Interview: "The audience were like oysters in the bay - The oysters clean the bay and then there's more oysters. " Mary Shelley talk aquatic analogies, new material, touring the UK and why A.I won't kill Rock n' Roll.

 

📷 Madelyn Barkocy

Fate is a rather fickle beast - and without wanting to get a bit Forrest Gump on you so early on - it really can throw some curveballs in your direction. There I was, a mere week before the start of FOCUS Wales - innocently minding my own business and trying to muster the motivation to tackle the ever-expanding black cloud of my inbox - and I get an email that changes my musical landscape for the forseeable future. Fast forward a week and I'm totally swayed by a band that has traveled a few thousand miles over the Atlantic Ocean to tour the U.K. and play as many shows as possible at a showcase festival in sunny Wrexham.

That band, of course, is Brooklyn, New York Art Punks Mary Shelley. Anyone who may have had the misfortune to talk to me about music since may have had this band rammed down their throat slightly; I would apologise if I felt the need to. After a couple of false starts and some self-induced tech idiocy (How do you record on Zoom again?), I finally got to sit down and find out more about the band and what the future holds for them. 

The band are comprised of Jackson Dockery who plays "..everything but the drums.", Sam Pinson who similarly plays "..all the things except the drums." Charlie Hull who plays "EXCLUSIVELY the drums!" and Taylor Yancey who plays .."guitar, bass, and an E chord on the synth."  

It's going to be that kind of interview.

Even the origin story of Mary Shelley as a band has its quirks as drummer Hull explains: " Jackson and I went to college together and coming out of it decided to start jamming some ideas about. We'd been roommates previously but had never got around to it as we were busy with other things. So when we finally did we were like "This feeeeels good!". So we filmed a short video as a two-piece and applied to play an Alumni show". 

Their first show as a duo didn't perhaps go as they planned and they were upstaged by another act on the night - " We followed up the magician in the show and that was fun..if nothing else. That night Jackson met Sam and the rest is history." I ask if Pinson had been the glamourous assistant to the magician and after a few jokes between the band about coming out of a hat and wearing a bikini, Dockery deadpans "He then joined our group and left his magician boss behind."

Yancey was the last member to complete the band, having only joined after playing a Halloween show in 2022. She had grown up in Oklahoma with Sam and they had played music together on several occasions before she arrived in Brooklyn, Pinson takes up the story: "Taylor and I were at Middle School together and I always knew she was one of the best musicians I know. So when she moved to New York, I knew we needed to get her in the band ASAP." 

In another example of fate playing its cards at the last minute, it almost didn't happen at all: "My friend told me she was looking for a band, but was under the impression she was looking to start her own." " Which was not true." Yancey interjects to tell her perspective: "I think I played it down when he said I could be in the band, I was like "It's a nice thought, but I don't think they need me in Mary Shelley." Leading Pinson to joke " How wrong you were!"

The band's debut album Look At You was released in April 2022 and is a rip-roaring ride of sardonic punk with songs about the toxicity of Fraternities, love affairs in a nursing home, profane fridge magnets, and Pisceans who talk too much about their feelings. Being born in early March, that last one cuts a little deep.. 

A collective approach to the writing process has helped create something fresh, yet almost instantaneously familiar. "I think we're pretty bent on trying to make the songs sound different from each other." says Dockery,  "We're conscious that it's very easy for a band or artist's songs to kind of all blend together. That's the great thing about being in a band - everyone has different influences and ideas to add." 

Pinson takes the opportunity to shift the focus to their new material: "One of the reasons I'm most proud of our new single 'Goin' to the Beach' - that's coming out in July - is that it was fully created in the practice room pretty much. I think Jackson came up with the outro part, but apart from that everything else was made spontaneously. I think the song reflects that." 

On the back of playing on the line-up of FOCUS Wales' showcase in Brooklyn with a variety of Welsh bands, Mary Shelley were invited to perform at the three-day festival in Wrexham in May. It allowed them to plan a short tour of the U.K, and for some members of the band, it was the first time they'd got to this side of the pond. They played several shows in London and a couple of dates in Sheffield and Leicester, but they have no doubts what the highlight of the tour was: "FOCUS Wales was the highlight of the tour." says Yancey, barely hesitating to take a breath. "Everybody was so friendly and willing to help us out, it made us feel like we belonged. Nobody was cold as ice; there was no pretentious coolness." I fight the urge to sing that late 70's Foreigner classic and take that notion too far in the opposite direction. 

Scheduled to play three shows over the three days of FOCUS Wales, they ended up playing six due to some last-minute cancellations. The shows seemed to get rowdier as the weekend went on with Dockery and Pinson determined to get more and more involved with the audience and produce a thrilling spectacle. From seemingly out of nowhere, Hull produces a profoundly poetic analogy to help explain how they felt: "The audience were like oysters in the bay - The oysters clean the bay and then there are more oysters." 

Hands up, who had their money on the drummer being the philosopher? Serves you right for gambling. I'm slightly confused by this statement, but the explanation makes perfect sense on reflection: "The crowd gives all this energy and it gives us the power to go on stage and do it ourselves. They kept being amazing and made it so much fun and it made us so excited to play each show." 

Talk turns to their final show of the weekend, where technical difficulties threatened to prevent the show from happening at all. "Everyone we met there was so lovely.." You can see the makings of a grimace on Dockery's face as he starts the story.."..but there was this one guy at the last show who we interacted with who was not so lovely when we were trying to sort our gear out. But it gave us this fierce energy in the final set. That was the first time I'd seen Taylor jump in the crowd and mosh whilst playing guitar! The crowds were just incredible and as Charlie said, their oysters gave us...ermm...oysters." That's quite enough of the oysters thank you very much.

Conscious that time is limited on the call I begin to wrap up the interview, but before I leave the most exciting band in New York to their day, I'm intrigued by their thoughts on an issue that will abruptly change the world forever. The imminent rise of A. I looks set to impact how we live our daily lives and its influence on music - and art in general - is something that we won't be able to ignore for too long. I ask the band what they think will happen to this beloved Rock n' Roll that we cling to.

 Initially, there is some hesitancy as the question sinks in and it is Yancey who takes the mantle: " I think it will affect pop music and top 40 music. It might make that type of music more lucrative in sales and online influence. However, I think Rock n' Roll can never die - She has been born and she cannot die."  There's a collective murmur of agreement as she continues "There's been a lot of unprecedented events in Human history and music has been part of our most basic ritual."  

The interview ends in the hopeful manner that I could only have wished for. Now I know how those oysters must feel.

Mary Shelley release their new single 'Goin' to the Beach' in July and you can find out more by following them on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok and can buy music and merch from their Bandcamp