Dan Wilson’s Words and Music mini-tours have been something of an underground phenomenon. The acclaimed singer-songwriter has been breaking down his songs and his process for audiences stateside and in Europe over the past couple of years, performing some of his best tunes live, and then explaining how they were written in a fascinating (and often funny) peek behind the scenes.  Speaking of which, he’s spending much of his summer working on what will be yet another Dan Wilson solo album – but in the autumn, the road beckons again, and Wilson will be returning to his Words and Music shows, including stops at the Minneapolis Institute of Art (10.16) and the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago (10.17.) We caught one of his sets at Joe’s Pub at The Public Theatre in New York City, where the Grammy Award winning singer-songwriter sang his songs, told his tales, and helped motivate an audience made up in large part of fellow musicians (including Wilson’s Semisonic bandmate, Jacob Slichter), geeks (the majority of the audience actually “got” Wilson’s obscure references, which included Shakespeare, physics, and ancient archaeology) and one older gentleman who was decked out in a suit and sunglasses like Roy Orbison’s long-lost brother. Semisonic – you’ll know them from their one big – no, make that massive – hit single “Closing Time” – haven’t put an album out since 2001’s All About Chemistry. But Wilson has most definitely not been sitting around in the meantime. If you’ve heard Adele’s “Someone Like You,” The Dixie Chicks’ “Not Ready to Make Nice” and “Easy Silence,” or Taylor Swift’s “Treacherous,” just to name a few, then you’ve heard Wilson’s work. One music career with Semisonic led to a second as a solo artist (Free Life...

Quiz time: What do you get when you combine an acclaimed bluegrass and banjo guru with a big-city, edgy string quartet whose sounds are often outside the box? Bela Fleck and Brooklyn Rider, that’s who. While on the surface they may look like an unlikely match, in reality Fleck and the BR boys are both on the outer edge of their respective sounds, so teaming up was actually a pretty insightful choice. And it was one that started when Fleck was simply trying to find a string quartet to collaborate with for one piece on his Imposter album. “When I realised I was going to write a piece for banjo and quartet, the question was, which string quartet would be the best to collaborate with. All roads led to Brooklyn Rider,” Fleck laughs, “everyone I spoke to thought they were a great choice, and possibly the best choice.”   Ladies and gentlemen, Brooklyn Rider Once the striking “Night Flight Over Water” – the banjo/quartet piece that Fleck started with – was completed, all of the musicians decided that further investigations of this new sound were in order. A full setlist of music was developed from their initial collaboration, which led to a tour that put Fleck and Brooklyn Rider on the road together for much of this past summer, with more dual dates on the way this November 2014. It was an irresistable combo of sounds, Fleck says, that simply couldn’t be denied. “The string quartet is already a complete ensemble with myriad beautiful sound possibilities,” he explains, “and yet, the banjo possesses sounds that don’t exist in the quartet. The combination of the lush and the stark, the long tones versus the short, the rhythmic and the static, presents amazing musical opportunities.” In...

Music writers be warned – Jonny Lang might try to head you off at the pass. Resting after a soundcheck at the Ridgefield Playhouse in Ridgefield, Connecticut, Lang, inquisitive and interested, seemed more interested in my music than in talking about his own. Once he found out I was a musician, too, he wanted to know the details: Really? That’s so cool – what kind of music do you play? Do you write your own songs, then? “Sorry – it’s like I’m interviewing you now,” Lang laughs. I told him it was his turn, and we started talking about his latest album, Fight For My Soul, his sixth solo effort and another notch in his throne as blues-rock guitar whiz kid. Lang has been slowly gaining steam since the release of his first major-label album, 1997’s Lie to Me. But he was briefly derailed by – well, life, really, as he started a new path of sobriety, snagged a Grammy Award along the way, and took some additional Big Steps. “I had a crazy 7-8 years,” Lang explains. “Starting a family and entering into a new chapter of my life. It was a psychological battle for me for a while.” The album – which is named after the song of the same name – was originally intended, Lang says, as a “really focused and thought-out record,” but his state of mind during the three years it took to write and record the set found him taking a different approach than he’d planned. “In some ways, it was a focused record,” he says, “but in others, it was more like just throwing paint at a wall – I felt like I just wanted to get there, and get these songs out.” Lang’s changed his songwriting...

