Shawnee Smith talks rock and her band Smith & Pyle

 

Chris Goss of Masters of Reality produced it, and Missi and I formed a label and financed it ourselves. We’re gonna see how far we can take it, you know, utilizing the “air waves” so to speak- a lot of people in the music industry are suffering being at the back of the line. Power to the people!

 

 

It’s so funny, it was so simple and so obvious! One day Chris Goss said “what about Smith & Pyle? It’s like Smith & Wesson only more dangerous.” We knew that was the name. Now we’re working on the Smith & Pyle Show. We’ve been filming all along- the making of the record, the rehearsing…every rehearsal is like a ho-down or a barbecue with lots of booze…or a picnic with a lot of booze. The church picnic and the rowdy tailgate party after the church picnic. We have a lot of footage and we edited together a bunch of webisodes, so to speak- we’re gonna put ‘em up on the website shortly and we thought we might continue on our own, guerilla-style, or we might team up with a bigger production company…we’re really just exploring right now. But it’s a cast of characters- you know, it’s kind of endless with this cast of characters and this pool of talent and all these personalities- it can go in any direction.

Shawnee in SAW

 

 

Yeah, why wouldn’t you? I mean, I don’t have to have a ton ton ton of money. You need enough money to live comfortably, raise your kids, put ‘em through school, and retire when you want to. Other than that, it’s how you spend your time and who you spend it with. For me, it’s like heaven on Earth.

 

 

I know, right? We could move the whole operation- we would, but Los Angeles is…a cess pool, but there’s also a real concentration of talent. You got the worst, but you’ve got the best.

 

 

We did a TV pilot together last year- Missi was cast at the last minute. Halfway through working on it, which is like, a week and a half, there was Coachella music festival. We were hitting it off- you know those people in life that you just connect to- and she was going through a crossroads in life, and I thought it was a good time to talk with each other and get to know each other sitting in the car and we drove out to the desert. She said her life’s dream was to play in a rock band and I said “Really? I’ve done it” and she badgered me and badgered me and finally I said all right- I’ll be in a rock band with you just so you can see it’s not all it’s cracked up to be and you can have another dream ruined. Here we are a year later, with a great record that’s totally inspired and a tribe of gypsies that are a band of sweethearts, you know? It’s ridiculous how talented the musicians are- it’s retarded. Every rehearsal, every gig, we’re like, “How the hell did we end up here?”

 

How do the songs come together?

 

Missi plays guitar, and we both write- we’re writers on every song on the record. Missi’s the biggest newcomer, right? Every so often she goes “God, what am I doing here?”- at least I’ve been in a couple of bands over the last ten years. There’s only one song on the album that’s 100% one writer- every other song is at least two writers or more- and it’s “I Wish You Were Dead”, which is the most popular iTunes download. I’m like, there you go, do you feel like you belong here yet?

 

Obviously, when Missi wrote “I Wish You Were Dead” she was in the throes of a break-up and she said it how we’ve all felt it but we’ve never had the balls to just say it all the way, you know? Me, I like to use imagery. Sometimes it’s a story, sometimes the music inspires the lyrics, sometimes it’s the other way around…

Missi Pyle & Shawnee bein' cool

 

 

Speaking of tequila, a lot of that record was inspired by tequila. It’s just the happiest band in the universe…we’ve had such a ball that everyone is willing to do whatever it takes to keep going. It’s a no-brainer.

 

 

Exactly! Or we could go to Africa and find a child choir to sing behind us…that’s a great idea.

 

Check out It’s OK to Be Happy On iTunes and Amazon, and be sure to visit Smith & Pyle (www.smithandpyle.com) for all the latest band news. Shawnee can also be seen in the forthcoming films Saw V and The Grudge 3 as well as VH1’s new reality show Scream Queens and the new webseries 30 Days of Night: Dust to Dust. Yes, she’s extremely busy.