Birds of Chicago, Millennium Park, Aug. 8, 8:45 p.m. as part of the Harmony Arts Festival (harmonyarts.ca).
It can be hard out there on the road.
Gig after gig, town after town, coming home to empty hotel rooms – the life of a touring musician or band can be many things, but it’s not always easy. It’s definitely not for the faint of heart or those prone to homesickness.
JT Nero of the band Birds of Chicago understands this, perhaps better than most.
The band tours relentlessly, often playing more than 200 gigs per year.
But Nero says he’s most comfortable on the road. When performing and travelling between shows, he’s in his element and so is most of the band. It helps that he brings his daughter and wife along for the ride.
Though it’s more accurate to say the couple brings each other along.
The collective is centered around singers, songwriters and musicians Allison Russell and Nero, who are married, with each bringing out the best in their partner due to their unmistakeable musical chemistry.
“I do think we had such a clear musical bond right from the jump, our creative lives were already integrated,” Nero explains over the phone in Edmonton as he cooks his daughter breakfast.
The band is Chicago-based, but Russell (formerly of Po’ Girl) has relatives in Edmonton and the band is resting up there before gigs in Canmore, Alta., followed by a trip to West Vancouver to perform at the Harmony Arts Festival Aug. 8.
They’re happy to keep playing and playing.
“If you want to be a musician at this point, and if touring is not your natural state, you kind of need to figure out how to make it your natural state,” Nero says.
“I sort of always had a romance with the idea of being a touring musician but you don’t really know until you get on that schedule.”
The band officially formed in 2012 after Nero and Russell had already known each other and played together for a number of years.
“I suspect it came slightly easier for us because the musical bond came first,” Nero says about their relationship, both in forming a band and starting a romance. “I was compelled by her voice. As soon as I heard her voice I wanted to write songs for her to sing.”
Those songs can be broadly defined as Americana, but Birds of Chicago might simply describe what they do as rock ’n’ roll.
The songs might not seem like typical rock songs, but the soul of it is there, Nero says, in the way the band takes roots music and turns it into its raw materials.
“(Rock) has meant so many things to so many people now that it maybe just has a little bit less clarity,” he says about the challenges of defining rock music.
One thing that is clear: Birds of Chicago puts an emphasis on re-inserting beauty back into music and lyrics, especially in an age where people’s attention spans and ability to communicate are constantly shifting.
Nero says he certainly doesn’t see the Internet as a bad thing, in fact he describes it as a “grassroots tool,” but the band is intent on using music as a way for people to escape some of the numbing effects of the culture at large.
“I do think there’s something about melody and harmony that lets people sort of re-enter the language and rediscover the binding power and healing power of words,” he says.
Birds of Chicago is touring on last year’s Real Midnight album, but also have a bunch of new material they’re testing out.
A new full-length record is expected early next year.
Nero reflects on the parts of touring that feels like a grind, but admits that most jobs can feel like a grind at times. For Nero and Russell, getting to perform while having their daughter by their side helps a lot.
And besides, the grind is worth it – especially when you know what Nero describes as “That feeling” when hearing or experiencing music.
“You know it,” he explains. “When you’re in a sweaty room with people, someone is up there and really just hitting you where you live. You know that feeling and it’s a very irreplaceable feeling.”
