How to create the most anticipated local release of the year… in March!

1. Start by building hype for it’s release more than a year before it actually comes out – CHECK!

2. Have a Grammy award winning engineer/bandmate on board – CHECK!

3. Have the country’s biggest and best booking agency at your back (Billions) – CHECK!

4. Garner the support of most every blog, radio station, and indie music junkie in the city – CHECK!

From my viewpoint, this is the formula that local hero’s Pickwick have seemed to have followed for the release of their first full-length, Can’t Talk Medicine (released on Tuesday). The album is hard hitting, smart, danceable, and worthy of every piece of hype it gets.

On a recent Friday morning at a coffee shop in Eastlake, I was lucky enough to sit down with the band’s electric frontman and it’s chief songwriter Galen Disston (vocals) and Michael Parker (guitar). Here’s how it went (Warning: be careful of “The Fetal”!)

 

Dom: So guys, things are going great for you and you really seem to be hitting your stride. You’ve signed with Billions, that’s pretty cool — and you’re going on tour with a new record. As the band moves forward at this point, is there a certain path that you guys are looking to take? Maybe a Damien Juardo type thing, where it’s more album focused, more down time, tour here and there – or will it be more like the Head and the Heart does where they release an album every three years and is fucking on it all the time with the touring. Or is there someone else that you guys want to emulate?

Michael: Well, we’re learning a lot of this as we go. I don’t think that we necessarily have a set plan in terms of how we’re going to try to execute things. I think—

Galen: Dom, can you be our life coach and make our decisions for us?

D: (Laughs) You’ve got my number now, call me whenever you need me.

G: I mean, we’d love to make a living and that’s obviously demanding.

M: And because we’re such a big band, there’s six of us, that means — like Damien can go do a tour by himself, like right now he’s touring in a rental car with just an acoustic guitar.

G: Yeah, playing like a 50-person library at 50 bucks a ticket at Big Sur.

M: Yeah, and for us, we’ll never be able to do a tour like that. For us to actually go out, it’s a lot of rambling and it’s kind of a logistical nightmare. So that means that we have to kinda—

G: But we don’t have any illusions that we’re going to be able to make a living. You know, we’re not delusional about that, it’s hard, it is really hard to make a living as a musician. So I think what really means most is being in the basement and writing new songs. Like, I think all of us would say that. So I think we’d love to be album-focused.

M: Yeah.

G: I don’t think we had the freedom to be album-focused on this record, you know. We were all working jobs and recording at night and doing it in between touring — spaced-out touring.

D: Right on. So being an established group of guys with wives and kids and lives and jobs, has it been challenging to put all the pieces together?

M/G: Yeah.

M: Galen and I are the only guys that are married, and Galen is the only guy with a kid. I think if there were more of us who had kids that it would be next to impossible. I think that the only way that we’ve been able to do it is that those of us who aren’t tied down and who have a fair amount of freedom are able to pick up the slack.

G: I just watched this LCD Soundsystem documentary. It’s weird, I’m just discovering his music now, which is interesting because I’m around the same age he was when he started really making his music.

D: How old are you?

G: I’m 29. And what, he was in his early thirties when he started LCD — and it was after being in punk bands. And listening to him talk now, especially in that documentary, it’s pretty interesting thinking about what his priorities are and what he wants to do with his life — I think we have a unique mix of both. We get to experience touring in a band and playing in shitty clubs and doing it for no money, but at the same time we have the perspective and our heads are on straight and we’re more responsible because we have, well, responsibilities, you know.

G: But I think it’s kind of a cool blend. I mean, we all do envy the 22-year-old genius who can just get it all together and get it done.

D: It’s like seeing LeBron James at 17 making a million dollars, and being like, “What!?!”

M: It’s exactly like that.

G: That’s not us, but I think we’re ok with that and I think it makes us work harder and have a good time and try to write better songs. And just try to get out there and see what happens.

