Jealous Again – The Return of The Jealous Sound

See a video of The Jealous Sound from their latest show in Seattle

About an hour before they take the stage in Seattle on a June evening, The Jealous Sound can’t believe the sun is still shining outside. As if they don’t know, I tell them that the late-evening daylight in the Northwest is all about latitude. Busily chatting with old and new friends, the band probably didn’t hear my comment. But if they did, I imagine the word “latitude” might have summoned definitions in their minds other than “distance from the equator.”

For The Jealous Sound, the word “latitude” is probably more likely to call up synonyms like “independence.” Because after a long spell of business-related confusion, The Jealous Sound are finally free to release and support the new music that their fans – and that people who don’t know yet that they’re J-Sound fans - have been waiting for.

Released in June on Better Looking Records (the same label that put out their debut EP) Kill Them With Kindness is The J-Sound’s return to record stores. Its 12 passionate, well-produced rock songs make a beautiful summer soundtrack. But dig into the lyrics of KTWK, and you’ll find a lot of unhappiness. The three years between albums certainly helped The J-Sound improve as musicians, but the downtime also must have included some frustration and personal problems that shine through in KTWK’s new songs.

During that time, The J-Sound signed with Mojo Records, and as a result, the band soon ended up being shifted onto Jive Records and into contract deadlock. Eventually, Jive released The J-Sound from their agreement, and the band quickly reunited with Better Looking to record and release their first full-length album. It was a welcome return to indie-label freedom for vocalist/guitarist Blair Shehan (formerly of Knapsack), guitarist Pedro Benito (formerly of Sunday’s Best), and bassist/programmer John McGinnis (formerly of Neither Trumpets Nor Drums).

After recruiting Adam Wade, former drummer of Jawbox and Shudder to Think, and after playing several high-profile shows (including Austin’s 2003 South-by-Southwest festival and a stint opening for the Foo Fighters), The Jealous Sound finally began their first headlining tour ever – a quick string of dates on the West Coast. When the band made a stop in Seattle, Shehan was kind enough to sit down with Bettawreckonize to talk about the bumpy road that led to an excellent album.

Interview conducted in person and photos taken by Jeff Locher.

Name: Blair Shehan (guitar, vocals)
Band: The Jealous Sound

BettaWreckonize: From what I’ve read about The Jealous Sound, you guys are experienced, motivated musicians, and it sounds like you’ve got an ambitious, goal-oriented musical career going on. Is that pretty accurate?

Blair Shehan: We’re definitely not weekend warriors or something like that. We’re definitely here to play for as many people as we can and to have as many people hear our music as possible. Nothing out of the ordinary.

BW: So thinking about it from that perspective, what was it like the last few years, between the EP and the new LP?

BS: It wasn’t terrible. We were sort of stuck in limbo for a little while, which was unpleasant, but it wasn’t horrible. We were still able to tour; we were out with some other great bands. We went out and recorded a bunch of demos, wrote, and just sort of got organized. You have to remember that when we first did the EP, we were totally disorganized and totally scattered at that point. We weren’t focused on anything; we didn’t know exactly what we were doing at that point.

BW: The EP was basically a demo itself, right?

BS: More or less, yes… The relationship was too new; everything was too new. Time solidified what we were about and what we wanted.

BW: The major label thing: Do you guys feel like you gave that a fair shot, or did you pretty much decide to make an exit from it when –

BS: It’s a pretty simple story. It [Mojo Records] wasn’t really a major; essentially, it was a large independent through a major backing, kind of the way I looked at it. So that was fine, but then everything fell apart as far as their financing and how everything was set up. We were just stuck, and we got shifted over to another major label, which was Jive, which was not a good fit for us no matter… That’s crazy. We contractually had to give them a record, or they had to let us go if they weren’t going to have us put out a record. So we said, “Look, you have to give us some money so we can record and get on with our lives, or you have to let us go.” Eventually, they just let us go. We never gave them anything. In the end we actually came out looking pretty good, because we got money from them, so that was actually pretty great.

BW: So how did the return to Better Looking Records go down?

