Nikki Stout writesThe CHIRP Radio Interview: Billy Joel Jr.

Matty G of CHIRP Radio recently spoke with Ari Levin and Nate Dorian of Chicago-based indie rock group Billy Joel Jr. Their most recent EP, Rubberhose, was released in April 2024. You can catch them opening for Modern Dairy at Schuba's on December 19th. You can listen to their full interview HERE.

Matty G: You guys are still relatively fresh in the Chicago music scene. Do you want to take a second and tell us a little bit about your band and its members? 
Ari Levin: I'm the singer-songwriter for the band.
Nate Dorian: I also play the electric guitar in the band and I sing in the background sometimes.
AL: We've got two other members. We've got Charlie Dykstal, who plays bass, and then Karl El Sokhn, who plays the drums. We're all normally recording together, so we'll record live and then do any kind of overdubs or tracking with all of us together. We have a couple of other folks that kind of come in and out. As you probably know, there's a huge community in Chicago of artists and musicians that are making music and we try to collaborate wherever we can. So a lot of other folks like Blake Sokoloff, who is a good friend of ours and who runs a studio that we work out of, will sometimes do some overdubs on keyboards with us. Other friends like Cima Kale will do bass and different string instruments, and then vocalists and friends of ours like Syd Kamuda from Big Kid, will add additional vocals here and there. 

MG: Your first EP, Rubberhose, was quite a diverse collection of sounds and vibes. What was the writing and recording process like for that project?
AL: That's really well said. It's a bit of an aggregate of a time period from 2017 to 2020 of songs that I'd written for myself in my room. And then after the pandemic, I decided, you know, I might try to put a band together and get this going. The band formed from a group of comedians who liked playing music, though it has transformed to the point now where there aren't really many comedians left in the band, other than myself. And so we're making music and playing together. A couple of the songs were written back in 2017. So like, "Oh, Nancy," "You're So Tall," "Leo," were all written seven years ago. And then other songs were written in the last year and a half or so, such as "She's Always on My Mind," "Joanna" and "Baseball Bat" in addition to the older material. So it's a bit of a mishmash of older songs I've had in my backlog and the newer ones that we came together as a band. 

MG: I think you guys are working on some newer stuff now. Can we kind of expect a similar aesthetic? 
AL: So we're working on a full length LP that's a little bit eclectic too, but I think it still kind of fits in with our universe. 
ND: Yeah, I like the question of diversity, right? Like having a diverse sound, but also having diverse members from different parts of the world and the country that come together in Chicago, almost like an analogy for the larger melting pot of Chicago. But we all came together and, you know, Ari has these songs that he has written and will play it for us. And then we will each individually add what we hear sounds beneficial to it. And it really does become this mix of using influences of stuff that I've come up with, especially in Latin music or some guitar players that I really like, and we'll bring some type of twang that way. So to answer your question about the upcoming album being diverse, I would say it is also diverse thematically. Just thinking about the songs that we've recorded, dynamically we are definitely quieter in some places and louder and others. And I think that's a good indication of who we are as a band and being able to say, "Hey, here's all these influences. Let's make it into one thing." And I think that's what we've done specifically with Rubberhose, but for everything else that's coming up too feels very much on brand with that. Do you agree, Ari? 
AL: Yeah, totally. I think I've been really intentional with songwriting, but not necessarily intentional with genre. So a lot of times we'll play "buckets of music." As an example from the EP, "Nancy" has a little bit of soul and classic R&B vibes, but also still has that fun and melodic atmosphere that a lot of the other songs have elsewhere, such as "You're So Tall" or even "Baseball Bat," a little more fuzzier, shoegazy, punkier tunes with a little more rock. Still kind of fits in thematically, I think, with us as a band. 

