The Back Alley on Friendship, Touring, and The Next Chapter of Their Sound
Interview and photos by Paige Dummer
Chicago indie band The Back Alley didn’t set out with a grand plan. They started with garage rehearsals, a few friends, and a shared love for playing music. What began as a casual project between members balancing other bands and solo work quickly evolved into something more. In this conversation, the band reflects on how they first came together, the moment they realized the project could become serious, and how touring, songwriting, and growing as friends have shaped the next era of their music as they prepare to release their new single, “Is It Me?”
PAIGE DUMMER: We will just jump right in, I guess. I want to start out by asking how you all met and how did you decide that forming this group was the right decision? Especially with you guys [Sal and Hunter] being in Ax and the Hatchetmen, and I know a few of you did some solo stuff before.
JADEN CONE: We should let Hunter and Sal take this one fully, because I don't think anyone’s ever asked specially their opinion going into it, already being in Ax and The Hatchetmen
RALPH PORTER: I’ve never heard Hunter’s side of this story!
JC: Yeah what were you guys thinking at the beginning forming the band when you had already done all the Hatchetmen stuff?
HUNTER OLSHEFKE: I was jealous of Axel, no I'm kidding. Well, but sort of because Axel [Ellis] who was in The Runarounds had a lot of his time taken up doing that, for a period of time they were filming and doing some shows. So me and Sal were painting houses and were just like what the fuck are we gonna do with our time? Sal just happened to be going to SAE, which is an audio engineering school, and he met Ralph.
He was like “Hey man, I know this guy who wants to start a band, but he’s got like five of each musician or something”.
SAL DELFILIPPIS: Yeah like three drummers, four guitarists, yeah I don’t know.
HO: Yeah going into it I thought it was gonna be something fun to just jam, I love just playing music. We went to on of Ralph’s friend’s houses and did a rehearsal in somebody’s garage.
JC: The “Kilby Girl" video.
HO: Jaden was super quiet and Ralph was breaking out of his shell too, and we were with a different drummer at the time. And we just so happened to get some shows in Lombard, Illinois. Was that your doing Jaden?
JC: That was Ralph.
HO: At a place that is now closed. I think Sal and I just thought it was a good time. It was silly, goofy, and then we just ran into some good opportunities. Jaden was really really optimistic and hard working in terms of finding shows. And I remember we kinda tried to put our heads together and just email every band that we saw on a venue's calendar that didn’t have an opener announced yet. And we were lucky enough eventually to open for Arcy Drive. I think we said the other day in an interview that that was the moment we were like “Oh, this can be a band, this can be a thing”. And Sal and I never really talked about it, it just happened. It was just like “Okay, this is an actual band now”.
JC: Now you’re in too deep. Can’t back out now.
HO: I mean we’ve been having a good time. Everything’s been happening super naturally.
PAIGE: Is it hard for you guys to juggle that now that both of the bands are kind of up and running again?
HO: Yes and no, As Axel still does Runarounds stuff, the schedules fit pretty well. We [The Back Alley] and Ax and the Hatchetmen have the same booking agent which really helps.
PAIGE: Were there any band names before “The Back Alley” came about, and how did you guys go about choosing that name?
JC: There was an awful one. There were a couple ideas floating around that we won’t say.
RP: Your Mom’s favorite?
SD: I don't like that one.
RP: My dad came up with that, it wasn’t a real pitch.
JC: Yeah, there were a couple names. The Back Alley made so much sense. Ralph before was just releasing bedroom pop music on his own. Super cool, catchy stuff, and he released an EP, which was his final project from the solo era, called “The Back Alley EP”. We didn’t have band names we were all too excited about at the time, and that one just made so much sense. We could pay some homage to what he was doing before because we were playing some music off that EP with a new twist. So it just made sense to carry that on with us. And it’s obviously stuck and we love it. We like the name, I think, right guys?
HO: It's less of a mouthful than Ax and the Hatchetmen
PAIGE: How would guys describe your band or your sound in three words? To someone who has never heard of you or heard of anything that you guys are doing?
SD: Indie, Alternative, Folk?
JC: I would say, fun, upbeat, and catchy
PAIGE: Do you guys take a lot of inspiration from other artists coming out of Chicago, Being from Chicago. There is so much indie music there now, especially.
