Interview with Eisley!

Eisley
Sat August 11, 2007
The Loft
Atlanta, GA
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The DuPree family is back on the road! Sisters Stacy, Sherri and Chauntelle along with brother Weston and cousin Garron make up the mesmerizing Texas quintet Eisley. After a string of successful dates opening up for The Fray, this family band will launch a headlining acoustic tour to support its upcoming release, “Combinations.” On its sophomore record, Eisley teamed up with noted composer and producer Richard Gibbs who seamlessly integrated his background in film scores to create a lush, sweeping record. With dramatic harmonies over layers of guitar, Eisley has created a work of art far beyond their years.

We had a talk with lead vocalist Stacy as she traveled through the deserts of Utah to their next gig. The phone reception wasn’t too great and the line cut out repeatedly, but we eventually got to piece together the amazing story of a tight knit band and a songstress that wrote her first tune at the age of eight!

TALive: What inspired you to do an acoustic tour for this record?
SD: We just wanted to introduce the songs in a way that's stripped down and really honest. It’s been really cool because we've had more of a chance to connect with our fans because the shows have been in such a little setting. There’s more of a human element, I think.

TALive: How does that compare coming from the tour with The Fray where you had more of a chance to gain exposure but maybe not in as intimate a setting?
SD: Well that was really great, too, because it’s always, obviously, really good to play for that many people every night. And, we hadn’t played bigger venues like that since we toured with Coldplay in 2003. It was a little bit nerve wracking of course, but it was really good and their crowd was really welcoming to us. It was a really good tour; a lot of fun! All The Fray guys were totally awesome, really nice. We connected really well with them.

TALive: Some bands struggle in that opening slot. You know, the turnout isn’t always that great earlier in the night…
SD: Haha, yeah. It’s funny; like you said it’s hard to play an opening slot. People are skeptical of you. Especially a band like ours because we walk on stage and we’re like three blonde girls. And I can feel their thoughts: “Oh what is this? Some cheesy girl band, great.” But I think they warm up to us when they figure out we are just trying to be honest. We aren't trying to be sexy or crazy, you know? We are just trying to be ourselves.

TALive: That's an interesting point. It makes me wonder what your experience has been releasing two records on a major label having sort of that indie approach to music. Have you felt that pressure from them to go in a more pop direction?
SD: To be honest I think the label has really embraced our vision of being seen as more of an indie band. I think they are really helping that grow and doing whatever they can to help us along and to keep that, I guess, indie sort of feel. While also, they are trying to get us a bigger appeal to the rest of the industry.

TALive: I was really impressed with how big and lush your new record "Combinations" sounds. I know you had Richard Gibbs on board who has worked on film scores in the past. Is that a direction Eisley would like to work towards?
SD: That’s one of the reasons we worked with Richard because he is a film composer, and that’s just something we’ve looked up to; someone who is just so musically advanced. TALive: Have you been approached by the film industry to use your music in a movie yet? SD: Not yet! It was kind of random how we decided to work with [Gibbs]. He was our manager’s brother-in- law. So we met him that way, and we are such fans of soundtracks and movies and things like that. But I think it would be cool in the future to continue working with a composer. I think it’s a neat idea because they come from such a different place, obviously.

TALive: How was the making of this record different than your first one? I know this time you were able to sort of start from scratch... did that influence or change you approach to songwriting?
SD: Yeah for sure! Because like you said, we started from scratch totally. On the last album we had so many songs we wrote from when we were way young. And this time we got to start over, and we were working with one person where last time we were working with several producers, and I think that got chaotic at times. It was much more focused this time around, and more fun I think.

TALive: Have you noticed the themes changing as you are getting older, as far as what you or writing about or the tone of the songs?
SD: Umm… I think that this record is more…Well, it’s a combination of things. I think that’s where we pulled the title from. There’s a lot of romantic songs about love and obviously some of our more rootsy stuff from our old record, mystical stuff. We tried to keep it as close to home as we could. We pulled from life experiences, from books, from anything that really moves us at the time.

Read on to learn about the new record, what inspired Stacy's first song, and what it was like to interview Stevie Nicks!




TALive: I was especially intrigued by the opening track "Many Funerals." It almost has a Medieval, dirge quality about it...
SD: That one’s a little daunting, a little dark. That’s why we put that track first. I think it’s so dark that people almost won’t be expecting it. It’s a little bit morbid, but I love it. It’s real.

TALive: Did you hear something that inspired that melody or that tone?
SD: I don’t know! I think the song is about this person being held captive at sea and they lose someone while they are at sea. It’s just a really rigid riff. I like that riff a lot. It’s pretty dramatic in my opinion, but we like that. It has sort of a movie soundtrack feel.

TALive: So this has been a big year for Eisley both as a band and personally as well. Your sister Sherri just got married [to Chad Gilbert of New Found Glory] and Chauntelle is engaged [to Adam Lazarra of Taking Back Sunday]. Your manager Boyd was joking on myspace that he is going to be look out for you as the only single DuPree girl…
SD: Yeah I know! He’s so funny. Because both of them met their husbands on tour, and now he is just very cautious of who we tour with. He wants to get all the information. Things have definitely changed, but in a good way. Our family is growing and getting bigger and bigger every day. But it’s really cool because we have the ability to grow closer I think.

