How did the band get together?
TH: Last year, I was in Mexico doing this band called Los Muertos, it was me and Bob Weir and Bill Kreutzmann and Dave Schools and Jeff Chimenti and man, I was super burnt out. I was burned out emotionally, I was burned with the version of the Babies I had. It was just killing me, I just felt like I was carrying people, and that’s like not a good feeling. It’s not a good feeling to be on stage and to feel like you have to like be conducting, instead of just being able to be in the moment, you know? And it was killing me man… So I talked to Jon, my manager, and I was just like, “Listen man, I think I wanna do this thing, I think I wanna start something different, and you know, kind of flip the band and start making moves… And so, I kinda like put a feeler out to Scott to make sure he’d be in, I put a feeler out to Steve, make sure he would be in, and then once that was all a thing, I had gotten Holly connected with my manager to represent her as well so it was kind of easy to all be on the same page… It’s interesting, you know, I’ve heard Holly say before how her first time getting to know some of the people was purely musical, and that’s a really interesting way for people to meet.
HB: It was, “Hey how’s it going?” Here’s our names, three minutes of conversation and that was it. So definitely the way that we got to know each other initially, as far as a full conversation in figuring out like “Who are you?” with Scott and Steve was musically, initially, which I absolutely love… [The whole band is] kind of all over the map as far as where we’re coming from, which I think is really great. I don’t really want to be in a band with four other people that listen to all the same shit that I do. But you know, there were also cool surprises, personally. Like I had no idea that Scotty is a friggin’ hilarious comedian that just never quits. Like that’s really cool, “This is gonna make 20 hour rides in the van way less tedious.” [Laughter.]
What about vocals?
HB: The strongest vocalists are going to take the lead, but we’re really excited about the ability to create some pretty lush harmonies and we’re at the very beginning of that. I think that it’s something we’ll play into more and more as the band grows and develops, but yeah we’re definitely playin’ around with the vocal pallet and how that can fasten, layer and blend.
TH: We recorded the vocals last on the record so we have all the tunes tracked basically. But we have time and so we’re gonna go out on tour and we’re gonna play these tunes and we’re gonna try different things lyrically and see how they evolve that way. And if something evolves and we need to retrack it, we’ll do that in between runs or whatever. I’m not trying to be evasive but I just don’t want to give anything away until what we’re giving away is the real deal, you know?
What compelled you to start a new band from scratch?
TH: I was gonna see if Holly wanted to join American Babies because we had been playing together a bunch. And then I was like, “You know, fuck it man, let’s tear it down and start fresh and make it so it’s five people on a level playing field.” So that’s something that I think the thing that’s really creatively satisfying for me, is the camaraderie of that thing.
HB: It’s less that I wanted to join a band and it’s more that I wanted to start a band. I had this thing that I was working on and it’s not dead, it’s just on hold temporarily, but that’ll reappear at some point here. I have a whole set of songs that I was working on that are instrumental and a completely different flavor than what Ghost Light is and it’s cool. I think they’re gonna be an interesting counter-balance to each other, but I realized, part way through, that trying to launch two new bands at once was absolute madness and that would short-change both projects. You know, I don’t like to half ass things; I wanna do something and do it with every fiber of my being, every minute of my time and like every corner of my brain. So right now, I’m living completely immersed in Ghost Light.
No Comments comments associated with this post