The music scene in Chicago had always been an endless font of cool bands – so endless in fact that it can sometimes feel overhwelming. WLUW is here to help you sift through the huge but amazing scene that we have here in the city! Today, you can read all about local punk rock band Typesetter, who recently put out their latest full length album “Nothing Blues” on 6131 Records! I had the pleasure of talking to Marc Bannes over the phone this past weekend who gave me some info on the band and their new album – take a look!
Q: So tell me about Typesetter, when you guys came together, what Typesetter is about?
A: Yeah – so myself and Alex Palermo our bass player and Kyle McDonald our guitar player all grew up in St. Louis, Missouri and our bands would play together, we always talked about starting a band but it didn’t happen for a few years. I cam to Chicago first and those guys kind of made their way to Chicago a couple years after that and we finally got the band we were talking about starting off the ground. We released out first EP in 2013, first full length in October of 2014, played a bunch of shows, toured our asses off, changed some members and stuff like that. Fast forward to now this record we’ve been working on for a year, Nothing Blue, came out this year on October 26th – super proud of it.
Q: So you’re from St. Louis – what was it about Chicago that drew you in?
A: Well I moved to Chicago to go to school. I went to Columbia College. But also St, Louis is cool but there’s not much going on. I always wanted to play music and I was hip to a lot of bands in the city, a lot of bands I grew up listening to and loving were from Chicago so it seemed like a good fit.
Q: Nothing Blues came out this past October – you said you were recording it all this past year?
A: Yeah we started recording in the summer of 2017 and we did drums, bass, guitars and then I took the tracks and did vocals, keys, more percussion an then I mixed it as well. Over the course of six months or so. And then we started submitting it to labels last winter and made things official with 6131, our current label earlier this year. Everything just takes a long time.
Q: So when it’s taking that long to record and make the album, is it difficult to decide when you’re finished?
A: Yeah it’s impossible. Absolutely. it’s so hard. I wrote 9 out of 10 songs on the record and wrote all the lyrics and mixed the whole thing I had no idea when it was actually done.
Q: So what was the deciding thing for this one, when did it actually end?
A: Eventually my desire to just put the damn thing out already outweighs day desire to keep working on it. So in the end i asked everybody to tell me if this is good or not, I can’t tell anymore.
Q: So what is the theme of the album? Is there one What re these songs about?
A: I mean we didn’t set out to write a concept record or anything like that but you know the things I was going through in my life during the couple years these songs came about. i was having a really rough time, some mental health issues, I was having problems dealing with that and I felt admitting that was like admitting defeat or admitting some sort of fault with myself and realized that’s not the case and you know talking about the issues you’re having and the issues you’re going through is actually a strength. A lot of the record has to do with trying to be healthy, some soul searching and self reflection in ways you’ve never done before which can be scary. i think that people can take away from it that if you’re going through some stuff that’s not weakness it’s a strength and the only way to deal with all your shit is to do it with open arms.
Q: So how is 6131?
A: We ruche out to a ton of labels, and some got back to us with some positive stuff but 613 got back to us pretty much right away and seemed really stoked about it. I was really excited when they emailed us back because they really only put out really cool records. So many rad bands have passed through that label so I just have always respected them, cool aesthetic. It’s kind of validating in a way.
Q: How’s the tour going?
A: We’re in Omaha tonight and out release show is in Chicago tomorrow (Sat, 11/17) at the Sleeping Village. It’s bene great, we played in Gainesville, Fl. And then we did New Orleans, met up with this band Red City Radio in southern California and did some West Coast dates which was a big party, did some Northwest and now back through the Midwest.
Q: What are you guys listening to lately? What do you dig right now?
A: On this tour we’ve been listening to a lot of…um…Foxing’s new album, Antisocialites by Alvvays, thee’s this band called Waax from Australia – we listen to them all the time.
