Canadian Award-Winning July Talk Return To SoCal With Three

Toronto-based five-piece group July Talk bring their alt-bluesy garage rock-n-roll back to SoCal for three beginning with The Wayfarer Jan. 27, Soda Bar Jan. 28, wrapping up at Bootleg Theater Jan. 31.

The band formed in 2012, touring alongside big name acts such as Billy Talent, Tegan and Sara, Sam Roberts, and Weezer. Their 2014 tour across Australia, Canada and the United States was documented in an online series entitled ‘From The Road,’ shot and edited by award winning director Jared Raab.

Concert Guide Live spoke with Dreimanis and Fay about the band name, the group’s accelerated rise in the music industry and life on the road.

CONCERT GUIDE LIVE: How did the band form and what were the first few jam sessions like with all the members? When did the group know that they wanted to play music together?

LEAH: Peter and I met in a bar one night, Josh and Peter both dropped out of the same film program to start a production company, Danny and Peter had played in a band together and Ian showed up to rehearsal one day having learned all our songs and was a perfect fit. The first few practices we had as a five-piece felt so right. We’d been tinkering around with things as a two-piece and a three-piece (at times someone would be playing a kick drum and bass at the same time) so it was relieving to learn the project was meant to be a full on rock-and-roll band all along. We fueled ourselves with beer and two-liter bottles of wine and just played like it was the only thing we knew how to do. We got to know each other that way. Exposing the uninhibited sides of ourselves to each other and figuring out how to play passionately in a tiny, dark rehearsal space without accidentally hitting each other with instruments and flying limbs.

CGL: Who came up with the name of the group, July Talk?

PETER: I think I did. It was the original name for the first song on our album, The Garden, and we stole it for the band. It’s supposed to be a style of conversation. July felt like the right descriptive word for a band caught in an infinite adolescence of sorts. Generally if you’re in your early-mid twenties the summer kind of swallows you whole. You fall in love, party your face off, fall out of love, have incredible sex, experience intense depression and extreme ecstasy all within a few months. Then, September rolls around like a giant eraser and sweeps it all under the bridge to wash away down the river. All of a sudden, all of that pain and happiness and real experience feels naive and immature. We wanted to have a band that was caught within that emotional chaos. A band that was that chaos.

CGL: What is the group’s musical writing process? Do lyrics come first then the instrumentals or the other way around or it all kind of happens as a collective?

LEAH: All our songs are formed differently. The same way the project kind of unfolded by dictating to us what it wanted to be, the songs all have minds of their own as well. We write as a band. Once the initial idea for a melody or a chorus is there, everyone has a chance to take it by the hand and lead it their own way using their specific strengths. Sometimes the right path is obvious to everyone and sometimes it couldn’t be more hidden. Sometimes lyrics come first, sometimes they’re reworked 20 times and sometimes it’s necessary to know the vibe of the song before even one word is written.

CGL: Since forming the band in 2012, things have been moving fast to recording and touring. What does the group attribute to its success so far?

PETER: We get along really well and I feel lucky for that. I’ve been around bands that fight and it’s hard to imagine being able to handle that for nine of 12 months a year in a van together. There’s no science to how art is perceived, so I really have no idea why people like us, but I’m proud of how vulnerable we are when we perform. Leah and I push each other really hard and I think that’s probably fun to watch. Once when we were playing in Alabama, Leah grabbed a roll of duct tape and started to tape my face, circle after circle, over my eyes, over my nose… Suddenly I was blind, hacking away at my guitar as I stumbled around the stage. It seems like it would be fun to see two people interact like that.

CGL: Toronto seems to be turning out a lot of alternative-indie bands lately. Is there a big scene happening there currently or just bands who are good at promoting and marketing themselves outside of the area? How does the group feel they fit into the Toronto music scene?

PETER: It feels like there is. I’m very excited to see a new generation of bands rising from the city. There are very few characteristics that you can blanket over all of Toronto. It’s such a diverse city, that I think bands don’t associate with each other as much as I’ve seen in say, Montreal, Seattle or Berlin. That said, Toronto bands definitely hang out and help each other out whenever needed. Artists like Alvvays, Metz, Pup, Lowell and Diana represent a new guard of Toronto’s scene, and that definitely makes it a fun place to make art. I think July Talk is mostly known as a live band within Toronto, because our roots lie on the stages of the Silver Dollar, The Horseshoe Tavern and The Dakota. Josh and I have a background in Toronto’s music video scene, so we were introduced to the city’s music industry through that lens.

CGL: How did the group become a part of the Juno Awards and how has winning the award helped the group?

LEAH: The Juno’s provide an amazing opportunity to meet other musicians from all over Canada. People you might not otherwise know about or ever be in the same room as if your scenes don’t cross over. It’s helped us so much to be recognized by the Juno Awards because we’re still a relatively new band. It’s given us exposure to ears and eyes we wouldn’t normally be seen and heard by.

CGL: What are some of the band’s rituals while on the road and before a show, if any?

PETER: Hmm… I wear the same kind of white-buttoned shirt every show. Josh writes every set list holding the sharpie between his teeth. He’s getting pretty good at it.

CGL: What has been the most unexpected experience while on tour so far?

LEAH: This isn’t really my story to tell but we were on tour with a great Canadian act named Matt Mays. Mays fronts the band and is backed by his best friends (who are incredibly talented players). We were really lucky that they took us out on tour with them when July Talk was still in its infancy because we learned so much about playing and touring. We just woke up everyday feeling elated and inspired. Then one morning in the middle of the tour we found out that Jay Smith, the band’s amazing lead guitar player, had died suddenly. He was there in Edmonton and then gone by Calgary. We were shaken and devastated and we had only just met him. We couldn’t imagine what the guys in his band were going through. They decided to play the remaining two dates as benefit shows with proceeds donated to the family Smith was leaving behind. It was heavy and crazy and fucked up. There was a moment of feeling like ‘How are these shows still happening? Isn’t this wrong?’ but it made complete sense. No one wanted to go home and be alone back in real life in the real world. They needed to stay together and play for their sanity, to feel something other than anger and grief, or at least to feel it while playing their hearts out.