“It’s kind of like a sitcom vibe we have going here. Each morning we accumulate at this coffee shop and just loiter around on the street all day.” With a debut record for New York’s Public Access T.V. in its final mastering stage, singer-songwriter John Eatherly can be forgiven for spending idle time in the narrow East Village streets he and his band mates call home.
“You’ve got to have the dynamic – that’s more than half of getting a band to run smoothly and work right.”
Well-versed in the art of melody making, and all that comes with it, Eatherly has pursued the craft professionally since dropping out of high school aged 17 to tour with now defunct punk band Be Your Own Pet. Arriving in New York by way of Tennessee in 2008, the multi-instrumentalist began to play with a roster of established artists before forming his latest project Public Access T.V. in 2014 for which he appointed close friend Xan Aird on vocals and guitar – “We shared records since we were kids, so were already on the same page as far as taste goes” – bassist Max Peebles and drummer Pete Star.
“I’m really out of the loop with the internet. There’s just so much shit on there now, I don’t know where to begin.”
Sonically the swaggering rock outfit takes its cues from the stars born of the 70s Downtown scene whose inimitable legacies stand unaffected by time. It is the prevailing heroes from rock ‘n’ roll’s extensive back catalogue that motivate Eatherly to create the kind of hook-laden songwriting immune to short-lived trends; seminal bands like Television and The Velvet Underground whose freewheeling members wandered the same skinny streets that Eatherly and his band mates do today.
“More than anything we’re working on wrapping
up our record and mastering it. It’s due out September.”
