It's easy for anyone with some fluency in recording scenes — musicians, vinyl collectors, journalists and the like — to forget that not everybody is equipped with the basic contextual knowledge to recognize that the title of Steelism's full-length debut, 615 to FAME, refers to a recording process begun in Nashville and completed in Muscle Shoals.
"We've had a few people calling it 6:15 to FAME," says the band's Telecaster-wielding co-founder Jeremy Fetzer. "So I think a lot of people haven't caught on that 615 is our area code yet. But I guess that's OK."
And if they happen to miss the essential detail that "FAME" appears in all caps — and is therefore not a prediction of notoriety so much as a name-checking of the storied Alabama studio — Fetzer's not sweating it.
"There've been funny titles," he says, "like how Big Star [called an album] #1. There's an ego to it, but it's really a joke."
That could also apply to the genesis of Fetzer's Steelism partnership with pedal-steel guitarist Spencer Cullum Jr. While backing Caitlin Rose on a European tour, Fetzer and Cullum started fooling around with instrumental licks during sound checks and grousing about their insufferable opening acts.
"They were always kind of a drag," says Fetzer. "Because it'd be, like, a 16-year-old kid with a synth and drum machine. So we joked about, '[What] if we were the opening band and just did our own thing?' Then we turned the joke into a monster."
Cullum and Fetzer were soon warming up crowds for Rose and their other singing, songwriting employers, Andrew Combs and Jonny Fritz, on the road. Back in Nashville, the duo booked a string of Steelism shows at The Basement, initially taking care to break up sets that merrily paraded through arrays of '60s-inspired instrumental pop — goosed by jazz, rock, R&B or country leanings — and covers of period hits like The Shadows' "Apache" with guest vocal spots by Combs and Rose.
By the time Steelism put out an EP, The Intoxicating Sounds of Pedal Steel and Guitar, on Theory 8 Records (the indie operated by Rose's manager Aaron Hartley), Fetzer and Cullum had gone all in on their all-instrumental format. There was singing on a subsequent 7-inch single only because it was split between their kaleidoscopically bopping surf number "China Plate" and a Combs track. The new album, whose release on Alabama's Single Lock Records they'll mark with a tour of three of Nashville's indie record stores, once again features nary a peep from a human larynx. Speaking of, Fetzer, an Ohio native who landed in the ragged riff-rock outfit The Deep Vibration while at Belmont, thought British-born Cullum was laying on his Cockney accent a bit thick to be believed the first time they met. (Fetzer claims to not even notice Cullum's amiable Londonisms anymore, though they've no doubt elicited surprised reactions as Cullum has toured with Miranda Lambert's band this summer.)
Regardless of the geographical divide in their backgrounds, it didn't take long for Cullum and Fetzer to begin cranking out flamboyantly melodic compositions. They shared a classic-rock foundation in The Beatles, the Stones and Zeppelin. And as it happens, Cullum's first exposure to steel was the Stones' "Torn and Frayed," featuring Al Perkins, and Fetzer had his first experience playing with a steel guitarist when Perkins sat in on a Deep Vibration session.
It's the complementary areas of specialized geekery that give Steelism its color and range: Cullum has a thing for the experimental side of steel legend Pete Drake — including Drake's out-there, pre-Peter Frampton uses of talkbox — and Fetzer's obsessed with Booker T. and the MGs, especially guitarist Steve Cropper.
"Now we're both just interested in finding more and more obscure film music that we haven't heard yet," Fetzer says of himself and his collaborator.
He adds that he'd love for Steelism to grow into a contemporary, indie-scale version of the position the MGs had at Stax, the Swampers had at Muscle Shoals, and Area Code 615 had on Music Row: in-house sidemen who'd also step out and do their own thing. To that end, Fetzer and Cullum are slowly stockpiling gear for a studio. But no matter how busy they get down the line, they won't be mixing other acts' business with their instrumental pop pleasure during sessions.
"If you're playing with a singer," says Fetzer, "it's like you're focused on complementing their song and taking in their vibe. With Steelism we're on our own trip."
Email music@nashvillescene.com.
