What do you get when you put seven friends together who have a shared love and passion for music? You get Canadian indie/ska/punk/jazz/emo hybrid Small Town Get Up! The band was technically on hiatus for the last four or so years after one of the members moved away. Instead of replacing him, the band decided to put things on hold because friendship was more important to them.
Small Town Get Up officially ended their hiatus in 2020 because they realized distance meant nothing during a global pandemic. Throughout the year, the band worked on their first new music since 2014’s New Noise. Gone were the ska punk heavy arrangements of yesteryear; replaced with a more evolved sound that blended indie, ska, punk, emo, pop, and even a touch of jazz.
Their new EP, Time And Space, came out in January. It’s 20 minutes of sonic perfection that reminds me of RX Bandits at times. It’s really hard to tell that most of the album was recorded separately and pieced together in post production. There’s a maturity that can be heard throughout. The band has definitely grown since the last time they recorded music together. There’s also no evident rust. They’re all definitely at the top of their game, giving fans dynamic and well-structured music to experience. It honestly sounds like Small Town Get Up never missed a beat. I guess that’s what happens when you make music with your friends.
Lead singer and guitarist Nick Arseneau-Wang took some time to talk about the band, recording remotely, and how he’s kept busy during the pandemic. After reading the interview, take some time to listen to their new EP.
You put out Time and Space this year. What challenges did you have recording virtually during a pandemic?
Almost the entire album was recorded through social distancing. Surprisingly, I actually found that it made some aspects easier. With seven people in a band who live in different parts of Canada, it gets pretty difficult to coordinate schedules. But for this album, everyone got their own home recording setup and we bounced parts back and forth online. Everyone could work on their own parts at their own convenience.
I write all the horn parts, lyrics/vocal melody, chord progressions and form, so I was able to upload sheet music, lyrics, and rough recordings to a cloud and everyone could just learn the parts and lay them down. One challenge was getting the drums, bass, and guitar parts to mesh, so we did get together once in-person for a writing session, and we recorded the drums in a studio. We kept distancing measures in mind while in-person, and this was also at the end of the summer when things had opened up a bit.
The album is a nice blend of ska with indie pop and punk sensibilities. Is it challenging to mesh all of those styles together?
I think the fact that we are still defined as “ska” speaks more to our roots than it does to our current sound. When we started out more than a decade ago, we were really trying to emulate Streetlight Manifesto. But today, the only “real” ska fan in the band is Jeff (trombone/vocals). For the rest of us, we listen to a pretty wide range of music. There’s a lot of indie, but also jazz, emo/math rock, country, reggae, hip hop. So, I think blending these styles comes very naturally. That being said, I’ll still throw on a Streetlight or Planet Smashers album and skank around my kitchen, don’t get me wrong. It’s still great music! Being a big Canadian ska band, Jeff and I make it a point of going to see the Planet Smashers together whenever they’re in Toronto.
For readers who may not be familiar with Small Town Get Up, what song is going to hook them?
Our main single off Time and Space is “Hey Sister.” This one is a bit of a throwback to our early Streetlight-influenced days, although we definitely put our own spin on that vibe!
However, our most streamed song is “Don’t Tell Me” off New Noise, so that one would be a close second.
The band ended four years ago. What happened, and what drove you to reform and make music again?
We were starting to make a big push towards promoting, but at the same time each individual member was getting busier with life outside of the band. Many of us were just finishing school, finding work, settling down, etc. It was becoming harder and harder to get together to make music. I think when Adam (trumpet) decided to move to Vancouver, on the other side of the country, we decided that the most important thing for us was our collective friendship, and it didn’t feel right to continue without him. With the pandemic, we realized that we could make music without having to be all together at once, so we gave this album a shot, and it worked out. Ironically, as soon as we started working on the album, Adam moved back to Ontario.
What have you learned about yourself and your bandmates since the beginning of your hiatus?
Speaking just from my perspective, I miss the days when we were super actively playing shows. I personally took what we had for granted. We played some amazing shows to packed crowds in sweaty rooms, dancing and singing along to our songs. We opened for some great bands like The [English] Beat, Mustard Plug, The Toasters, Five Iron Frenzy, and The Planet Smashers. It also made me realize just how much I value the friendship of these seven dudes. I guess I could sum up what I’ve learned since hiatus with a quote from the great Canadian artist Joni Mitchell: “Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got ’till it’s gone?”
Aside from Small Town Get Up, you’ve also been working on some solo stuff. What can folks expect from those projects?
I love making as much music as I can, so I’ve always got a lot of different projects on the go. In the past year, aside from Time and Space, I put out an ’80s synth-pop inspired EP under the artist name Gulangyu, an EP with my emo/indie/math rock band Chronophobe, a modern jazz album, and a video with my video game cover band Contra-Band. I plan to keep putting out recordings and videos with all of these groups!
I’m guessing most bands miss the same things during the pandemic, so I won’t ask. Instead, I’m curious what you’re not looking forward to going back to when the dust settles?
There’s been a lot of hanging out at home for me, so I haven’t had to drive nearly as much as I did before. The traffic in Toronto is really bad. That’s the biggest thing I’m dreading!
There was a lot of sitting around in 2020, so lots of time for music. What is your favorite new band discovery from last year?
Now THAT’s a tough question. I’ve discovered a lot of artists in the past year. I have a Spotify playlist I’ve made that encompasses a good chunk of new music I’ve been listening to, maybe this is a better answer than picking one artist? It’s a lot of indie/emo.
What’s the best way for people to support you until you can play shows again?
We’d love to get more folks listening to the album, so please share it with your friends! And if you want to go the extra mile, leave our album streaming on repeat while you sleep (hahaha, only half-joking here). Buying the album on Bandcamp, especially on Bandcamp Fridays, is the best way to financially support.
Any last words?
If it weren’t for the pandemic, I don’t think we would have thought to make the album via distance. It might not have happened otherwise. 2020 was a really tough year to say the least, but for me, making recordings through online collaboration has been a silver lining. At the heart of it, this band is about seven friends who are linked by a love of music. We’ve been talking about doing another album for a long time, and we’re all incredibly stoked that we finally got to make it happen. We just hope y’all have as much fun listening to these tunes as we did while making them!
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