Tower Defense singer-songwriter-bassist Mike Shepherd’s lyrics will make any rock ’n’ roller over 30 feel seen. The Nashville foursome’s second album In the City (out tomorrow via YK Records) hits home with treatises on barely recognizing your hometown because of all the development and becoming wallflowers in a scene you once ruled. It also makes several vivid forays into 2020-appropriate magical realism. On the succinct 10-song, 24-minute set, recorded by Jeremy Ferguson at the venerable Battle Tapes, Shepherd’s crisp, confident vocals dovetail with ecstatic harmonies from wife and fellow bass player Sarah Shepherd, guitarist-vocalist Currey May and drummer-composer Jereme Frey. Ahead of the record release — to be commemorated with a livestream Friday night from The 5 Spot — the Scene enjoyed a Zoom happy-hour with the band.
Two-bass bands are pretty rare. Girls Against Boys, Dianogah — and Tower Defense.
Mike Shepherd, vocals and bass: There’s also Ned’s Atomic Dustbin, and Man Is the Bastard. But yeah, not many. Initially, I was imagining something like Trans Am — lots of bass chords, building big chords out of two basses. But our shared heritage musically is pop and melodic indie rock, so that’s what we ended up writing. A Venn diagram around Jawbox, Fugazi —
Jereme Frey, drums: — and Billy Idol.
Jereme, you’re the drummer, but also the principal composer in the band. Tell me how that works.
JF: I found a computer program that let me hook up a 49-key MIDI controller, then on a keyboard I was able to tap out some guitar and bass parts in [intentionally] difficult keys. I wrote about 100 30-second, minute-and-a-half things, brought those in, and about 12 of them were good. So if I was a baseball player, I’d be hitting .120. I’d probably be in Single A.
MS: But that’s what we needed. After our first record [2013’s Mind the Menagerie] I had profound and self-perpetuating writer’s block. I couldn’t figure out how to write any more songs.
What takes longer to perfect in Tower Defense, the musical interplay or the harmonies?
Currey May, guitar and vocals: The music. The harmonies come pretty naturally.
MS: Currey and myself are practiced singers. We sang in church, in school, in the car. Jereme and Sarah are less practiced and less confident singers, but have much more interesting voices.
Sarah Shepherd, bass: I can play bass all day long with my eyes closed, but singing while playing takes a lot of practice.
What are your songs about, Mike?
MS: There’s a lot of dream songs. “In the City” — I had a dream I was downtown, and the Cumberland River started surging over its banks. We ran uphill, but kept slipping in the water. Rain and weather anxiety, tornadoes, floods … Nashville is just a beautiful, loving swamp town. “Richard Nixon’s Safe Room” — I literally dreamt [Nixon] had a safe room decorated like Ricky Shorter’s bedroom from Silver Spoons. “Theme From Renewal” is a three-way dialogue between developers, new arrivals and jaded natives of Nashville. “Schools” is a ghost story about getting old.
Is the album title a nod to The Jam’s 1977 debut In the City?
SS [to MS]: I knew this would happen. I fought for calling it just The City because I didn’t want people to think we were ripping off The Jam.
MS: I wanted them to think we were ripping off The Jam. I like when albums have the same name as other albums, like Let it Be.
What’s your quarantine experience been like?
MS: Jereme lives two doors down from us — I could shine a flashlight on his front porch right now, and he’d see it. So we just combined our households through the spring and over the summer.
CM: Honestly, having a project to work on — checking masters, mixes, artwork — gave a glimmer of hope.
Tell me about the virtual release show at The 5 Spot.
JF: We’re big fans of what [co-owner Todd Sherwood] is doing over there. Multi-camera live videos like the ones they’re producing are something a lot of bands could use.
CM: I’m anxious about it. It’ll be weird to play with masks, with no audience. But for my sister in California, who’s probably our biggest fan — she made her own Tower Defense sweatshirt — it’s a way for her to get to see us, so that’s nice.
