A Conversation with The Stone Foxes’ Spence Koehler & Shannon Koehler – HuffPost 3.6.15
Mike Ragogna: Spence, looks like you’ve got some “Locomotion” behind your Foxes First Fridays. See the lame thing I did there?
Spence Koehler: Ha! I’ll take it! It’s definitely been a fun new way of rolling out new songs, giving fans something fresh to look forward to at the beginning of each month. We’re happy to see that they’re into it too.
Shannon Koehler: More dad jokes please!
MR: [laughs] So this upcoming album, with one song being released a week over the course of a year when it will finally be released, will not only be a full album but somewhat of a travelog, also containing pictures, live recordings and more. How did the idea come about to approach your new album this way?
Shannon: It started a year and a half ago when we decided to add three old friends to the team, Brian “The Buffalo,” and Vince “Trish” Dewald, and Ben “Wang” Andrews. All three are multi-instrumentalist wizards, and as they joined one by one over that time, we jumped into the studio between tours to slowly develop our new sound. We play a live show that feels like we’re a high-octane GT 500 engine, but we wanted to get that feel to translate to tape. We took the straight up rock n roll that all six of us love to play, and went through phases of punk, country, folk, and pop sounds. This collection is the documentation of that process. It’s nothing like the old school albums we’ve done before. With one song about heart problems and surgeries shortly followed by another about gentrification in SF, the songs all feel so different, but they come from the heart of the same rock ‘n’ roll band.
Spence: Plus, the way most people digest new music is shifting. We wanted to give everyone a fresh track each month that they could listen to for free. This method gave us an opportunity to feature each song for an entire month, which is rarely the case on a traditional record. For those who enjoy taking the time to listen to a record from front to back we are also going to release a full physical album, press vinyl etc. That release will include some studio B sides, live video from The Chapel residency we did in Nov. 2014, and photos of life in the studio and on
the road.
MR: How has your audience reacted to this approach so far? Were you ever
afraid it might demand more of their patience than they’re willing to give for such an ambitious approach?
Spence: At the merch table after shows people keep asking us about the new
tracks and when the next one is coming out, they seem to be digging it as much as we are. When we were brainstorming about how to release the songs, we discovered that we all love it when we find out that there’s a brand new EP or single up for download on “So and So’s” site. You don’t have to wait for a full album to drop later down the road, you can go listen to some of it right now.
Shannon: Our fans and friends have stuck by us through thick and thin, from our first show at a cafe/laundromat to headlining The Fillmore. We weren’t afraid to give our fans something new, in fact, we wanted to give them the music for free as a thank you. We can’t do it without them, and we know that.
MR: How many of the Twelve Spells have been completed?
Shannon: We’re actually in our friends studio, The Complex in downtown SF,
doing overdubs on the last tracks right now! You know it’s going well when going to the studio feels like going to camp. It feels like summer camp right now.
Spence: Yeah, we have all the main tracking done, but the big final task is mixing the songs together as a group. We recorded with some well-known dudes with impressive resumes and big time artist credits, but this time around we wanted to get back to the basics and do it ourselves. So far it’s felt really natural and great.
MR: Is there any older material or songs written over a year ago making it into this batch?
Spence: There are some old riffs I had saved away that we used, probably some old lyrics that Shannon found on a notepad under his couch among the cookie crumbs and dust bunnies.
Shannon: They weren’t under my couch, jerk face! Some of the songs are a year old, some of them were written two weeks ago about things that are in our newspapers. A lot of our lyrics come from our passion for social justice issues, and there’s always something worth standing up for and singing about.
MR: What do you think of the blues-rock scene these days?
Spence: For a while, it seemed like Jack White and The Black Keys ruled the world, everything they put out was monstrous and awesome, but I feel like that bubble has burst and bands like Alabama Shakes and Tame Impala are putting out the most honest forward thinking blues these days.
Shannon: Everybody is so damn good…our Bay Area brothers Strange Vine and Two Gallants, and even bigger boys that we look up to like My Morning Jacket and Wilco… We could go on forever, but we’re lucky to live in a time when there are so many great bands taking rock n’ roll and doing it their own way.
MR: What’s been the biggest surprise about making music together over these last few years? The biggest evolution for the band or music?
Shannon: Honestly, we’re surprised to be talking to someone like you! We never thought we were gonna get farther than that cafe/laundromat. Playing festivals like Outside Lands, starring in music videos, flying to other countries…it’s all gravy.
