Today we’d like to introduce you to Joe Maddock.
Hi Joe, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today.
We started as a home recording project in Portland, OR. Shelby and I were living up there right after we got married. She was going to art school, and I was working at a guitar shop and getting involved in the music scene. We both became enamored with vintage recording equipment.
She found this cool tape machine called the Tascam 388 and we started cooking up little songs at home. I think we made a good team because I was focused on the instrumental side, and she was a natural vocalist and helped with writing more relatable songs and giving the band an aesthetic identity. “The Plastic Cherries” popped into my head as a name, and I just remember writing it in a notebook and liking it because it was visual and a little surreal.
Amid the pandemic, we decided we wanted to move closer to our families. We had originally met in Salt Lake and had a lot of friendships and roots here. We made the move back right as our first album “Sunshine” was being created. The song “Where the Light Wants to Go” was partially recorded to tape, and it’s really beautiful for me to think about how that album was informed by our experience of moving home and also literally recorded in both places.
“Sunshine” kind of crystallized the vibe of The Plastic Cherries. As we made it, we wanted to make sure it was playful and fun but also heartfelt and earnest. Our main influences were 70’s art rock (Bowie, Kate Bush, etc.) and homemade lo-fi style stuff like Connan Mockasin, Elliott Smith, Cleaners from Venus, etc. We wanted to create an imaginary musical world to escape into.
When it was done, we connected with our friends Stephen, Wayne, and Natalie to complete the band. At the time, I think the idea was just to play the songs live and see what happened. Stephen, the bassist, was an old friend of Shelby’s who played multiple instruments and had been on our minds as a collaborator for a while. Wayne, the drummer, was my good friend and former bandmate and we were excited to play together again. Natalie was a friend we had just made through an art community here in SLC, and it turned out she was classically trained on piano.
To our surprise, our first show at the DLC downtown sold out and we received a very enthusiastic response. We were all really inspired by that, and I think that started the real momentum of the band. Our friends from the band Dad Bod connected us to a local label and we put out our album on cassette and LP. Our shows in town kept growing and growing and the identity of the band expanded into more theatrical classic rock energy.
That energy inspired our 2nd album, “The Plastic Cherries on the Moon,” which will be available to stream on February 23rd. We recorded the first two singles “Lovers on the Run” and “Moon II” as a full 5-piece live band at Stephen’s family cabin and wanted to capture the energy of our shows. We collaborated with a lot of people to complete “…On the Moon,” finishing tracks at Archive Recordings with local producer & multi-instrumentalist Denney Fuller.
It’s been a dream come true to see our music resonate with people as “Lovers of the Run” is played on more and more playlists and radio stations around the world. We’ve started playing festivals like Kilby Block Party, Treefort, and Schellraiser. We’re excited to see the band grow.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Creating is always something of a challenge, but it’s a labor of love and to us, it’s worth it.
Booking tours, recording, and promoting the band all require a lot of work and communication. Sometimes it feels like we’re always “On the Run,” but we’ve been trying to take on those challenges mindfully. In the end, the joy of sharing music with the people we love keeps us going.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I think what makes us special as a band is that we are playful and theatrical while also being earnest and relatable. I’d like to think that when people see our shows they’re dazzled and entertained as we play the part of the “rock star,” but that it comes across in such a way that they feel they can be rock stars too. We’re laughing at ourselves a little bit, and the energy is very celebratory and inclusive— homemade props and costumes, glitter, make-up, space aliens, guitar solos, etc.
Musically, we are inspired by a wide variety of genres, especially pop-rock from the 70’s like Wings & Fleetwood Mac, and we try to infuse lots of melodic movement and pop sensibility into what we do.
We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you.
I suppose I do believe in a certain amount of luck and fate.
We’ve been lucky to meet each other and the people in the scene who have supported us. I can think of several situations where it felt like we were in the right place at the right time, and I think that came from the natural momentum of working on what we love.
Contact Info:
- Website: theplasticcherries.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/theplasticcherries
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@theplasticcherries
- Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5huH9kfH2XagrBGrcTUVW8?si=CJrvNYVYR76DHNtjI_tGKw
Image Credits
Nathan Christiansen
