You never what will wash up on the shores of creation. If that shore be Omaha Nebraska, and that sea be the rolling plains of wheat and corn; can we imagine a more unique harvest than Tilly and the Wall? A band that has been described as “The Brady Bunch singing Power Elf Music” will put a somewhat discordant picture in your mind, but the truth is even stranger than that.
Tilly started out as just a bunch of friends who jammed together for giggles and somehow ended up touring. There is a theme of spontaneity to the group. Things just happen. The music just happens. There is an innocence to the sound that would have been accessible to the few creatures around while the Earth was still cooling, and how the band is able to tap this is something of a mystery. In music, it is far simpler to do more than to do less.
You may observe that there is no drummer on stage, but rather an oblong wooden box. Vocalist and tap dancer Neeley Jenkins climbs up on that box and provides the rhythm track, with her feet. This is not a gimmick, this is simply a natural evolution of the group mind. Speak to any member of the band and it is like they use TILLY MIND LINK with the other members. The unusally pristine quality of the sound is a result of their union, and no single individual..
When they all start singing- in unison, the mind’s eye unfurls vistas of summer camp and all that slow progress toward adulthood is swept away in seconds. With all the worries and responsibilities that come with full use of the forebrain conveniently out of the way, you automatically begin to have an earnest and simple good time.
It is the very uniqueness of this phenomenon in mind that I spoke with vocalist Kianna Alarid .
T. Virgil Parker: One of the things that I’ve noticed about Tilly is that most of the members have a professional background, and the music is a fairly thorough rejection of the professional world.
Kianna Alarid: Nothing is ever thought out with us. We never thought ‘this is what we want to say’ or anything like that. Obviously things turn out to have a theme. Our theme is kind of about people growing up and forgetting that they can do anything they want..
TVP: The format of the music itself seems to discourage people from taking life too seriously.
KA: Yeah, don’t take anything too seriously. We as a group just assume that everything is going to be all right. You could call us overly optimistic. Everything we write about and the sound we produce reflects that.
TVP: At that same time you reject the things that need to be rejected, though with a pronounced lack of bitterness.
KA: None of us are the kind of people who hold grudges, we’re just really free. When you’re that free, it comes out.
TVP: The music has to be the most unpremeditated sound I ever heard.
KA: That’s exactly what it is.
TVP: People spend years in Zen monasteries trying to get to a place like that.
KA: That is true. If there were one different member in the band it wouldn’t be like that. We love each other so much. The way we feel about each other comes through.
TVP: You used to play in a fairly hardcore band. What was different?
KA: Everything was different. This band is like a family, but I still love metal.
TVP: The only band that has a remotely similar feel is The Violent Femmes .
KA: We love them, I’m so happy to hear that.
TVP: It’s is not easy to occupy that space, especially when they’re pissed at the world and you’re obviously not.
KA: It just seems like a waste of time to get pissed off. By the way we’re not abnormal or anything, we do feel these emotions.
TVP: If anything you’re the only well-adjusted people in North America. Another influence I can see is campfire music.
KA: People have said that actually. I think it’s the whole sing-song sing along quality. When we write we know that nobody is going to solo. Everybody sings on everything.
TVP: You’re all intelligent adults, and no-one is accusing you of this being pure artifice.
KA: I should hope not.
TVP: Because you’re all intelligent, it would be easy for someone to interpret the whole Romper Room thing going on in your music as being more ironic that it really is.
KA: We feel like odd balls, and the people who really get what were doing are like odd balls too. They feel what’s going on in the music. We lay out our emotions.
TVP: Really, it would be impossible to fabricate that. Another observation: You’re certainly not in it for the money.
KA: No, we’re not. That would be dumb.
TVP: Even that is a little unusual in the most corporate country on earth.
KA: I think our friends influenced us- not that we would ever try to use art for money in that way. Our friends all grew up here in Nebraska and obviously they are all amazing artists. They got to a level where they’re huge- and they still don’t do it for the money. They’ve always done it for the art. We started playing because we wanted to be together and have fun. Its also for the love of making something.
