by Brent

How did the Southern Sea form? (and who’s in the band?)

As for the who is in the band; myself (Billy Hale), Marc Atkinson, Kenny Comerford, and Brad Wofford.

As for the forming; Brad, Marc, and I were playing in another band called Ecuador Centennial, an indie type band, along with two other friends. We thought we had some good ideas but could never really put it all together. So with much hesitancy we decided to disband.

In the aftermath Brad, Marc, and I continued to write material looking for an outlet, but with three guitar players we lacked the ability to play shows. To fix the problem I moved to drums with Brad and Marc playing guitars and we still needed a bass player. I asked my old roommate Kenny, who also plays guitar, to play bass.  He agreed.

How did you come up with such a neato name for your band?

Brad was listening to NPR and he heard a story about a sail boat race that sailed through the southern sea (or maybe the southern ocean) so later we were thinking of band names and he mentioned the NPR story.

Have any of you been involved in other bands?

Along with the afore mentioned Ecuador Centennial Llast, The Mary Gold Rodeo, City on a Hill, and Nontra Volta (instrumental disco).

Your site looks great…do you guys design it?

Thanks, yeah Brad designs all the stuff for the band, with us collaborating a bit.

What/who are some of your musical influences?

Appleseed Cast, Yo la Tengo, Pedro the Lion, Ester Drang, Air…

How would you describe your sound in your songs?

We don’t really know. It’s hard for us to tell, it’s hard to remove ourselves enough to describe it.

Describe to me your songwriting process (collaborative?main songwriter?)

Usually Brad and Marc come with pieces of songs that they’ve written away from the band. a verse or chorus or just a few notes. Then we will mess around with the parts and configure and rehash until we get something solid.

What has your experience been in regards to performing live?

We have actually been surprised at the diversity of people that liked our music. Shows are fun.

What place do you think your band, as an independent one, has in the overall music world?

There are so many good bands that go unnoticed it’s hard for us to imagine that we have any place at all.

What specifically are the future plans of the Southern Sea?

We are going to continue striving to write good songs. Songs that are honest, creative and inspiring to others both musically and spiritually.

Musical secret obsessions?

We have a two-part answer involving the only two members who have enough time to have secret obsessions. I’m somewhat obsessed with my own music, under the name De Oro. It’s simple acoustic music and I occasionally ask for help from marc and brad. Currently Marc is obsessed with the Moss Eisley fiasco, “it is like watching a reality show only you have seen the stars in person.”

Any other comments?

Texas is the reason.

www.thesouthernsea.com

thesouthernsea@hotmail.com