Syracuse alumnus and lead vocalist of Florida-based rock band The Heavy Pets, Jeff Lloyd, shared details about their up-coming album and upcoming tour. The band will return to Syracuse this weekend for a show at Funk ’n Waffles.

The Daily Orange: How did The Heavy Pets come to be?

Jeff Lloyd: Actually we have roots at Syracuse University. I met the keyboardist in the band [Jim] when we were both freshmen there. We were both up on the Mount. Jim and I both played in the Syracuse Jazz band at the time. Jim knew Jamie and Tony, our bassist and drummer from growing up. Mike and I, the other guitar player, had started playing music when we were freshmen back in high school. He and I have continuously been in a band since then. We performed at a now defunct venue called the OPL.

DO: Are you guys excited to be back in Syracuse?

JL: It feels fantastic. I’m glad that it’s in this time of the year, November, then in like December or January. But you know, of course I miss it up there. I still have family up there and what not, but it just always feels so nostalgic and so awesome to just get back to the ‘Cuse. I love that school so much and even though its completely different people that are there when we were going to school there, there’s still kind of like camaraderie that you feel. Everybody has to deal with the Syracuse winter together. Everybody goes through that. That hasn’t changed, from year to year there. So, it’s always fun meeting new ‘Cuse students and seeing our old friends and family from up there.

DO: You’re playing a lot of venues in October and November. How has the tour been so far?

JL: We’ve been off the road for a little while now, which is nice. We did the Hulaween festival last weekend, then we had another show at Blues Traveler. The northeast portion of the tour starts Wednesday, and it takes us up all through the Northeast for a couple of weeks, and the December is gonna be like a nice month for us as well. We’re doing an annual “Toys for Tots” show that we do and this time we really stepped it up. We’re doing it at this big beautiful theatre down here in South Florida, in Delray beach, called the Crest Theatre. And, that’s kinda like our big project for December, which is just try to raise money for “Caring Kitchen,” raise a lot of toys for little kids that otherwise wouldn’t get them. So, that’s kind of the focus for December. We’re doing a nice New Year’s run, and then January we are announcing that we’re doing a full run up and down the West coast before doubling back to catch the Mid-West. So, we’re pretty much blanketing the nation from now until the end of February. Which is fun. It’s nice.

DO: Your last studio album was released a while back, any new material debuting soon?

JL: Yes, the last full length album we did was ways back. I think it was released in 2011. In the mean time we’ve released a handful of these short EP records, which is something, you know, financially we could afford to do, because we were producing this stuff. And also, time wise it takes a lot of time to make a full length record, and it just wasn’t something that we were super interested in doing for the last couple of years. But that itch just kinda came back. We love making records, and just going for that long format. We’re very happy to announce that we began recording in October for our new, self-produced full length record, which will our first self-produced full length since 2007, and our first full length since any kind since 2011. It’s been a really awesome process of doing it with our team. We have Mr. Michael McCleary from the band Surfer Blood is engineering the record for us and kind of assisting us in producing it. Really, it’s just the five of us making this record.

DO: Can you reveal the name of the album, or is it to be kept a secret until it’s release?

JL: It’s not that it’s a secret. We haven’t even decided on it yet. We’re still trying to figure out which songs are gonna make the final cut, but we’re a good chunk into this process now, and we’re very excited about it.

Published on November 10, 2016 at 10:56 am

Contact Malavika: mnrandiv@syr.edu