2013 was a breakout year for The Revivalists. After months of incessant touring, the New Orleans-based septet—David Shaw (vocals), Ed Williams (pedal steel guitar), Zack Feinberg (guitar), Rob Ingraham (saxophone), George Gekas (bass), Andrew Campanelli (drums) and Michael Giradot (keys/trumpet)—built up a solid following on the national stage. What started out as a couple of dudes hanging out at Tipitina’s youth music workshops has blossomed into a full-fledged musical force. The band even brought things full circle by teaching one of those same Sunday workshops at the iconic NOLA club last September.
While everyone else in the Crescent City was reveling in the annual Bacchanalia that is Mardi Gras this past Tuesday, The Revivalists had one more reason to celebrate, as March 4 marked the re-release of their 2012 LP City of Sound, which will now find its way to store shelves all over the country. We spoke with frontman David Shaw about the the new reissue, life on the road, working with Galactic and much more.
What made the band want to re release City of Sound?
It was a function of the label, Wind Up Records. They contacted us and were interested in our music, and they expressed some interest in wanting to give City of Sound some more layers. We previously just self-released it in the channels that we had available to us at the time, which nowadays are still pretty good for the independent artists. We kind of wanted to set the stage a little bigger so we said, “alright, we’ll give this one a shot and re-release it to the masses.” We signed on with the label. They are distributed by Sony, so by March 4 our records will be in all the stores and obviously all the online outlets as well. That was the incentive to re-release this album, to give it some more leg and give it more room.
How is this version different from the original release?
The re-release has something that we needed to do to set it apart from the original release to give the fans a little something more. People have been asking us for years to do another live album, and so that’s what we did. We put together what we’ve been recording from the past year. We hand-selected 8 tracks to go with this re-release. So, it’s basically like they’re getting new live versions of songs from City of Sound, from our first EP and from our first full length. It’s kind of a compilation of those first three discs. And that’s all free. It comes along with the disc.
It looks like a lot of those live tracks are from your Harvest the Music performance. Was there something about that show that really resonated with you guys?
The magic doesn’t happen every single night. I think one of the things that really keeps a band together, let’s just say you’re on tour, 15 out of 20 shows, the magic happens. That’s how it should go, hopefully, sometimes five out of the 20 have the magic. It was one of those shows where we were all hitting on the same wavelength, all cylinders were full go, for sure. That was one of those shows where magic definitely occurred. Everybody knew it afterwards, and we were all feeling really great after the show. And then the next question is, how were the tracks recorded? How did they turn out? They sounded great. We probably could have taken that entire show, had it mixed and just put it out. We didn’t have enough room on the disc. We took a “best of” from it and that was that.
Let’s talk about your plans for the spring. You’ve got some SXSW stuff coming up…
We’re going to SXSW. We’ve got a few showcases. We’re going to do one for our record label and I think one for our booking agency. We always have fun at SXSW. It’s a great networking place. I love going there and checking out new bands, finding out what’s the latest buzz on the scene. I’m definitely excited. We’ve done it the past two or three years, and it’s done nothing but good for us for sure.
You’re also going to be hitting the road with Moon Taxi later in the spring. What made you want to team up with this band, and what can we expect from those co-headlining shows?
They’re a great band; great guys and we’ve done a few shows with them. After some shows, the fans would be like, “Have you ever heard of a band called Moon Taxi?” After a while we checked them out and it was just like, wow, these guys are great. We should definitely do something with them. We did a show in New Orleans, and we did one in Austin not too long ago. It sold out. We were like, Why don’t we team up to go out and play some of these bigger rooms all over the Southeast and Northeast, and we’ll see what we can do. It’s definitely a good match.
Last year The Revivalists were one of Relix’s summer stars. Have you guys found a lot of love on the festival scene, and what do you have planned for this summer?
We are definitely feeling the love on the festival scene, that’s for sure. Somebody told us that we might have played the most festivals last year out of any band at our level. It was certainly a whirlwind year. After it was all typed out and we looked back, it was like, What? Did we just do all that? It was a great time, and this year is nothing less. We’re doing some of the same festivals. I’m definitely looking forward to Counterpoint Music Festival. Definitely looking forward to Jazz Fest. That’s always a riot; the crazy after shows and the nightlife is great as well.
You’ve toured with Galactic in the past, filling in the part-time vocalist role that’s also been filled by Corey Glover and Maggie Koerner at various times, and you’ve also worked with them on a few studio tracks, “Dolla Diva” and “Hey Na Na.” How did your relationship with that band begin?
The relationship with that band actually began when Ben (Ellman) was the producer for our album that’s about to be re-released. He liked my songwriting and liked my singing. He started sending me instrumental tracks for me to write songs to and he sent me this one track, which was “Hey Na Na.” I was hanging out in my bedroom and my friend Maggie (Koerner) came over and I said, ‘I want to know what you would do to this song.’ I left for like 10 minutes, and she’d written “Hey Na Na,” and I was like, “Alright, alright, we can definitely work with this.” I wrote some verses, and then she put the hook in there, and then we added a bridge and a couple more verses to the song. The rest is history. I’m a songwriter at heart, and that’s what I love to do. The relationship is great. I also co-wrote “Dolla Diva,” and there’s definitely more in the bag.
You guys came out of what I would say is the greatest musical city in the United States, New Orleans. What was it like coming out of that scene? How do you think The Revivalists fit into that crazy gumbo down there?
We love New Orleans. We all came here from other cities — some to go to school, some to pursue a career in music, some for both. Rob came to get a degree in saxophone, so that’s what he did. But it’s one of those cities. There’s a saying: There’s San Francisco, New Orleans and New York City. Everything else is Cleveland. And I’m not dissing on any of these other cities, but it’s really true. It’s got a unique life of its own, that’s for sure, a unique personality of its own. And some of the music coming out of here, some of the indie bands that come out of here don’t sound like indie bands from New York or the indie bands in San Francisco. It’s really, really got its own sound because the funk thing is running very thick throughout the city and throughout the music that people hear just on a regular basis. A lot of the bands are very groove-oriented. That’s one thing we’ve really tried to capture. We’re after that ferocious groove. Even if it’s a folk song, you know what I’m saying? It’s a beautiful city. If they made “I heart NO” shirts, I’d wear one. But I don’t really see many of those. You always see “I heart NY.” But it’s the bomb. I love it. It’s kind of a love-hate relationship with touring, because you gotta tour to make money and do what you love, but then you can’t be in the city. So I always kind of say “It’s a great place to vacation at for me,” because that’s pretty much what happens.