JC: Yeah definitely, like you said Chicago has a bunch of great bands right now. I don’t know if we’ve found too much inspiration within the Chicago scene. We love all the bands on the larger scale like Whitney and Wilco, obviously we are major fans of. But, I don’t know if we’re really pulling them.
HO: I mean were you [Jaden] and I, our top artist on Spotify last year was Free Range.
JC: Yeah our favorite song, both of us, was “Storm” by Free Range. Which is like a dangerously underrated band coming out of Chicago right now, they are so so good. But, I don't think we are pulling from that stuff too much. What do you think, Ralph?
RP: I think vocally, I kinda look up to Dylan Basse from Flipturn, Britney Howard in a kind of soulful way, Briston Maroney. Just kind of belty voices like that, that can get real gentle at times. I admire that and love to replicate it myself.
JC: Definitely on a larger scale, we have influences all over the world.
SD: I think we all have our own inspirations.
JC: We are pretty spread out when it comes to that.
PAIGE: That was my next question, Who are your main musical inspirations just in general?
JC: We’ll just go down the line. Peach Pit for me. When it comes to this music. I have other inspirations and people I look up to in the music industry and music history. But when it comes to what we are working on as The Back Alley, Peach Pit for sure. Their lead guitarist Chris is so cool.
RP: Is that the one with the moustache?
JC: Yeah.
SD: I really like The Strokes and Hippo Campus. Like cutesy, indie, deep pop kinda.
BEN KREMER: Growing up to develop that style that I like to play, I always looked up to Stewart Copeland from The Police. As far as part writing for drums, I think Grizzly Bear has some really cool drum parts. They are just great at writing drum parts for the music and not just for solo purposes. But overall sound, I got to agree with Peach Pit.
HO: I think I’m Ben and Sal. I was gonna say The Police and Hippo Campus were huge inspirations growing up.
RP: Freddie Mercury for me, performance wise. I really like Hippo Campus and Peach Pit in a way, yeah.
PAIGE: Awesome, Is there someone that you would have a dream collaboration with, if you were to do a song or record with them?
JC: I like shouting these out simultaneously. That's what we have been doing.
RP: 3, 2, 1…
SD: Charli XCX.
The rest of the band: Mt. Joy.
JC: Woah, Fire. I mean Mt. Joy has always been such a collective answer. Like we want to open for them one day. Or maybe they will open for us one day. But yeah, I guess Charli XCX.
PAIGE: Just hit her up, maybe you can come out for Lollapalooza this year.
JC: Imagine we asked her “try writing a Back Alley song”, I wonder what would come out of it.
PAIGE: You guys recently finished up a tour with The Runarounds. I was at the show in Michigan, you played a great show..
JC: That one was fun. That was one of our favorite shows of the whole tour.
Paige: What was your favorite part about being on the road with them? You guys are obviously all friends so…
HO: I mean that was definitely the best part, was just being with them. But for us as a band, it was just stepping on bigger stages and getting comfortable on them. You can never take the experience of just doing it for granted. Just getting to experience that, it’s great.
RP: I think we have a sense of how to occupy a bigger space now and what stages like The Royal Oak Music Theatre and The Sylvee was huge, that was kind of like, wait, I’ve never had this kind of stuff. We got a taste of that now going forward, if we ever do that again, we know a little bit more of what to do.
PAIGE: Is there anything specific you guys like to do when you’re in a city on tour? Like stores or activities you like to do?
SD: Thrift!
JC: We make a point to, either the morning of or day after, to check out any artisanal coffee shops. Lately there hasn’t been enough time to explore unfortunately. Even on tour with The Runarounds, where we had off days in between it was tricky because the drives were a little bit longer. But yeah, local cafes.
PAIGE: Do you get recommendations from the fans about where to go?
SD: I would say that’s the best part about traveling to the place and playing a show. Because the people have all been there, and are so friendly, they are a big help.
PAIGE: Do you have a favorite snack for the road?
HO: Should we try and name each other’s? Yours [Jaden’s] is the green cold-pressed juice from Love’s.
JC: And the Kind dark chocolate, vanilla, coconut bites. But, the green juice from Love’s I’m so stoked everytime.
RP: Sal’s a wild card, Maybe the Strawberry panda snacks.
JC: Or he’ll get a cup of clementines or watermelon.
