Big Bands Making A Big Comeback with Calico Trail

Newcomers Calico Trail not only enjoy breaking boundaries with their music, but they are also bringing the idea of the Big Band back, with style.

I recently had the opportunity to chat with Jonny Houlihan and Cole Bruce, fresh from the studio, about their band, upcoming record, and why you probably won’t find them partying with girls after a show.

How did you come up with the name Calico Trail?

It’s actually a trail that leads to a ghost town in California. I’m from California and always liked a band name that stuck out like a road name-like The Eagles- and because a lot of our songs deal with travelin’ I kind of just googled “road” and “trail” to see what would come up. Then it just came up and had a cool vibe for a big piece band; and calico, as far as a cat goes, is a cat of many stripes and colors and that’s kind of like what the band is– seven guys who are classically trained in Jazz, Country and Rock all brought together.

So do you guys play a little bit of everything then?

Well we can, most of the band still play with like Patty Loveless and stuff, so it’s like one of those things like getting a super group together. Everyone is bringing their own sound and it’s what has brought us the good luck we’ve had so far.

So if you had to bring a stereotypical label on your sound what would it be?

Most are considering us kind of like what the Eagles did for the 70’s, but with a lot of Tom Petty influence. Obviously were a collective, but John Cougar Mellencamp wrote a lot of the big radio hits and that’s what we’re trying to achieve today, but we definitely carry our own sound.

So since some of the guys have been on tour for a while you’re kind of like Veterans of the business and know what you’re doing and it shows with how fast things have been coming together for you guys.

Yeah, most of these guys have been full time musicians for the past 10 years and although it’s a passion for us all it’s also a job , so once we had to perfect chemistry and the right seven guys together, through the crazy process, it was just 30 days later that we signed out record deal. It took a long time to put together, but once we had that right team it was really us getting signed on our first show.

A seven piece band is a big deal today, not many would stick in that venture, especially with record labels.

That’s what everyone is like, like the label that ended up with us. We were like you have to take all seven of us to play on the record and write all the songs. It’s a second brotherhood, although four of the guys have been lead singers on their own before, the way it all clicked when we came together just worked and mid-December we finally begin recording on a full-budget and in one of the biggest studios. So from the stuff we have out now that we recorded in our home studios we’re really looking forward to this, we’ve been blessed.

Another big deal with labels-it seems-is the idea of keeping newcomers relationships on the down-low but you guys aren’t about that.

We look at this as our business; it’s not about drinking beer and meeting girls (although we like beer), most of us have girlfriends and are married and are just doing music  because we love it, not for the party. We’d rather do a show and go home and sleep then stay around and party. Again, we play because we live for the music, nothing else.

You can hear music from Calico Trail on  myspace and keep up with them on facebook and twitter .

*By Candace, who will be in bed before midnight tonight. Yippie!

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