Frontier Ruckus will be taking the Sonic Lunch stage again Aug. 1. Their Ypsilanti-based trumpeter Zach Nichols let Current look behind the scenes for what there is to look forward to once the opening act, Timothy Monger, wraps up.
This interview was conducted over the phone. Zach’s answers have been edited for length and clarity.
CURRENT: Let’s talk about your musical background and how your band developed first.
Zach Nichols: Matt and Dave met in high school. I had heard about them when my girlfriend at the time saw them busking on the street. She said “You really have to check this out. They have a banjo, and a guitar,” at the time I thought “It doesn’t sound interesting to me. It’s country music” but when I actually heard the music, I ended up really liking it.
I met Matt on Facebook, in the early days of Facebook, because I was looking up phrases like “singing saw” and “melodica” which were instruments that I was recently fascinated with, and had just only sort of started to play, and Matt was looking for someone to play those instruments, so I messaged him and said “Hey, I almost play those instruments!” and we set up a little meet. That was in like 2006, 2005.
CURRENT: How would you describe your band’s style?
Zach Nichols: It’s oscillated a bit between pop-yer and weirder with some electronic elements. But I would say its bluegrass influenced folk country, with a really strong lyrical element.
I would say that lyrics are the most important part of the band. That all comes from the mind of Matt. He labors over the lyrics, and I’m always really impressed by how he can make them fit over these melodies, and it sounds almost conversational.
CURRENT: Can you walk Current through Frontier Ruckus’ history with Sonic Lunch?
Zach Nichols: It always rains so we’ll see how Aug. 1 is looking! We’re gonna have Connor Dodson on drums and Evan Eklund on bass and harmony. They’re both super talented musicians with other groups around Detroit.
CURRENT: The perennial story that journalists always talk about is that concert tickets always keep finding new ways to get more expensive. So, what does it mean for music lovers, and for musicians, to get a venue that’s completely free?
Zach Nichols: Something feels natural about it, especially in that open air environment.
What we really want as musicians is to play for free to everyone. In an ideal world, all concerts would be like this. But certain forces, like how we need to make a living somehow, and all the infrastructure and overhead that goes into a show usually makes that impossible.
It is a moment of realized idealism to get to play a free show.
CURRENT: Have you and your bandmates decided how much of your songs will be new, old favorites, or covers?
Zach Nichols: If we do one cover it will be just a short little saw song, a little instrumental novelty act that Dave and I do; something like Moon River. We’ll play a good mix of songs from earlier records, and some from the new record. Fifty-fifty.
We may or may not have a guest with us. But I don’t want to speak out of turn, but I don’t want to get people’s hopes up.
We’re really proud of the new record. We like the songs off of it and think it’s been received pretty well.
CURRENT: What is it that you love about music?
Zach Nichols: It can completely change your mood. You can be stuck on the doldroms and music can break you out of that.
It adds some sort of emotional element, even if it is lacking in emotion in and of itself. It can do something to you, it can affect you. Sometimes it can be thought provoking, make you nostalgic, or start thinking about the future, but more than that, it’s emotional.
Drew Saunders is a freelance business and environmental journalist who grew up just outside of Ann Arbor. He covers local business developments, embraces his foodie side with reviews restaurants, obsesses over Michigan's environmental state, loves movies, and feels spoiled by the music he gets to review for Ann Arbor!
