AuthorDaniel Bromfield of Country Risqué Mitch Rocket is a familiar figure in the San Francisco music scene thanks to his theatrical performances, mellow style of self-described “yacht grunge,” and championing of the Bay Area music scene through his popular Bay Area Sounds playlist on Spotify (though he strongly prefers listeners check out both his own and his friends’ music through Bandcamp, which actually pays artists). If you’ve spent enough time in SF music venues, you’ve likely seen his distinctive stickers; incredibly, Mitch Rocket is his real name, and he was born and raised in SF. 🤯
Was there a lot of music around you growing up? Totally. It's in the family. My grandma was a piano teacher. My mom played in a garage rock band back in the ‘60s. They covered Ten Years after and Santana and stuff. She played keys and guitar. My dad was a recording engineer. There was a recording studio in my house growing up. His clients would come over and I'd hear trombone or whatever he was working on at the time coming through the door. Did you make anything with that setup? I messed around with MIDI keyboards and GarageBand and stuff, that’s kind of how I learned to record. Some of the tracks on Petting Zoo were actually recorded all track by track in his studio there at home. “Hands Won't Touch” was done like that, and “Fading Away” was done like that, some of the more acoustic stuff on the second half of the album. Why did you decide to split Petting Zoo between electric and acoustic halves? The album was made over a pretty long period of time. Most of the recording on “Hands Won’t Touch” was done in 2017, so it ended up being a few different visions. It’s not really a very cohesive album, I’ll be the first to admit it. It got to a point where I was like, “I need to put this out or I'm not going to put this out.” When I actually released the album, I was on a six-month break between two jobs. It's really hard to record a whole album and also be working 40 hours a week at the same time. That's why I've been less prolific since then, honestly. Stream Petting Zoo You started out studying jazz—did you always write pop and rock songs or did that come later? I didn't really listen to jazz when I was, I was learning like theory of jazz. I was playing jazz in school and in summer camp, but I wasn't a very dedicated jazz listener. The earliest things I recorded, I don't know what to call them. It sounds more like soundtrack music. Some of the stuff on The MIDI Years, a compilation I put out, is some of the earliest stuff that I made in GarageBand. If not jazz, what did you listen to growing up? My dad used to listen to put on a lot of XTC and Toad the Wet Sprocket and the Beatles and ‘60s stuff like the Lovin’ Spoonful, so that's kinda what I was raised on from that side. Mom was more into George Benson and Van Morrison, she also liked Whitesnake and Scorpions, ‘80s hair-metal stuff. Tell me about your live performances, which can be very theatrical. Why did you decide to get silly with it onstage? I'm glad you say theatrical, because sometimes I feel like we're not doing enough on stage. I sometimes feel very confined on stage because my mouth has to be within a certain radius of the mic, and I have to be able to hit the pedals so I can't run around on stage and dive off or do any crazy real theatrics that I would love to do. To me shows are shows, not just concerts, so there's a visual element. There’s even a physical element to it. So I try to do that as much as possible within the constraints I’m given. What's next for Mitch Rocket? Are you planning on recording anything? I know you have a bunch of new songs. There's a ton of new songs and we gotta get something recorded, but we have like one and a half songs recorded. One of them is actually mastered. It’s a live favorite we've done for a long time called “Dirty and Wrong (Fuck You Jeff Bezos).” That one's fully recorded. Unfortunately we can’t play that song at the bandshell gig that we're playing on Saturday. There's a lot of kids around. Have you run into any resistance to that song? Honestly, I mean we're in San Francisco, so it's kinda hard for people to like “Jeff Bezos is great” or “I love Elon Musk.” ---- Trixie's Note: See The Retro-Future Revue live at the GG Park Bandshell in San Francisco this Saturday, 5/25!
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