Interview: Gloryhound

I spoke with Gloryhound outside of Sneaky Dee’s between sets at the ECMA daytime showcase, but the band had a busy Canadian Music Week, having already played two other showcases on the first two days of the festival.

The guys were already settled before the festival had started, though, because the band had already been in Toronto for about a month. And the Halifax band loves spending time in Toronto. Everyone agrees as frontman Evan Meisner says, “There’s lots to do. There’s lots of bars to go to, have too much fun at and be hungover the next day… Like today.”

Having played the night before, the guys then all start talking about whether they’re hungover or not. Bassist Jeremy MacPherson says, “Nah, I’m feeling good man” attributing his lack of hangover to a burger and water.

We’re only a couple minutes into our chat and I can already tell these guys are hilarious.

The band released an EP, Electric Dusk, in December 2010, which has received some high praise out East. The EP was nominated for two Music Nova Scotia awards (Group Recording of the Year and Rock Recording of the Year) last year and is currently up for Rock Recording of the Year at the East Coast Music Awards that will take place on April 15th.

The 7-song EP full of shorter songs, each less than 4 minutes in length. Their reasoning, according to lead guitarist David Casey, has a little bit to do with money, but he also says, “[It was] what we wanted to do anyway, release something short and to the point, what our live set was revolving around at the time.”

And to ensure the recording was true to their live sound, the band recording Electric Dusk live off the floor.

Drummer Shaun Hanlon adds, “We figured we’d give ‘em more on an EP rather than less on an album.”

Jeremy agrees, “No filler that way.”

“We thought everything was pretty strong. It is an EP, but at the same time if you listen to the whole thing, it’s a lot of music to take in, even if it is just 7 songs,” Evan continues.

And for fans that are anxious to hear a follow-up to Electric Dusk, the band confirms that they’ve started cutting demos, so the process to get more music recorded has already started. In fact, that’s what the guys were up to in Toronto prior to the start of the festival.

Evan describes the band’s songwriting process. “I usually dream them up and wake up and that’s it… No, I usually write most of the songs. David writes some of the songs too. And we get an idea on paper and we bring it to the band and we all arrange it together, the four of us in the basement where we rehearse. We kind of bring the core of the song and we arrange it together.”

Jeremy adds, “Embellish as necessary.”

Evan then says, “We embellish it. That’s how we write songs, we just embellish them. We have an idea and we just embellish on it and then we have a song.”

Jeremy jokes, “That’s a good word. Word of the day.”

“Reminds me of relish, Evan says while agreeing to put that in their stage banter. “I’ll say relish twice tonight.”

For those who haven’t seen Gloryhound before, David describes their set as “high energy” and says “It’s kind of a bang-bang sorta thing. We like to just play the songs and not have any bullshit in between. We like to put on a good show.”

Jeremy then calls out, “Sweat rock.”

Evan agrees and adds “Super sexy.”

Their live show has taken them to play with some very notable acts. Evan says that the Deep Purple tour around the East Coast is one of his highlights and David says sharing the stage with Thin Lizzy was a favourite.

After this the guys are taking their live show to JunoFest, playing tonight twice (Gibson party and Zaphods) and then back out East to the ECMAs.

Evan then says, “After that, I think we might be coming back to Ontario in May to do some festivals out here and some more touring.”

When I press for a drunken story, they joke, “We have lots of drunken stories… we’re drunk right now.”

Evan then tells this story. “We were playing with Matt Mays and El Torpedo and we were playing a few shows with them and we’re having fun, almost a little too much fun. And after the show, we just ended up getting pretty drunk, some of us more than others (as his head tilts over to Shaun), so just really drunk and basically made a big scene. I still remember Jeremy carrying Shaun down the loading stairs while Shaun was puking and puked all over him and Jeremy slipped on Shaun’s puke with both of them tumbling down the stairs together. And people wanted Shaun to go to the hospital and all this stuff…”

David interrupts, “We had this super fan. We won’t name any names, but he insisted on calling an ambulance for Shaun…”

Evan counters, “He did see a paramedic, so maybe he was right. For all we know, Shaun could’ve died that night.”

Shaun then says, “And they really cared” before continuing, “This was our first Agency booked show. We weren’t even with them [yet] and they got a complaint from the bar the next day for us – “Gloryhound’s drunken backstage shenanigans” was the quote.

Jeremy, “We drank their rider, kicked it over…”

Evan exclaims, “Oh yeah! We drank all their booze because we thought it was ours!”

“And then spilled the rest,” Shaun adds.

David then says, “We were young pups then.”

“We like to think we’re a little bit wiser,” Jeremy says.

Evan jokes, “We still drink other bands’ riders. We just don’t get sick anymore.”

Unanimously, the band says Jager is their shot of choice.

Jeremy says, “It’s perfect any time of day, honestly.”

Shaun questions, “ANY time?”

“Any time,” Jeremy responds.

Stay tuned for what Gloryhound has coming up – lots more touring, recording and… possibly an East Coast Music Award? Good luck, guys!