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10 Questions with ... The Myriad
June 23, 2008
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NAME:The MyriadTITLE:Band
Line-up:
Jeremy Edwardson (vocals/guitar)
John Roger Schofield (bass)
Randy Miller (drums)
John Young (guitar)
Steven Tracy (guitar/keys)Label:
Koch RecordsDiscography:
With Arrows, With Poise (2008)
You Can't Trust a Ladder (2005)1) Can you introduce the members of the band using musical history and personality traits?
John Roger Schofield: Raised on the Beatles, James Horner and the Carpenters; loves trout, alpine forests and Joanna Newsom
Randy Miller: Raised on Dokken; loves huge guns and bow hunting
Jon Young: Raised on the Posies and Nirvana; loves Pho and organization
Jeremy Edwardson: Raised on Smashing Pumpkins; loves movies and popcorn with real butter
Steven Tracy: Raised on the Sidewinders and Wonderstuff; loves the desert and rattlers in the desert with hot air and saguaros drooping in said hot
2) Can you offer a brief look at how the band started and eventually signed with Koch?
JOHN ROGER: Jeremy and John Roger graduated from college in 2001 and quickly moved to Seattle to start the band and do things the exact, precise way they wanted to do them. Then all the other members fell into place like granola and raw milk for breakfast. Then we cut our teeth in Seattle for three years (3 EPs) and Seattle blinded its "indier than thou" eyes toward us like Oedipus Rex. Then we signed with benevolent Floodgate Records (R.I.P.). Then we toured for three years (230,000 miles) after cutting our first full-length in 2005. Then we signed with KOCH out of NYC in summer 2007 and began finishing up our new record (2006-2008), released in May 2008, a full 12-pound neonate with attitude, wit and everything!
3) What's the message you hope is conveyed through "With Arrows, With Poise"?
JOHN ROGER: Hope, love, life, good food, good chocolate, good coffee, good people, experience, God, good books, good poems about onions, good dogs, good days out on the lake. Real soul. Real things. Real thump. And fresh, new clothes dipped in cultural panache and brio!
Mountain lions, too. And the ghosts of mountain lions. With mining equipment clanging in the high country at midnight with a full, juicy moon a'silverin' the sky.
Art is boring, stories are exciting. Fin.
4) What's your favorite city/venue to play?
JEREMY: We all really love playing New York City. It can get a little hectic. New York has a way of bulldozing you when you least expect it but we love the adventure of it. The Hammerstein Ballroom in NYC is my personal all-time favorite venue to play. I had seen many live performances there and loved the room and the architecture. Playing there to a sold out 3,300 people last fall was a huge career highlight for me. I'm looking forward to going back again someday.
5) Is there any special story behind your new radio single "A Clean Shot"?
JEREMY: No special story. It was one of the first songs we wrote for our current album "With Arrows, With Poise" and it definitely set the high bar for cool swagger guitar riffs and sexy bass lines.
6) Was there a moment when you were in the studio, working on the record, that you thought, "Ah-ha! Wow. Now we have a record!"?
JEREMY: When I listened back to the completed demo of "Holiest of Thieves" there was this big moment where I sat back and felt an overwhelming sense of excitement to be in this band and to be making this record. It sounded like everything we talked about as a band on those late-night drives across the country. Suddenly this whole album felt like a responsibility, in a good way. Everything had to count. Every note. Every chord. Every lyric.
7) Upcoming touring plans? What's on the books?
STEVEN: Well, we're currently resting up a bit after a two-month tour with Eisley but we'll definitely be hitting the summer festivals and then a fall tour that for now is a Class 3, Code B secret. Even the president doesn't know.
8) What's your favorite song to play live?
STEVEN: That definitely changes night to night, but no matter what craziness is happening "Throwing Punches" hits my reset button and I can just feeeeeeeeel it. Specifically on verse two when Randy's kick-drum drops. Makes me wanna dance with my piano bench.
9) If you weren't doing music, what would you be doing?
STEVEN: I haven't the slightest of ideas. That's a world that I can't really imagine.
10) Life on the road isn't a cakewalk. How do you guys remain friends while being co-workers?
JONATHAN: The easiest answer would to just be one or the other, but unfortunately for us we do have to work together and we just love each other too much to only be co-workers. So how do we be both? Maybe by hard work and choosing to be both and not just one or the other. The way we look at it is that we are fortunate to be able to work at a job where we all love what we do and with some of our best friends! I guess the question I need to pose to you is "why aren't you all working with your best friends?" And by the way, the statement is correct: life on the road is more of a "piewalk" fresh out of the oven with a nice scoop of vanilla bean ice cream on top.
Bonus Questions
1) Favorite city to visit:
New York City (but only to visit and for short times or the city itself will chew you up and spit you out for overstaying your welcome!)
2) Favorite road meal:
Any home cooked meal. Road meals usually consist of fast food and that is some of the worst stuff to put in your body.
3) Any musical guilty pleasures?
We all have 'em, but to name a few that you might hear on a Myriad tour would be in no particular order: Journey, Michael Jackson, YES, Bread, 2Pac, Missy Elliott, Skid Row. Actually, after trying to make a list I realize that these aren't guilty pleasures but more just "pleasures." So, no, we don't have any.
4) If you could join any band, past or present, which would you join?
Jeremy - HUM; Randy - Tower Of Power; John Roger - YES; Steven Tracy - Union Station and for myself (John Roger), it would be Lawrence Welk
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