Interview: Satellite to open for Lisa Loeb at World Café Live

On Sunday, March 24th, Satellite will be touring through Philadelphia with Lisa Loeb, the singer-songwriter you totally once had a crush on, who wrote your favorite song from Reality Bites.

The alternative rock quartet boasts the musical talents of Steven McMorran (vocals) who has written songs for the likes of Céline Dion and Michael Bolton, as well as Mitch Allan (guitar), the singer-songwriter for SR-71.

They'll take the stage at World Café Live later this month, and they kind enough to take some time to chat with me about their upcoming tour, first full length album, and a bit about some of their songs.

So your tour! You're visiting Philadelphia and playing World Cafe Live with Lisa Loeb. How'd that tour come together?

I don't know how they came across our stuff but I'm glad it happened like this.

Since it's the last date of the tour, any plans to visit anything in Philly?

We want to compare Pat's, Jim's, and Geno's! I'll be the judge.

By the time you hit Philadelphia, your debut full length will be out in stores everywhere. Tell us a bit about it.

Yeah, it's a big milestone for us because it's exactly what we pieced together over the years that this idea of Satellite has existed. The name of it is Calling Birds--Birds are the first sounds you hear in the night reminding you the suns coming up.

One of the singles from the album, "Say the Words", has a particularly beautiful music video. What can you tell us about that?

Wow, you've done some homework on us. I'm glad you like it.

I had just moved to Nashville and something about making that video got my head right with the change. I just jumped down that rabbit hole and kept making more of it. There's a speech in parts of it, Faulkner accepting the Nobel prize for literature, and he's saying how important the writer's role is in the world.

I want to write good songs that pick up on what he mentions. The floating is about the fact that you have no idea what you're capable of once you start admitting the truth; the truth about how we feel about ourselves, and then answering the resulting "why".

The song "Brooklyn" is also getting some serious attention. What's the story behind that song?

Each song sort of catalogues the time it took to make it and the headspace it was written from. I know we're better for having made this record, and I hope the songs become like friends for people out there listening.

Brooklyn was written on a trip to NY. It was a really hard time personally, and transitional to say the least. The song just admits that I'm one these three things: a ghost of who I was, a shell of a man learning how to feel something again, or a stubborn fool who refuses to process what was being said to him. No matter what I need to bury the past and move forward without it.

It might not make sense written out like this, but I promise that'll make sense if you listen to it again.

Question for Mitch. I was a huge SR-71 fan. Seriously, I even imported Here We Go Again back in college. Satellite is a lot different than your last band. How do you manage to switch genres so well?

Wow that's really nice to hear! I'm always listening to every kind of music there is and never really thought of myself as one kind of musician.

With my voice, SR-71 had a very specific sonic signature, but I never thought you could actually pinpoint our songwriting into a genre. Truth is, if I would have been blessed with a voice like Steven's, we would have even had some songs that sounded like Satellite.

Great music is great music, and when you're recording with great musicians playing it like the guys in Satellite, it's going to bring in fans of every music genre… including me!

And Steve, like Mitch you've done a lot of songwriting and producing too, correct? Tell us about a few favorite projects.

I think a few of my favorites have been the Meleé project and singing with Bolton on the song of mine he put on his last record. All my biggest hits make me question how rock and roll I really am!

I'm like your mom's favorite songwriter.

Selfish question... any chance we'll get Calling Birds on vinyl? I need this album as an LP, guys.

Absolutely. I just bought a old record console to listen on, so we can both be selfish.

And lastly, where can our readers find you and your music online?

Find us on iTunes, etc. and keep up with us at weareSATELLITE.com