Meet Future Mailmen

 

We were lucky to catch up with Future Mailmen recently and have shared our conversation below.

Future, so excited to have you with us today. So much we can chat about, but one of the questions we are most interested in is how you have managed to keep your creativity alive.

Our band started as a group of friends trying out some musical ideas in a basement. We were gathering just to hang out, and workshop each other’s original music. The three horn players in our group (Andrew, Jesse and Michael), came to Portland in 2022 after spending some years in Boston together. They had been gigging and teaching around Boston, but had some holes in their life, particularly a draught of original music and places to perform it. Arriving in Portland and meeting Hunter, Robben and Alex (as well a whole host of other wonderful musicians) was a series of lucky collisions that developed fast friendships. After playing music together and trying out some different original concepts, it was quickly clear that we had a ready made band with it’s first few songs already written.

The fact that all six of us write music for the group is a huge part of what makes our band sound the way it does. Having six different compositional styles has shown us different ways we can utilize our skills, and gives our sets a sonic variance that keeps listeners on their toes. As we’ve developed as a unit, there’s been even more group editing. Once someone’s song ends up at rehearsal, it passes through all of our creative lenses, so that even if it’s a song that has been recorded/performed elsewhere, by the time it’s ready to be performed by Future Mailmen, it has taken on a unique version of itself that is greater than the sum of all of us.

Having six of us writing for Future Mailmen has also provided us with a plethora of music, too much even to realistically perform. That fact has provided us with a lot of my favorite part of this whole process, which are the times we are playing someone’s new music for the first or second time, and seeing where we can take it. I think that this group think aspect is a major driver of our creativity as a band, and makes a fascinating challenge as an individual composer. It forces us each as composers to

1. Have a vision for a song in the context of our instrumentation and skill sets

but then, something that can be more emotionally difficult,

2. Being okay with that vision getting altered (sometimes greatly) as we find the best way to present as a group

The fact that we are friends with love for each other is what makes #2 possible. It requires emotional trust and musical trust, and as we have grown as a band we’ve proven to ourselves that trust gets rewarded. It can turn your personal music into something you had never quite imagined before.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

We’re a unique band that looks visually like a jazz group, but we play original songs that feel closer to something like indie rock. A tight and rockin’ rhythm section of Robben Harris (bass), Hunter Lefebvre (guitar) and Alex Ouellette (drums) lifts up a soaring three horn blend of Andrew Bedard (tenor sax), Jesse Beckett Herbert (tenor sax, bass clarinet, flute) and Michael Sabin (trombone, flugelhorn). Succinct arrangements with singable melodies coupled with layers of improvisation are the basis of the sound we’ve been busy refining.

We’ve recorded a bunch of music last winter, and are working on getting it ready for release this fall. We play regularly around Portland, most often at BPM (Blue) where we play every 4th Wednesday.

You can see all of our shows on our website futuremailmen.com, and follow us on instagram (@futuremailmen) for all kinds of shows/updates/content!

https://www.instagram.com/futuremailmen/

https://www.futuremailmen.com/

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

1. Communication/Organziation

Organizing six busy people to be together often, is a difficult task and relies on a clear, effective communication. If you’re going to ask for someone to commit time, you need to be organized about so you don’t waste the hours we are giving to each other. Even if it’s just to hang out with each other, it’s difficult to give up the time we are not at work, particularly because we’re not making very much money for the amount of time and effort that goes into this. It’s not about making money, but especially as we all grow older, free time is precious. Being smart about how we use it is essential to accomplish our goals efficiently, and keep everyone feeling properly loved and valued. Inter band communication like that is important, but so is all of the emailing and other work that goes into booking gigs, marketing the band, recording and releasing music. Communicating with strangers is it’s own beast, and is a huge part of bringing our project out into the world. Knowing who we are and what kind of shows make sense for us as a group is an essential part of representing ourselves effectively to venues, and ultimately audiences. A big part of strong communication is foresight. We often have to set up most of what we do months and months in advance. Putting lots of organizational work in early can be difficult because it often doesn’t come to fruition for a long time.

2. Listening

There’s two main types of listening that are ultra important for our group. The first is the musical sense. To make music with another requires you to split your ear so that you can focus both on the sounds coming from you, and the sounds coming from each other person. We have a lot of improvisation in our songs, which asks a lot of everyone’s ears. We need to be strong in our individual roles, while also ready to adjust those roles constantly in live time. We’re never going to play a song exactly the same way twice, and we’re at our best when we’re all attempting to follow each other into new territories by using our ears.

The other type is interpersonal listening. Giving a space for everyone to voice their opinion is essential, and then truly digesting what people have to say, keeps us on the same page. Creating that space can be tough when there’s a lot of opinions in the room, but a plethora of opinions is also exactly what we want to make the best version of ourselves. We don’t always have to agree, but everyone has to feel like they can speak their mind and be heard. Everything interpersonal affects the music as well. Playing music is hyper emotional, and if people are feeling hurt, unheard or confused, it eventually comes out in the music.

3. Love/excitement for life

The most fun part of this whole process is when we are literally playing music together. It’s what makes the whole engine go, and is the easiest part to love, because we have found each other originally through our desire to play music. Original music has it’s own special type of excitement, because it’s something that has never existed before. Something that, as a group, we have created from scratch. Original music often comes out as an amazing amalgam of all of your favorite things to listen to. It’s a type of record of who you are as a unique individual that has never existed before, and will never exist the same way again. It’s so exciting to explore what that sounds like, in you, and in others who you love. That’s above all why our project exists. The part where we play each others music is extraordinarily fun.

We’ve all got limited resources, time, energy, focus etc – so if you had to choose between going all in on your strengths or working on areas where you aren’t as strong, what would you choose?

I think that to maximize your abilities, you first need to be able to accurately identify your strengths and weaknesses. Your strengths are going to be the basis of your skill set, and are probably what has dictated the activity you are undertaking. Using them to the full extent you can is often what can set you apart as an individual or group. But you also need to save some effort for the stuff you are not as good at if you want to have a complete skill set in the area you choose. Usually your weaknesses are a lot harder to give time to, because they are not naturally enjoyable to you (if they were, they’d likely be a strength), but they round out details that can be the difference between being able to use your strengths or not.

My strengths, and my favorite part of Future Mailmen, is the actual music part. When we are together making music, I am most comfortable and at my best. It’s the reason we do any of the other stuff, but the other stuff is what makes it possible for us to play for others. I’m much weaker on the side of things that is not directly musical, like booking gigs, promoting, social media, etc. But those are what make it possible for us to do the playing part in a really fun way, so I need to spend time refining my skills at those as well. Performing music is what I would love to spend my life doing, and these are all essential skills for that, even outside of this one project. Giving these weaker areas time and energy is key for the progress of our music, but it’s always important to remember that the music itself is the reason for all of it .

Contact Info:

Image Credits

images by Heather Lynn, Bonnie Snyder, and Bella Espenilla. Mailbox painting by Jess Uminski.

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