Spence: The band has evolved several times since the start. Adding Elliott on
keys was a big sonic change to the beef of our sound. Two–and sometimes three–guitars gives Ben and I the flexibility to back up and weave in and out of each other. The addition of Vince, our second lead singer and songwriter, has expanded our vocal range and lyrical depth. Probably the most visible change has been adding Brian as a second drummer, letting him focus on his beats and allowing Shannon to sing and play harmonica from the front of the stage with a full tilt band behind him.
MR: Has this First Friday program been working better than you planned or is it still a work in progress?
Spence: It’s definitely been working well, though one big unexpected challenge has been coming up with the artwork for not one, but twelve covers. We’re collaborating with our friend and fellow SF artist Giuliana Pinto, who has been doing incredible paint on cardboard backdrops and costume design for our covers. Each song is given a representative character and she takes it from there. We’re all taking our turn donning whatever crazy outfits she’s devised for the cover shoots. I let her dress me up in shimmering glitter, makeup and hairspray to pose as Ocean Man for the cover of “Like it ain’t Nothin.” Giuliana herself wore tights and a red cape in the BART station for the cover of “Cold Like a Killer.” All of them are shot in and around different parts of SF because this place is a big part of our inspiration.
Shannon: And as we said before, not all of the songs are completely done…yipes! So we’ve been in my room with a kick-ass mic and towels draped all over my walls singing, disturbing my neighbors, then running in to mix, sending it out to be mastered, all to get it back in time for the first Friday.
MR: Who do you listen to casually, like what bands or solo acts?
Spence: I’m on a country kick right now–Buck Owens, Flying Burrito Brothers, Ryan Adams. Bakersfield-style stuff.
Shannon: I’ve been digging a lot of Nick Cave, he’s got a song about how Miley Cyrus was the best girl he ever had. If I wrote that, I’d get kicked out of my band! Outside of that, I can never get enough of The Band, and if I need to get pumped up lately I turn Jay Z’s “Threats” waaaay up!
MR: How do you see your recordings and music growing over the next year? How will that effect musical output and touring schedule?
Shannon: We’re really gonna put our heads together when the spells are finished, but we’ve been loving the darker places the music and lyrics have gone. We like the hard hits, with Ennio Morricone licks, just a pinch of hip-hop when needed, and lyrics that talk about what’s happening right now. A lot of people sing about girls, and we do it here and there too, but Vince and I are passionate about peace and social justice issues that our generation can’t ignore. We feel that rock ‘n’ roll has the power to move mountains, and we’re gonna keep playing till we move one.
Spence: We’ve had our days in most studios and home-recording environments and I think we’ve finally found a comfortable spot right in between at the Complex SF. It’s not a slick LA studio and it’s also not our musty used-mattress-lined garage. It’s kind of a glorified garage though, a Wayne’s World-style garage with some quality gear and a chill dude who knows how to run it. It’s important to have a good set of mics and preamps to get solid tones. We track most instruments live, all together in the same room, with a bit of bleed. If someone flubs a note, but the rest of the take is right on, we keep it. Then we dub vocals either at
home or at the studio. We try to get too bogged down in the process and let the tracks speak for themselves.
MR: What advice do you have for new or emerging artists?
Spence: Write more songs than you’re actually putting on your record, then choose the best. Our first two records were cut the moment we had enough material to fill an LP and I’m sure we could have done better if we were not so antsy to just get another record out. It’s nice to have options to choose from when you’re putting together an album.
Shannon: Play lots of shows. Play lots of shows. Eat some ice cream… And then play more shows.
MR: What advice would you have given to The Stone Foxes when they started out?
Spence: Play like it’s the last show you’ll ever play. We once drove all the way to Phoenix, Arizona, to play for a huge room full of empty chairs. But we played in to ourselves nonetheless and made it a hell of a good time for us and the few people who were there putting on the show. Two years later, the same promoter asked us to open for The Black Keys.
Shannon: There was a meeting after another bad show in Southern California
where our managers sat us down the next morning and told us we could never play that sh**ty again. I wish I could have told ourselves that two years earlier. Oh, and I would have also told myself, get a better van, you idiot.
MR: [laughs] What does the immediate future look like?
Shannon: We’re about to book it down to the desert and play a mess of shows
including the the VIVA Phoenix fest and a bunch of SXSW showcases. We have eight shows in four days in Austin, so we’re getting in shape so we can keep it high voltage! We also are continuing to collect healthy non-perishable foods at each show and take them to shelters and food banks as part of our Goodnight Moon Project. Donate food to those in need and we’ll give you a 7″ record, easy as pie. See what it’s all about at http://www.goodnightmoonproject.org.
Spence: This Friday, we’re releasing “I Want To Be You” in our next installment of #FoxesFirstFriday. Check it out!