If you’ve ever been to a big city, you’ve probably seen street musicians putting on percussion performances, crafting beats on such informal gear as pots and pans, garbage cans, milk crates, and your shoes, if you stand still long enough. Founded in Los Angeles, California, nearly ten years ago, Street Drum Corps takes this kind of performance to a whole new level. Their amped-up punk version of sidewalk drumming has taken them onto a record label (Interscope Records), TV (Conan O’Brien, American Idol), and sharing stages with such rock notables as No Doubt, Chris Cornell, and 30 Seconds to Mars. “We have all been doing music professionally since our youth,” Street Drum Corp co-founder and performer Frank Zummo explains. Zummo, along with his fellow co-founders/performers Adam Alt and Bobby Alt, met the Alt brothers ten years ago. Zummo was working with a band called TheStart, while Adam Alt was in Circus Minor, and Bobby Alt was peforming with Faculty X and S.T.U.N.  But it wasn’t long before he found they all shared the same passion for percussive shows. “We decided to get together then, and start something new and outside of the box,” he says. Outside of the box, and including everything but the kitchen sink (and they bring that along sometimes, too.) SDC does use traditional drum kits in their performances, but just as often are drawn to garbage cans, buckets, rain barrels, marching band equipment, washing machines, kitchenware, and even power tools. It’s no wonder so many heavy rock and experimental musicians have been equally drawn to SDC’s unique approach to percussive sounds. Featured guests on SDC’s albums have included No Doubt’s Adrian Young, Angels and Airwaves’ Matt Wachter, Bad Religion’s Brooks Wackerman, and a who’s-who of collaborators that have added even...

Elbow’s latest album isn’t really an album, but a collection – specifically one of Elbow B-sides and rare, non-album tracks. Taking a sly turn on words from their debut album, Asleep in the Back, the English alt-rock band dubbed the set Dead in the Boot, and it’s already turned into a fan favourite for its more chill vibe;  frontman Guy Garvey calls it Elbow’s “late-night” album. But fans are still wondering when Elbow will drop their next full-length studio set, even though their last one wasn’t really so long ago (2011’s Build a Rocket Boys!) According to Elbow’s bassist, Pete Turner, new tracks will be along relatively soon – if you consider at least half a year “soon.” Most of the songs for a new Elbow album are reportedly in the can, even if the band doesn’t plan to set them free for a while yet. “We spent the past year in the studio in-between festivals and our mammoth touring schedule,” Turner explains, “with Craig (Potter, the band’s resident piano/keyboard guru) at the helm. The bulk of the album is done.” So, for a while at least, are Elbow’s live performances. After, as Turner said, an extremely busy 2012, including an arena tour last November and December, the whole band is taking a hiatus (we didn’t say a breakup – we said a break – no panicking, please), with Garvey heading to New York City for a half-year to work with Massive Attack’s Robert Del Naja on writing songs for a new stage musical adaptation of King Kong. Turner, meanwhile, has something far more mellow in mind. “My New Year’s resolution was to spend three months in Thailand, playing in the sea and seeking inspiration for my bass playing,” he grins. He’ll be well...

“The tour has been great!” enthuses Ivan and Alyosha’s bass player, Pete Wilson. “We played a few cities for the first time, and were shocked with the amount of people. New York and Minneapolis have always been good to us – but it’s when we headline Fargo, North Dakota for the first time, and a bunch of folks show up – that’s when we are really taken aback.” With tracks like “Beautiful Lie” and “Be Your Man” – two of Wilson’s personal faves, he says, to play live – it’s no wonder Ivan and Alyosha are garnering more attention from coast to coast. Founded in 2007 by Ryan Carbary and Tim Wilson (yes, Tim and Pete Wilson are brothers), Ivan and Alyosha started as a duo, but decided to expand the band to include songwriter-bassist Pete, as well as guitarist Tim Kim, all the better to serve their increasingly complex songs. In 2009, their debut EP, The Verse, The Chorus, snagged plenty of national exposure, plus an interview on NPR’s All Things Considered. Their second EP hit stores in February, 2011. And now they’re promoting their newest full-length set, All the Times We Had, with no sign of slowing momentum. “All the Times We Had was recorded mainly at Avast Studios in Seattle,” Pete Wilson continues. “Chad Copeland engineered and co-produced the record with us, and Nate Price co-engineered for most of the time. There were plenty of great moments during the sessions – there was one moment when we were doing some guitars on “Running for Cover,” and Tim Kim started doing this ambient stuff. He had a pretty difficult week, and it was as if he put all of his emotion into this specific guitar part, letting the music tell a story...

