Hi guys, welcome to VENTS! How have you been?
Wow! Thank you first of all, we are honored you would have us. We have been awesome….and super busy. This whole thing kind of evolved out of nowhere and left us doing a lot of things on a very short timeline. It’s been a wild ride but we really are having the time of our lives.
Can you talk to us more about your latest single "Wreckless Soul"?
Yeah of course. I wrote that song about 6 or 7 years ago now, maybe longer if you go back to the birth of the guitar riff itself. It’s a song about non conformity. That’s a touchy subject for me, we have to conform to so many artificial boundaries in our everyday lives, sometimes it would be nice to just say no, not because I don’t want to do that particular thing, but just because everybody else wants me to.
Did any event in particular inspire you to write this song?
This song is about my son Blaeklee! He was the kid who would do the opposite of what you said, just because it’s what you said. He was like that before he even learned talk, and he is still like that today. He is now 19, and the frontman of a Deathcore band called Swords of Sanghelios. He will always be himself. I admire that, I’m super proud.
Any plans to release a video for the single?
Funny you should ask. We are just wrapping up the finishing touches on a hilarious video for “Wreckless Soul”. We really wanted to capture the essence of how we have been living this experience out. J Danger (Guitars) lives in Austin Texas, the Machine (keyboards and back-up vocals) lives in Bellingham, and the other three live in Gig Harbor. We are spending a considerable amount of time, effort, and resources, more or less, shipping on another around to make this happen. So the video is basically that, the worst most “wreckless” delivery guy you could imagine, hauling us around “less than carefully”. It’s pretty funny, I’m really happy with it.
The single comes off your new album Some Other's Day - what's the story behind the title?
We don’t do anything without a story, do we? We must be fairly predictable. This one isn’t that “deep” actually, originally we were going to title the EP “Allow me for a moment…if you will…to be Frank”. However, we (DubSeven Records) are an independent record label, so resources must be maximized where possible, thus we got a discounted rate on studio time because we booked Mother’s Day weekend. We figured since we went into the studio on Some Mother’s Day and cut a record, why not “Some Other’s Day”, right? We are dedicating the EP to our (Bilderback) mother, as she gave birth to three of the band members, and saw none of them on Mother’s Day.
How was the recording and writing process?
The writing process for 3 of the tracks was very long and sort of “piecemealed” together over time. So I literally recorded the entire 7 song demo that started this, by myself, one track at a time, starting with drums. I had no scratch tracks, I just sat down and started playing the beat, knowing how long each riff was supposed to go on, and then hopped over on bass as soon as I finished to check the drum tracks for accuracy. It took forever. Once I used that demo to sell the boys on putting a live lineup together, it was on. “One Single Night” was the first song we wrote as a group, and it took all of about 3 or 4 minutes to explode into a full blown song from the riff MK Ultra (Bass) brought to practice. Once DC (Drums) threw in the stops and starts you here in that one, I just about lost it. That guitar solo is another story…
As for recording, that was a breeze. Jack was “very specific” about how he would like us to prepare, and I took him seriously. He is after all, one of my childhood hero’s. He was amazing in the studio I’m not kidding. I’ve never seen anyone like him in all my years. The guy is amazing, I can’t say that enough. It was a bucket list weekend.
What was it like to work with Jack Endino and how did that relationship develop?
Absolutely mind blowing yeah! The relationship, oh man. I think Jack hated me for a while at first. I’m super analytical, and I tend to get “way deep into the weeds” when I go down a rabbit hole. I’m not sure if it was the volume of questions, the type of questions, or the way I asked them, probably all three, but I got the sense shortly after agreeing to it, he was hoping we would bag the idea. I wasn’t letting him off that easy, and God bless him for sticking with us. I’d like to think we are friends now, but I had to earn it. We came in prepared, I built a good team, I didn’t bite off more than I could chew trying to play all the instruments myself, I think he saw that, and decided to give me a break. Once he “bought in” things just blossomed. He was a huge part of big decisions that were made that day for sure and we have stayed in touch.
How much did he get to influence the album?
A ton. I gave him 12.5% of the authorship of my songs because I believe his choices, advice, and buy in, we truly that elemental in the structure of what we made. He really is a visionary, yet he gave me respect as a producer also, asked me how I liked things to sound, pushed for what he wanted where he really believed it was critical, and stepped back on a few others and gave me the freedom to try some things we weren’t too sure about at first. The solo on “One Single Night” for example, I know he was skeptical at first to say the least, but he let me hack away at that thing until we got close enough he could see what I was after, then he stepped in and made those “ever so slight” tweaks to my settings, or timing, and Bam, we had real magic. He knew it too, I’ll tell it was really cool watching a guy you look up to like that, bouncing around the studio playing air guitar to your own riff. What a trip, I love that guy I really do.
What aspects of your life did you get to explore with this album?
I’m a lunch pail kid by trade. I worked as an electrician, a factory worker, construction and maintenance. I’m blue collar, and so is my sound, I want to stay true to that. We all come from Seattle Seahawks territory, so our motto “Come with the attitude of an Underdog, and hit with the punch of a Champion” really fits our roots. Top of the World gets into the messy divorce I survived, and learning to deal with shame. The lyrics to the first verse were written for 6 years or so, the last verse didn’t materialize until I processed that experience. At first I was angry all my “laundry” was so out in the open, but I have to tell you, I am the free-est I have ever been. There isn’t anything anyone could say or do to me that I haven’t already survived. So bring it, right? That’s where “One Single Night” comes from. I’m ready now Life, so give me your best shot. Joshua’s song is a bit more somber. I had someone’s teenage child pass away in my arms after being struck by an SUV while riding his 4 wheeler without a helmet. It was awful. I’ll certainly never forget, but having this song “in my pocket” if you will, helps me unpack that baggage to this very day.
Any plans to hit the road?
Yes, we have already begun actively gigging to promote the August release. We just played Studio 7 Seattle with some great Oregon bands, (Amelia and the Welkin Dim), who we will be teaming with again August 18 in Portland at the Analog theater and Café, where we will also be joined by the Austin Texas band Drive On Mak (our touring companions). We will be playing Seattle again July 5th at LoFi Performance gallery, then in August we will hit Olympia, San Jose, back to back Saturday andSunday nights in LA, Portland and then home. We have some gaps we are still actively working on filling in, we’d love to stop in San Diego, Vegas, and Reno, wink-wink.
What else is happening next in SixTwoSeven's world?
Trying to stay alive until September really. This has been such a whirlwind, honestly, we just need to survive the summer tour, get back home, take a breath, and get set to repeat the process. We are extremely focused on the idea of releasing a full length album. I have such a vast catalog of fully completed songs, as do most of the other guys, we all want to write completely new songs together as a group (we have a few already), I think we could cut a 14 song album every year for the next five years if I can figure out how to finance it. The latter being the tricky part. Let’s complete round one, breath, reset, and repeat. That is where our minds are at.