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How Fun Evolves

Seriously, fun. A Lazy hard work ethic. Dive bar heroes. Rachael Price’s voice is the robust engine that revs up the Indie Soul, folky pop band, Lake Street Dive. Hailing from different parts of the country and meeting at the New England Conservatory of Music, this crew of friends are performing their way to legit notoriety. But no matter how hard they’re working, above everything else, they’re out to make sure everyone’s having a fun time. Can’t argue with that. We sat down with her to discuss all things entertaining and a tad more.

The Soul Dynamic | You’re from Hendersonville, Tennessee how did where you grew up influence your art and music?

RACHAEL PRICE | Hendersonville is a suburb of Nashville and of lot of musicians, a lot of working Nashville country and bluegrass session musicians lived in Hendersonville. My dad is also a musician, which is primarily why we moved there. And while I wouldn’t say the style of music in Nashville directly influenced what I do, I think the idea – being a working musician – was always very much present, and a very feasible thing. We interacted with people that lived as musicians all the time.

The Soul Dynamic | What or who had biggest impact on you influencing you to become and artist and make music?

RP | You know probably the biggest is my family. Primarily my father, because him being a musician ensured I was taught music at a very young age. I was sort of pushed gently into performing when I was young. And encouraged, like very, very, very encouraged in my house. Anytime I did any sort of singing, it was encouraged to do more of it and everyone was very, very supportive. So yeah, it would definitely be my family.

The Soul Dynamic | How young is young?

RP | Five maybe, yeah.

The Soul Dynamic | That’s pretty young. So the work. The creative process is not an easy thing, everyone has their own way and approach in getting to the work and figuring out their process and figuring out a way to create what they create, what’s your process like and what makes it successful? How do you guys go about finding your sound or the right fit for your last couple albums?

RP | Basically we’re constantly in a process of evolving. I’ll tell you what it is – it first starts with the song. Everybody writes songs and everybody has a slightly different style of writing. And the way this band started, was we took the songs that we’d written and played them in the best way we knew how to communicate those specific songs. We tried to serve them. And as we started writing different styles of songs; that sort of moved you know, that changed the style of the band, the aesthetic of the band would change based on the types of songs that were being written. That’s definitely the case now. We sort of started writing more soul, like 60’s pop, rock n’ roll type of songs, and that started to shape the sound of the band, and then we started to write specifically like that because that’s how we were playing. But even now we’re writing outside of those styles, and there’s going to be different things on the next album that people haven’t heard from us, and we’re doing it because that’s what the song asked for.

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 The Soul Dynamic | I love it. How do you push through challenges when maybe it’s just not there or it’s not sounding right?

RP | (Rachael starts laughing) This band pushes so hard. I mean we’ll work on a song for a year and a half in various arrangements.

The Soul Dynamic | Really? Wow.

RP | Oh yeah, I mean we just did it for certain songs. Some songs take one rehearsal and some take that long (1.5 years). Or sometimes someone brings in a song and we’re not equipped to play it the way it needs to be played, and so we have to really really work it out for a long time. We have to try different arrangements, different background vocals, try it for different crowds, it can take a long time. And sometimes it feels like you’ve been working on a song too long and you should give up. And that’s not the case – sometimes you actually need to play it for that long.

The Soul Dynamic | You just mentioned the crowd, I was reading about how you guys mold your live shows, by feeding off the energy of the crowd, gauging them and going into your performance. Do you guys come in with a set list of like three to five songs, and depending on the vibe you’re feeling from them add other songs from your catalog into the mix? Or is it something where you already have your like ten to twelve songs set and you’re ready to go?

RP | It’s the latter. We have a set list. We rarely change on the fly, we do shape it for our expectations though: is it a seated room, is it a standing room, is it a Friday night, is it a Monday night; we’ll make the set list based on what type of energy we think we’re going to be getting from the room, we try to anticipate it.

The Soul Dynamic | Got you, got you. What’s the best live music experience that you’ve either seen or performed?

RP | That’s a good question, that’s hard. For us, we’ve played so many good shows this year, so many legendary rooms. Sometimes you think that’s not going to make a really big difference for your show, but it does. We played the Fillmore in San Francisco recently, and there’s such a culture that has been created from the bands that have played there over all these years, and it creates this energy in the room that’s undeniable. That show was just, I think for us, it’s going to be top three of the year. We were so pumped, the crowd was so pumped, it sounded incredible, we just had the best time. Similar thing, we played First Ave in Minneapolis, where Prince played a lot and lots of shots from Purple Rain are in there, same thing. Just like crazy fun, crazy focused energy. The people there really know how to listen to the music, and in turn, we played differently because we felt that.

