We’re looking forward to introducing you to Jessi Fredeen & Jared Fredeen. Check out our conversation below.
Hi Jessi & Jared , thank you so much for joining us today. We’re thrilled to learn more about your journey, values and what you are currently working on. Let’s start with an ice breaker: What do you think others are secretly struggling with—but never say?
Probably authenticity. It’s become a rare commodity these days, especially with the rise of social media. People feel like they need to put forward a different face or a different sort of posture than they would in real life, to the point that they sometimes lose themselves in their personas. They take on this armor-like exterior that becomes their refuge, and they can’t really figure out how to take it off. But when we go out and play our music for these crowds in places where that armor is particularly thick, we’ll see people soften and start to peek out from behind who they think they need to be with this look of absolute relief on their faces. Sometimes they’ll duck back in, sometimes they come all the way out, but that look of relief tells us that they’re struggling with it.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
We are Jessi and Jared Fredeen otherwise known as Champagne Sunday, a glam-folk duo from Tacoma, WA. The music that we play is all-original, and genre-wise falls somewhere between rock and folk, but not really. We haven’t found a good category for what we do, so we called it “Glam-Folk”, and that has made the most sense to people. What we do is more than just the music. We’re really interactive with our audiences, sharing the stories behind the music, and our shows end up becoming therapeutic for a lot of people, hence the folk aspect. But we’re way more intense than most folk acts. And for an acoustic duo, we create a sound big enough without backing tracks that people feel like they get a full band experience, but without the corduroy of folk or the ennui of glam.
Okay, so here’s a deep one: Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
If anything, we were us, just making a lot more mistakes. The world does a lot of talking, but in the end, two things: (1) You don’t HAVE to be anything, and (2) the world can only make suggestions; you ultimately choose who you are going to be. Also, the world doesn’t know what the fuck it’s talking about. It told us to abandon ship and stop doing what we’re doing hundreds of times, but also told us to keep going almost as much. We’ve always been who we are, and I think we were almost always destined to be musicians. The world’s babbling is a stream-of-consciousness cacophony. You can glean what you want from it and make your choices, but I wouldn’t count on the world to tell anyone who to be.
Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
Yes. Recently, as a matter of fact. Back in May of this year, we released our tenth album, which coincided with our twentieth anniversary as a band. We assembled a band and worked and rehearsed with them for months to have an album release concert that we pushed and pushed for. Sold a bunch of tickets, hired a string quartet for one of or songs, flew our producer up from L.A. to back us on a song, brought up a former bassist to open the show and play a song with us, hired a videographer at a great bro-down rate (albeit, still not cheap) to have five cameras shooting the concert; we went all-out. Next day, I plugged in our hard drive to check the audio and start mixing . . . they hadn’t captured any audio. Nothing. They knew they were supposed to, we had it in our contract, stage plot, everything. They just didn’t do it.
That really sucked in and of itself. That video was going to do a lot for us in terms of album promo for the next year and well beyond, and now we couldn’t use it. The band that we had worked with weren’t available to do another show with us, and we didn’t have the energy to find and rehearse another band or the financial resources to do another show of that caliber, and even if we did, it we can’t ever have another tenth album release / twentieth anniversary show like that.
Mourning the loss of the show was one thing – all the effort, time and money we put it was just gone, but bigger than that was the feeling of disrespect. We felt like we had come so far in our career only to have these guys just completely shit on us. And we felt so powerless to do anything about it that we were very close to just packing it in.
But we kept playing, kept booking, kept writing, kept working. Eventually, time away from it and the love we got from our fans was enough to bring us back on track. But it took some time.
Sure, so let’s go deeper into your values and how you think. Is the public version of you the real you?
This is a great question, and we are CONSTANTLY getting asked it. The short answer is, yes. The extended answer is that it is complicated. As artists who perform, we are under the scrutiny of our audiences because they WANT to believe that everything we sing and say to one another on stage is genuine. And we want it to be. Therefore, if we come to the stage after a particularly trying day, or a deep discussion, we tend to address that openly and then proceed to sing our way through it. We are in the unique position to use our own words and music as a sort of self therapy, and in doing so, show our audiences through transparency and honesty how we navigate those situations and come out on the other side. Transversely, if we are in a great mood and excited, that absolutely transfers to our audience and makes for a hell of a show. Whatever the case may be, we tend to lead with honest hearts, as we truly believe an audience can smell bullshit from a mile away, and we never want to be associated with that!
A funny anecdote about this comes from a conversation we had with a bassist we were interviewing back in 2010. He asked us what we did when we fought. We said we typically didn’t “fight”. We would have some heated discussions, but we just aren’t fighters when it comes to our relationship. We told him nothing negative between us ever made it to the stage. He persisted, “Seriously though. What do you do when you need to go on stage and you’ve just had a fight?” At this point our drummer chimed in. “Dude. I’ve been in this band a couple years now and toured for months with them in a 26-foot RV. They really DON’T fight… they yell at ME a lot, but they don’t fight!” We all laughed really hard, but ultimately, that summed it up. Dang drummers.
Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. Are you doing what you were born to do—or what you were told to do?
This career path is NOT even remotely easy. From DIY artists struggling to book bar gigs and grateful for the occasional few hundred dollar tip night, to the mega stars with handlers ushering them from stage to interview, hotel to home, to everyone in between, one thing is constant; the entertainment business is NOT FOR THE WEAK. First of all, I can’t even imagine anyone continuing on this path if they were being forced to or told to, although, as many time old tales about children stars will remind us, it certainly DOES happen.
However, most of us crazy enough to pursue the performance arts in any form are doing it because we truly have no other choice. As naturally as one foot steps in front of the other to propel us forward, so the very molecules in which our whole beings are composed of, guide us to do what we do. We could not so much consider NOT doing what we do, as one might consider for even a moment NOT breathing. You may attempt the end of your breath, only to pass out, have your body convulse, then awake with a splitting headache and all inner monologues screaming at you in unison, “What the actual HELL were you thinking.” That is exactly what it feels like when we even entertain the idea of NOT being musicians. Regardless of the complete uncertainty, chaos, highs, lows, and all else that goes along with it. There is no other path, no other option, no other deep calling as heavy and profound as that that drives all us lunatics forward in this industry.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.champagnesunday.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/champagnesundayband/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ChampagneSundayBand
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@champagnesunday
- Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/champagne-sunday
Image Credits
David Neufeld, Shannon-Renee, Michael Englehart, Peter Jensen, Bonnie Yenney
