Sissys

Music is loaded with misleadingly named bands — The Pop Group, Women and the No-Neck Blues Band, to name a few — and you can go right ahead and add the Calgary duo Sissys to that list. Not only will their name annoy any English majors and/or spelling nuts, but musically the group creates a decidedly non-timid and bracing rock presence. Sissys will be performing on Friday the 13th at Broken City, along with Calgary’s Stalwart Sons and Edmonton’s Book of Caverns. Fast Forward Weekly sat down with Sissys guitarist-vocalist Darrell Hartsook and, writing here as a man of relatively average height, I can assure you that if Hartsook really is a sissy, he’s certainly the tallest one I’ve met.

The duo recently issued Sissys Talk, a seven-track cassette on Bart Records. The EP rushes through its 12-minutes of garage punk with brash hooks, humour and plenty of hooky guitar melodies (see “Darts” for a great example).

“[Sissys is] me and my friend, [drummer] Nathan Navetto. I’ve known him forever, but haven’t played with him in 10 years,” Hartsook says of the band’s origins. “I just had songs in my head for a while and I was like, eh, I should make a band. I took a week off in the summer, recorded some songs and that’s what happened.”

“The songs were unfinished, and I finished them the first day I started recording, really easy, really quick. It was very natural — at first I was overthinking things before I recorded. I had so many ideas and things to be ‘interesting,’ but it ended up being straightforward, and I like the way it came out.”

Part of what makes Sissys’ huge sound is Hartsook’s preference for the baritone guitar. Rarely seen in punk and indie rock circles, the timbre of a baritone guitar can be placed somewhere between its more commonly seen bass and standard electric brethren, allowing for huge, round low-end without sacrificing access to upper-string melodicism.

“I’ve always really liked ‘different,’ interesting instruments, whether it’s synthesizers, weird guitar effects, or whatever,” Hartsook says. “For a two-piece band, [the baritone] really makes such a big difference compared to guitar or even a bass. You don’t miss the high end or low end of either, really. I like it.”

This essentially allows Hartsook to play double duty with the instrument, filling out Sissys’ sound. Often with a duo, one of the biggest challenges is managing to sound full, or at least not incomplete — a challenge the two-piece is keenly aware of. So, does this affect the way the Sissys plan? “A little bit, but most of that was more — it wasn’t in the way I wrote or put the songs together or anything, it was more with gear. I hate it when there’s a two-piece playing with three- or five-piece bands, and they’re half the volume of every band. So I got the loudest amp I could get my hands on, and I think it works. I think most two-pieces always leave something to be desired, and I really don’t want that to happen.”

As for the band’s name?

“It goes back a ways — it was my joke of a graffiti tag, almost exclusively for the two S’s in the middle, to make a lightning bolt. That’s pretty much the only reason,” Hartsook says. “I was like, that could be a good band name. I also think it’s a kind of funny commentary on, um, dudes.” - FFWD