Jayler
By: Lori Smerilson Carson (interview by Lori and Lindsay Carson)
It’s happening again that the U.S. and the world will see another British rock revolutionary band, but this time with inclusive elements of many genres. On May 29th, Jayler will release their debut album VOICES UNHEARD which is comprised of eleven songs that are bluesy, hard rock, a bit funky with some 70s and 80s overtones that display their serious musicianship and powerful vocals to create a refreshing new sound. These songs will stick in your head!
Catching up with Lead Vocalist/Guitarist James Bartholomew and Lead Guitarist Tyler Arrowsmith, they discussed the new album that they and fellow bandmates Bassist/Keyboardist Ricky Hodgkiss and Drummer Ed Evans are now releasing, as well as some details about their music, shows, and what fans can look forward to.
SFL Music Magazine: What inspired VOICES UNHEARD?
James Bartholomew: Nothing particular inspired us to do this album. More or less we just wanted to do it. It wasn’t anything in particular. It was like, let’s just do it. We all really wanted to release something new because we released the EP and that was like three years ago. So, I think we just all wanted to really release something. That was literally all.
Tyler Arrowsmith: Yeah, ever since we released the EP (A PIECE IN OUR TIME) the plan was always, we’re going to do an album next. We wanted to do it earlier on and there was an attempt to do that which didn’t really work out very well, but we felt like now is the right time to do it. We’re in the right position. We have the right people behind us, and that’s what really made the deal for us and that’s why we did it!
SFL Music Magazine: We listened to it, it’s a great album! Your song “Over the Mountain” is about people getting over something. In your bio it states the song also inspired the album title. How did that come about?
Bartholomew: For that song, I just wanted to write something which was quite inspiring and uplifting. So, the words were kind of like just talking about the journey over this mountain, and I guess it’s a bit about the band as well. That’s what it’s kind of about just trying to uplift people trying to get over something in their life. It could be a bad relationship; it could be addiction to drugs or anything that’s holding them back in getting to where they need to be. So, that’s what “Over the Mountain” is about. The album name, there’s a lot of different names we kind of thought about and thrown across each other, but I think we were in Nashville doing like a press thing and we still didn’t have a name, but it had all been recorded and I was having a piss and I was just humming the lyrics in my head and then I got to the “over the mountain”, the chorus, “voices unheard” and I was like, that’s it! I literally shouted to Tyler because me and him were sharing a room. I’VE GOT IT! And he went “You what”? I was like I’ve got the name for the album. And he goes “what then” I went, Voices Unheard and he went….
Arrowsmith: Yeah! We kept chopping it in different ways, but we thought that nice, short and sweet VOICES UNHEARD gets it across.
SFL Music Magazine: Your song “Down Below” with a bluesy, metal sound, 70’s style, opening with harmonica. The video really shows the band’s excellent musicianship and how you guys got into the song. We read it was written about painful emotion? What inspired that song?
Bartholomew: I just had a really bad relationship. A lot of cheating, a lot of misleading. A lot of lies were told.
Arrowsmith: Not him.
Bartholomew: Not by me. By this woman and yeah (he laughed).
Arrowsmith: A lot of it was emotion, very raw. When we were doing the vocal takes, James was in there recording and our producer George really riled him up.
Bartholomew: Yeah, out of nowhere I get airdropped from my phone a screenshot of my ex’s profile picture on Instagram and I was like, alright, that’s it!
Arrowsmith: And that was the take!
Bartholomew: That was the take, the take you hear on the album. It was me staring at this phone. It was like giving it all the beans.
Arrowsmith: You can’t get much more raw emotion than that.
Bartholomew: No, you can’t. It's just about a painful relationship or a painful breakup.
SFL Music Magazine: “Riverboat Queen” also has a retro rock sound and style including your clothes in the video. Your bio states it was written for your management team which is cool considering sometimes artists don’t have the best relationships with their management team. What prompted you to write this song for them?
Bartholomew: Nothing really prompted it. I think as I was writing the lyrics it was like, what’s the word I’m looking for? It came together and I didn’t think about it in that way.
Arrowsmith: It was going on at the time that you were writing it where we were all kind of kicking off and just getting into management. So, it all happened around the same time.
Bartholomew: I’ve got the word! Subconsciously! Subconsciously writing down these lyrics and when I finished them, I looked back and I was like, what’s this song even about? And it clicked and I was like, oh, that’s about Adam and Lisa. I was like, right! That’s cool, but the funny thing about that song is, I wasn’t at the studio, and I asked for a ballad. I was expecting pianos. I had lovely lyrics for a ballad. I let them write a song and then they came back with “Riverboat Queen”. I was like, that’s not ballad!
Arrowsmith: I called it The Ballad of James. It’s not ballad!
Bartholomew: I was like ahh. Then they saw me on it. I was like, no,no just listen to it, listen to it, and we did a key change. Then, I think it took for me about two weeks to be happy with it. I’d mix it myself and I’d hear how it would sound, and then we got in the third week and we’re like alright, that’s our first single. Let’s get that going.
SFL Music Magazine: What would you say inspires your music when you all write?
Bartholomew: I think life.
Arrowsmith: Yeah, James is the main lyricist in the band. We all go into the studio, and we do our own things. Like I might come up with a riff or you know, the other two lads play guitar as well, Ricky and Ed. So, any of them can come up with a song, and it can be like the basis of an idea and it can become a full song. But as far as the imagery and the actual lyrics, that’s 99% of the time James.
