Tyler Jon Tyler

Tyler Jon Tyler: "Tick Tock Tick"

The latest from the Chicago-based trio is a fuzzy and impossibly happy jangle pop gem with a Lemonheads-meet-the-Vaselines-in-1991 feel. - Washington Post

The Logan Square-based trio Tyler Jon Tyler may feature some old hands — Nathan Jerde from beloved garage outfit The Ponys and Tom Cassling (ex-Daily Void) — but it's the newbie up front that defines the band's sound. Rebecca Flores, the 24-year-old singer/guitarist for group hardly sounds like a beginner — she is a natural lyricist and has an easy way with pure pop hooks. Tyler Jon Tyler has recently released a self-titled album — one of the most accomplished local debuts in recent years — which showcases how powerful a simple pop sound can be. The album has (rightly) won the trio a wave of adulation, though critics struggle to categorize it — Garage? Pop? Punk? All of the above? We'd wager the latter option.

QRebecca, how does it feel to have your vocals described by critics and blogs as "spunky"? Some of the descriptions make you sound like one should expect a cheerleader, rather than a singer.

AI don't really understand it, I guess. Some of our songs might sound "spunky" because they're upbeat and I yell, but an equal amount are sung lower and are pretty melancholy. I don't even really have a spunky personality!

QWhat was it that made you guys want to start a band with each other?

A(Jerde) Becca and I worked together and developed a friendship through common interests of music and art. She and her buddy Jenn started playing some songs together. They were so catchy and simple — Becca's lyrics, and the topics she chose to write about were so inspired, and forthcoming, that I just fell in love with the whole thing. I felt like I had to be in the band, so I made Becca teach me how to play the songs on bass.

A(Casling) I was a late addition to the band. Jenn was leaving for California, and they had two weeks to find a drummer before they were supposed to record. It was a ton of fun trying to get up to speed as quickly as possible to do the recording.

A(Flores) I was psyched that they wanted to play in a band with me. This is my first band; I had only been living here and playing guitar for about two or three years when we started, and Nathan and Tom had been playing around Chicago in excellent bands for awhile. I was really into The Ponys and Daily Void when I first started writing songs, too. I almost didn't ask Tom because I thought he'd say no.

A(Casling) After we recorded, I asked how much my share of rent in the practice space was and they kinda looked at me funny for a second. Maybe they intended for me to just fill in for the recording, but I've refused to leave.

QWhen you started TJT, did you know it was going to sound like this —- more like a pop band? Was that the intention or a product of your chemistry?

A(Jerde) I feel like there is a strong chemistry between the three of us, but I don't feel like we've ever intended to carry a particular sound. In fact, when we are compared to bands, half the time it's never anything that we are particularly influenced by.

A(Casling) I'm always confused by comparisons. My dad recently asked me what [the musical genre] "twee" meant. I still don't really know, but I'm put off every time I hear it in reference to us.

A(Flores) The songs just kind of came out that way. Whenever I'd try to intentionally write a darker song or faster punk song it would just come out as another pop song anyway. - Chicago Tribune

At first blush, Tyler Jon Tyler sounds like more of that retro garage pop that many, many folks have doing so well for the past handful of years, which is a little bit of a turnoff: It’s simple music already–is it really so special that so many bands have to try their hand at it? But the answer is yes, because that’s not what Tyler Jon Tyler are actually doing.

TJT’s rock is tight, to be sure, and minimalist and poppy, but it owes as much to Blondie as it does to Strawberry Alarm Clock, and as much to The Cure and the Pretenders as to the Standells or Ramones. The drumming (by Tom “Daily Void” Cassling) leads you though Rebecca Flores’ terrifically urgent vocals and guitar work, and crisp songwriting keeps the pace moving quick. Oh, and if the bass is as heavy and steady as a drumbeat, it’s because it’s played by the drummer from The Ponys ,Nathan Jerde.

By the time the album goes silent after just 26 minutes, you’ve lost yourself in it. Highly recommended. - Berkeley Place

Everybody jangles these days. It’s just the coolest thing. You can’t go anywhere without some reverby guitar gently massaging your eardrums, in that safe, pleasant, afraid-to-take chances type of way. But hey, after Real Estate “broke out” who can blame them? So I initially scoffed when I came across Tyler Jon Tyler the other day on AZ. But, after spending some time with their tunes, I find them charming, well-written, and without all of the usual pretentious trimmings, such as hollow and distorted vocals meant to hide out-of-key singing (Twin Sister) and poorly played guitars (The Beets).

While this post seems to be out to condemn the lo-fi genre, which we’ve certainly been vocal about our disdain for in the past, it’s less about that, and more about how surprised we are to be enjoying Tyler Jon Tyler’s self-titled debut so much. We don’t mean that to sound cheap either. There is a youthful passion here and a clear joy for playing that cuts through all the noise and hype of the lo fi world and strips the music down to its core elements of solid songwriting and quality execution. There is a larger purpose behind these songs that seems to be more about the actual music, than where that music fits into the blog spectrum at large. It’s refreshing. - Stark Online

Don’t let the name fool you, Tyler Jon Tyler is not a dude, it’s actually a three-piece from Chicago. On the strength of their spunky female vocals, the band pulls of the 1980’s indie pop sound much better than many other bands trying to recapture the decade’s magic. The best part is that it all seems so effortless for them. The jangly guitars and the simple melody-driven pop songs are as sweet as honey dripping from your headphones. If you’re a fan of groups such as Black Tambourine, The Vaselines, or The Pastels then I HIGHLY recommend that you check out Tyler Jon Tyler.

Their self-titled debut album is out on Slow Fizz records now. If you like what you hear, do yourself (and the band) a favor and order yourself a copy. Oh, and swing by their website for more info. - Cactus Mouth

NEW BAND OF THE WEEK! Insound staffers seek out new music constantly. Between the hundreds of music submissions we get per week and the new bands and labels we're always reaching out to, we stumble upon some really great stuff. Each week, we will be picking one lesser-known band that we particularly love. This week, Andy F. plays the peanut butter to Tyler Jon Tyler's jelly. Yum?

There are a lot of qualities of Tyler Jon Tyler's debut LP that remind me of college radio. Rebecca Flores' vocals can't help but waft up memories of Sleater-Kinney, but the music underneath her howl has more jangle and shamble than they usually copped to. The band seems fit to name check The Vaselines and Raincoats which works on some level but maybe only if they were mashed together with some more bombastic punk tendencies like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich of fierce jangle-pop destruction.

No matter what touchstones you want to pull out of your pocket, the band's self-titled debut is a whole lot of fun and an ardent about face to some of the garage-y tendencies coming out of Chicago of late. Clean edged but deceptively sharp, it’s the kind of album that shows up on most overlooked lists years down the line. I'd say get in on this now.

(Andy French) - Insound

Running through just about every inch of jangle-pop you could rack your brain to name, Tyler Jon Tyler are a stripped down shamble that can't help but bring a smile to the lips of anyone who grew up bopping the Raincoats and the Vaselines. Plucking members from The Ponys and Daily Void, and shaking them up with a healthy dose of earnest female vocals, the band has just released their debut LP for the brand new Slow Fizz imprint. The band's popped up here in the past with a single on Trouble in Mind and the full length builds on all the promises of those early singles. No frills and no fuss and that's kinda what keeps it so charming and loose. Just one of those solid pop records that makes you feel fifteen forever. - Altered Zones/Raven Sings The Blues

Bringing up the rear here is co-ed trio Tyler Jon Tyler’s “Separate Issue” b/w “Paul”, a blast of jaunty indie pop that falls just on the right side of twee. The honeyed vocal wallop and galloping, tuneful riffs of the a-side remind, in a good way, of the halcyon days of late ’90s indie pop, especially the variety that was peddled to great effect by labels like Kindercore and Blackbean & Placenta. Turn the platter over and you’ll find that “Paul” is the most forthrightly rocking (it’s redolent, if you close your eyes, of Dressy Bessy in their slightly more subdued moments) thing we’ve heard from this lot yet, and despite the fact that it knocks your socks off, it retains the band’s gooey pop core and ear for hard-candy hooks. Honestly, we hope it’s a pre-cursor to a direction they continue in for many moons to come. - Impose Mag

