At the heart of every saga, beyond the twists and turns of the road, is the music that tells the story. Skeleton Birds’ latest album “The Silver Age” is an emotional soundtrack to a cerebral journey.
According to Jeremy Edwards, drummer, “The inspiration for the album comes from the spirit of creating something. We’ve all made music so much of our lives, it’s only natural. We all came from different musical backgrounds, except me and Jon. We came from the same womb.”
Skeleton Birds is a band composed of Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor natives Jonathan Edwards on guitar and vocals, brother Jeremy on drums, Jesse Tack tackling the zither, the bass, and the Rhodes piano, and Storm Ross playing the guitar and other
miscellaneous sounds on their album’s tracks.
The band was born out of the musically inclined brothers.
“We had all these songs we wanted to do something with. We hoped we would eventually be able to play the songs for other people, but we weren’t sure how we’d be able to,” Jeremy said.
After recording their first album, they formed a full band and began to perform.
When asked to describe the genre of their music, Jeremy replied, “The most ambiguous description would be indie rock, but what isn’t indie rock? It’s definitely not pop. It’s reminiscent of a lot of music you may have heard growing up, or music your parents may remember, but with a contemporary twist. We make it new.”
According to Storm Ross, “It’s dark but pretty rock ‘n’ roll.”
Skeleton Birds now has two albums under its belt, “The Owl” and “The Silver Age,” the latter of which took nine months to produce.
According to Jeremy, “We spend a lot of time working and finding different ways to expressing the same thing. A lot of time goes into tweaking the sound, but it was worth the time investment.”
“It never feels like we’re laboring over something,” Jonathan said. “Creating it, writing it, doesn’t feel like work. It’s kind of an amazing album.”
Skeleton Birds created a symphony of sorrow with songs like “Away Away,” unfolding like a spring flower, and others like “Chant” that press on the most tender part of the heart with sobering melodies.
“Each song has its own atmosphere. It floats really well as an album. We did bring in some outside artists,” Jonathan explained. Musicians such as Brandon Cota, Josh Holcomb and Alex Truelove offer the cello, viola and trombone to diversify the tracks.
“Every song has something in there that gets in your head,” Jonathan said. “There’s something to hold on to. It’s accessible. It’s not too out there but we like to keep it interesting for ourselves, too. While the album has a subdued melancholy and somber mood, our live shows are more energetic and fun.”
If you want to see Skeleton Birds perform live, they’ll be playing the Groove Box Studio Kick Start Fundraiser on Feb. 28.
They will also be playing an upcoming show at Detroit’s Metro Times Blowout, the largest local music festival in North America. The band will be playing in the Atlas Bar at 12:40 a.m. March 3. Otherwise, “The Silver Age” CDs are going for ten dollars.
“And we’ll even throw in our signatures,” Jonathan said.
Have a listen to Skeleton Birds’ latest album, and “do enjoy it,” Ross advised.