RP: Or he’ll get the pizza.
SD: I give a different vibe everyday.
HO: He usually needs a sweet treat though
JC: I can easily say as a band, baked Lays, across the board. If we had to come together for one last snack, it would be a bag of baked Lay’s.
RP: What’s Ben’s?
JC: Just protein, scoops of protein powder. Not even put into a bar or cookie. Just dry protein powder.
PAIGE: You mentioned earlier that you have such good energy when you’re on stage. Is there anything that you do preshow, like a ritual or even a superstition, that helps get that energy? Or does it come naturally?
SD: We all get into a circle and break down each other’s egos.
RP: We used to be all mishmosh and just run around free for all. But, Jaden made a great point, where we should, like 20 minutes before a show, we are all just in the same room with each other, feeling the same vibe. No phones or anything like that. Then we do our usual, we group up and say “in the alley way”. I don’t really know how it started but we’ve been doing it.
JC: We haven’t found too much of a full ritual, but lately we’ve just been trying to do better every night of being together in the moment so that we can walk out as a unit, rather than just individual people going to play their instrument.
SD: Team!
PAIGE: I was at a radio show recently with the band Edgehill, if you know them. And they said that they started slapping each other in the face before going on stage.
JC: They are a little more on the punk side on indie-rock right? Aren’t they opening for Worry Club right now?
Paige: Yeah they were opening for Worry Club and they were opening for Winyah also.
JC: We don’t really fit in there. We're not that hardcore.
HO: The Edgehill dudes are hilarious, they’re awesome.
JC: Have you played with them?
HO: Yeah, I played with them at Canopy.
JC: Oh, I knew that!
PAIGE: Is there anything that you guys do differently from headline a show vs. opening a show?
JC: Obviously the set list is different. What we are choosing and breaking down to play is totally different. But I think the answer should be no. Beside the set I can’t really think of anything. At the end of the day we want to make sure we are walking on stage and playing the best show no matter how long it is. If it’s support and no matter who is in the room, and what utilities we have, space, gear, anything.
HO: I think it’s more about when you’re doing an opening set, what you have to unfortunately, sacrifice in terms of, you’re trying to always build a connection with the audience. So it’s doing that the best you can in like 30 minutes or whatever. It’s much luckier when you get to play for an hour or hour and 15 minutes.
RP: For me, I like to think I’m very energetic when performing. So it can be nonstop energy when performing an opening set. Whereas a headline, I can really feel it out, bringing more dynamics.
PAIGE: You guys have a new song, “Is It Me?” coming out tomorrow (3/27) What was the process of that song coming to be?
JC: We wrote that song in Ben’s garage on a spring/summer day during a dust storm. Which was crazy. It just came together. It took a while to bring it to the studio. We road tested it for a little bit, which I think is a good idea when we have the time to do so, and just played it a bunch. I think the first time we played it might have been SummerFest last summer or a few shows before that. So, it’s been a while and we kind of just took our time with it. It didn’t feel like we needed to rush on that one. We’re super excited for it. I would say this is our last song from this time of The Back Alley, just our songwriting style. I think we’ve matured a lot as a band and really grown to know each other through these tours. So it feels like with the new music that will be coming a little late, it’s not different. It’s just a new chapter for us.
HO: It’s so interesting to feel that “Is It Me” is almost old now. We already wrote so much more music that feels like a different era or generation of this band.
BK: Compared to what we’ve been writing for this album right now, I did all of the engineering and mixing and mastering for this song. And I kind of took a lot of inspiration from bands like Paramore and their punchy drums and driving guitars and very present vocals. It’s so funny, applying that type of style and energy would be so different to this upcoming record that we’re working on. So it was fun to kind of work on something like that.
PAIGE: Did that process differ from the other songs you’ve released? You kind of mentioned that this song is the end of that and now you’re onto a new thing.
HO: We’ve done two writing trips up at Ben’s lake house, and each of those I separate as eras of music for us.And then we did a thing where we just wrote in his garage for a day. So, there’s like three different versions of The Back Alley already, for me.
RP: With the new music, we took our time and even split up into groups and took our own ideas into it.
JC: It feels like it boils down to us knowing each other better and being more comfortable in a writing situation. And not feeling the need to rush songs out. It just didn’t feel like there was pressure when we were writing the newer stuff.
