Silver Trees Interview with Paul Johnson

I had the great privilege of speaking with one of my favorite bands right now, Silver Trees. I found Silver Trees on Noisetrade while surfing their website as I normally do. Silver Trees is a breath of fresh air, providing listeners with a collection of beautiful, melodious songs, that urge listeners to sing-along.
Please check out http://silvertreesmusic.com for the latest info in them.

First off, how did this project originally come together? How did you and Chase meet?

Chase and I had initially met for a co-writing session a few years ago, and then reconnected when I wanted him to produce a demo for a pop song I had. Not long after that, Chase was working on a side project of his called “Speakeasier”, and invited me to help write & sing on one of the songs.  By then we had a positive working relationship and Chase reached out to see if I’d be interested in doing an EP with my songs and his production.  I didn’t want it to be a Singer/Songwriter record, and so we took the approach of developing the project as a band, inviting in great friends and musicians with the recording process.

Did you guys have a direction for the project, before you approached the recording process?

I had a handful of mellower “indie” songs that I really liked but had no real previous outlet for, so when we met up to start thinking about the track list we already had the skeletal versions of the songs.  However, early on in recording ‘Paper Hearts’ we decided we wanted to be experimental with the production and stretch our usual assumptions of what the standard instrumentation and performances should sound like.  With that in the back of our minds we just dove into recording  “One Less Bird”, then used that as sort of a sign post to how we would proceed with the rest of the record.

How did the writing pan out for the 'Paper Hearts EP?'

Most of the writing on that EP happened in early 2013 and late 2012, before I knew there would be an opportunity to record those songs.  It was pretty much a collection of songs I had wrote in my living room in between “record songs” as sort of a self-therapy, giving myself a free pass to write music that might be too quiet or personal to end up sharing outside of the room.  However, I think the “nobody to impress” approach of those tunes is part of what made them more meaningful and appropriate to produce & share.

I would love to hear the stories behind "She" and "Paper Hearts." How did they come together?

People ask me a lot who “She” is, and for me it was a metaphor for grace from the beginning of the writing process.  We thought it was just going to be a really quiet tune with just guitar, voice and maybe some strings.  But Chase had the idea of the massive vocal layers on the chorus, and then we had a drummer who transformed it again when he made the building drum part in the bridge after we told him to just try anything, thinking that it would be without drums until then. From there we got a lot clearer feel for the song and ran with it.

“Paper Hearts” was the last song wrote for the record, and the only one I wrote while we were already in the process of making the EP.  Chase works with a fantastic singer/artist, Bailey Jehl, who was a clear choice for the female vocal part.  I think that song was one of our quick favorites, but was also one of the easiest and quickest to put together.  My favorite songs to write and record always seem to be the ones that just clearly tell you where to go.  I like when we can just get out of the way and let the music do all the work. 

What would you like for people to take away from the 'Paper Hearts EP?'

Living in Nashville I realize that I’m not the best musician, writer, singer, etc., and so whenever I make music I pretty much have one measure of a successful song: “Does it make you feel something?”.  I would like ‘Paper Hearts’ to be one more thing in people’s lives that shortens the distance between the head and the heart, adds a little color to their day and maybe just keep them company in certain emotions and moments.  I think the real power any music can have is already in the people reacting to it. The songs will hopefully just help highlight the beauty in our day-to-day operation as growing people.

How did you get hooked up with Noisetrade? Why give the EP away, even for a brief period?

NoiseTrade was founded by some guys here in Nashville, and so we’ve been using the platform for a while to find great new music as fans.  Since Silver Trees is a pretty new entity, we wanted to use NoiseTrade as one of the outlets for the EP, the idea being the opportunity to form a long-term relationship with our early fans (via the email they give us to download the EP) is far more valuable to us right now than a one-time $ transaction.  The fact that it was the main way most people have downloaded our EP so far was actually a really lucky fluke.  iTunes had a technical difficulty that delayed the release a day and a half, which channeled most of our family & friends to get the EP on NoiseTrade.  That got the album to the #4 most-downloaded spot, which caused NoiseTrade to offer us the opportunity to be featured the next week as a “New & Notable” artist.  That feature caused our downloads to explode way beyond our own expectations and set us up with a really great early fan base, along with the ability to build a lasting relationship with most of our fans.  The support of these early listeners has set us up for some great opportunities moving forward, and we’re SUPER grateful for these awesome people that are willing to give a new band like us a listen.  A free EP is the least we could do to say thanks (:

Do you plan on touring with this EP? Will it remain a studio project?

