Q&A: Leo McKay of The Marvel Stove
By Jillianne Hamilton
(07/18/09)
Based between Maitland and Truro, The Marvel Stove is a folksy acoustic roots trio, headed by writer and English teacher Leo McKay. (Check out their MySpace. Do it.)
Tell me about The Marvel Stove.
The Marvel Stove is a band that plays original acoustic music. It started several years ago. I had been playing in a straight ahead rock and roll band. You know, electric
guitars, an obnoxious drummer banging away on an outrageosly sized drum kit. Anyway. For the same reasons that many bands disintegrate (the ubiquitous 'creative differences'),
that band broke up. One of the things I had been doing in that band was writing songs, and I really wanted to continue writing and to continue playing music with people. I
considered playing my songs solo, accompanying myself on acoustic guitar, but the great joy of music, to me, is the social aspect. Music really brings people together in a way
that nothing else can touch.
Jim Bruce, who now plays accordion, clarinet, piano, and some other percussiony type stuff with The Marvel Stove, lived in the village of Maitland, as I did at the time. I'd
played with him informally at parties a few times and I knew he was a really good musician with a great ear. So I just called him up, told him I had some original songs I'd
been working on, and did he want to play some music.
Angela Dwyer James, the bass player, joined a couple of years later. She was playing with the Maitland Ukulele Ensemble, which I also play guitar with, so it just seemed
natural to bring her on board.
Why do you like to play music in your bare feet?
Ha, ha! You've seen me perform sans shoes, and probably socks, I take it. I don't know. I don't always do that. But if I can, I like to give the audience something visual to think about or to latch onto in a performance. As soon as a fully dressed person walks onstage in bare feet, it gets people's attention. After the famous incident in Bagdad where the journalist through his shoes at George Bush, I came out on stage in sock feet and said: "Sorry I had to come out here in my sock feet. I just threw my shoes at George Bush." It's a bit gimmicky, but not over the top.
Favorite breakfast cereal? And why?
My favorite breakfast cereal is Red River Cereal. Cracked Wheat, Cracked Rye, Whole and Cracked Flax. Cooking that stuff for 20 minutes in the morning is much less convenient than dumping some Cornflakes in a bowl. But when you've had a bowl of Red River for breakfast, you've eaten a meal!
Do the band members write songs and then bring them to the band or do you write songs together?
The songs in The Marvel Stove are all my concoctions. I write the lyrics and the chord changes, but the vocal harmony parts are Angela and Jim's doing. I usually say: "This needs harmony right here," but I'm useless at coming up with harmonies. So them that sings them, writes them. The parts that Jim and Angela play on their instruments are mostly their doing as well. I might say: "Giver on the bass right here." or "I hear a sort of light, airy accordion part here." So the arrangements of the songs are collaborative. I guess that's what I'm trying to say.
(Referring to the song "Breaskfast At Zellers") What's your favorite thing to order at the Zellers restaurant?
I should not admit this, but I haven't eaten in a Zellers restaurant for years. I worked at Zellers in New Glasgow Nova Scotia all through high school, so I'd get the odd fries then. The milk shakes used to be really good. They were real milkshakes in those days. Someone actually put ingredients in a blender and MADE them. Can you imagine!
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Leo McKay's Top 5 East Coast Acts
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* Scott Nicks
* Old Man Luedecke
* Brian Borcherdt
* Rose Cousins
* Joel Plaskett
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"I mentioned [Scott Nicks] already,
but that guy is a real song writer.
I knew him before he was famous,
and he's still not famous.
But Scott writes these incredible
thought-provoking songs with great
music and insane lyrics. And he does
it essentially non-stop."
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Truro's music scene: fiction or non-fiction?
Unfortunately, Truro is apparently a great place to be from musically.
Charlie A'Court is from Truro.
Garrett Mason is from Truro. Brad Lahead of
The Got To Get Got is from Truro. Our biggest problem here is that people with larger musical ambitions usually leave town for Halifax and other more exotic locations. That being said, there is a lot of music being made in this town. Chad Peck, who runs Noyes Records out of Halifax is as much a Truro guy as a Halifax guy, and almost all the Halifax Noyes showcases have mirror shows in Truro.
