BAG OF TOYS INTERVIEW
San Francisco's biggest beach bums, Bag of Toys has returned with its exicting new album Afternooner. On initial listen, it is evident the four-piece is taking everything up a notch, yet still manages to capture the cruisey beach vibe the band is famous for. Guitarist and sometimes lead vocalist Steve Cowgill drops by The Pier to share what went into making this latest effort.
The Pier: So tell us how you approached the song-writing on Afternooner?
Steve: Most of the songwriting for the album occurred in one of two ways: (Robert) Tait would write a song and then bring it to the band, at which point we’d all jam it out a bunch and figure out our parts. I’d write all the lead guitar lines, Joe (Schewe) would write a bass line and (Robert) Stadler would hammer out the drums. A good example of that is Smile So Wide. Tait had the basic song structure and all the lyrics written, then he brought it to the band so that we could flesh out our parts and really bring the tune to life.
The other thing that happened a lot was that I would write the guitar part for a song and then I’d dump it in Tait’s lap for him to write the lyrics and vocal melody. This is what happened with a song like Good Time. I wrote the music and then recorded a crappy demo for Tait to work with. Then he would come back with finished lyrics. Then finally we’d jam it out with Joe and Stadler and we’d have ourselves a song.
But the album as a whole was very collaborative with lots of input from everyone. My place is kind of the party pad for the band so there is a ton of jamming and songwriting that happens there.
The Pier: Afternooner is a pretty simple but effective album name (debut album was titled Nooner). Was it pretty easy to come up with?
Steve: The album name actually came up pretty easily and pretty early on in the process. In fact, I think we had the album name figured out before most of the tunes were written.
The Pier: How was the recording of the album at Gadgetbox Studios in Santa Cruz? Any fun stories?
Steve: Anyone that’s ever recorded an album will tell you that it’s a pretty tedious process and it can feel like a huge pain in the ass at the time, but it can also be a ton of fun too. All in all we had a great experience and our engineer/producer Andy Zenczak was a blast to work with. I would have to say that the secret ingredient was a large red cooler that we kept stocked with cheap beer. As for fun stories...I think my favorite story from the recording sessions was the time that Tait passed out in the back room and I drew a bitchin' mustache on him. It was one of those dastardly, old timey villain mustaches, and I must say that he wore it well.
The Pier: Any pictures of that? Did you have any new goals for the recording of this album in comparison when you did Nooner?
Steve: One of our main goals with the new album was to keep the same vibe and feel that we had on our first album Nooner, but we wanted to make sure that we weren’t just repeating ourselves. That’s one of the big challenges as a band. How do you grow as a band without changing so much that you get away from what made you successful in the first place? And that’s definitely something that was talked about when we were writing and recording.
I’m not sure if this will make sense or not, but we wanted each individual song from Afternooner to fit in with the songs from Nooner, but not too much. The idea was that if you took one of the new songs and plugged it into the middle of Nooner, it would seem like it belonged there and that it fit in with the album. But we also really wanted Afternooner as a whole to feel like a step forward from Nooner as a whole album. Confused? Me too. Let’s just move on.
The Pier: You stepped up and did the lead vocals on the song She Said. Did you also write the lyrics?
Steve: Yeah, I wrote and sang vocals on this tune. That song is obviously about a girl. I think every guy has met a girl like that at some point. And if you haven’t, then you are definitely missing out.
The Pier: Rollin' is one of my fav songs, with its country rock type style. Was that a fun song to write and record? What was the inspiration behind it?
Steve: Glad to hear you like Rollin'. We weren’t really sure exactly how a song with a country vibe would go over with our fans, but we’re pretty stoked with how it turned out. The song was written by Tait and it originally had a reggae vibe to it. At one point we were screwing around in the studio and spontaneously busted out a country version. We really liked how it sounded so we decided to record it that way. Yee-haw.
(Steve and Tait in the studio working on Afternooner)
The Pier: Who hooked up the guest trumpet on Everybody Says?
Steve: Our producer Andy had done some work with Dustin Hengl before and he thought he’d be a perfect fit for Everybody Says. Dustin is clearly a very talented guy and he’s played with some big names before including Jack Johnson, so we were stoked to be able to have him throw down a little guest trumpet love on our album.
The Pier: Besides the release of the album what else have you got coming up this year?
Steve: We have a lot of things in the works including some of our music being licensed for use in movies and on television. The only thing I can really comment on at this point is that in October one of our tunes will be featured on an episode of Bones on Fox. We’re getting a ton of interest in the new album so far and we’re really excited to see what the next year holds.
The Pier: Nice. Do you also see yourselves doing any touring outside of California this year?
b>Steve:I freaking hope so. We’re building some pretty solid momentum right now so if all goes according to our evil plan, hopefully we’ll be doing some serious touring sometime in the next 6 – 12 months.
Thanks to Steve for taking the time to answer these questions. Make sure you check out the following link: