Interview with Silverteeth’s Bill Bartholomew

Photo by Sarah Rayne

When it comes to the music coming out of Rhode Island, The Ocean State’s rhythmic roots stretch far and wide. Take, for example, Brooklyn indie rock act Silverteeth consisting of Brazilian musician Gabriella Rossi and Charlestown, RI, native Bill Bartholomew. The band recently released a music video for the song “Shoes,” so I had a chat with Bill about the making of the video, life in Brooklyn compared to Rhode Island, performing in Brazil earlier this year and when fans can expect Silverteeth’s debut album to be released.

Rob Duguay: The video for “Shoes” was shot and recorded at The Columbus Recording Company, operated by Ben Knox Miller and Jeff Prystowsky of The Low Anthem and located inside The Columbus Theatre. Who directed the video and what was it like working with Ben and Jeff?

Bill Bartholomew: The video itself was directed by Colleen Hennessy of SoPa Productions and Colleen is someone that I greatly respect. She’s done quite a bit of work in the area. She’s does the documentary for the Newport Folk Festival each year as well as a lot of other major festivals. She’s also done some really cool work with a lot of great artists including The Low Anthem. I was really excited to be able to work with her on this. As far as working with Ben and Jeff goes, it was great. They’re definitely one of those classic one-brain-two-body situations at this point where they really complement each other and are able to accomplish a lot both creatively and in more of the scientific side of recording.

RD: It’s pretty cool that you got to work with such talented professionals. What was the inspiration behind “Shoes”? Is there a story behind the song?

BB: I think it’s sort of a general portrait written with a little bit of tongue in cheek from looking at the area I’ve been living in North Brooklyn and how it’s changed and the sort of characters you see out there, who they are, how it makes me feel and potentially how it looks like if you were to take a photo of it. It’s also a song that from a musical standpoint started out as more of a purely electric rock song. It was one of the first songs that the current incarnation of Silverteeth kind of found home base in by utilizing an acoustic guitar as the engine of the song and putting a pick in Gabriella’s hand and having her almost play a Pixies style bass to it. That particular song really helped us find the next step in the sound we’re after.

RD: I think the song is awesome. I’ve already listened to it a bunch of times this week and I like the rhythm behind it. So how long have you been living in Brooklyn?

BB: I actually moved down here in 2006. I guess it was in July of that year when it really started, I came down here with a band I was playing in that was based out of Providence called Commas. All five of us decided to pack up and move to Brooklyn. We moved to a loft in East Williamsburg in a building that became fairly legendary called the McKibbin Lofts. The band lasted about a year or so, and slowly but surly everyone else trickled out either back to Rhode Island or elsewhere. I ended up staying in the city myself in the loft and began pursuing a new career as a solo artist.

RD: Being a musician from Rhode Island, did you notice any big changes when you moved to Brooklyn? What’s changed the most with you musically or personally since you moved down there?

BB: Well, I think it corresponded with the time period in life where I think everybody kind of goes through personal, social, political and musical awakenings. I really benefited from the timing of being here in Williamsburg & Bushwick in Brooklyn during the late 2000s. Just to be around basically a true bohemian scene that was entirely driven by art and the pursuit of something cooler. That was different than Rhode Island for me. In Rhode Island you sort of had to really work hard to find allies if you weren’t partaking in the mainstream. There’s certainly a great scene in Providence and there’s always has been, but just in my personal situation a new scene, a new group of people and the fact that it came across as a bohemian community really shifted my thinking. That’s the biggest difference other than the fact there’s no ocean and there’s no space here in New York where as in Rhode Island nearly every day you can guarantee yourself solitude.

RD: That’s definitely an interesting perspective on both places. Earlier this year, Silverteeth performed a few shows in Brazil. How did this happen? Where exactly did you guys play and how were you received there?

BB: Gabriella is Brazilian in the sense that she truly moved to Brooklyn just a few years ago. It’s not as if her family raised her in the States or anything like that. She has a lot of connections to ordinary, everyday people from living there and being around the music scene, political scene and things like that. We knew confidently that we could at least get a couple people to come out to a show if we went down there — it wasn’t a total shot in the dark. When we got down there we were really excited to meet and be taken in by some really great people, really great indie bands that have since broken fairly large on an international level. Through them we connected to other people down there who were really interested in music and indie music in particular. We were able to set up a couple of really cool shows, one was at a record shop called Fnac and it was amazing. It was a 250 to 300 person crowd. We worked very hard handing out flyers and it was very well received. It sort of left us in a spot where we got a nice chunk of ears and eyes ready for what we do next.

RD: It must have been an amazing experience to go down to South America and play in a different place to a whole new group of fans. Silverteeth are currently working on their debut album, so when can fans look for it on record store shelves and on the internet?

BB: We’re currently working on new and old material, recording demos and just getting prepared to go track in the studio this spring. I don’t have a specific date, but it’ll be next year that our debut record will be coming out. It’ll be a long time in the making and I’m very excited that it’s being taken down that route to really take the time to make sure we have the right songs on there.

Link to video: youtube.com/watch?v=pg4UnavVo24

Silverteeth’s website: planetsilverteeth.com