Two Gallants: Full Interview

Hailing from San Francisco, Two Gallants are not only a band one should watch out for, but a band one should go out and find. Recently, the Chronicle's Taylor Long sat down with Adam Stephens (vocals and guitar) and Tyson Vogel (drums and backing vocal) before their show at Maxwell's in Hoboken, NJ, to discuss the recent tour, street shows and why their music is similar to a support group.

The Chronicle: You've been touring with Rogue Wave- what's that been like?

Adam Stephens: Touring with Rogue Wave-it's been really fun. They are a lot more established than us, if you will, so a lot of people come out to every show. So we've kind of been milking their audience unintentionally. All the shows have been really fun, they're really awesome guys. I think that's kind of the most important thing, when you're on tour with a band or some people, is to get a long with them really well. They're also kind of veterans of bands and touring, so they kind of are coaching us sometimes. I mean, we've done it quite a few times ourselves, but-they're a little bit older than us, too, so they have a bit of a developed view on things, you know. To summarize it's been really fun.

Chronicle: So, to continue on touring, what are your favorite and least favorite parts of touring?

AS: Favorite part is staying up until six in the morning.

Both: every night.

AS: Even when you don't want to. 'Cause you just have to sometimes. My least favorite part would have to be-

TV: Bathrooms with no doors.

All: [laughter]

AS: Um, yeah-I don't know. Tyson always has to resort to potty talk. I guess my least favorite thing is driving. I don't like driving.

Chronicle: Yeah, that must be rough; you guys drive everywhere, right?

AS: Yeah. I drive too fast, too, so, it's not very safe.

Chronicle: Have you gotten in trouble for that?? AS: No. I have a way with the cops. Tyson's the one that gets tickets.

Chronicle: Oh really?

AS: Yeah.

Chronicle: Then I guess it's better that you drive.

AS: Yeah-no.

Chronicle: So I guess it's not better either way. Okay, your recent album got a great review from Pitchfork Media and there was also reviewed in Rolling Stone. Is that kind of press exciting to you, do you feel that it's influenced crowds at your shows?

AS: I think so. I mean, I know a lot of people who saw the Pitchfork thing. I'd never heard of Pitchfork before

Chronicle: Really?

AS: Yeah, but I don't really read up very much on what's going on. That was really cool, I really like the review we got in there, it said some really pretty close to the mark things. The Rolling Stone thing I thought was kind of a joke, 'cause they didn't really say anything, they just kind of more or less mentioned that we existed. You know. Like, here's this album. They didn't really say it was good or bad or anything, they just kind of dropped who they thought we sounded like. I think it was only a couple of sentences long. Whatever. I guess that's cool.

TV: I mean, I think that it has had an effect. A very small-well, not very small, but-I don't know. There have been people who have been coming out to the shows that have gotten turned on to us through those things. And that's pretty amazing; to actually think that there's people with open minds that pay attention to that stuff. It's quite humbling, because I guess that's kind of where it starts sometimes, too. But I kind of agree with Adam, that Pitchfork was very, really cool hearing his perspective. But Rolling Stone didn't really-there was nothing personal about it at all.

Chronicle: If I read my information right, you two started playing together when you were young. What can you tell me about that, and when did you decide that it was time to turn the pairing into a full-fledged band?

TV: It's pretty organic. We've known each other since were like five years old, and have both played music together in different forms ever since sixth or seventh grade. But this didn't really come in as it is now until two - two and a half years ago or so. Adam was playing a lot of shows, acoustically on his own, and I just kind of began to pick up the drums a little bit. We never thought of it consciously like we were going to make it into a band, we just stayed up all night drinking and playing music.

Chronicle: Sounds like a good time.

TV: Yeah. [To Adam] What do you think?

AS: I mean, I think basically the same thing. It wasn't something we planned, at all. It wasn't something waiting in the basement for years and years or a couple months at most. We just decided to start playing, it kind of happened real fast.

TV: Our first show was on the street, wasn't it?

AS: Kind of-it depends. Our first show under our name was on the street. But Tyson played with me at a show at a coffee shop out in the Richmond Disctrict. Then he played another show that was kind of under my name, at this played called Café International at lower Haight in San Francisco. But our first show with our name was on 16th and Mission, like a street show. It was kind of like, we had to get a name, which was-it was like, we had this show and were like "oh, okay, I guess we're a band now." It kind of went from being-I wouldn't say this is true-but probably from the outside, it went more from me playing with a drummer to then being like a mutual, balanced band, I guess.

Chronicle: So, going back to the street show thing, you guys used to play shows on the street quite a bit-why did you start doing that, and did you find that street shows drew a large amount of fans? And do you still do that?