Scott Nicks, who I think is Truro's Chad Vangaalen, is based here.
James Hill, the Ukulele virtuoso, originally from the West Coast now lives in Brookfield, just outside Truro. He runs an international Ukulele performance and educational career out of his log home in Brookfield. The influence of the mere presence of someone of that calibre cannot be underestimated.
Where did the name "Marvel Stove" come from?
The Marvel Stove comes from a
poem by pulitzer prize winning poet Elizabeth Bishop. It's a beautiful and haunting poem. And she grew up in Great Village, just outside of Truro. The last three lines of that poem never fail to transport me to a more meaningful place.
Favorite Marvel (or DC, if you prefer) superhero?
When I was a kid, there was this weird kid down the street who was a total comic book freak. He was 3 or 4 years older than me, so I didn't really know him. But he lived with his grandmother and they lived right across the street from my grandmother. About twice a year buddy's grandmother would get fed up tripping over comic books and she'd give two or three big boxes of these things to my grandmother to give to my brother and I. We ate them up. There was everthing in there: Spiderman, Fantastik Four, Archie even. And lots of the old Classic Comics with Dickens in comicbook form or famous folk tales in comic book form. My favorite was always The Thing. A weird choice. Nobody liked The Thing. Maybe that's what I liked about him. I knew I'd be alone in my hero worship. But comic book nerd consensus at the time was that he was the 2nd strongest comic book hero, after The Incredible Hulk. I think I also liked that, that he was strong, but he was only the 2nd strongest. It made him seem a little sad an vulnerable. And he was so misunderstood. No one even knew what he was, for god's sake. He was just called The Thing!
If you were an alcoholic beverage, what would you be and why?
I would be a homebrewed beer. Because I'd be reasonable priced, delicious, and I would involve some degree of trouble or labour. We're too used to everything ready-to-go in our culture. We need to learn to work for things a bit.
And, lastly, what type of guitar (and other instruments) do you play?
My main guitar is a Taylor acoustic that I found in Kijiji, right here in Truro. It's the best intrument I've ever had, and the first non-junky acoustic of my life. I had to wait until I was 42 to get that guitar, so believe me, I appreciate it. I saved toonies for two years to buy it. I'm not making this up.
My second guitar is what I call the greatest beater guitar ever. I use it on stage for songs like Nesting Boxes, which is in DADGAD tuning. It's an old Yamaha jumbo, all laminate, so it doesn't have a super high-end tone. But everyone who plays that guitar loves how it feels, and for a non-solid wood guitar, it sounds pretty good. My wife bought it years before she knew me, when she was living in Northern Saskatchewan. Some guy sold it to buy a bus ticket to Edmonton. It was lying around my mother-in-laws house in Sask for years. Every time I went there, I'd clean it up, put new strings on it, and rave about how great it was to play. She has relatives who work for Purolator, so she gets courier service essentially free. So one year, she packed the thing in a cardboard box (it had no hardshell case) stuffed with puffed wheat cereal instead of foam peanuts to protect it, and sent it by courier. I didn't know it was coming, and was sure it was going to be in three pieces when I opened the box. But the Puffs did their work. It was in great shape. Dave Carroll should be so lucky.
I have a 6 string banjo that I play on a song called The Massy Wheel. That was a kijiji find as well. It's a bit of a beater, too, but there's something about the righteous tone of a banjo. The banjo always speaks the truth.
I play what I call rudimentary piano as well on a couple of Marvel Stove songs.
(Photo courtesy of the Marvel Stove MySpace.)
Related links:
+ The Marvel Stove (MySpace)
Go back to Intervenus Interviews.
Go back to Reading Material.
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Jillianne Hamilton is a writer, blogger and a lover of indie music, funny movies, artsy things and the color red. She is studying Journalism at
Holland College, had an internship at the
Truro Daily News
and blogs for various college and pop culture websites. To contact Jill, visit her
website.