MG: You guys kind of touched on a little bit of influences. Nate, I think you said some Latin music and guitar, and you mentioned shoegaze. Are there any particular artists you all have been pulling from lately? 
ND: I don't know if we would say we're directly pulling from this, but both Ari and I have a large Beatles background and we do find ourselves being like, "Oh, this kind of reminds us of when they did something like that." And I think it's one of those things that, I don't know if it's necessarily Intentional of us being like, "Let's do something Paul McCartney would do," but more in the sense of, "Oh this reminds me of that or I could hear where that influence came from." So I don't know if I would say Billy Joel Jr. is influenced by The Beatles per se, but some of the members in this band definitely have been. Ari, I don't know if you want to piggyback. 
AL:  think we could individually have a conversation for weeks about The Beatles and the songs that we like, and Nate and I have like done little acoustic shows together where we'll do some Beatles covers, and we've talked at length about different tunes and what they mean to us. I think I even recently did a Spotify playlist of ranking my top 55 Beatles songs because I couldn't reduce it down to like 50 or a flat number. 
ND: Yeah, and I definitely think, just in a nice bridge or through line between that, I think one of the things that we find ourselves influenced by, and I I'm kind of speaking for myself, but I feel like we as a band enjoy other bands who enjoyed playing with each other for a good amount of time. That's definitely the vibe that we like to bring to our shows. There's a sense of brotherhood and being in this band together. So of course there's The Beatles, but we have other bands that other members really like, like System of a Down and Slow Pulp. And there are all these bands that we enjoy and we've seen live that have a chemistry with each other, that have definitely influenced us. Or we'll see a band in the local Chicago scene and be like, "Wow, this band rips, we should all see them." To that point, there are bands where you will hear them and their own influences are obivious. Nate and I always talked about Nirvana, obviously Kurt Cobain was super influenced by the Beatles, so we have that through line again. It's not just one area, but it's all about what what are we getting influenced by and what we are bringing back to our writing.

MG: You mentioned live shows here. A huge part of our local music scene is our love for Chicago's independent venues, and even makeshift music spaces. Does the band have any favorite venues to play, or maybe a past performance that really stands out?
AL: We were born at Book Club, which was, up until recently, a secret DIY venue in the Lakeview/Wrigleyville/Uptown area. They helped us create the band and I kind of owe our origins to them. So for me, Book Club is a super important venue. And as they reopen their space at the former Elbo Room at the beginning of 2025, we're really excited to be part of that community and play their new stage. We also played the Empty Bottle for our EP release back in April, which is a dream come true. Before the pandemic, I had a New Year's resolution to play a show at the Empty Bottle by the end of the year. And of course, it didn't happen in 2020, but I can say four years later that we made it happen. 

MG: If you guys could curate a local showcase, any particular artist you'd want to include? 
AL: That's really hard. There are so many good bands. I don't know, there are also different levels to these different bands where, you know, there are some bands that are clearly blowing up and have amazing music. And I put like bands like Slow Pulp or Ratboys or Footballhead into that incredible category. Even Friko, right? These are great bands that are getting to the level that we would like to get to one day, and it would be amazing to play with them. And then kind of bands that are still levels above us in notriety, such as Cusp. They're a huge band right now, and I have been listening to them a ton. They just had an EP come out earlier this year, too. They're from Rochester, but they all live in Chicago now and it'd be awesome to be able to play with them. And then I think I've also got to put Pinksqueeze up there too, because they're just so much fun. I've maybe seen them four or five times. And every time I've seen them, the shows are incredible. 
ND: If Billy Joel Jr. could one day open for Fall Out Boy, that'd be really cool.  That's just me. I know that they're near-ish and I know they're a lot larger now, but you know, one could wish. 

MG: All right, you guys mentioned some themes for the up-and-coming music. Are there any dates or things we can expect to come out? 
ND: Well, we've got a single release timeline. So we're going to start releasing singles at the end of November, early December. The first one is a complete left turn from some of the songs we've been writing. It is not really guitar driven, it's a melodic piano piece called "Blue." Everybody tells you that you've got to release a single every six weeks or the algorithm won't play, but we're working on a timeline of roughly once per month. We'll release a new single and then sometime next year, the full album will be released.

MG: Awesome, well we'll definitely have to keep an eye out for that. And you know we'll also keep an eye out for that Fall Out Boy show announcement, because I've got faith in y'all.
AL: Thank you! If you have connections...
ND: Tell Patrick that we're interested.

MG: Sure. Let me call him right up. Well, thank you Ari and Nate for taking the time today.
ND: Thanks for having us. 
AL: Yeah, thank you so much. It's been really great. 

You can check out Billy Joel Jr. on Bandcamp or at their upcoming show at Schuba's on December 19.