Hey Marseilles is a seven-piece band that always brings a cello, accordion and trumpet — among other instruments — to live shows.
“In a lot of ways, I think our live show is a lot bigger than what’s on the record,” said Hey Marseilles lead singer Matt Bishop. And if that’s the case, the up-and-coming band is a must-watch tonight at DC9 when they open for Sea Wolf.
“A lot of bands who use some of the instruments we use don’t necessarily bring them to their live shows,” Bishop said. “But we absolutely bring a cello and a viola and an accordion, a clarinet, bass clarinet, trumpet, two guitars, a bass guitar and two sets of drums.”
The seven-piece, (at least) 12-instrument band makes huge, orchestral pop-rock — and they make sure the new fans they gain on tour as an opening act will hear every single song as it is intended to sound.
The band’s sprawling debut album, To Travels & Trunks, is filled with lush strings, horns and percussion — most notably on the song “Rio,” which earned them an NPR “Song of the Day” spot back in 2010. The band has spent years promoting To Travels & Trunks — releasing it locally in 2008, then nationally again in 2010 — and is now looking to release its second full-length in February.
“The record as a whole is a bit more focused,” said Bishop of the next release. “But certainly a lot of the components that people were attracted to with our first record still remain with this one.”
Bishop and his bandmates are hoping to gain fans as they travel the U.S. with Sea Wolf this fall. They’re about a week into the tour and will hit the Northeast, Midwest and California by the middle of November.
“In Seattle we do really well, but we haven’t really seen that translate to any other places — and that’s essentially because we haven’t pushed our music to many other places,” Bishop said. This tour is one of the band’s first national trips, and they are looking forward to playing for new audiences.
“The joy of being an opening band,” Bishop said, is that “there’s a lot less pressure. You kind of relax, take it easy, and really just try to make new fans. So it’s a lot of fun for us.”
Bishop sees an opening in the pop music world for a rising rock band making big sounds. With the recent success of artists like Mumford and Sons and The Lumineers, Hey Marseilles is hoping they can follow the same path while remaining true to their roots.
“It feels like the pop landscape currently is really interested in the type of soft rock that we produce,” Bishop said. “There’s a lot of acoustic bands out there that are doing really well on the charts.”
Bishop hopes the band’s orchestral nature ends up setting them apart “because there isn’t a lot of that out there on the market, so we have a pretty unique niche to sell.”
Hey Marseilles will play at DC9 tonight at 9 p.m. Tickets are $14.
