Leaving Port

Great Northern embarks on a treacherous voyage of labels, recording and funnel cake.
by Lesley Bargar

While the crew of L.A.’s Ship collective continues to sail this city’s rough musical waters, a few deckhands have embarked on a voyage of their own. The crew: Captains Rachel Stolte (vox piano) and Solon Bixler (vox/guitars), First Mate Davey Latter (drums) and new stowaway Ashley Dzerigian (bass). The vessel’s name: Great Northern. The exotic and faraway destination: Arcadia, where a hidden treasure of a recording studio awaits them and their uniquely lush blend of piano, boy/girl vocals, tonal warmth and rhythmic cool. They’re far from their usual home in the Ship’s studio hull, but with a fresh record contract on the deck and the wind of fresh perspective in their sails, their debut full-length is rising quickly on the horizon. But before they reach the isle of album-ville, the band’s sailing into port this weekend on the main stage of the Sunset Junction street fair. And as they tell L.A. Alternative, with all the calm seas ahead, this is the perfect time for a little on-stage shore-leave celebration.

LAA: So, you’re in the midst of recording your first full-length? Where are you doing that?
Rachel Stolte: We’re at this place in Arcadia called Donner & Blitzen. It’s new to us, but we feel like we’ve stumbled upon a goldmine. (The Ship) studio is where we did a lot of our beginning stuff, but we’re kind of trying to move away from that and do something fresh and new, because we were there for so long. Our rehearsal studio is attached to the Ship, but we didn’t want to do it there this time. We wanted a change of pace and new energy and new input. That scene is so prevalent, which is great, but if you get outside of it you get a whole different, objective opinion about the songs you’re writing.

LAA: Is it all new stuff, or are there some older songs from your EPs?
RS: There are a bunch of new ones! We have 11 that we’re working on here, and three of them are brand new. It’s more like the sound we do now live as opposed to those first ones. It’s hopefully more evolved. It’s definitely different.
Solon Bixler: A few of these songs we’ve had for a couple years now, and if you’ve sat with something for a long time, then sometimes it’s hard to come back to it and take it all apart and put it back together again. … It’s weird because Rachel and I have been having these flashbacks of when we first started and revisiting some of these songs that we wrote two, maybe three years ago. Having those memories of what was going on in our lives then and now, it’s really cool.

LAA: Is there any way the new songs are significantly different?
RS: I think we’re getting a little weirder, which is cool. Solon and I always talk about how we want it to be a little more fucked-up and a little more weird. We write stuff very linear, and we want it to be perfect, but then we get it and we’re like, “Yeah, but where’s the edge?” So we’re deconstructing a lot of what we did and piling vocals back on top of each other so there are a lot more harmonies and a lot more kind of a broken-down sound in parts. Like a quiet/loud/quiet/loud, but things are more falling-apart sounding.

LAA: I heard you guys finally got signed to a label! Congrats!
RS: Yeah, we are in the process of signing with eenie meenie records.
LAA: Does that change the attitude with which you go into the studio, knowing that this record is most likely going to be the first to make it to a huge number of ears?
SB: At first, I thought that was really going to be super overwhelming, but it’s not. I think Rachel and I tend to work a little better under pressure. All the EPs that we made, we put out ourselves; we hand made them at home. But now, knowing that it’s really going to come out, I’m super excited about it, ’cause it’s like, “Wow, this is really going to be in record stores all over the place!” It feels good. It feels really nice; it’s perfect timing. I don’t feel too pressured at all.

LAA: Eenie meenie is one of a few local labels that have been sprouting up and evolving over the last few years.
SB: I think it’s about time-and I don’t mean this in a bad way-but that the little guys come up. ‘Cause a lot of the music industry gets gentrified by these major labels that don’t really take care of their bands. They just want them all to do the same thing and then they spit them out when they’re done. It’s unfortunate because it probably really hurts a lot of good bands. … Actually, lately I’ve felt like L.A. music and bands are getting stronger and a bit more interesting. Everybody is doing different stuff, as opposed to everyone doing the same thing. It’s nice. You can go see a band like Darker My Love-where it’s a really kind of droney rock-and then you can see Silversun Pickups-which is another kind of rock group but on a different scale. There’s a good variety of music, and everybody seems to be doing well and helping each other out. There are a lot of great artists.

LAA: So, this is your first time playing Sunset Junction. Are you excited?
RS: I always get excited when it comes around, and then I either miss it, or only go if I’m going to see a band. I always go and then I’m like, “Eh, was that fun?” But I always end up eating, like, a hotdog with onions and seeing music. It’s just fun because it’s summertime.

LAA: How do you feel about the fact it’s mandatory $12-$15 payment this year?
SB: They kind of just cut to the chase, like, “All right, you’re going to have to pay to get in.” For a while it was like, “Well, do we have to pay? Or not?” I am horrible in those situations. Dude, just tell me what to do and I’ll do it. But we got this little package that we have to submit with our stage set up, and there’s this little map of the stages. And all it has is this little box that says “stage,” and then there’s another little box that says “backstage,” and then there are three or four blank boxes, and then another one that says “beer.” I guess that’s all you really need to know, where the stage is and where the beer is. And the funnel cake. Those are great! LAA

Great Northern plays the Sunset Junction street fair on Saturday, Aug. 26 on the Bates Stage at 1:30 p.m.