Jess Balisle: Hey, this is Studio Live SoundCheck. I’m Jess Balisle. This week, we welcome the Sideburns to the show. Specializing in Stax-era Memphis instrumental soul, the band is made up of Mike Rumsey, Jonathan “J” Keeney, Jody Bilyeu and Mike Henderson. They stopped by the station to chat about the band’s origins and how they came up with the name.
Balisle: Okay, so if you were going to craft the sideburns origin story, whether that be purely factual and truth or in some mythical sort of way, how would you do that?
Mike Henderson: Formed of space, time and taffy? Is that where it was? We just came together.
Jonathan Keeney: I mean, the real story is pretty straightforward.
Henderson: It really is.
Keeney: Our beautiful guitarist Mike Henderson said at one point after a JM Buttermilk Show, which I think, uh, I think everybody in this room is familiar with JM Buttermilk. He was a soul music artist who was very, very popular in this town. And we had the good fortune of being his rhythm section for a time. We would always start the shows out with some instrumentals, and it was always a really good time. There's a lot of things we could explore, a lot of things we could try. And after playing Cissy Strut a few times, I think it was Mike Henderson who first broached the topic of like, what if we just made a band out of that?
Jody Bilyeu: Well, our dear friend Todd Wyrick came up after the instrumental section and section said, “You guys, you four ought to be a band.” And Mike was like, yeah.
Henderson: Yeah, thanks. Let's do that.
Balisle: You have to talk into the microphone.
Bilyeu: Aha.
Keeney: Sorry.
Henderson: And then I pointed at the guys with finger guns and they're all like, okay. And that was about it.
Keeney: Yeah. To be fair, our voices into the microphone is not really what we do.
Balisle: Yeah. We should inform our listeners that this band, the Sideburns, does not participate in the frivolous use of vocals in your music.
Keeney: Yeah. This is by far the most you'll hear of our voices.
Balisle: When you guys first got together thinking that you were going to do something different than, um, you know, be JM’s band because, you know, that guy? Pssh.
Keeney: I hear he's nice.
Balisle: He's fine.
Mike Rumsey: Local legend says he took a straight job with some radio station.
Balisle: I heard that, too.
Rumsey: But that's just hearsay.
Keeney: It's hard to know the truth about that guy.
Laughter
Bilyeu: You were asking a question.
Balisle: Yes. I'm trying to get my brain back. When you guys got together without JM, did you immediately decide like, we are not going to be the Hot Buttered Biscuit Band of the JM Buttermilk Hot Buttered Soul and R&B revue? How did the Sideburns come into play? Where did that name come from?
Rumsey: The idea was bandied about. A couple of other suggestions came about and we discussed it, and Sideburns was put forward as a name, and we decided that we liked it.
Bilyeu: Are you being modest with your.. .
Keeney: He's being very modest.
Henderson: He's being very modest, yeah.
Bilyeu: It's Mikey.
Rumsey: It was my idea.
Bilyeu: Mikey said let's be the Sideburns.
Balisle: What made you settle on that after your suggestion? Because none of you have amazing sideburns. Sorry.
Henderson: I thought it was hilarious and that's why I…
Bilyeu: Wow.
Keeney: I didn't come here to be personally attacked.
Henderson: Did we just get… We just got just a little bit by our lack of side hair on our face.
Bilyeu: If this were Threads, we just got ratioed.
Henderson: Interview’s over!
Laughter
Rumsey: It’s short and catchy and easy to remember and it kind of sticks with you and it kind of invokes the classic cool that we like to project.
Balisle: Well, and lucky for you guys, Sideburns Corporate did come up with a fabulous logo that actually gives you guys sideburns.
Keeney: We're very fortunate to have Sideburns Corporate.
Henderson: Yeah.
Rumsey: Corporate has a lot of functions in this band. Provides, you know, snacks and things for rehearsals, wonderful art work and sometimes messaging service for between members of the band.
Keeney: Yeah.
Henderson: Shuttle service to and from gigs, roadie service. I mean, really.
Bilyeu: And to and from the combine derby.
Henderson: Mmmhmm.
Keeney: Yes.
Bilyeu: Very important team building event.
Keeney: It's worth talking about the fact that we have company picnics. The first and most significant being at our drummer's request, we went to, what was it, O'Reilly Auto Parts Night of Destruction?
Rumsey: Oh yeah.
Keeney: Or I could just say the demolition derby. In case I can't mention O’Reilly Auto Parts.
Rumsey: Featuring the combine derby.
Keeney: Featuring the combine derby. They have actual like combines - farm combines clambering into each other and just crashing around and having a great time.
Henderson: Lighting them on fire.
Bilyeu: During the normal derby we did watch a man catch on fire.