BS: We had been stuck in limbo so long, we didn’t even send a demo out. We had a bunch of demos that we didn’t send to anyone, anywhere. We got together and said, “Look, we’re going to go for some bigger independent or try another major label,” but then we were like, “The negotiation time would take forever to do something like that.” Paul [Fischer of Better Looking Records] had been fair with us, and we wanted to have a lot of ownership about what we were doing at this point. So we were like, “Should we just do it? Let’s just take some of the money we got, pony it up with Paul at Better Looking, and make a record the way we want.” We had booked the producer [Tim O’Heir] like two days after we got off. I mean, everything was like, [snapping fingers] “Let’s go. Let’s get on with it.”

BW: The material that you recorded for the album: Had it been around for a while, or was it brand new?

BS: It was a mixed bag. Some was brand-spanking new, some was recorded during the “middle part,” and a couple of songs were older songs.

BW: When I listen to your EP and then to the new LP, the biggest difference to me is how much you’ve smoothed out your sound. Would you agree with that comparison? How do you see the two?

BS: People have said things like that: “It’s smooth…” The point of the demos was that they were demos. It’s kind of like we were in a loud place, and I sang sort of quietly. On this [new] one, I really got into it and sang and did the best I could. Also, we had a producer on board. All the other stuff was essentially self-produced.

BW: What about lyrically and thematically. Any differences between the two recordings? It seems like there are a lot of people getting hurt on this album…

BS: Between the two [recordings] was not a particularly great time for me. Personally, there was just a lot of stuff going on in my life that was really crazy. So essentially the record deals with that, as far as becoming alright again. Like, “Oh God, I sort of feel normal again. Things are starting to calm down. I can deal with this again.” My life was really just on 11 at that point, so a lot of the record has to do with that: sort of regaining my own reality again without being scared of everything around me.

BW: So it’s all good now?

BS: Nothing’s ever perfect that way, but I’m in a lot better head space than I was in between [records]. But I don’t want to be like, “Trouble makes for good records.” It was just time for me to have some problems. [Laughs.]

BW: Fair enough. A really easy way to compare your EP and the LP is to listen to “Anxious Arms” on both. Why did you decide to include that particular song on the new album?

BS: We talked about it and said, “OK, we have enough songs to make a record without that song.” So that wasn’t really an issue. It was that people like that song… I think people connect with that song. And it was one of those things where people would see us live and say, “Wow, you sound nothing like you do on the EP.” So we were like, “What’s the song that we like best that we still enjoy playing and that we want to make sound more like what we sound like as a live band. Because originally it [“Anxious Arms”] was a demo, so it didn’t really reflect how we play it live. You know, it was a lot bigger live, so we wanted to re-do it the way we actually play it.

BW: Did you re-record any of the other tracks from the EP? Nothing in the vault?

BS: No.

BW: So Tim O’Heir was obviously on board for this one. Mark Trombino was involved with the EP, right?

BS: Yeah, he mixed it for us.

BW: But he wasn’t involved here [on Kill Them With Kindness] at all?

BS: No.

BW: Did Tim have a lot to do with the smoother qualities of the album, or is that something that you guys had in your heads going in?

BS: See, I understand that you think it’s smooth, but I don’t think it’s that smooth. I think there are a lot of true sounds, like the way guitar sounds, the way bass, drums… It’s clean, and the sound is big. So in that way it’s smooth, I suppose, not rough like the way demos would be rough, or static-y or hissy. But Tim brought a lot to the table, and he was a really great inspiration while we were recording. He kept the energy up and had a lot of great ideas, and he was just an all-around great guy to record with. He spent two months with us, basically. He was all in, and we lived it all together and made the record. So it was really great.

BW: It sounds like there’s a lot more electronic action on this album…

BS: Yeah, records are supposed to be fun; that’s the way we look at it. We’re not going to use all that live, but we added some stuff in there, some textures. We want to make a record that sounds really great, and you throw on headphones and it sounds awesome. We don’t have a large enough fan base where everyone’s going to give us some crazy backlash for doing something… or they expect some certain sound on everything. We just wanted to make stuff that was fun. You know, you try something, a little keyboard line or something, and you say, “Oh, that sounds really great next to the song.”

BW: Actually a couple of my favorite parts of the album are electronic, like the little breakdown on “The Fold Out.”

BS: Oh yeah, the little handclap. That’s great; that’s fun! We have a guy that’s a friend of mine that I’ve known for years, and he came in, and he’s an amazing keyboard/piano player. So he did some stuff and helped us. And then John [McGinnis] our bass player does a lot of programming and a lot of the texturing-type stuff that you hear – like those pulses and things like that – and I think those things are really fun.

