Interview: Catching Up With Bobby Mahoney and The Seventh Son + Stream “Empty Passenger Seats”

Since first hitting the local hotspots in the various music scenes in New Jersey, frontman and axe wielder Bobby Mahoney and The Seventh Son have steadily risen to prominence with their high octane live show. Now, the band currently comprised of Mahoney, James McIntosh (drums) Andrew Saul (guitar/backing vox) and John Shepherd (bass/backing vox) are gearing up to release a steady stream of new singles led by the incendiary rocker “Empty Passenger Seats.”

To introduce GroundSounds readers to Bobby Mahoney and the Seventh Son, we sent them some interview questions to get to know them better. Check it all out and stream “Empty Passenger Seats” below.

Hi, Bobby Mahoney! Congrats on your new singles. Can you tell us a little more on who you are and how you first got into making music?

B: Thank you so much! We are an alt-rock band from East Brunswick, NJ. I’ve been playing guitar and singing songs around Asbury Park and New Brunswick for the last 7 years. We started as a high school band, and have had different members and ended up here trying to make it happen at a higher level.

What’s your songwriting process like? Who are some of your biggest influences?

B: I tend to write down ideas in my phone as I go through my day and then when I have time to go sift through them, I put them together with voice memo ideas of riffs I have. I try to write as much as I can.

Some of my biggest songwriting influences are Springsteen, Tom Petty, Brian Fallon, Laura Jane Grace, Neil Young, and Warren Zevon

What’s “Empty Passenger Seats” about? How did it come to be?

B: “‘Empty Passenger Seats’ started as a riff/jam with my friend Dan Cohen (Creating Clementine, Hero of Me), and then I brought it to the band and we shaped it and arranged it together in a hotel room near Pittsburgh. John Shepherd whistled that little guitar lick in the chorus, and recording that bit was one of my favorite parts of the process for these new songs. We drove over night home from Richmond at the end of last summer’s tour, and that experience became the lyrics for the bridge.

This song feels like the band’s current journey in a way, and it is just a lot of fun to play. It’s loud and it kicks you in the ass. This is the first of a bunch of new singles we will be releasing and it’s just the tip of the iceberg. We had a great time working with Frank Marra (Brian Fallon, Jared Hart, Dead Swords, many more) at North End Recording and we can’t wait to keep releasing the new songs”.

If you had an unlimited budget, what would your dream live show look like?

B: I would love to know what it feels like to play in front of 50,000 people. Anywhere we could do that or get to a point where we could do that, I would be happy. Every dreams about doing the Garden someday too.

Any new New Jersey-based artists/venues/purveyors of the arts you could turn our readers onto?

B: Some of my favorite musicians in NJ right now are Man Dancing, The Vaughns, The Vansaders, Hodera, Ariana Gates, and Jeff Linden. There are a lot though– so much talent around here. I could go on for a while. I love that I can go to a show pretty much any night of the week and be entertained by great music. The Saint is always great for shows, as are Asbury Park Yacht Club and House of Independents.

Where can we follow you and where can our readers catch you live next?

We will be in NYC, Boston, Asbury, New Brunswick, Nashville, Pittsburgh, and more by the end of the year. Stay up to date at: www.bobbymahoneymusic.com
and www.facebook.com/bobbymahoneymusic
Any parting thoughts? Open platform!

Can’t wait to release the other songs and play a lot more shows as the year progresses! Exciting things on the horizon.

“God of Rock, thank you for this chance to kick ass. We are your humble servants. Please give us the power to blow people’s minds with our high voltage rock. In your name we pray, Amen.” -Dewy Finn [Jack Black] School of Rock