Six Foot Blonde is the sincerely enjoyable indie band you need to listen to right now.

Words by Ava Firmani

Photos by Ava Firmani

Best Left Magazine: Why should people know about “Six Foot Blonde’?

Six Foot Blonde: If they're looking for a truly independent, up-and-coming band to follow, we think we have a lot to offer. One of our strengths as a band is our ability to connect with each other and the audience at every single show. Our strength is our live show. It's very dynamic, and to an extent, tells a story of where we've been and where we're going as a group. We really try to share how much our music means to us, and how much it means that people in the audience are really listening. Additionally, with our next single coming out July 19th and our debut album, "Ask Me How I Am," coming out August 9, there is plenty more to get in on the ground floor and connect with. Julia is a great storyteller, and we really believe in what she's speaking about in these songs.

Best Left Magazine: Where did the name originate from and what was the thought process?

Six Foot Blonde: The name originated from when the band was a 9 piece initially, we had 2 singers at the time and the two of us girls were both tall and trying to embrace our power and harness our confidence on stage, so it felt only natural. However, after 3 members left due to graduating and the 6 of us remained to pursue something more, the name now feels like it honors the original spirit of the band. Embracing our unique attributes, whoever we may be, dancing like no one is watching, and speaking out loudly and proudly—celebrating self love.

Best Left Magazine: Who would you say is your main inspiration for pursuing a career as a musician and why?

Six Foot Blonde (John Alex): Bon Iver. Not as much musically, but their music has been there to support me during my own down times. The idea of our music being that rock for another person? Very motivating.

Six Foot Blonde (Dom): From a famous artist, I would say Fleet Foxes. Robin Pecknold's songwriting feels like poetry both sonically and lyrically. The music gives me peace, excitement, and can console me, all based on what I'm needing from the music that day. That amount of skill is inspiring. Also, my parents and brother. They’re all musicians!

Six Foot Blonde (Julia): Florence and The Machine is a huge inspiration, which I talk about dreaming to open for them one day, but I also find so much inspiration in singer-songwriters such as Phoebe Bridgers and Carol King. The simplicity of a voice, a story, and a instrumental melody focuses on the lyrics, which to me is the first thing I listen for. I love the picture their music paints, as it inspires many of the topics I talk about in my own writing.

Six Foot Blonde (Brian): My dad. Seeing him write song after song about anything and everything is inspiring and motivates me to create as much as possible.

Six Foot Blonde (Elliot): My main inspiration for pursuing a music career is my mother. Her careers as an artist in storytelling and as a professor solidified that I’ve always wanted to purusue passion-based work. Her events created a community through shared love and interest. I hope my music can one day do the same.

Six Foot Blonde (Zach): Twin Peaks. The amount of fun they have on stage when I first saw them in high school and the engagement they received from the crowd was amazing. I knew then I wanted to be in a position to make people feel that way.

Best Left Magazine: If there were any artists, alive or dead, who asked you to open up for them on tour, who would be the first person/band that comes to mind?

Six Foot Blonde: For me, if Florence and the Machine asked us to open for them, I would initially freak out. Once the freaking out was over though, I would gladly accept. Florence Welch has been a huge inspiration to me with her lyrics and melodies. She touches on feelings that, before I heard their music, thought I was alone in. I would only hope to do the same for others. She also represents a powerful woman and role model to so many young women (including myself), which I find so inspiring.

Best Left Magazine: What is the music aesthetic of “Six Foot Blonde’?

Six Foot Blonde: Our music is an intentional push and pull between careful reflection and spontaneity/fun. We have songs with dramatic builds like Blackout that grapple with the consequences of flattery under the male gaze. But we've also got songs like Ripe that are more lighthearted, up-tempo and groovy, which are meant to capture youthful stories from Julia's past.

Best Left Magazine: What skills have you guys gained as a band that have helped you grow and flourish as musicians?

Six Foot Blonde: Listening to one another has been the biggest skill we've developed over the past few years. It sounds easy, but really listening to one another means being fully "on" for the entire show. By doing so, it's allowed us the ability to better write with one another, as well as make really amazing moments on stage.

Best Left Magazine: What have been your most memorable moments as a band?

Six Foot Blonde: Generally speaking, it's always memorable when we play in a city or state we've never been in before and someone in the crowd already knows our songs. It brings us a lot of confidence and joy to know our music is able to connect with people outside of our own circle. Just this week at The Low Dive in Asbury Park, someone walking on the boardwalk heard us playing and recognized one of our songs. Those little moments where we get to connect with people really stick with us.

Best Left Magazine: Tell us about your upcoming single ‘Blackout’ coming out July 19th.

Six Foot Blonde: Blackout is a deeply personal song for myself, I wrote it after taking a poetry class in college and my professor pointed out how many poems, even the ones with no male presence, have a male gaze intertwined in them. It soon opened my eyes to how much of my life I spent relying on male validation to feel beautiful. That pain became the lyrics to blackout. But what I love about the lyrics, is that they feel amorphous to me. Everybody feels the need for validation in their lives because that is how we’re built. I hope to touch everyone with this and hopefully start a conversation where we are less embarrassed to accept the fact we need praise to feel loved, that way we can sooner start a journey to learning self validation. Musically, it is a slow build that sits in itself until it explodes. It has moving melodies both from an instrumental standpoint and a vocal one. Mirroring the idea that progress in our insecurities is not one that is linear or predictable.

Best Left Magazine: What gets you guys excited and prepped for a show/tour?

Six Foot Blonde: It may sound like a cop-out, but it's hard to not be excited when you're getting ready to play. But when we do have those off shows, our guitar player Elliott does a great job at hyping everyone up by reminding us of just how cool it is to be doing what we're doing. And it's absolutely true! In terms of prepping for shows, it really depends on the person. Our guitarists do a lot of warming up before we leave for the venue, other members make an effort to rest/relax, just whatever gets us in the zone!

Best Left Magazine How do you guys work together as bandmates to grow?

Six Foot Blonde: We do so in a lot of different ways. First and foremost, we look out for each other’s emotional well-being and make sure we understand one another. Growth is really hard otherwise! We’re also very honest with one another about how to get better, both as individual musicians and as a collective. That translates to a lot of dedicated rehearsal time and creative thinking to make our set more engaging and fun!

Best Left Magazine: How do you see yourselves as a band as having gotten where you are today?

Six Foot Blonde: Reflecting on that, we've really started to come into our own over the past year and a half. This debut album represents what Six Foot Blonde is now and what we can become. And the further we've stepped into the music world, we've also realized how young we are, doing what we're doing. That's a good feeling to have.

Best Left Magazine: Favorite songs you guys have released, why, and what was the thought process?

Six Foot Blonde: Callin' to Karma and Landgirl are two huge standouts for us. Both songs felt very serendipitous in how they were written, and are just really really fun songs to perform and dance to. Especially with Landgirl, Julia had written the melody, and Dom had written the verse completely separately. In the car on the way to one of our gigs in Cincinnati, Dom started to play a voice memo on his phone of the bassline and Julia's melody was the same rhythm, key, everything. That was a really cool moment!