#Suddenly, Tammy #alternative rock #indie rock #alternative pop rock #piano rock #1990s
Siblings Beth and Jay Sorrentino began making music from about the age of five. In their Lancaster, Pennsylvania home, Jay would play drums while Beth sat at the piano. Bassist Ken Heitmuller also began playing early on. In 1989, the trio formed Suddenly, Tammy! and recorded two EPs in their basement studio. With the absence of a guitar player, the band provided a fresh sound in indie pop. Both Spokesmodel and El Presidente were well-received, especially in the College Music Journal. Indie label spinArt's first release was the group's own full-length debut. The self-titled album did well and earned Suddenly, Tammy! a spot supporting Suede. Signed to Warner Bros. in 1994, the band recorded throughout the summer and released We Get There When We Do in 1995. From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/suddenly-tammy%21-mn0000489735/biography
HEARSAY: We love the way your music seems to allow a lot of improvisation within a certain structure. Do you have a method when it comes to songwriting? Is it primarily a three-way collaborative affair or do you each work on separate parts and bring them to the rest of the band? Are the lyrics exclusively Beth's department?
Beth: Usually we get together and play and many songs grow out of listening; sometimes I bring some ideas I've sketched out on the piano and sometimes with lyrics - many times an idea will grow out of having all of the instruments together and the music just 'clicks' together.
Ken: I'd say that the lyrics are exclusively Beth's department. Her words are always somewhat autobiographical and I'd never presume to put words into her mouth.
Two other notable bands who manage pretty well without guitars - Morphine and Ben Folds Five - seem heavily jazz-influenced. Has jazz been a big influence on ST? Do you all listen to similar things? And do you have any current recommendations for us?
Beth: Personally, I've developed a taste for jazz over the last few years, although I grew up with jazz records (Ella Fitzgerald, Dave Brubeck) mixed up with the Doobie Brothers, Chicago, Carole King, Barbra Streisand, Elton John, Billy Joel - all kinds of stuff. Our band seems to reflect some of all of that from time to time, including more current music - I listened to a lot of Kate Bush in the 80s. Right now I recommend Young Chet Baker and I'm listening to Elton John's Greatest Hits (with Rocket Man, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road...); the best.
Ken: Have you noticed how Beth over-uses hyphens and semicolons and I over-use all-caps and exclamation points? (We both overuse parentheses (well maybe a little (JUST a little!))). Personally, I claim little from jazz. Although I own more jazz recordings than the average jazz fan, I know so little about the genre. I know enough to claim that it's probably the most difficult music to be good at - yes, even more than classical music. To be a good classical musician requires mostly athletic dedication. Rock requires mostly that you really mean what you're doing, even if you suck. Jazz requires music knowledge, innate or schooled, skilled playing with finesse, and style. I'm very flattered when people make jazz references to Suddenly, Tammy!
Your self-titled debut album was tightly packed and highly chromatic. The follow-up seems more tranquil somehow and perhaps more structured. Was this deliberate? Was it anything to do with the move to a major label or the introduction of an outside producer? Or perhaps working in a concentrated burst in a professional studio rather than working at home over a long period?
Beth: Probably all of that is true. I don't really hear the album as 'tranquil', but that's probably lack of objectivity! River, Run is certainly quiet, but Hard Lesson always makes me a little hyper. Working at Bearsville was a departure from home; I think the sound of the album reflects the whole experience.
Why did you choose Warne Livesey as producer and what was he able to bring to the project? Was his role to 'realise' your ideas or did he add something new to the creative process?
Beth: Mostly because of his enthusiasm for the music – he was concerned about keeping the band 'organic' – keeping the three-piece sound clean; using acoustic pianos; more of a 'live' sound. We worked very closely with him, but his influence does come across on the album.
Suddenly Tammy's lyrics always seem alluringly oblique and more about specific imagery and particular moods rather than telling a straightforward story with concrete meaning. Do you find things in everyday life which inspire you to write songs or do you prefer to tackle more abstract themes and ideas through specific angles? The theme of uneven relationships or power seems to appear fairly frequently. Is this a theme that particularly interests you or are we clutching at straws here?
Beth: Things in everyday life became abstract themes for me. Something that seems to be so 'normal' (a ride in the car, a talk with my mom) can turn into very strange mixed imagery in my mind – relationships and the problems within are always being sorted out in my lyrics.
Ken: Knowing Beth, I clearly see what many of her lyrics are about. Sometimes the meaning is very clear. She is not too literal, however, with her words. The things she sings about often seem to have a multilayered meaning. This allows for many interpretations and people often apply her words to their own situations.
And there's a kind of dream-like, hallucinatory – sometimes even vaguely unsettling – quality to lots of the songs (Mt Rushmore, Bound Together, Beautiful Dream etc). Do dreams and/or nightmares influence you? Do you feel lost when you're asleep and found when you're awake, or is it vice versa?
Beth: For me, many dreams are clues, sometimes, to things that bother me during my waking hours sometimes (I guess) I suppress thoughts about disturbing issues, and a lot of my 'bad' dreams leave me with many questions and images, which seem to unfold sometimes only when I play music, accounting for the lyrics, possibly.
Ken: Sometimes Beth drives when she sleeps – a sleepdriver.
What images unfolded on the Cine film you sat down to watch In the middle of your first album? Do you have any favourite films or directors and do they influence your writing?
Beth: I don't remember what movie that was; Ken had his projector running. He shows movies in his yard over the summer. I have many favorite films – 2001 is a great movie to watch outside in the dark on Ken's lawn! I also love Hitchcock films and Searching for Bobby Fischer is one of my favorites.
Ken: I think it was The Cat in the Hat by Dr Seuss. It's the Lancaster Public library's copy and is now half splicing tape. Every few seconds the action jumps ahead like a skipping record. I recorded the sound from that film, with that first tape recorder, as a child. It was splicey then. When I borrowed that same print fifteen years later, I recognized the locations where the music skips from the 15-year-old splices – and noticed it to be much more dashed up since then. I don't think people realize that a print of a half-hour 16mm film costs about $500 to replace. Soon, that Seuss will be only 15 minutes long! It makes me sad that kids today won't know that SOUND! That lovely purring of the Bell and Howell Filmosound in the back of a darkened classroom. It puts our Beth right to sleep.
From: http://www.hearsaymagazine.co.uk/suddenly_tammy/