TALive: Well with your family growing, especially since your sisters are both marrying musicians, maybe in a few years there will be a second generation of Eisley kids?
SD: I know, that would be amazing! I would love it!

TALive: Well would advice would you give either your kids or others who want to start a band with their siblings?
SD: That’s kind of hard because it was so natural for us because we were already best friends. I think I really it depends on your relationship with your brother or sister or whoever. Even in bands that aren’t related, you have to have a strong connection with them to be able to make it through the long haul. I think it’s just about persistence, not giving up, and really loving what you do.

TALive: What was it that first inspired you and your siblings to first pick up instruments? Do you come from a musical family?
SD: Yeah we were pretty much born into music. My parents were such music freaks. They had just grown up listening to all these great bands and they passed it along to us. That’s all we did, pretty much and we loved it! We lived a little ways out of the city in Tyler, Texas. As a family we just hung out and listened to old records all the time, and we got inspired. It was a part of the family already; and in the genes maybe.

My two older sisters, Chauntelle and Sherri, they started messing around, working on songs with their friends in their room while we were growing up; having fun playing around with music for the first time. That was the first time that anyone in our house had ever experimented with music before. I was really intrigued by it, and I would always go and listen by the door. I was like, “Man that sounds really great! Guys, can I come in?” I always wanted to go in and sing harmony with them. They were like, “No, Stacy. You’re too young. Which makes sense, I mean I was only 8. At the time it just seemed so unfair. I would cry and complain to my mom and she would say “Oh you’ll understand some day,” and I guess that wasn’t good enough for me. Haha!So I went and I wrote my first song and then I showed it Chauntelle, I think, and she liked it, and we started writing music all together. And then shortly after that Weston started playing drums and we wanted him to play for us, so we just started out like that.

TALive: When you wrote that first song, how did you present it? Did you just have some lyrics written down or a melody in your head?
SD: Well, Chauntelle had taught me a few chords on guitar. It was a pretty simplistic song, but definitely carried a lot of emotions that I was feeling then. It was a pretty depressing song, actually. It was about a friend of ours who had attempted suicide. It really affected me in a strong way, and I just remember feeling really sad and it sort of leaked out into a little song. So we built the song up and started playing it and writing more songs after that. I don’t really know, I can’t really explain. It’s this kind of overwhelming feeling that came out into music.

TALive: Wow, that’s amazingly intuitive for an 8-year-old to have that sense of emotion.
SD: Right…It was pretty weird. I think for all of us, everyone has always said, “Your kids are so mature.” I think for me I was never a certain age. It was pretty natural.

TALive: One thing I really liked reading about from your tour with The Fray was that you’re always out there after the shows, talking to fans, taking pictures, signing autographs. Is that something you really enjoy?
SD: Absolutely, it’s a big part of it, yeah. I think we live in a visual world where people need to see…they need to meet and feel and see something real. And that’s why we like talking to people and making them feel like we care about them. We want to connect them with our music anyway we can. We love doing that.

TALive: You also have appearance on Conan coming up soon, right?
SD: Yeah! That’s our first, I guess you’d call it, “television premiere.” And we are huge Conan fans so I am excited to at LEAST shake his hand. I’ve heard that the bands don’t really get a chance to hang out with him, but we’ll at least we’ll get to say “hi.” It’ll be cool. I am pretty excited and horrified at the same time

TALive: With all the harmonies in your music how do you prepare to go on tour? Do you just keep warm being on the road or is there something you have to do every night to get to that place?
SD: We’ve been singing together for so long now that we don’t have to think about it all. Sherri and I just have that, sort of, bonding within our vocals. It’s really weird. It’s like we don’t have to think about it all. It’s just a natural thing. We warm up before shows, but working at harmonies… We do that when we go into write a record or when we’re putting songs together. But other than that, no, we don’t keep up with it or practice. We should probably!

TALive: I wonder if that chemistry has something to do with your being related.
SD: I’m sure it does! It’s some sort of weird connection in our head.
TALive: Or even some similarity in vocal chords?
SD: Totally. I really think so.

TALive: You had the awesome opportunity to interview Stevie Nicks, for Foam Magazine. Are there any other idols that you would love to talk to?
SD: I’m also a very big fan of Bjork or Thom Yorke. Either one of them I think would be pretty cool to interview. Stevie was amazing! I mean, gosh, I cant even…She was so cool. She was so motherly to me.

TALive: Did you get to meet her in person or what it over the phone?
SD: No, it was just phone, but we talked for about 30 minutes. It was just crazy because I’m obviously a huge a super fan of her. So it was really rad. But there are tons of artists that I would like to talk to. I like building relationships with other artists for sure and connecting as many dots in the music world as I can.

TALive: If you had the opportunity to talk to like a Thom Yorke or Bjork, what would you ask them? SD: That’s a really good question. I don’t know to be honest. Anything, really. Bjork just almost seems like she’s on a different planet I would love to know where she draws her inspiration from and how she is able to stay in that always inpsired place.

Eisley’s new record “Combinations” is out August 14th!

http://www.eisley.com/