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The Soul Dynamic | If you could kick it with anyone dead or alive, from any era, for one night, who would it be?

RP | Ella Fitzgerald.

The Soul Dynamic | Love that answer. Alright, kind of a cliche question, you don’t necessarily have to answer this, who’s your favorite artist right now, who’s really fucking moving you guys?

RP | We’re all really into this country singer called Sturgill Simpson. We’ve been listening to his record and we’re super, super into him right now, and we’re all really into the guitar player Blake Mills.

The Soul Dynamic | Love Blake Mills. If you could create art in any form outside of music, what would it be?

RP | That’s a good question. I think I would like to build furniture. There’s something really awesome about wood.

The Soul Dynamic | Wood! Ok, so we do this thing called versus, it’s really quick, snappy. I throw out rapid fire questions, for example Arcade Fire vs. Vampire Weekend, and you just spit out who you prefer.

Newport Folk Festival vs. Jazz Fest in New Orleans | I haven’t been to Jazz Fest yet, so I’m going to have to go with Newport Folk.

BBQ vs. New York City Pizza | BBQ hands down (she is from Tennessee after all).

Colbert vs. Letterman | Colbert.

Your sound as a band: More Jazz vs. More Soul | Soul.

The Beatles vs. Rolling Stones | The Beatles!

The Soul Dynamic | What’s the one thing you want people to take away from your music?

RP | That’s hard. We just don’t want anyone to take us too seriously. I think that’s the one thing we want people to take away from us, we don’t want it to be a joke, it’s just like…it’s not serious.

The Soul Dynamic | You had mentioned Minnesota, I know you guys take your name after a diver bar there, can you tell us a little bit about the story behind that? Were you all just kicking it one day or at that bar one night and with your friends when someone said, “Dude. This is it, this is our name!”

RP | (Laughing) So our trumpet player and guitar player is from Minneapolis and he (Mike “McDuck” Olson) named the band before we were even a band basically. The first day we got together, he was like this is what this band is going to be called. And Lake Street is, or at least used to be, this seedy street full of dive bars where a lot of the local Minneapolis musicians would play. Mike’s uncle would play in those bars and the thinking was, Lake Street Dive is the generic dive bar that would be on Lake Street. And he wanted us to be the type of band that would play in one of those bars. We wanted to achieve the aesthetic of a dive bar band, cause we were in jazz school and it was kind of stuffy, and music was different, and we were always playing in these ornate looking concert halls and we really just wanted to sort of play sloppy, shitty music.

The Soul Dynamic | This is the last guy (question), what inspires you?

RP | Just other bands. Especially other bands that are like us…that are sort of like the middle-class, working, touring musicians. Like do whatever they can to get themselves in front of twenty people to play shows. And that they have a fun time. That inspires me.

The Soul Dynamic | How do you feel about the fact that you guys are gaining so much momentum right now, you’re really making a name for yourself, you’re playing Terminal 5 Friday and Saturday – that’s not a fucking dive bar – how do you feel about that success?

RP | We feel, you know we’ve been a band for 10 years so in some way we’re like, finally. You know, we’ve invested a lot of time in it and this is great that this is working out, because we don’t want to do anything else. In other ways, we’re completely overwhelmed, what if this doesn’t remain? And in other ways we’re like, if it never gets any better than this – Perfect.

It’s hard to say too at this point cause it’s still just happening.

The Soul Dynamic | Ok I guess I’m not done, I’m just going to keep going till I feel like I’m done. What’s your favorite song to perform? In listening to your guy’s music, for me there’s a handful of songs that I’ve had on repeat, like “Rental Love,” “Bobby Tanqueray;” “Ellijah” may be my favorite, and like you’re the one, you’re bringing it, and you’re a big part of the heart and soul of this band: what’s the song that you see on the set list and you’re like “Fuck, I can’t wait to throw that down tonight!”

RP | You know I’ve been asked this question a lot and it’s cheesy, but it’s like picking a friend, like saying, “I prefer hanging out with Molly more than I do with Jim.” I love them all so much, there all written by my best friends, so I’m pretty deeply aware of what the songs are about and so in that sense, if I was doing a set of jazz standards I’d be able to give you a favorite song, but I’m singing a set of my best friend’s music. So there’s something innately unnatural about me feeling particular about one, like picking a favorite. I just don’t have one.

The Soul Dynamic | Ok then, so what’s your favorite jazz standard?

RP | Let me get back to you on that one.

Lake Street Dive’s second album Bad Self Portraits (HERE + BELOW) is out now and they’ll be performing this evening and tomorrow night at Terminal 5 in New York City. Check out our pictures and review of their show next week.

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