A Chat with KJ Ward of The Backseat Lovers

August 13th, 2023

Photo: Sloane Johnson

Having a colorful background in music including his own solo music and working with multiple bands, KJ ward is a talented 23 year old multi-instrumentalist from Ogden, Utah. He’s previously played in bands such as The Wednesday People and with Sammy Brue. Fresh off a headline tour and Lollapalooza performance, he currently plays bass in the indie rock band The Backseat Lovers. Off the Record got to chat with KJ on an early Sunday over a cup of tea about his journey of joining the band after the release of their debut album, his bass line writing process and dealing with long periods of touring.

How did you meet The Backseat Lovers?

I met them through the music scene in Salt Lake [City].I think I met them at Kilby Court for the first time, which is funny. It's kind of  the hub in Salt Lake, that little venue. We were all playing shows together, when I played with Sammy Brue. There's multiple venues across Utah that the local bands kind of cycled through and we would open for each other and play shows together and just became friends with them after that.

At first you were just filling in for bass? Or following their previous bass player's departure, did they automatically want you to be part of the band?

It's kind of a funny story when I think about it. There was no indicator like ‘you're in the band’. I think maybe I practiced with them once and Josh [Harmon] had just moved into the house that would be the house that we all live together in the future (a couple weeks later).

Josh just moved into this house, we jammed and then he was like, ‘Hey we have a room available’. It was at the point where I was looking for a place to live, and move out of my parents' house. So I moved in not knowing if I was even gonna play in the band or not.

I just always played with them after that. We played a couple shows. We played a couple little local shows I remember after. And then shortly after that we did, in the fall we did our first tour.

It felt pretty natural because at the time Sammy was wanting to do some more solo stuff and wasn't wanting to play with the band as much. I was also looking to expand and collaborate with more artists. So it really just worked together seamlessly. Perfect timing.

The album When We Were Friends had already come out when you joined the band. How did you handle that and having to learn the music?

I was used to it because the other projects that I played in, that was kind of the case as well. I'd been in that position before where I was learning other people's parts. It's kind of an interesting place to be in as an artist because it's like, okay, you wanna be able to express yourself, but somebody else wrote this part. You have to find a balance to make it your own and make it you, but also fulfilling and recognizing that somebody else put their time and effort into writing this part too.

The Backseat Lovers: Joshua Harmon, Juice Welch, Jonas Swanson and KJ Ward

Photo: Sloane Johnson

Did you have to listen by ear to learn the bass line?

It was all listening by ear. I remember they would just send me the recordings and be like, all right, learn this. When you're transcribing by ear you probably play it differently because everyone's brain works differently. So it still felt fun and creative and new and fresh.

It was a new sound. And I also really respected all of them as musicians. So I knew the parts were really solid and I was already a fan of the way the music was composed.

Is that not insane though, that you can do that?

It's definitely a skill. I'll hear some songs and I'm like, I can’t transcribe that, that's too much for my ear, but I feel anyone could do it, you know, it just takes time and effort and intense focus.

So ‘Heavy’ was the first song you actually wrote with them.

Yeah. Heavy was the first song that I got to write the [bass] part for and be in the studio and really help bring it to life.

Do you ever feel pressure with writing bass lines since you don’t have anyone else to fall back on?

To give some insight into playing the bass for me, it's always such a foundational role. The biggest thing for me when I'm playing the bass is the feeling. I started out songwriting, so I'm always listening to the lyrics and the emotion that's trying to be portrayed. And that's my goal to listen to the emotion of the song and form my bass line around that. I think less melodically and more about the emotion and feeling behind.

Do you get the lyrics and the guitar part first and then you  write the bass line? Or is there ever maybe you having a bass line first and then the rest of the band comes in?

There's so many different methods at this point, which is really fun and exciting. There is the method where Josh and Jonas [Swanson] will bring a half or fully finished song to the table, and we will write our parts around that. Or they'll have some ideas for parts and we'll expand upon that. More recently,we've been creating a more jam format.

So I'll start out with a bass line and then Josh will add some guitar on that, then Juice [Welch] will lay down a drum beat and then it just expands. And then we're just fully in the moment creating, and hopefully somebody has their phone recording so we can listen back and remember what we did. I think that's partly because we're just on the road sound checking, we get an hour and we end up just jamming.

We have a lot of songs stemming from the jam format and that feels really exciting and fun because it's spontaneous and it's a very present way of writing, So we'll take the seed of that jam or a part section and then we'll just expand upon that.

I was  looking at all the tours you guys have done since 2020. It seems  the most time you've ever had off is two months at a time.  How are you guys handling that?

Definitely a little tired. I've gotten to the point where I'm like, it’s okay to be tired. We've been going full force for a long time. It's a lot of fun. But it's also, being away from home and just traveling in general, going to different time zones and we have to get on that stage, whether we're healthy or sick or sad or whatever it is,and we're gonna give it our all. That's just kind of how we roll and that's really important to us. And that could be exhausting…but I am very grateful.

There's been so much growth that has happened in that time of touring, but I'm also very excited to have some downtime and relax a little bit and settle in and kind of move into a new chapter. It feels like the timing's perfect.

What is your favorite song right now?

There is a band that we played with in Europe called Wunderhorse. And there's a song called ‘Leader of the Pack’. I think they're probably gonna be one of my top artists this year.

Favorite show on this past tour?

There were so many good shows, the first one that comes to mind is the Stone Pony Summer Stage. We did a popup before that show, which was really cool. 

We played and it was a full moon and the moon was coming up mid set and it was huge. It was a super moon and I felt something, some magic in the air that night. 

Favorite song to play Live? 

I think  my top two are  ‘Slowing Down’ and ‘Maple Syrup’ mostly because we added  this little outro that I've been loving to play. I feel with the older songs, the intros and the outros are what make it for me.

End of interview.

While KJ and The Backseat Lover’s will most likely be taking a deserved break to rest and write more music, be sure to stream their latest album Waiting to Spill here.

To wrap up the tour, the group will be performing at Endless Sunshine festival on September 8th in Denver, CO and will be supporting a local organization called The Gathering Place, which offers services to women, transgender folx and children facing poverty and homelessness. Tickets can be found here.