D: Are you guys pretty good about picking up the slack if one or more of you just can’t make it happen at that moment? Like phone calls and emails, etc.?

G/M: Yeah.

M: We have a couple dudes in the band who are really organized and are great at doing stuff like that. And without them we would….

D: Crumble?

G: Yeah.

D: With this new record, and having Kory (Kory Kruckenberg – Grammywinning engineer and member of Pickwick) in the band, did his presence and knowledge of how things would sound in the studio affect your writing? For example, when you were writing, were there points where he would be like, “Try this, I know it’s going to sound great when we record it.”

G: I don’t think so. I don’t think his abilities affected the writing at all. I think we worked it all out together. Yeah.

D: So his influence kind of comes in after the songs have already been put together?

M: Kory is a great engineer. Kory’s amazing at getting sounds. Like Alex, who joined us in the middle of last year to play drums on the record, he was really impressed right from the get-go – because Alex has drummed for David Bazan, and Rosie Tomis, The Long Winters, and Say Hi. He’s kinda like this great – we’re really lucky to have him. He’s just this great Seattle drummer and he was taken aback immediately by Kory’s ability to get drum sounds – I mean, we recorded our whole record in our living room!

D: Yeah, I saw Kory in line for Built to Spill tickets and that’s what he told me. “Still haven’t moved out of the house.” And I was like, Wow!

G: Have you heard the record? Did you get a copy of the record?

D: I have heard it. Many times. It’s great!

G: Ok, good, glad you got a copy.

M: But yeah, that whole thing was done in a carpeted living room no bigger than this little area right here (Vicace coffee shop’s mezzanine), and he was able to get some pretty cool drum sounds. So Kory’s really gifted with stuff like that.

G: We crafted and worked on it together and the final product is a compromise, mostly pro-songwriting, because a lot of those songs were written before Kory even joined the band. I think “Halls of Columbia” has Kory’s influence on it as a songwriter, but I think a lot of the rest of it does not.

D: Is there a particular band or record that Pickwick sat down with and said, “Ok, we want our album to sound like this”, or, “We want the flow of our album to kinda mimic or be very similar to this”?

M: I don’t think so. We really – we all have a very eclectic taste in music and we all draw from a lot of different things that might not necessarily – we’re all drawing from a lot of different influences that people don’t always put together. So we’re really trying to make a record and write songs that sound like us, as opposed to someone else. I mean, I know that people will hear whatever they want to hear in the music as far as influences go, but we really just try to be ourselves on the record.

G: In terms of the flow, I think we just kind of served each song in terms of production and trying to make it work. And sometimes I think we really succeeded in that and sometimes I think we could have still done better. But yeah, I don’t think that there was any model we were going after. Song to song we were just like, let’s finish this!

M: I think sequencing was something that took a while. (Note: Lou Reed’s “Take A Walk on The Wild Side” starts playing in the background speakers). We all have different ways that we can think about the layout of a record. I know for me I was constantly trying to sequence the record in my head before it was actually done to try and have a map. So that whole process took a while.

D: Yeah, I remember talking to you guys at SXSW last year when you played the Seattle showcase and you were right in the middle of it and a lot of people, including myself, thought it was going to come out very close to summer of last year

G: Yeah, that would have been nice. (Laughs).

D: So, re-recording songs like “Hacienda Motel” and “The Round”, was that because Can’t Talk Medicine is slated for national distribution and you felt like those songs deserved to be heard by a larger audience, or was it more that up until now you guys haven’t had the chance to do them justice or to make them sound the way that they sound in your head?

M/G: Both.

M: I think that’s very – that’s good, very astute. I think both of those things are true. Our manager from the get-go said he wanted to push for “Hacienda Motel” to be the single and so it made sense to re-record that one. Also when we first did Myths we had literally written those songs two or three weeks before, and we had never recorded anything before, we didn’t know what we were doing. It was also our first time working with Kory and we didn’t know what it was like to work with him. None of us had really done any recording at all and we kind of did Myths over the course of two weekends.

