Greenville Scene

I’ve got to go with Dave Barnes @ The Handlebar for Friday and Scott Miller & Commonwealth @ The Handlebar on Saturday. If you’re itching to take a roadtrip, try The Noises 10 in Charlotte on Saturday and Rooney in Atlanta on Sunday.

Check out the new interviews with The Winter Sounds and By’r Lady in the Interviews section. Also, please take a minute to navigate to the Forum and tell us what indie bands you’d like to see in Greenville. Your vote counts!

by: Daniel McCord

By’r Lady is a three-piece out of Clemson, SC with Dwight Hutchenson on guitar/vox, Ben Shealy on bass/vox and Jason Walter on drums.

GS: Describe your sound in one word
JW: Good.

GS: Who are your biggest influences?
JW: Television, David Bowie, The Velvet Underground, and the Kinks.

GS: What is your creative process like?
JW: Although most of the group’s songs begin with Dwight, Ben and I put our stamp on every song. Dwight purposely leaves tunes unfinished when he presents them to us. He feels that a song is going to turn out the best when it’s a reflection of all three members.

GS: What other bands have you guys played in before?
JW: Dwight and I were in The Lavernes.

GS: Why do you play?
JW: Ideally, this is what we all want to be doing for the rest of our lives

GS: What do you think about playing in Greenville?
JW: We played a show at Gypsy G’s with Leslie a couple of months ago and had a great time. We were introduced to a shot called the “Lunchbox,” which became the shot of choice for the weekend. The bar stayed open past 2pm which was rather surprising for us Clemson folk. Also, the Gypsy has one of the best sound systems and soundmen around. We’d really love to play at the Handlebar especially with some of the bigger out-of-town indie acts like The Whigs and The Noises 10.

GS: What do you think about the local scene?
JW: There’s really two things going on musically at Clemson right now. The downtown scene is saturated with acoustic “dudes” who only know how to play songs that they THINK girls like and jam bands that cover songs that they THINK they know how to play. Farther down College Ave, you get to the Blue Heron and you’ve got Clemson bands that have been regularly playing there for the past year or so; like GoodE J vs. Nieltown, the Wildlife Series, and Heart Monster; and these bands are not only playing their own songs (what a concept), but the audience actually pays attention to the band! The main thing that would really give Clemson a legitimate music scene is if it had a venue in which underage kids could get in but that still served alcohol. Then, the ball would would really start to roll.

GS: What’s the toughest thing about getting a local gig?
JW: All of the bars in downtown Clemson want one thing and one thing only: cover bands. Most of the bar owners aren’t willing to take risks and book bands that might actually become famous someday.

GS: What do you absolutely love about music?
JW: Listening to it every chance I can possibly get.

www.byrlady.com

by: Michelle Hannon

The Winter Sounds are a five piece rock/pop band based out of Athens, GA. They signed with Livewire Recordings in January and have been touring vigorously since March. Their sound takes a cue from 80’s pop like The Smiths and more recently Interpol and The Killers. Check them out July 5th at Downtown Alive and July 6th at The Handlebar.

GS: So who is from Greenville? I noticed a few Easley High graduates and Gina went to Eastside. How did you all end up in Athens?
PK: Well, we consider Greenville the hang out spot and if we were to get into specifics of where we’re from we’d just have a bunch of small towns outside of Greenville to list. All our friends live there and we always go to bars in Greenville when we’re in town. Its kind of a happening spot compared to Six Mile if you know what I mean? We ended up in Athens because I wanted to record a CD there. Gina and I moved together. Kass was living there already and Tim followed shortly after we finished. We met Donovan in Athens.

GS: How did you meet/form?
PK: Basically, I already knew Tim, Kass, Gina, and Donovan, and I asked their help recording an EP we put out last year called “Land of No Output.” So the first album kind of created the band.

GS: When did you sign with Livewire and how has that affected the growth of the band?
PK: We signed with Livewire in January of this year. All of sudden there was a well-organzied, well-funded team of people working along side of us helping us to do what we wanted to do and that was very exciting.

GS: How are you holding up on tour? Is it going well?
PK: The shows are going great. We’ve made touring a science and we know how to maintain without getting on each other’s nerves and without losing too much touch with the rest of the world. Since we’ve been touring so much and we have the support of the label we can go almost anywhere and play for a bunch of people that have heard of us and are really into the music. We try and make friends every night (we always need a place to stay) and so each night is filled with meeting new people and exploring a new town.

GS: What/who is inspiring you right now?
PK: We’ve been listening to a lot of random stuff; podcasts from the Commonwealth Club of California, Mitch Hedburg, political debate, news, Chomsky lectures and of course a lot of music. We usually have some pretty long drives so the music is a large part of it. I think today we played Midlake’s the Trials of Van Occupanther, the National’s Boxer, the Essential Billy Joel, Final Fantasy, some Smiths, some Stone Roses..

GS: What is the next step for The Winter Sounds?
PK: We are touring the rest of the year, we’ll be doing CMJ in October then going out West. And we’re working on a European release of “Porcelain Empire” in November followed by a European tour in February of next year. Hopefully by the summertime of ‘08 we’ll be in the studio again.

GS: Any big plans for the album’s release?
PK: We are having a CD release party July 6th at the Handlebar in Greenville. The day before we’re doing a hybrid set of mostly acoustic, some electric versions of our songs at Downtown Alive. Mostly just keep touring, keep crossing the fingers.

www.thewintersounds.com