Having “put to bed” their acclaimed The Failure Cabaret show, The Fremonts have revisited their musical history with re-recorded versions of both of their full-length albums. The duo has released updated versions of We Don’t Live There and The Failure Cabaret, along with a new music video for “Ketamine Happy Hour.” Known for their cabaret-inspired, narrative-driven approach, The Fremonts see these recordings as their best studio representations to date, though the material continues to evolve through live performance.
The Fremonts consists of Stephanie Dodd (originally from Fremont, Nebraska, vocals and accordion) and Justin Badger (originally from Fremont, California, vocals and guitar). Drawing on years of experience as professional actors, they bring a highly theatrical edge to their music and performances. They had been working on new material when the idea struck to revisit and refine their earlier albums with fresh vocals, added instrumentation, and the perspective gained from years of live shows. In an email interview, they shared more details about the project.
Do you consider these re-recordings to be the definitive versions of your work?
These songs will always be works-in-progress. We’ll keep iterating and reworking them for live performances. We want them to always feel alive. But as far as recordings go, these are the best representations of what we can do in the studio… at least for now.
How far along were you with new music when you decided to do this? How would you describe the new material, and when do you think it will be released?
We made a series of demos for our new songs and were just about to start work with an engineer when we decided to change directions. At this point, the new material is a continuation of our cabaret/storytelling aesthetic. It will be interesting to see how that evolves when we actually go into the studio. We don’t have a timeline set for the next release.
Could you discuss the ideas and creative process behind The Failure Cabaret? For example, was the material originally written with both an album and live show in mind? How did it evolve once you started performing it?
The idea for THE FAILURE CABARET was born in a bar in Boulder, CO. We were out for a beer with our boss at the time, advertising legend Chuck Porter. He’s a big theater fan and asked us a lot of questions about our past lives in NYC. We lived there for many years and worked professionally as actors before relocating to Colorado. Then, he suggested that we make a new show together and offered to produce it. We were shocked. We really didn’t expect to find ourselves making theater again. The process was a blast. We had a ton of songs already written and we started weaving them into a script. When we originally recorded those songs, we were thinking of it as a “cast album” for the live performance.
Do you have future plans for it?
At this point, we’ve put THE FAILURE CABARET to bed. But we never say never! It could come back some day.
You’ve both been involved in many interesting projects outside of The Fremonts. What do each of you feel you bring into the band, and what does it allow you to express that you might not get from your other work?
Working on the Fremonts has given us a chance to become more well-rounded artists and producers. We have creative control over every element of our work. While that can be stressful, we have the opportunity to tell the stories we want to tell and create this body of our original work. When we worked as actors, we were usually performing in other people’s projects with very little say over the direction or finished product.
Justin leans more toward building chord structure and handling the technical side of recording/editing/designing our projects. Justin is a natural performer and thrives when we have a lot of live shows.
Steph tends to do a lot of the concepting and writing for The Fremonts. She also enjoys performing, but is a lot more introverted and needs to take more breaks from being in front of an audience. Her favorite part is rehearsing and thinking up ideas.
I know the band name comes from you both being from different Fremonts, but was that an instant, obvious choice?
The first songs we ever wrote together were for theater productions in NYC. One of the shows we made had an onstage band called “The Weight Boys Band.” We tried to perform under that name at music venues and realized pretty quickly that it was absolutely terrible. People kept calling us “The White Boys Band” and we were mortified. We changed to the name “The Fremonts” as soon as we could.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
We created a visual pairing for our album releases, a music video for our song “Ketamine Happy Hour”. It’s a comic reflection of our experiences with alternative therapies for depression. It’s available now on YouTube.
For tour dates, music and more info visit thefremontsmusic.com.