Tyler Jon Tyler took the stage next. Based on the name alone it would have been reasonable to expect some sort of one-man singer-songwriter act, but that was certainly not the case. What we got was actually a female-fronted rock trio. The band's sound was overall taut and minimalist, but not without a helping of pop elements that kept things fun and interesting throughout. All of the songs were short, as was singer/guitarist Rebecca, whose petiteness couldn't have prepared any unsuspecting audience member for her commanding howl. The sound was so consistent that many songs were somewhat indistinguishable from others, but the band's tightness and uniqueness made that easy to look past. Keep an eye out for this band. Check out Loud Loop Press's recent album review to get better acquainted. - Windy City Rock

This lil’ guy is brimming with an amateur enthusiasm that would fit in comfortably with the Yoyo-a-Gogo crowd circa ‘94. You can almost feel the frays from their badly cut jean shorts and taste the sweat from their over-sized tank tops, all while their large, wire-framed specs slide down their runny noses. A-side “New England Street” is spiky home-brewed female-fronted rickety coffee shop punk-pop, but it’s the flip that takes home the TVP “bacon.” “Faster Than Light” posits a six-note repeating guitar line on top of a rumbling and more importantly uplifting rhythm section, and it’s like the little engine that could. A well-worn trick for sure, but it gets me every time. These guys were even nice enough to send me #1 out of the pressing MIKEY LIKES IT! (Mike Pace) - Still Single/Dusted Magazine

Tyler Jon Tyler has a name that’s bound to mislead. Tyler Jon Tyler may sound like some redneck parody out of My Name Is Earl or Eastbound or Down, or perhaps a forgotten teen idol from the mid-nineties. But, in fact, TJT is a sharp, tight power-pop group from the Windy City. Tonight, the trio is set to release their self-titled debut full-length at the Empty Bottle.
Musically, TJT’s scrappy, fun but disciplined rock resembles past Midwestern acts like Green, but with attitude-fueled vocals tough enough to make Chrissie Hynde cower in a bar’s back corner. Tracks like the jangly, minute-and-a-half kiss-off “Tick Tock Tick” (“Got a problem with the way you talk/your lips are moving and they never stop”) and the bouncy, bass-driven “New England Street” have a loose, carefree but not careless vibe.

If there’s anything negative to be said about the trio, it’s that the limitations of their sound ensures that their songs can all run together in a same-y sounding stew. But, based on their recent Coach House Sound session, if there’s a live band in Chicago that knows the virtue of hitting it and quitting it, it’s probably Tyler Jon Tyler. - Chicagoist

The first thing you'll notice about Tyler Jon Tyler's debut seven-inch, "Faster Than Light" b/w "New England Street" (out last month on Trouble in Mind), is Flores's commanding singing, and next you'll probably pick up on the pedigree of the music—the cleanly jangling guitars, simple melodic bass lines, and stomping drums (played by the Daily Void's Tom Cassling) are rooted in the early-90s indie-pop of Washington, D.C., and the Pacific Northwest. But unlike, say, the Vivian Girls, who sound like they're trying to remake albums from the back catalogs of K Records and Simple Machines 19 years after the fact, Tyler Jon Tyler wear their influences lightly—and by comparison they sound refreshingly unpretentious. - Chicago Reader

For much of the year and a half of their existence, Tyler Jon Tyler have been known as "that band where the drummer from the Ponys plays bass." But with the release of their first full-length, they prove themselves more than capable of standing on their own. Sonically they're about as uncomplicated as a power trio can get. Singer/guitarist Rebecca Flores plays chunky, simple rhythm parts and the occasional single-string lead. Drummer Tom Cassling (who also drums for the garage-punk outfit Daily Void and owns the Logan Square music emporium Shake Shop) pounds tribally on toms and snare, barely ever touching the cymbals. And Nathan Jerde's rubbery bass lines carry most of the instrumental melody, as well as offering the only decorative embellishments in the mix. But the center of attention is Flores's voice, a robust yelp that brings to mind Chrissie Hynde, the Raincoats, and other female-fronted acts from the early 80s who balanced new wave and power pop this well. On standouts like "Separate Issue" and "Tick Tock Tick," her melodies are difficult to shake well after the record's stopped spinning. (Miles Raymer) - Chicago Reader