D: The whole thing?

M: Well, pretty much. It was pretty much two or three weekends with mixing in between. So it was done pretty quickly, and when we did that it was all for ourselves. We were playing in this band because it was something we all loved to do but we all had jobs and lives, and no one was coming to our shows.

G: (Laughs). It’s true!

M: We just got the idea to put out 45’s because that’s what we like to do – to go record shopping and like sift through 45’s. And so, we just decided to put these songs on 45’s and then somehow it caught on and it was a bit of a surprise. So that was cool.

G: But we had limited time with those and I think we got some feedback on Myths initially, from someone that we trust, that they’re a little flat – the recordings are a little flat. And I think I agree with that, and so on the record we wanted to expand, you know. It was a second chance to expand on these songs.

D: You can hear that too. I always thought that the best version of “Hacienda Motel” was the Sound On The Sound (Seattle music blog) version. It had the right speed, it had the right feel. But I think that this time around you guys captured it better than ever because it has all those elements from that recording except it just sounds incredible and omplete. There is a lot more meat to it.

G. Thanks man.

M: Yeah, that’s what we were going for.

D: Speaking of the songs and how long you’ve been working on the album, do you guys feel like this is an accurate representation of who the band is right now? Or could you see yourselves putting out something in the next year or so just to like say, “Ok, this is really us!”

G: I think it’s definitely the most accurate representation of us on record, but I think if someone wants to really experience our band, they have to come see us live. That’s where we’re at. Our live show is where we’re at. And even that’s a little delayed because it’s not comprised of completely new material.

M: Yeah, I could see us, hopefully, if we have time to work it out, I could see us getting another record out in the next couple years.

G: Yeah.

D: So speaking of your shows, what’s a good show feel like to you? What does it feel like before, during, and after? What’s that energy feel like and what are the different elements that go into that now that you’ve played all sorts of venues like the High Dive’s, the Barboza’s, and the Neptune’s (all Seattle venues). What makes a good show?

G: I don’t think size. I think it’s like – we don’t have a pre-show ritual. We just all try to like, I don’t know…

M: I’m usually having a panic attack.

G: (Laughs). We all kind of regroup.

M: Galen’s doing vocal exercises, I’m like, pacing.

G: Um, but the room size doesn’t necessarily matter, because like – we had a show in Salt Lake City with maybe fifteen or twenty people and like, I jumped on the floor and was writhing around on the ground.

M: That place is still one of our favorite places to play.

G: It maybe holds 50 people.

M: 50 – 75 people but everybody’s right up on you and the energy is so great. I mean, we’ve got lucky in the sense that we’ve gotten to play Sasquatch, the Showbox – and that thing we got to do on the 4th of July at Gasworks Park where we played for like 20,00 people and we were on tv and all that. Like, that was crazy, but we still, at our core, are probably in our element most when we’re just playing small clubs, that just feels so great.

G: Yeah, I think the rooms, I mean, I hope that people show up, but I think the rooms we’re playing on the east coast are probably the size of rooms that we like to play, like Barboza.

D: You guys are playing Shubas in Chicago right?

G: Yeah.

D: Well that’s where I’m from and I was just there, and it’s amazing!

G: I just hope that people show up, because if there’s energy there, it’s going to be awesome. We get stoked about that stuff.

D: Oh, you’re going to love it for sure.

D: So what do you guys think of Macklemore right now?

M. We think he’s very smart as a businessman.

G: Played his cards right.

D: Is that something you guys are interested in doing, something outside of a label, or are you looking for a label potentially?

G: We’re not closed to the idea of partnering with a label but at this point, it just felt like we could organically continue what we started here with the six member band. But yeah, we’re open to labels in the future.