A huge yes to touring.  The band is still growing in members, and ideally we’ll be able to take the music on the road in early 2014.  Right now that’s one of our biggest and most exciting priorities.  There are few things we love more than to have those real-time interactions enjoying the music with our fans. 

Any plans for a full length album?

There’s definitely the intention, but not yet a clear timeline.  There is, however, a definite plan for a single that’ll hopefully be coming out this February along with another video.  We’re excited keep sharing music with our fans and hopefully keep growing the Silver Trees community in the process.

The Icarus Account Interview with Ty Turner

As the Icarus Account prepared to release their brand new album, Carry Me Home, I had the chance to catch up with Ty and find out more about the album! Check out
www.theicarusaccount.com for more info, and links to purchase their new album.
What have you guys been up to lately? Working on a new album correct?

Absolutely! We took the summer off from tour to make sure that we gave plenty of time to focus on the release of our new album.  So far so good! We recorded a few live acoustic sessions coming soon to www.youtube.com/theicarusaccount.  We posted our first music video last week http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5sjR4BNph0. Have been working on getting our website www.theicarusaccount.com up and running so yeah it's been a pretty busy time gearing up for the release (laughs).

Did you personally produce the record?

We co-produced the album with our good friend Chase Coy. We were all on the same page with the direction we wanted to head acoustically, with strings, percussion etc. It was definitely a team effort, but chase did a great job producing the strings and percussion that we weren't quite as directly involved with during the recording process.

Before approaching the writing and recording process of this upcoming album, did you guys have a direction in mind?

I wouldn't say we had a specific direction in mind; usually we just try to write songs that are real and personal to us so that other people can relate to them. We want to make our listeners feel emotions when they hear our songs.  There were a lot of happy things that inspired this album like trey's marriage in April 2011; and then some sad things like our parents’ divorce in August 2011 that inspired a lot of the writing for this album.  Whether we intentionally had a direction or not our lives kind of took our writing wherever it pleased.  (Here is a little promo video on the writing/release of the album - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlRgdyKeij0)

How does the writing process normally pan out for you guys?

Typically we will write individually & start with music, then start humming some melodies and blabbing lyrics. Sometimes the lyrics write their own story without us deciding beforehand what we want to write about but usually we tend to pic a subject that we shape the song around lyrically.  We usually don't ask each other for help unless we are stumped on something or want a second opinion on something.  

I know that choosing a favorite song on a new album is much like choosing your favorite child, but if you had to pick the song that you were most proud of once it was completed what would it be?

I'd say personally my favorite song is "All I Need" because of the way the writing came together for it in the studio. When we first got to Indiana all I had were melodies, and a few basic lyrics. I had no intention of finishing the song or putting it on the album, but Trey & Chase both said that it sounded amazing and that I should try to make it happen. Any free time we had was spent trying to finish that song and turn it into a story that encouraged people and made them feel like they were coming home. I think the song turned out great and said exactly what we wanted it to. The addition of strings on the final mix also really brought the song home for me.

What motivated you guys to put up "Keeper of Your Heart," on Noisetrade?

We love giving away free music.  The exposure you get by giving something away for free is worth the money you might lose in a sale.  It results in more fans, and sometimes more sales in the long run :)

Are you guys planning on hitting the road soon?

Absolutely! We are SO excited to start touring again! Obviously we took off most of the summer to prepare for this release so we are anxious to hit the road again in Oct/Nov.  Looking to do a nationwide tour and probably a few Canada dates as well!

What kind of advice would you have for a band starting up right now?

If I could give one piece of advice to other bands out there I would say "don't wait for anything, get to work and make things happen on your own. If you want it sometimes you have to go get it. You will get exactly what you are willing to put in."

Who are some artists/bands that you have looked up to in the past in terms of stage presence and live performance?

This is a tough question to answer.  We've always appreciated artists who write their own music and sound the same live as they do in the studio. Bands like One Republic (with Ryan Tedder's songwriting abilities/live performance), and Live shows - The Fray, Augustana, Copeland, have been pretty good examples of both of those to us. 

What kind of impact has social media had on you guys?

I'm not sure where we would be with our music if it weren't for things like MySpace, YouTube, Facebook, etc.  We might still be playing in local coffeehouses if weren't for the amount of fans we've been able to round up through the internet.  I'm pretty thankful that we live in the world we do today.  The internet is especially helpful for the unsigned artists like us who have no connections to TV/radio/ etc.

Perfect day, driving in your car with the windows down, what are you listening to?

Currently Taylor Swift's new music (laughs). The Fray. Dangerous Summer.