Keeney: Yeah, we did do that.
Henderson: That was really cool.
Bilyeu: And he was fine. The entire cabin was full of fire and he dove through the window with alarming alacrity. And also relieving alacrity. And then he kind of put out his arm and looked at it, and he was fine. And that's informed our musical sensibility.
Keeney: Of course.
Balisle: Okay. How so?
Bilyeu: Well, fire. It put the fire in the solos.
Henderson: Yeah.
Bilyeu: We didn't have very much fire before then, right?
Henderson: Right.
Bilyeu: And then the might of farm threshing equipment. I feel like courses through especially the rhythm section.
Henderson: Exactly.
Keeney: Yeah.
Henderson: And then with the support of corporate com-bined, uh, all these things just really work out to some, uh, creative sessions.
Rumsey: Not to mention the comfort aspect of the foot-long corn dog.
Bilyeu: Oh, boy.
Balisle: Absolutely.
Henderson: Yeah.
Bilyeu: Tasty.
Balisle: That's key. So, you mentioned snacks are a big part of this band. Do you guys get particular kinds of snacks?
Bilyeu: We're a candy and confection heavy band. Like meat and cheese tray? Usually not.
Keeney: There's been sufficient taffy that we have an entire song referencing that fact, “Taffy time.”
Balisle: Now, how do you go about, you have this song, “Taffy Time,” which is an instrumental because you guys do not mess with vocals.
Keeney: Kind of our thing.
Balisle: How do you convey taffy in an instrumental song?
Bilyeu: You got to want it.
Henderson: You do.
Balisle: Is this something we're just gonna have to wait and listen to on Studio Live?
Rumsey: It just sticks with you once you hear it.
Henderson: It really does.
Keeney: I learned in this building… Oh, I just got that.
Laughter
Keeney: Yeah, that's awesome. That's why he's the drummer. I learned in this building about Potter Stewart, a former Supreme Court justice, and his opinion on, you know, obscenity and in the early 1900s and wrote basically what boils down to, of course, he was more eloquent, you know it when you see it. And that's how we feel about instrumental candy songs.
Balisle: Okay. That's fair enough.
Henderson: Well, and I think as we were progressing through, we have, you know, little recordings as we're learning the songs, we'll share them with each other to kind of listen to the version of, and the version that established that song is what it is, Mikey, being the minister of all timing, counted us in with a mouth full of taffy and you hear wuh hoo hee huh. And apparently that's the name of that song.
Balisle: Okay.
Henderson: All those things. And then his brilliant count in that we get to hear for the rest of our lives with mouth full of taffy.
Keeney: It is fun to title songs that are instrumental because you can call them whatever you want. You're just going on vibes. I've got a list of potential Sideburns song titles. Most of them are just…
Balisle: Just titles and no songs yet?
Keeney: Yeah. Just hey, what if this one is called this? And there's a couple we've actually used, I think.
Rumsey: “Milk and Cookies” is one.
Keeney: “Milk and Cookies” was one. I always wanted to have a song called “Milk and Cookies.”
Henderson: “Soul Crab.”
Keeney: “Soul Crab” was also one.
Rumsey: Rangoon version.
Henderson: Rangoon version.
Keeney: Yeah. We do the Rangoon version of “Soul Crab” these days.
Henderson: We had to remix our own song before it was complete, and it was the Rangoon version.
Keeney: Yeah. We also had to make “Chocolate Milk and Cookies.”
Henderson: We did.
Keeney: And that's the version we play now, too. We evolve.
Bilyeu: Here's the thing.
Keeney: Here's this about that.
Bilyeu: We love the Meters. We love Booker T. & the M.G.’s. And when you go out, like people are always singing. And you're like, what is going on? Why are they not playing sweet, sweet soul music instrumental from the 1960s and 70s? And we saw the problem. We defined the problem. We made a plan to address the problem. And now we have solved the problem. The problem is solved. You're welcome.
Balisle: Thank you.
Keeney: We're public servants first.
Laughter
Balisle: I think that's beautiful. That's a lovely note to end on. Guys, we're really looking forward to having you in the studio on Friday for Studio Live, featuring the Sideburns.
Keeney: We're very much looking forward to being there.
Balisle: No singing.
Bilyeu: No singing. We're looking forward to communicating with you in Morse code.
Henderson: Yes.
Rumsey: Oh, I just got to the Tootsie Roll center.
Laughter
Henderson: The timing of this interview is perfect!
Keeney: So good. How long does it exactly? One soundcheck recording.
Balisle: Yes. All right. Well, thank you guys. I'm going to turn this off.
Join us for Studio Live with the Sideburns this Friday at 12:06. Thanks for tuning into SoundCheck. I’m Jess Balisle.
