February 2016
The Sound STC•Vol.2 Issue 02
The Sheepdogs Get Nostalgic
With Their Latest Album
By Chris Illich
After the release of their fifth album, Future Nostalgia on October 2, 2015, The Sheepdogs
are getting ready to head back on tour,with a stop in St. Catharines. I had the chance to
chat with the lead singer and guitarist Ewan Currie on the phone.
So to kind of get things going, I remember one time when you were supposed to come
play in St. Catharines but had to cancel that show because of everything that was going
on with the Cover of the Rolling Stone contest. That must have been a whirlwind of a time
going through all that. What was that like? It was a huge platform for us to get some publicity
and get our name out, because that’s the toughest thing. How do you make people aware of your band
whether it’s a band or a product or your business or a movie or a website. It’s all about getting people to
know about you and then hopefully they like what you’re doing. It was a massive shot in the arm for us, but
we’re just trying to keep our own. I guess it was four or five years ago now and it was a huge help for us.
And since then you’ve been busy touring, you released your self titled record in 2012,
then near the end of last year you released Future Nostalgia. I saw that you recorded that
in Stony Lake. Did you want to add that romantic notion of recording a record in a cabin
in the woods? I guess it was kind of a two-fold inspiration: One, we were sick of being around a lot of
The Sheepdogs perform at Isaac’s Bar & Grill at Brock
University on March 6. Tickets are available at
Mindbomb Records or on ticketfly.com
people all the time. There’s always constant distractions and all that kind of stuff, so we decided to do it
somewhere isolated, quiet and peaceful – which it absolutely was. Two, we love classic era rock ‘n’ roll.
Look at Led Zeppelin IV, they recorded it in Jimmy Page’s crazy-ass house in the country. For Rolling
Stone’s Exile on Main Street they went and got a house in the French Riviera and just set up gear. The
Band made Music From the Big Pink in a house in upstate New York. We just thought that these were all
such great stories and that it seemed like a good way to do it because there are no parties, there are no
women and there is no commuting. We were all right there and we focused on that all-day everyday.
One of the really fascinating things for me when listening to Future Nostalgia were the
song titles “Jim Sullivan” and “Jim Gordon”. I immediately looked them up, and then
there’s “Darryl & Dwight” about Dar