Bands Through Town

The series of successes like touring with The Head and the Heart, The 502s, and Judah and the Lion, has landed this five-some on some of the country's largest festivals. For this assemblage from Oxford, MS, their party mentality perfectly fits in with Laollapalooza. Here's our sit-down with, Matty Hendley (guitar/vocals), Keegan Christensen (keys/bass/vocals), Jacob Christensen (drums/vocals), Andrew Gardner (violin/mandolin/vocals), and Wilson Moyer (bass/guitar/vocals).  

​

BTT: I saw you guys perform earlier at the Bacardi stage. You guys did fantastic! I was surprised; There were a lot of guys around my dad's age who were just jamming out there.

 

Matty: It's fun for all ages. It truly is. You come to our show and usually you see a lot of college girls and then it's like “oh in the back. There's a ton of experienced folks.” 

 

BTT: Also I wanted to say congrats on your album that released a few weeks ago. Your harmonies on it are clean. When you sing on stage or even just when you're recording in the studio, do those harmonies lock in naturally? Is that something that you guys practice? 

 

Wilson: I would say our harmonies are maybe the one thing we don't need to work very hard to get to. We have found that we all enjoy singing with each other and also, according to our producer at least, our voices layer very well together. So I think we just get a kick out of it. A lot of how our songs come together starts with saying “this would be a great moment to have a crowd thing where it's just silent and we're singing this part and then come back”.

 

Andrew: I think we're tight as friends. People always say “the instrument you can't buy is brothers and sisters singing together”. We're not related by blood but I would say that we have spent enough time together that we feel like family. You know what I mean? 

 

BTT: And touring together too. 

 

Andrew: Time in the car will make you close with anybody. And we kind of call ourselves a family band sometimes and hopefully that comes through in our vocals, I appreciate you saying that. I think they're only getting better and it just gets better with every show, hopefully. 

 

BTT: Matty, you said that something that you love to do is tell stories. I saw recently on the Reddit AMA you guys did that you get lost in the story when you're writing your songs. What do you love not only about telling stories but being able to do so together on stage

 

Matty: Yeah it's a great question, Liam. I do love stories. I think we all have a love for stories whether it's books or films or whatever. But as far as it translates to live performance, I guess lyrically and melodically, you can tell someone a fact all day long but if you know how to tell a good story, they can experience it as well with you and so I think translating that live is the most fun part because you kind of bring that story to life and so people can actually not only hear the story you're trying to tell, but they can also see it and feel it in their bones. I think that's what makes our live show really cool. And that's what makes me look forward to when we have a million dollars to spend on a set. We can actually bring that world all over…well, the world. We can bring our own universe and what we create. So it's cool to see that being communicated to the audience.

 

BTT: I know you guys formed Oxford, Mississippi. Is there anything about that place that has influenced your musical journey together in particular? 

 

Andrew: Oh man, that's cool. There's a big college audience in that town, specifically, because it is a college town. It's like railroad towns are only a thing because the railroads are there, whatever. Oxford is only on the map because of the University of Mississippi. And so we have a bit of a partying culture. People just love to have fun in Oxford. And I do think that with Happy Landing, one of the key missions has been to just really have fun in our shows. I really, really want to have fun on stage. And if we have fun together, it usually means that it's an invitation for the audience to also have fun with us.

 

BTT: That was one of the notes that I had; it seems like with you guys having fun with each other that it really opens up room for the audience to join in. I heard somebody who said “that was the most fun yet”. So I think that that's one of the things that I really felt watching you guys, just how much fun you guys were having out there. Keegan, you've said that touring with everybody else kind of feels like a road trip. Has Lolla felt like that so far and what moments in preparing for and experiencing this moment have been the most impactful or memorable?

 

Keegan: Gosh, I mean, yeah, touring in general is like a road trip because the short amount of our time together is spent playing music. The majority is traveling and going places. And so being here is awesome and it feels so nice just to be able to sit here because a lot of the time we're on the road and we're in the van. I mean we've been to so many places since we knew we were gonna be here; we've been waiting for the day and now that we’re here it's like “we're not in the van, we're outside, we played our set”. We made it to the beach.

 

Jacob: We're like toddlers to the music business. And this is one of the most formative moments I think. 

 

BTT: I saw an article back around 2021 and you guys said “we're gonna put our first full-length album out there and then we're gonna go on tour” And now the album's out. You're here at Lolla. What's the next step on your journey? What are your plans from here? 

 

Matty: Definitely tour the album. Yeah. The Golden Tour in the fall. Keep making hits, you know. We're itching to get back to it. 

 

Andrew: (On their set) That was an unbelievable show. I will never forget that.

​