced for the Spring and Summer. Will you be adding anymore within the West Coast and throughout the US?
We just at Jazzbones Tacoma on April 19th, in what is an audition for a stage at Seattle Hempfest. It doubles as an audition for the Highway to Hemp Tour as well, which we hope/plan to be a part of this August. Aside from that we have a handful of other dates, like the Roswell Independent Film Festival April 28th, at Third Street Station Roswell, NM. We are playing the Pittsburgh Gay Pride Festival June 10th, and then we will be back in June auditioning for a stage at the Clone-A-Palooza festival in Tacoma in September. I’m sure we will be filling some gaps in between as time goes on. Working on a contract for NickStock in Owego, NY in June as well.
What do you hope to accomplish in 2017 with the new record and beyond?
hope to put out a full length LP around Christmas, or maybe New Years. We have about 9 songs ready to go, we are ironing out the last of a few more. I’d like to make a few more music videos, and I’m going to be starring in a short film by NakedFringeFilms. I’m super excited, we plan on being everywhere.