Stephen Kellogg and The Sixers strive for constant authenticity — both lyrically and musically.
It’s been an annual tradition now for the last several years.
When Stephen Kellogg and The Sixers embark on their holiday tour, the band always chooses a theme.
This year, on Wednesday, the passionate roots rockers will be bringing “Under the Influence” to the Tin Angel — with two shows featuring their own originals, as well as a collection of songs, according to Kellogg, by their peers.
“These are people whose music has affected the way we play,” says the affable singer-songwriter, who led his band through an acoustic performance of “Glassjaw Boxer,” their acclaimed 2007 album, during their last holiday gig at the Philadelphia listening room.
This time around, SK6ERS, as they’re fondly called, will be covering songs by the likes of Josh Ritter, Serena Ryder, State Radio and even OAR (the latter in what Kellogg refers to as a “much, much acoustified” rendition).
“The obvious thing would be to do Tom Petty songs and Ryan Adam songs, but we’re sort of under the hood of these other songs because we know the people,” he says. “We know those folks aren’t household names, but they’re majorly influential people. (State Radio’s) Chad (Urmston) and Josh are two of my favorite artists.
“A lot of times, we look around and are so blown away by the people we’re friends with and the people we have access to, just artists who have moved us over the years … it makes me think we must be doing something pretty cool.”
That attitude — a genuine humility laced with a determination to avoid career steps intended purely to gratify the ego — has become as much a signature of the band, which formed in western Massachusetts in 2003, as its heartfelt, melodic roots rock. For SK6ERS, which includes Kit “The Goose” Karlson on keys, bass, tuba and accordion, Brian “Boots” Factor on drums, mandolin and banjo, and the newest member, Sam Getz on pedal steel and guitar, such authenticity and integrity have always come before aspirations toward fame and fortune.
The guys, with the exception of Getz, met while at the University of Massachusetts but didn’t form a band until after they’d graduated and tried a hand at other jobs. Sure, the group’s first album, “Bulletproof Heart,” was released on major label Universal Records, after which they jumped to an Atlantic Records subsidiary before going the independent route for “Glassjaw Boxer” and eventually finding a home with Vanguard Records for “The Bear,” their most recent release.
But even when he was forming the band, after releasing three solo albums, Kellogg knew it was important that talent and fraternal camaraderie be augmented by a similar musical aesthetic.
“I think a lot of problems we experience as human beings, specifically in America, is we look at things that aren’t real and wonder why our lives aren’t like that,” he says, using an airbrushed magazine cover of John Mayer as an example. “We think, ‘He’s so perfect. I want to be like that.’ We don’t realize he has to go in for a colonoscopy when he’s 40 just like everyone else. … Everyone wakes up with a pimple on their nose, everybody, once in a while.
“I feel the same way about music. If you make music and use all these computers to totally alter the state of it, and you’re listening to music that’s all computers, then when you pick up your guitar and you strum, you’re, like, ‘I don’t sound like that. Where’s my perfect pitch?’
“We don’t use a lot of the tools that are available to us — which saying that out loud almost sounds stupid — but I’m obsessed with what’s real. I kind of want to make music that is for the guy and the girl who doesn’t have that kind of access, who doesn’t know that all this stuff is airbrushed, to continue with that analogy. That’s what our band can be about.”
He acknowledges that he has written songs that would be deemed “more accessible.” But an inevitable maturity — which, for Kellogg, has also included becoming the father to two girls with his wife and high school sweetheart — has shifted the weight of the group’s lyrics.
“The Bear,” released in September, is an intimate look at the journey of one family, grappling with all the pain and beauty of life. The scars left on the young by the dissolution of a marriage, the fear of growing old and the pain of watching our loved ones get older, the insecurities and hopelessness that weigh us down, the safety and healing found with loving friends and partners, and the shifting priorities that family brings — these are all subjects explored on the disc, in literate, ultimately optimistic songs of quiet introspection and catchy, at times even fiery, Americana-tinged rock.
“I think in the beginning, you really want to write something that’s going to make you look cool,” says Kellogg about the album’s lyrical depth. “But the thing about progressing and growing a little bit older and having your life change — on this record, I don’t think anybody thought about what was going to seem cool as opposed to being really honest, what really happened or what happens in this situation that might be useful to somebody else. There’s no ‘I got the girl’ on this record. It’s ‘Well, the girl left because I wasn’t a good person.’ That, to me, I find more compelling than the happy ending we stuck on a lot of other songs.”
That band has also been impacted by the charitable work they’ve been doing in the last few years, playing for various social causes and more recently, touring military bases in places like Kuwait, Bahrain, Turkey and Italy, as well as NATO bases in England and the Netherlands. After taking those trips last spring, meeting with the soldiers and their families, Kellogg says the band’s fall tour was its best ever.
“You need that, something to bring it back home and remind you that it’s not just about someone telling you you’re cool. It’s about human connection and making a difference in somebody’s life where you can make a difference,” he says. “On our fall tour, we felt like our job on stage every night was to spread love, which is such a huge thing compared to ‘Let’s go rock.’ ”
Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers perform two shows Wednesday at the Tin Angel, 20 S. Second St., Philadelphia. Jason Myles Goss opens. Show times: 7 (all ages) and 9:30 p.m. Tickets: $27. Information: 215-928-0978; www.tinangel.com.
Return to Archives