M: It’s really interesting because, like, using him as an example – you really are starting to see tangible ways the music industry is changing. Like the fact that that guy has no label and is the number 1 song in the world probably right now, it’s incredible! Like, this is the only time in the last hundred years where that has ever happen (Note: first in 20 years — second all time (Lisa Loeb) – first that wasn’t popularized by a major motion picture). And so, yeah. We would obviously love to be on a label if everything was right, but we’re also not opposed to the idea of seeing how far we can take things on our own. It would just have to be right.

D: What are your favorite songs on the new album?

G: I love “Brother Roland”. I really do love the “Myths”/“Brother Roland” connection. That instrumental/spoken word thing that leads into “Brother Roland” – I think that part is cool. Because to me that feels like an arc in the record. It’s like you have these upbeat type songs, then you have like this dip where you kind of get the chance to catch your breath and then the record starts to pick up in a different way. Like some of the intensity that’s within the songs and the lyrics start to come out a little more, they’re a little more obvious from that point on in the record, I think. And It’s heavier.

D: It is. I really like that.

M: I think for me it’s “Santa Rosa” because it’s the first song that I’ve ever written that I did entirely in my head. Like when I sat down at my computer I had a melody in my head and I just started singing that melody, then I overdubbed some harmonies to it, and I figured out a little bit of a structure, and I did it without any instruments, I just did it all with vocals. And I just spent all day in my room like trying to figure out how to make it work, just by what I was hearing in my head. And actually, to get it from there to the tape was an experience that I hadn’t undergone up to that point – just doing something completely with my voice.

D: Did you find yourself orchestrating the rest of the band’s parts? Like, “This is what I’m hearing exactly, can we just try this”?

M: Yeah, there’s a lot of give and take. I think sometimes—

G: It depends on the song.

M: Yeah, I think it depends on the song. I think sometimes I – like my brother Garrett plays bass and I can just tell him like, “You know that part from that record right there? Do something like that.” Then he’ll just be like, “Fine.” And then he’ll like totally take it and run with it. So yeah, each song is different. But “Santa Rosa” showed up in a way that I’ve never experienced. So that was fun for me.

D: Alright one last questions. Outside of music, what are some band activities you like to do?

G: We don’t do anything. (Laughs).

D: No Frisbee or hacky sack on tour?

G: I guess on tour, I mean, tours are the only time we ever get to hang out, other than being in the basement, or…

M: We enjoy doing “The Fetal”.

D: “The Fetal” what’s that?!

M: Tell ‘em what “The Fetal” is…

G: So, during my youth I invented this dive in the pool. So what you do is you stand at the edge of the pool – the water is nine feet, at least. If you’re doing it in more shallow waters you might cause serious health risk to you and your crotchery (thats the crotch region). But here it is. You just let yourself fall in, curl in, head first, and underwater you curl just a little bit more. And the G Forces that hit you, underneath the water, will remind you of your time in the whom. So we call it ”The Fetal”. You can’t do this shit in the hot tub!

M: Yeah, you have to try it in a full blown American pool!

G: You ever seen that movie, Demolition Man? Wesley Snipes, bleached blonde hair?

D: Nope.

M: It’s an American classic!

G: Important film. Important American film. Here’s the hierarchy of films. Alright. And this IS on the record.

M: You got Demolition Man, Citizen Kane, Casablanca—

G: No, no, no, no. Jerry Maguire… Number 1!

M: No Way!

G: Best Movie Ever.

M: No way!

D: Best Movie Ever?

G: Name a movie better than Jerry Maguire and I’ll shoot it down.

D: Tommy Boy?

G: I mean, I like Tommy Boy a lot more than Jerry Maguire, but I don’t think that you’re understanding my game. You’re supposed to come at me with Citizen Kane man.

D: Alright, Citizen Kane!

G: Jerry Maguire is far better than Citizen Kane.

D: Do you have any reasons why?

G: Because of Rod Tidwell. Ok, listen up, you want to hear… You know Cameron Crowe?

D: Yeah.

G: Here is some of his best dialog, “Nah, I air dry.”

