Review Fix Exclusive: Town Meeting’s Tim Cackett Talks ‘West of Seattle’ And More

Review Fix chats with Town Meeting’s Tim Cackett, who discusses the band’s single, “West of Seattle,” as well as their goals for the future. A cross between Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young and The Lumineers, they’ve got a unique and full sound.

Review Fix: How’d you get involved in music?

Tim Cackett: I guess we’d all have different answers to that question. Dean has been playing music since the 60s with guys like Jonathan Edwards and Tom Rush. Tim used to be in a hardcore band before he started doing solo acoustic shows. Russ, Brendan and I (The Brothers) would get together and make up songs and never really do anything with them. Then, at some point, we just decided to start recording them and playing them at open mics and stuff like that.

Review Fix: Who influences your sound the most?

Cackett: That’s a tricky one. We’ve all got such different musical backgrounds so there’s a variety of musicians who inspire us in the writing process. I’d say Dawes is a big one for me. Neil Young, too. Shovels and Rope, The Avett Brothers, Jason Isbell. There’s a bunch, really.

Review Fix: What’s your creative process like?

Cackett: Usually one of us will have an idea – either a melody or lyrics or both – and will send it to a group text. iPhone’s have been pretty helpful in that regard. Someone will get inspired and add to it or modify. Then we’ll get together and play with it as a band. It’s a real collaborative thing, at least it has been lately. It’s nice.

Review Fix: What makes your new single special?

Cackett: Our single – West of Seattle – was written a day before we went in to record it. We had gotten together for one last rehearsal before we went into the studio, and as we were tuning the song just kind of fell into our laps. It was a pretty awesome experience. It’s a song about loss and regret, but also a hint of hope. It’s a real bittersweet tune.

Review Fix: How would you describe your sound to someone who’s never heard you before?

Cackett: I’m not really sure. Maybe something like… A perfect blend of the old and the new. Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young meets The Lumineers. Harmony driven Americana with a little country twist.

Review Fix: Bottom line, why should someone buy it?

Cackett: Because we don’t beat around the bush. We write songs that we would listen to ourselves. We want our listeners to feel. To smile. To ache a little. We try to do that with all of our songs.

Review Fix: What are your goals for the rest of the year?

Cackett: We’ve got a busy summer – playing all over New England. We hope to get back to Nashville this year and New York and maybe a few places we haven’t been before. Geography part two will be out in September/October. Oh and we have a podcast we do! You can listen at Patreon.com/townmeeting

Review Fix: What do you feel you have to do to make your dreams in music come true?

Cackett: Just keep at it, really. Keep writing. Keep playing. Keep our fans engaged. I think a lot of the success you achieve in this industry comes from just being in the right place at the right time. So we’re trying to be in as many of the right places as we can.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Cackett: Conan, hopefully. Or SNL. Either one would be cool.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13819 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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