The Grand Rapids indie-folk band returned home from a U.S. tour and played Local Spins on WYCE, which also debuted new music by Seth Bernard, Nicholas James & The Bandwagon, Sligh and more.
As guitarist Alex McGrath puts it, “a lot has happened” to The Soil & The Sun since the atmospheric indie-folk ensemble released its award-winning 2014 album, “Meridian.”
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After taking time off last summer following some intense touring, three members chose to depart and the Grand Rapids group reassembled as a leaner, tighter four-piece band.
“The four of us who wanted to keep at it spent a good bit of time just having conversations about what we wanted to do next and making sure we were all on the same page,” McGrath said of the group which now features his wife, Ashley, Benjamin Baker-Johnson and Kellen Kerwin.
“It was a really healthy thing for us to do – like pressing the reset button. It feels like we’re finally figuring out and getting closer to what it is that the band has been trying to do this whole time.”
As part of that revamping, the quartet recently released a two-song EP, “Actual Replica, Vol. 1,” with more EP releases planned for the series.
NOT INTENTIONAL, BUT SOUND IS ‘MORE DEFINED’
“It wasn’t really an intentional decision to downsize,” McGrath insisted. “After the other three members left, the remaining four of us just started playing together a lot more and it was feeling really good. We decided we could make it work with the smaller lineup, so we’re going for it. It’s a more focused sound, more defined, more on purpose.”
Ashley McGrath, who sings and plays keyboards, said the music is a “little more spare,” but gives band members more room to be creative.
After an out-of-state spring tour, The Soil and The Sun will bring that “more focused sound” back to Founders Brewing on Saturday. The 9:30 p.m. show also features friends of the Grand Rapids band — Nashville’s Keeps and Caleb Groh; admission is $5.
PODCAST: The Soil & The Sun, Local Spins on WYCE
Ashley and Alex McGrath gave a little preview of that show with an appearance this week on Local Spins on WYCE, performing a couple of new songs – “Throughout the Night” and “AS I Was One Day” – in Studio X and chatting about their music. Listen to the podcast here, and check out a video of their performance of “Throughout the Night” below.
The Soil and The Sun recorded its new EP – along with other material – at a Chicago studio in February “and then took all the tracks back to Grand Rapids to finish them at home,” McGrath said.
“We weren’t really sure what to do with the songs because it didn’t seem like they fit very well into the new direction that we wanted to go as a four-piece. We didn’t just want to toss them, either, so I’m going to be finishing a few more of them and releasing them in small batches as the ‘Actual Replica’ series.”
Beyond that, the band wants to continue touring, with hopes perhaps of even traveling overseas to the United Kingdom or Japan.
And, of course, they’ll “keep developing new ideas, explore new concepts, write lots of new songs, make a record and play lot of shows,” he said. “We’re hoping to have a new album in the works by late fall of this year.”
The June 10 edition of Local Spins on WYCE also featured the debut of new tracks by Nicholas James & The Bandwagon, Seth Bernard, Michael Rice, The Preservers, Kari Lynch, Sligh and The Blueflowers, as well as music by Chris Bathgate (this week’s musicians’ pick).
VIDEO: The Soil & The Sun, “Throughout the Night” (Local Spins on WYCE)
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