Ski town stoke-folk musicians Shred Kelly are currently taking their unique sound across the country and they’ll be stopping in Revelstoke on Wednesday, March 11.
Times Review freelancer Melissa Jameson recently chatted with vocalist and keyboard player Sage McBride about the band’s newest album Sing to the Night, filming the video for the title track, and why their current tour includes stops off the ski-town circuit.
TR: Your video for Sing to the Night is pretty much a big tribute to everything 80s – fanny packs, hula-hoops, mullets, hot-doggin skiers — where did the idea come from?
Sage: We have this day in Fernie called hot dog day. People dress up in retro ski gear and hot dog down in a group. I’ve been in Fernie for 10 years and that’s always been a highlight. I thought it would be awesome if we could do a retro ski video. I also thought it would be really cool if we could film it all in one shot. Dylan Siggers, who filmed it for us, had to ski backwards the whole time. He’s a pro skier, I don’t think anyone else could have pulled it off.
TR: Sing to the Night happens to also be the title of your recently released album. It’s already received praise from various media (CBC, Exclaim Magazine, Aesthetic Magazine).
Sage: We’re excited with the reception of it. We worked with same producer as the last album [John Critchley]. He does a really great job at capturing the energy of our live sound, but translating that into the music. He always pushes us harder than we’re able to push ourselves which is always what we want in the studio It’s definitely different than our last work. Lyrically it’s a bit more thoughtful and we experimented with different tempos.
TR: What was the most difficult aspect of recording Sing to the Night?
Sage: I guess with the writing it’s always just kind of figuring out which direction you want to go – you write a song and you love it but wonder if that’s too far outside the genre we’ve kind of created.
TR: How big of a factor are the ski resorts when planning to go on tour?
Sage: On this tour, it wasn’t as big of a factor. We still love going back to ski towns because we sort of did the ski town circuit. We’re still hitting up some ski towns, but I guess the focus has been sort of to spread the music as far as possible. Ski towns are where our heart is, but this tour made sure we went across the entire country.
Shred Kelly perform at the Traverse on Wednesday, March 11. Tickets are $10..
