ACL 2014 - BLUE BEAR (Q&A)

So I consider myself having a pretty good base of bands and music in my personal library but SXSW shows me every year, as does ACL there are still so many good bands out there that I am not familiar with. Blue Bear is one I just discovered because they are on the ACL lineup.

Blue Bear is Grizzly Bearish - and also remind me a bit of Boy & Bear that has had some recent success (whoa a lot of bears going on there haha). Blue Bear is an Austin, TX based band so I'm super excited to promote and follow Austin based bands because we have such great talent coming out of this city.

Blue Bear is made up of Jeremy Holmsley (vocals & guitar), Khoury Moore (vocals & guitar), Casey Artur (vocals & mandolin), Jared Shaw (bass guitar & vocals) and Daniel Cole (vocals & drums).

I caught up with Jeremy Holmsley and asked him a couple of questions so we can get to know Blue Bear a little bit more.

WMB: How long has Blue Bear been playing?

JH: Blue Bear came into existence in late 2010 when a friend introduced me to the music of Grizzly Bear, which moved me to start a new project. Blue Bear began performing as a full band for the first time in early 2012. A big part of the sound we are developing revolves around big 5-part harmonies, which will be on full display in the upcoming album. It has been really fun experimenting with complex harmonies-cluster chords, semitones, and dissonance (you can hear in "Too Late to Go Home") - which we think sets our music apart from the typical harmonies of today's music.

WMB: How excited are ya'll to play ACL this year?

JH: I think we're still pinching ourselves! I know I am. It will definitely be the biggest thing we've ever been a part of, and we couldn't be more excited about it!

WMB: What are your goals this year (Umm besides playing ACL :)

JH: A big one is to finish this album and put it out. We'll be calling the record "Vacations". Putting on a great performance at ACL is also a huge goal. Other than that, we've already been doing a lot behind the scenes, trying to organize ourselves and move toward the possibility of making the band profitable. A huge goal of ours, of course is to get to a point where we can quit our day jobs and get out on the road and tour. We've been fortunate to be a part of a lot of great things in the past two years of playing here in Austin - we're especially proud because we have essentially done it all on our own, completely independent. We haven't had a manager or any booking agents to this point, so it has been a learning process.

Thankfully we are getting things rolling now, organizationally, and we're starting to develop a real vision of what it is we want to do and accomplish with the band.

WMB: If you could go on a dream tour, who would it be with?

JH: My personal dream tour would be with Grizzly Bear. I think I can speak for the band when I say Beach Boys or Fleetwood Mac - either would be an epic dream tour for us.

I'm super excited for the upcoming album and to check them out at ACL this year - here is one of their singles from the upcoming "Vacations" album - Too Late to Go Home.