The self-taught musician and Canada’s indie-rock golden boy, Shotgun Jimmie, began his musical career in high school after tossing one of his teachers a demo. That teacher was Jason Baird, who would eventually become a notable rock musician himself, encouraged young Jimmie to put a band together and the rest is glorious rock ‘n roll history.
Shotgun Jimmie spoke with us about starting his first band, growing up in a vibrant DIY music scene, and why he loves Harvest Sun.
What inspired you to start making music?
I was a fan of indie-rock and rock and roll music when I was in high school. I liked music before I liked playing it. I always had a strong connection with music and then at a certain point, I realized that I could do it too.
In school, they get you to play band instruments and stuff like that and you kind of see connections between the things that you're doing in school and the things that you're interested in and so I started to play the guitar. My development as a musician was untrained; I didn't take lessons. I'm self-taught. I didn't start by learning songs. I started by writing songs right out of the gate, which I think is an unusual approach.
So you taught yourself to play. Did you form any bands when you were a kid?
I got a four-track recorder in high school, and I started to make little albums in my parents’ basement, cassette albums that had six or seven songs on it. I had a student teacher at my high school in Ajax, Ontario who was finishing his after degree – Jason Baird, he is a Toronto indie-rock musician. He played with Feist for five or six years. He plays in Do Make Say Think and other Toronto bands. He was doing his placement at my high school, and I gave him a demo tape. He encouraged me to put a band together. He said 'this is really cool, but what you should be doing is finding other people and getting them to play these songs with you.'
So I got some friends to play with me. There was a community of bands in Ajax when I was growing up and I guess some of them knew I was a songwriter, but I wasn't playing in any bands. When I decided to put a band together I went around and sort of picked the guys I thought were the most interesting and nice, and I brought them into my thing. Those were my first steps towards putting a band together and having people play my music and creating that relationship with other musicians.
Shotgun Jimmie spoke with us about starting his first band, growing up in a vibrant DIY music scene, and why he loves Harvest Sun.
What inspired you to start making music?
I was a fan of indie-rock and rock and roll music when I was in high school. I liked music before I liked playing it. I always had a strong connection with music and then at a certain point, I realized that I could do it too.
In school, they get you to play band instruments and stuff like that and you kind of see connections between the things that you're doing in school and the things that you're interested in and so I started to play the guitar. My development as a musician was untrained; I didn't take lessons. I'm self-taught. I didn't start by learning songs. I started by writing songs right out of the gate, which I think is an unusual approach.
So you taught yourself to play. Did you form any bands when you were a kid?
I got a four-track recorder in high school, and I started to make little albums in my parents’ basement, cassette albums that had six or seven songs on it. I had a student teacher at my high school in Ajax, Ontario who was finishing his after degree – Jason Baird, he is a Toronto indie-rock musician. He played with Feist for five or six years. He plays in Do Make Say Think and other Toronto bands. He was doing his placement at my high school, and I gave him a demo tape. He encouraged me to put a band together. He said 'this is really cool, but what you should be doing is finding other people and getting them to play these songs with you.'
So I got some friends to play with me. There was a community of bands in Ajax when I was growing up and I guess some of them knew I was a songwriter, but I wasn't playing in any bands. When I decided to put a band together I went around and sort of picked the guys I thought were the most interesting and nice, and I brought them into my thing. Those were my first steps towards putting a band together and having people play my music and creating that relationship with other musicians.
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