Chances are you’ve heard them on the radio, in movie soundtracks (think Reality Bites and Hackers), or (more subtly) as the influence for current indie-rockers like The Shins, OK Go, Sloan, Death Cab for Cutie, and They Might Be Giants. It’s been a long and esteemed new wave road for English band Squeeze, who got their start back in the 1970s, and who you’ll most likely recognise from songs like Tempted, Hourglass, Is This Love, and Another Nail in My Heart.  Since then, they’ve made it through several breakups (and back) as well as the equally successful solo careers of Glenn Tilbrook and Chris Difford. Now they’re back (again) with a quartet of new tracks, a modernised approach to album sales, and appearances on the likes of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Did we mention they’re also on tour? And with a pretty amazing setlist of songs to play live every night, we might add. “Mostly we’re playing our songs like they were recorded, and therefore to me they all sound pretty great,” Chris Difford says. “But ‘Muscles…’ and ‘Is That Love’ are fast and full of fun. On this tour we will also be trying slower, older songs, so you will see and hear another side of our years.” Three weeks of shows are scheduled for the band on this particular trek (“22 days of sound checks, backstage meals and naps,” Difford chuckles) and the tour is keeping the band busy in other ways, too. In addition to their rollicking stage sets, Squeeze are kicking back at the major labels with their own model of selling albums, and are finding that the new “music biz scene” is actually benefitting Squeeze as a band quite well, thank you very much. “It is,” Difford agrees....

With a new album on the way in February of next year, an inimitable audio approach that fuses rock, folk, and the blues into their indie-Americana sound, and a rapidly growing fan base amidst the tv/film soundtrack set, East Coast band Bronze Radio Return are creating a buzz that’s kept them busy from Maine to Oklahoma. But we know you really want to know just as much as we did – what’s up with the unusual band name? “The name Bronze Radio Return was inspired by an actual radio I grew up listening to in my father’s art studio in Maine,” explains the band’s Chris Henderson. “He had, and still has, this beautiful old bronze tube radio that we spent hours listening to and learning about traditional American styles. It was there that I was introduced to everything from Chicago Blues to early Soul to Honky Tonk Country. When we formed the band we realized that everyone had some kind of ‘Bronze Radio’ that they listened to and learned about music, so we decided that our band would be the return of the Bronze Radio, with a focus on developing music that influenced us growing up.” Got it. Frontman Henderson and his bandmates seem to have honed in on that radio dial to find their own turning point with their album SHAKE!SHAKE!SHAKE!, which they recorded in Norman, Oklahoma with producer Chad Copelin. “It was an awesome experience, and our band has a love and trust for Chad and his approach to music,” Henderson says, “we spent roughly a month tracking the songs, and the album was later mixed in Seattle by John Goodmanson.” SHAKE!SHAKE!SHAKE! quickly gained fans upon its release, hitting the CMJ Top 200, and seeing its songs licensed by American Idol and Anthony Bourdain’s...

England’s Field Music hail from Sunderland, and released their first album in August of 2005. Two additional albums later, and it seemed that the end was near for the indie band that was made up of brothers David and Peter Brewis and bandmate Andy Moore. They’d told the BBC that they were going to break up after the promo duties for their 3rd album, Tones of Town, were over in 2007. That “breakup” wasn’t as dramatic as it sounded, however – they simply stepped away from their band duties for 3 years, and returned in 2010 with a brand new set of Field Music songs dubbed Field Music Measure, and an even newer album earlier this year that they dubbed Plumb. David Brewis gives us the scoop on the process. So what was the real impetus behind taking three years off from the band, and what did each of you do with your free time?  I think we could see a strong possibility that if we’d just kept plugging away immediately after we’d finished Tones of Town, then we’d be in danger of conforming to some abstract definition of what Field Music is supposed to sound like, rather than following our noses and trying to make the music we’d be most interested in. We’re not successful enough for there to be some huge financial imperative to repeat ourselves, like lots of bands, so anything which might hinder us in making the best music we can is definitely to be avoided! When we stopped touring for Field Music, I made a record under the name School of Language, which in turn meant that I got a chance to tour over here with some astounding musicians (Doug McCombs from Tortoise and Ryan Rapsys of Euphone). Peter,...

Founded in NYC and now hearing their latest songs being played everywhere from radio to adverts are upstart indie-popsters fun. (yes, that’s lower-case, with a period, thankyouverymuch), whose – sorry – fun mix of baroque pop, hip-hop, and theatrics is snagging them new fans left and right. The buzz band are currently promoting their sophomore album, Some Nights, with an extensive tour set to keep them steadily on the road through the end of this year, both in the U.S. and abroad. And according to the band’s multi-instrumentalist Andrew Dost, it’s a wild jump in popularity that they hoped for, but never really expected. “I think the broader exposure is due to a lot of things,” Dost explains. “We’ve been touring as fun. for nearly four years now, and we’ve seen a gradual increase of fans along the way, which has been amazing and has sustained us. But more recently, having our song on Glee and in the Super Bowl commercial really took things to a different level.” A level amped up even more by not only the band’s newfound visibility, but also contributions from album producer Jeff Bhasker (Jay-Z, Bruno Mars)  and quirky singer/performer Janelle Monáe, who added vocals to fun.’s latest single (“we’re really honored that she’s a part of it,” Dost enthuses.) Another component of the album’s success is likely the band’s focused approach, which followed a specific thematic thread as well as a razor-sharp aim at the tracklist-editing process. “There’s definitely a theme throughout the album,” Dost explains, “I wouldn’t call it a concept album by any means, but I think any time you write an album over a short period of time, a lot of similar lyrical ideas and musical themes will surface multiple times, just because that’s where...

