Interviews
Live from the Decker House: Rosewood Thieves Interview
- by Ronan Hunt-Murphy
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Add to del.ico.us.(2008-04-30)
They’ve already had two acclaimed EPs, and their singer claims to only listen to music from 1975 or before, so what can we expect from the band’s debut album? We had a quiet little chat with Erick Jordan to find out what the band has been up to. Fans of the band fear not, as their debut, Rise and Shine is not a total departure from their EPs. Jordan says “It’s more in the vein of From the Decker House, we are all excited about the new songs. We have been playing them at shows for a little while now and it’s been going well.”
Many people comment how music is a work of art, and the CD is our generation’s canvas. Jordan is one person who can compare the two worlds, having worked in New York’s own Museum of Modern Art. I made the mistake of asking him how the job was going: “Well I was fired from that job a while ago. I kept having ‘trouble’ making it on time, and finally they let me go. It was a great place to work though, the security guards all thought they were Samuel L. Jackson.” Art is a great influence on many musicians’ work, so should we expect a Jackson Pollock flavoured concept album to follow up Rise and Shine? “Ummmmm, more like Isaac Abrams.” To those not in the know (and I must admit I fell into that category), Abrams is a psychedelic painter. So if that’s anything to go by, God knows what to expect from this band in the future.
At the moment, however, the band is more focused on telling stories. We all have favourites, so what about Jordan, and will we ever get to see some of his favourites put to music? “Theodore Thumbleweed and Yodeling Yolanda are good stories. If I had to pick a favorite though it would have to be The Mild Mannered Short Haired White Rabbit. Maybe I’ll include elements from these in some songs one day, who knows.”
The band’s first EP, From the Decker House, the band relocated to a wilderness which was essentially the polar opposite of the New York City. How did that this help with the recording process? “Although we actually didn’t record the record Upstate, we wrote all the songs there. It was great to have peace of mind and do nothing but play music all day and night, I recommend it, but make sure you do it with the right people.” Recording their debut album wasn’t much different than their previous recording sessions: “The first recording session we thought we were doing another EP, and then after we listened back we decided these songs should be a part of an LP. Before we realized it, the LP was done. Finishing mixing, that’s another story.”
Those EPs have been compared to various pre-1975 artists. Their first EP evoked the sounds of John Lennon's solo work and The Animals. While their second EP had a country-rock sound similar to John Wesley Harding-era Bob Dylan. So who’s in the record player on the tour bus at the moment? “Right now we are listening to a lot of soul music, Otis Redding, Solomon Burke, Joe Tex and Reggae like Desmond Dekker and Jimmy Cliff.” Bob Dorough was a large part of the Decker House recording process, playing the piano on that EP. So did the band take time out from the sessions to play any of the Schoolhouse Rock tunes “Three’s the magic number.” It surely is, and their third release, Rise and Shine looks set to be amazing.
The band might not have even got this far, as their record label V2, disbanded before they even got to release a full-length record. Surely this was a real hindrance: “Not at all, we never got any help from V2 anyway, so nothing changed for us, we still do everything ourselves. A lot of people at the company were great, but they had to do what they had to do to keep their jobs. It was a mess, but it’s all good in the hood.” Thankfully the band haven’t let this impede on their road to glory. Their first LP Rise and Shine will be out in a few months