(All laugh).

D: I have no idea what that’s from.

G: It’s from Rod Tidwell in the locker room, man!

M: Welcome to our world, this is what we do!

G: On the last tour, I invented a culinary masterpiece. It’s a potato – a baked potato, but inside of it….is a sausage! Still looking for a name.

D: Do you eat the whole thing, like the skin and all too?

M: Yeah, motherfucker, you eat the skin!

(Everyone at this point is laughing their asses off).

G: It’s like a baked potato, but it has a sausage in it, ‘cause what’s the problem with eating just potatoes? It’s all starch and no protein, right? So you put the sausage in there and you sell it at food carts or county fairs and whatever, and you’re rich!

D: Yeah, if you deep-fried it, then it becomes county fair material.

G: Our friends are starting this venue in Spokane called the Bartlet. I told them, “Don’t start a venue, start a food cart and sell baked potatoes with sausages in them.”

D: Is this how you’re going to retire after the band?

G: They didn’t listen. I like to pursue many things at once man. My people are on it.

D: Good.

G: So that’s one thing that came up in van. It just came to me.

D: What do you think of the scene right now? Do you like the Seattle Music Scene?

G: Yeah, it’s great.

M: Yeah, I mean, we’ve been kinda removed from it in some ways over the last year, just touring and we’ve only played a couple of shows in Seattle.

D: Does that feel different?

M: Yeah, it’s definitely different.

G: Instead of playing a show every three months or whatever.

M: Yeah, we used to play once a month, or once every two months. Now it’s totally different. Like, we’ve been doing a lot of shows in odd markets. We played in Leavenworth, Wenatchee a couple of times, and Spokane.

G: If your band needs a show in Wenatchee, Cafe Mela is awesome.

D: Yeah, that’s what I hear.

G: Play there dude.

M: Yeah, they treat you well there.

G: Darin there is great. But you know, we love Radiation City, they’re an incredible band. We’re stoked to be touring with Deep Sea Diver, just a couple shows in Colorado though. It’s cool see how hard Hey Marseilles and Ivan & Alyosha are working. There’s a band called Pleasure Beauty from here that I think is brilliant.

M: We really like Tomten a lot. We think they’re great.

G: Yeah, there’s cool stuff going on.

D: I feel like it’s a good scene.

G: I think it’s a great scene. It will be interesting to see if it changes or anything happens with Macklemore blowing up.

D: Yeah. Well, it will be interesting because for so long, at least the last three or four years it’s been a really strong folk scene, and you guys aren’t folk at all. But you seem to be friends with all those people. So it seems like something is starting to branch out. I think people want to move a little bit more, rock a little bit more, which is one of the reasons why I think you guys are having so much success. You are filling the void that everybody wants… plus you’re awesome!

G: Thanks man!

M: I think that happened for us too – we were a folk band for so many years and then when we first started just turning the volume up a little bit and just letting Galen scream it started to feel way better.

G: Yeah, and I think it says a lot about people in Seattle that they were willing to come to our shows and dance and have fun, which isn’t necessarily the norm, where it’s been more about just standing there politely. And not that that’s bad because it’s pretty much the only way that I’ve ever seen a show. I don’t know how to dance.

D: Alright, well thank you guys very much. I can’t wait to try this baked potato and sausage thing.

G: Yeah dude, but if you steal my idea…. I’ll hunt you down! (Laughs)

Pickwick is on the road right now, and there’s a good chance that they’re coming to your city! For a full list of dates and a chance to listen/ buy Can’t Talk To Medicine, visit their website www.pickwickmusic.com. For all there updated tour shenanigans, press, and updates on show info, follow them on Facebook HERE!

*Note: Super special thanks to Michael and Galen for taking the time to do this interview. This has been one of my favorite bands for almost two years now and I felt very honored and stoked to hang out with them and do this. Thanks dudes!

– Dominic Cortese, music writer, The Monarch Review