Recorded at Type Foundry Studios in Portland, Oregon (which singer-guitarist Israel Nebeker calls “a neat place in an industrial area by the river”), Blind Pilot’s latest album, We Are the Tide, perfectly showcases what NPR calls the band’s “…sturdy, gorgeous songs.” And indeed they are. Nebeker, his co-band founder Ryan Dobrowski know how to structure a tune, setting down a foundation first and then crafting memorable choruses and thoughtful verses atop. This time around, the studio was part of the process. “Type Foundry is an old building, and the materials it’s made of are still quite basic,” Nebeker explains, “wood, brick, and steel. I’ve noticed that artists of all kinds will go to great lengths to surround themselves with spaces that feel ‘real’ as far as in the materials and functionality when they are creating. It’s odd, because art is maybe one of the most immediately impractical parts of our culture, but artists seem to be drawn to places that were created for the most practical purposes possible. But that said – the space felt great, and we were quite at home in it.” Recorded took about a month (the band broke for a bit of touring in the middle) and resulted in ten concise, eclectic songs. “Half Moon” has an elusive feel, as if the ghost character in the lyrics can’t quite decide whether to stay hidden from earshot or not; “Get It Out” adds unexpectedly peppy percussion to what would otherwise be a classic shoegaze number; and “Get You Right” takes its cue from indie-Americana music, with a dash of banjo seasoning. It’s a set that on the surface, appears to be carefully constructed with plenty of instrumental experimentation to keep things interesting – but it’s actually just a result of the...

  Syracuse, New York native singer-songwriter Martin Sexton began his musical career by busking on the streets of Harvard Square in Boston. Now, plenty of musicians busk in the beginning, it’s true – but how many can say that they’ve sold 15,000 CDs of their first self-produced album right out of their guitar case while performing on the street? That was only Sexton’s first claim to fame, albeit a pretty impressive one. But it wouldn’t be long before he’d step away from the streets as more and more of his peers noticed his work right along with the fans. Soon, he’d be praised by everyone from the NY Times to the Boston Globe – but all Sexton wanted to do was keep making music, and that he did, influenced early on by the likes of The Beatles and Stevie Wonder, and later by many of his own peers. “Growing up, I was influenced by all the greats,” he explains, “nothing too obscure. Today, I’d say independent artists who chart their own course and are beholden to no one.” This category would include Sexton himself. Dubbed “happily and fiercely independent,” he releases his albums on his own KTR (Kitchen Table Records) label, and has snagged major festival performance spots as well as music placement in such shows as Scrubs and Brotherhood. He’s living, busy proof that the DIY ethic works just fine in the music business. “I think the DIY scene is a healthy trend,” Sexton agrees. “The record business has gone the way of the typewriter. It’s essential to find alternative means of spreading music, and over the past decade I’ve been blessed with an excellent team, from my management to booking, marketing, and publicity.” His team are doing a pretty good job promoting...

Although it wasn’t specifically so, one might surmise that the three locales used to record The Cribs’ latest album, In the Belly of the Brazen Bull, were chosen one for each brother. Tracked in London, New York City, and Chicago, the trio’s latest collection of indie-rock songs may have started their little lives in the band’s hometown of Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England – but they quickly started logging frequent flier miles as rapidly as the bandmates themselves. “All of the studio experiences were radically different,” explains The Cribs’ Gary Jarman (brothers Ross Jarman and Ryan Jarman make up the rest of the band). “Tarbox Road (studio), where we made the majority of the album, is a secluded place in upstate New York. We would decamp there for a couple of weeks at a time, and have relatively few disctractions. We mostly just built fires and hung out at the studio.” Dave Fridmann (Mogwai/OK Go/Phantom Planet) was on production duties for the Tarbox sessions; Jarman calls him “very creative and interactive.” “Dave is always looking for a different sonic texture and interesting stuff to create a wall of sound,” he explains. E.A.R. – Manic Street Preachers/Sparklehorse producer Steve Albini’s facility in Chicago – was the second locale, which was a solid 180 from Tarbox’s rural feel. “The E.A.R. studio itself is a pretty incredible complex,” Jarman says. “It’s comprised of a couple of studios and electronic workshops, with living quarters for the bands. There is a crossover when one band finishes and the other band starts, so you get to meet some pretty interesting people. We worked really fast at E.A.R. – four songs in three days – and Steve is ideal for that.” The third and final studio carries legendary status all its own:...