TVP: Is Omaha like the alter ego of Seattle?
KA: I don’t know much about the West Coast scene. For us it is just the way it is. Only in the last five years have the bands around here gotten national notice. We’ve been hanging out since I was fifteen, that’s like eleven years. Everybody just always made music. In the purest sense of the word we’re all friends who take care of each other and love each other. Other scenes I think don’t revolve around friendship.
TVP: I think the music scene in general tends to be more competitive than cooperative.
KA: That’s absolutely not true here. Even new bands, people that you don’t know, everybody will be there for that first show. It is extremely supportive. If that is rare, I’m glad that this is where we got our start.
TVP: Every Tilly and the Wall song is on some level a love song?
KA: I would venture to say yes. I feel like love is the strongest emotion.
TVP: What do you do to sit down and write one of these songs.
KA: We all write songs individually and say ‘I’ve got a new song.” I write all the lyrics, which is really weird, Derrick thinks. Then, everybody brings in whatever they want. There’s so much trust in this group that we all feel free to bring in our parts. It all rolls into what our song is.
TVP: The way the music comes together, the melody is absolutely essential. We’re in a musical environment in which melody is almost forgotten.
KA: When I compose, the lyrics are most important. When I listen, really, it’s the melody.
TVP: Do you still have time for a day job?
KA: We have time to work, but nobody wants to hire us because we’re on tour every other month. Neely and Jamie are substitute teachers, so that works for them.
TVP: It has to be like having two personalities in a way. When you do something this unique it doesn’t really resemble the rest of your life.
KA: Since all our friends are doing the same thing it really isn’t all that different.
TVP: A lot of people seem to get your music.
KA: I didn’t think that anybody would ever get it, or understand what we are doing- not that we were trying to do anything weird. We were having a lot of fun just rehearsing and I never thought that we would play out. Seriously, we were these huge nerds who danced around and sang. When we did I didn’t think that anybody would ever get what we were going at. They did, and I was truly stunned that they did. We were basically singing and dancing around like a bunch of morons and they really enjoyed it. People seem to like it a lot.
TVP: It’s almost a corrective for what people face.
KA: When people tell us that it makes than smile or makes them dance, that is the whole reason.
TVP: On one level its actually intellectualized, the lyrics are going actual places.
KA: Its not like its just fun and games
TVP: Right. At the same time, the music kind of undercuts that and brings it back to fun and games.
KA: That is never thought out. I write about the emotions that are important to me and the band expands that. This very group of people are in the exact right place in the right time.
We like to think about contradictions, when I look at art I love the same contradiction, where one thing makes you feel one way and the other makes you feel totally different. We understand that there are things in life that will suck. That’s just life, and if you get that you don’t have to hold grudges and be a bitter person.
TVP When I interviewed Nappy Roots they said, yes there is oppression, racism and objectification, but that there were other things that they chose to focus on.
KA: Exactly. There’s so much pain. It’s going to be there. If you don’t see the fact that there’s love in the world then everybody would commit suicide. You have to be optimistic.
TVP: And no one worth listening to is saying that. I think it’s easier to sell leather to people who are morose.
KA: I think you’re right and I think there’s a trend, especially in Indy music. I really love that kind of music, but that’s not what we wanted to do. We wanted to do something really different, something happier.
TVP: All art is redemptive, even depressing art. Having said that, what you’re doing is leading people down a corridor that doesn’t put them at the exact same point where they started. That’s what the goal of all real art is.
KA: We all know that that’s what art does for us. And if you think about it too much, it stops working.
TVP: You’re headed on a tour with Bright Eyes.
KA: We’re headed on a big tour of the Northeast, big venues, which is good for us.

Flying in the face of the entire music industry, the band invites you to download their entire album for free. Go to tillyandthewall.com. Also check out some appearances on the site. The band will be headed our way.