Bartholomew: So, nothing particularly inspires us. I think just yes, life and emotions and everything that I go through. So, like the breakups or meeting Adam and Lisa, the management, and saying goodbye to people. Because I look up at people like John Denver, Bob Dylan, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. So, those are folk guys who can tell a story through their music. So, I think story telling is a big part. You’ve got to have a somewhat interesting life to tell a story, and I’ve had a decent one so far. So, yeah, just kind of expressing how I feel about certain things that’s like the main inspiration, but looks wise and sound wise, it’s many things because we’re all into different genres of music. Like I said folk, country. Ricky’s into reggae and jazz. Ed’s also into jazz and big band and disco. Tyler is into 80s hair metal. So, we’ve all got our different sounds, and I think what came together is, I’m not going to say unique because we do sound like other bands, but it’s unique in the sense of not many bands are doing it today. So, that’s what makes us unique.
Arrowsmith: We also don’t have just that one sound. This debut album isn’t just a rock album because we have tried to pack as many of our influences into it just to show like the shade of the band and the different influences. We thought it was quite important to do that for our debut and then in the future, we want to kind of explore that a bit more. So, more to come (he laughed).
SFL Music Magazine: In your bio there are the great stories of your Nan and like you mentioned John Denver and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Those influences, and then you went back and discovered your own rock roots with blues and all. Tyler, your story is also great with your dad taking you to the AC/DC concert at Wembley Stadium and then your Nan and Grandad bought you a guitar. Then your grandfather helped you build a “Frankenstrat”! Would you both say these experiences influenced you to become musicians?
Bartholomew: So, the first time I ever fell in love with music and realized there is more to music than people singing and it’s not just a performance, there is emotion to it, it was quite early on. I was eight or nine years of age, and my Nan showed me how to put a record on a record player, and the first thing I ever played was John Denver live at the Universal Amphitheatre (an evening with John Denver). The first song he played was about a minute or something and I was like, yeah! That’s it! That’s awesome! I always had other inspirations of being a performer from people like Michael Jackson and Elvis (Presley). They were the top guys, but what made me pick up guitar was the “If You Want Blood” music video by AC/DC with the (Gibson) SG goes through Angus’s stomach. I was like yeah, that’s it! That’s what I want! My dad showed me Def Leppard, some Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains and all, and then I kind of looked at who their inspirations were, and then who their inspirations were, and it came down to roots music again where I started. Ok. It’s weird to hear that Led Zeppelin were inspired by Bob Dylan or something like that. You can hear it. So, that’s mine.
Arrowsmith: For me as far back as I can remember, I always heard rock music in the house. If pop radio was on, my dad would go over and turn the dial to the rock channel and say “no pop music in me house.” Didn’t have the lullabies or the nursery rhymes. My dad would put the radio on, put AC/DC on. So, that’s always, always been around me. I remember my grandfather showing me Pink Floyd for the first time, and that really was like mind blowing to hear that. I think at the age it would have been around ten years old, my dad took me to my first AC/DC concert at Wembley. I had only really seen tribute bands before that, so to go to such a big stadium, it was incredible! It was life changing. It was huge, and I think from that day it really put that in my head as ok, that’s cool! I want to be a part of this in some way. At first, I didn’t really show too much interest in the guitar. It was when my grandparents took me to, I think it was some market in town and there was an acoustic guitar on the wall. It was just like, Grandad Look at that. I’d loved to be able to play. They were like, “well, if that’s something you want to do, we can get you as a present.” I think I had three lessons with that acoustic guitar, and it was like, yeah, but I want to play electric now. So, very quickly, the acoustic went down and then I picked up the guitar and plugged into amp.
Bartholomew: Now I’m making him pick up the acoustic.
Arrowsmith: (He laughed) yes! All the way back.
Bartholomew: It’s reverse now.
Arrowsmith: I think as I’ve progressed as well. Obviously I went through different phases. AC/DC, Angus Young was my first big inspiration. Then Eddie Van Halen as you said, making the “Frankenstrat”. So, I think there’s been quite a few inspirations. During about the start of Jayler was when I started to listen to more earlier rock like from the 60s and the blues music. That just worked well especially when we were doing the covers at first trying to figure out what songs we want to play. Although yes, I would do a bit of a shredding, Eddie Van Halen solo at the pub. We moved away from that and try to keep it a bit more traditional. I do a few solos. I don’t think I do any tapping.
Bartholomew: No.
Arrowsmith: I think I did one tap once. Not anymore.
SFL Music Magazine: You have tour dates in the U.K. What can fans look forward to with your shows?
Bartholomew: A lot of skin. A lot of hair. A lot of good vibes, bad vibes. All the vibes.
Arrowsmith: We’re bringing all the vibes. The emotion, the passion. Look really, we just want to get out there and we want to play as much as we possibly can in front of…
Bartholomew: As many people as we can.
Arrowsmith: In front of our community. We love our community, and obviously we have people all the time asking us to play in various places around the world. We’re just kind of starting out, just releasing our debut album, so we promised all our fans that we will play everywhere we possibly can. So, bear with us.
SFL Music Magazine: Will there be any dates in the U.S.? Florida?
Bartholomew: A few things on the table.
Arrowsmith: Yeah. We were trying to get out this year. It was very close. Unfortunately, we just weren't able to make that work, but we are constantly looking for things that we can do to get out there. I would say just starting out it’s expensive, but we’re going to do Europe first. We’re going to see how that goes and we’re going to try our best next year to get out there.
SFL Music Magazine: Is there anything else fans can look forward to from Jayler?
Arrowsmith: Well, we’ve got the album coming out the 29th of May which is VOICES UNHEARD. In the U.K. we’re doing the album release shows. Over in the States you can purchase the Black Vinyl I believe which is going with an exclusive signed insert, I’m pretty sure. So that’s great! Just keep your eyes peeled, and as soon as we announce something over hopefully near you, and we hope to see you at a show!
SFL Music Magazine readers - look for the YouTube video SFL Music Magazine Jayler interview! See and hear how they bonded and came up with the band name, who they are touring with and more!