If you’re a Cake fan, then chances are you’ve already snagged their latest album, Showroom of Compassion. What you might not know, though, is that the band recorded that entire set of songs off the grid – literally – with their recording sessions powered completely by the sun. No wonder they were recently named one of Billboard Magazine’s Top Ten Greenest Bands. Cake teamed up with a company called Borrego Solar in order to convert their California recording studio to solar power. The band’s John McCrea said that it seemed like a waste to be living in California and not be taking advantage of all the free electricity that the region’s sunny days could provide; bandmate Vince DiFiore agrees. “With the current scientific knowledge (available), the logical step was to better the situation,” DiFiore explains, “without halting our operation altogether, we did something that might help a little.” The band even recorded the proceedings of the solar gear being installed in their Sacramento studio; fans can watch how it all was done at a unique dedicated link. “Sacramento, like many places in California, has a gigantic supply of sunlight,” DiFiore says, “and because Sacramento is lucky enough to have a public utility, we actually get checks in the mail every month for our excess electricity.” DiFiore explains that the solar conversion box is continually making electricity, which is either used in the studio or sent back out to join the city’s power grid. DiFiore also emphasizes that he hopes bands and musicians both big and small scale will start taking steps towards converting their work equipment to sustainable energy as time goes on. “Hopefully very soon, more and more solar panels and converters will be available for many applications and many different situations,” he...

The recording sessions for White Rabbits’ latest album seemed to fly under the radar. Not much was talked about, not much was heard – but the truth was, the band was simply approaching the process in a more leisurely, dare we say garage-band-y way, than their schedule had previously allowed them. “We had to record the last record quite fast – something like four weeks,” explains the Rabbits’ guitarist, Alex Even. “So we knew this time around that we wanted more time to really workshop the songs and some room to stretch out musically.” They ended up spending about three months in Austin, Texas recording with Mike McCarthy (Spoon/Craig Finn/Alberta Cross), setting down temporary roots in what Even calls a “quaint little surburban home” next door to St. Edwards University. “We would record five days a week at his studio, and on the weekends we would set up instruments in our garage and continue to write and work on ideas which was quite nice, actually,” Even recollects, “some of my fondest memories of that time are of playing in that garage with the door open as the hot summer day cooled into evening.” Calling McCarthy an “uber-talented fellow,” Even praises the producer’s ear, attention to detail, and ability to get interesting sounds. “His skills are all unmatched,” Even says, “I always learn so much when working with producers and from him. I learned not to take advantage of my instrument, that it’s cool to be dedicated and disciplined, and to work hard to be the best and most creative musician you can be. That might sound obvious or silly, but for someone who grew up listening to punk and hardcore with its emphasis on emotional immediacy over technical skill, it wasn’t necessarily intuitive for...

Former Million Dead frontman Frank Turner, for those of you who haven’t been paying attention for the past six years, isn’t quite as punk as he used to be. Well, not sonically, at least. The talented Turner has – ‘scuse the pun – turned to a new sound since the breakup of Million Dead – namely folk music. But never fear, Turner fans of yore – there’s still plenty of his punk aesthetic left, which adds a nice layer of musical grit to his tracks. It’s a mix that is serving the English musician quite well, one of the best examples of same being one of Turner’s own favorite songs (and one of PyxisMag’s, too) – the uplifting, surprisingly thankful and just-punk-enough “If Ever I Stray.” “That one sits prettily happily in the middle of punk, folk, and country,” Turner smiles, “I like that song a lot.” Immediately catchy and perfectly arranged with a bit of an unexpected buildup to Turner’s more raucous vocals on the chorus, echoes of other vocalists can be heard on the song – a bit of Paul Weller, perhaps, or Joe Strummer – but the style is really all Turner’s own. And as for his actual musical influences, he grew up on heavier music, but it wasn’t until his 20s that he started listening to stuff like early Bob Dylan or The Man in Black. “My parents didn’t really believe in modern music,” he chuckles, “so the Johnny Cash American Recordings series was a big eye opener for me, seeing how acoustic music could be just as intense as screaming at people over a wall of noise with your shirt off.” After that, he says, he just wanted to be a folk or country singer, but… “But my background...