BW: I heard a rumor that John lived with Jimmy [Tamborello] from Dntel…

BS: No, Pedro [Benito] our guitar player lived with Jimmy for years and years. Just until recently. They’ve been roommates and friends for years.

BW: That must have made for interesting house parties.

BS: [Laughs.] Jimmy… All those guys who are really good at that kind of stuff kind of hole up in their room and just quietly work, you know, like a mad scientist in there.

BW: The [Jealous Sound’s] last drummer, Michel Bravine, what happened with him?

BS: Michel was a great guy, and he lived with me for a while. You know, bands have their problems, and we all just sort of came to an agreement that it wasn’t right right now for what we were doing. He knew it, we knew it, and we were all like, “Yeah, this isn’t working right now. You need to do whatever you need to do.” I still see him around; he’s still my friend and everything. But it was just one of those times when we weren’t all on the same page as far as what we wanted to do.

BW: Tony Palermo, I guess, is another friend?

BS: Yeah, Tony P! Tony played [drums] with us too on the EP – for like half of the EP. We were getting ready to record the record when Michel left the band. We were like, “What are we going to do? Alright…call Tony and see if Tony’s around.” So we got Tony in there to play the drums, but he has a lot of other commitments where he’s invested like ten years with other bands. So as much as he would have liked to play with us [permanently] – and we would have liked him to play with us – he couldn’t. He just had too many commitments, and he couldn’t do it.

BW: So how did you end up hooking up with Adam Wade?

BS: I’ve known Adam for a while, and Adam had known Pedro. He lives down the street from us, and we see him around. He lives like two miles from my house, so it’s like, “Hey Adam.” We’ve been friends for a while, so I’m like, “Hey, you aren’t doing anything right now, are you?” And he said, “No.” And I’m like, “Do you want to play in our band, The Jealous Sound?” [He says,] “Come on over we’ll talk about it.” So I play him the new record and he’s like, “OK, I’ll do it.” So there you go.

BW: So you guys are maybe not veterans, but pretty experienced.

BS: I’ve been doing this for ten years. I’ve been doing it since I was like 20; I’m 30 now.

BW: So is anybody still playing in other bands, or is everybody fully dedicated to The Jealous Sound?

BS: I think Adam sometimes plays in a country band out in Bakersfield… This is definitely the primary. There’s nothing that competes. That’s just a hobby that’s for fun, but we’re all fully invested in this.

BW: How have you guys liked playing this record out live so far?

BS: It’s fun. Certain songs lend themselves better for live play, and some songs are a little tougher to pull off. We have a lot of songs we can play now, so it’s great. We can play a full set instead of five songs, six songs, seven songs. Obviously, things sound different than they do on records when you play them live. But it’s been great; we’re having a great time.

BW: Do any shows stand out? I know you played out with the Foo Fighters for a little bit.

BS: That was mostly insane more than anything. That was really fun, and everyone was super nice, and the crowds were actually really good to us. But that was just surreal, like rock and roll fantasy camp. Playing in front of 8,000 people… But mostly what’s really fun right now is us having our own shows, whereas we’ve been supporting for so long. We went out with The Fire Theft for a month, we supported Death Cab for Cutie, we did a couple weeks with The Get Up Kids… always like support, support, support. [It’s good] to actually have your own show where people are there to see you, and it’s not, “Oh, who are these guys?” So this [headlining] has actually been really fun. This is our first week of doing this – ever.

BW: So what can we expect next after this little West-Coast tour?

BS: We’re going to do a full U.S. tour. It’s already three-quarters booked right now, and it’s starting in August. The way I look at it, I anticipate it being off and on for the next…however long. You know, month on / month off, month on / month off. Hopefully we can finally go to Europe or Japan. Those are things we’d like to do.

BW: One more question: Is it [from Kill Them With Kindness’s “Hope for Us”] “Kiss me open-mouth”?

BS: Yep!

BW: Not “on the mouth”?

BS: Nope. It’s “open.”

BW: I was reading a fan site that has tablature and lyrics, and it said, “on the mouth.”

BS: [Joking] Yeah, they always screw that shit up. [Laughs.]