By Rebecca Seung

Cy Barkley is the man to know in Nashville, TN. Fronting both Cy Barkley and the Way Outsiders and the hardcore punk band Slammers with Jamin Orrall from Jeff the Brotherhood, Mimi Galbriez from Heavy Cream, and Josh Shearon from Cannomen and Cy’s current band the Way Outsiders, he’s like the Kevin Bacon of the underground scene in Nashville—it probably only takes three moves to get to him. But then, it is a small town and a smaller scene, so it probably only takes six moves at most to get to anyone. Cy also lives with Nashville’s Dead founder Ben Todd and throws a few shows a month at their south side space Glenn Danzig’s House, recently hosting touring acts like Personal and the Pizzas, in addition to frequenting local favorites like Useless Eaters, Natural Child, and D. Watusi. And whenever he gets the pocket change for his self-produced label Baby Don’t, he releases 7”’s for up-and-coming bands like Bass Drum of Death. If you know no one else in Nashville, you need to know Cy Barkley.

But while Cy might seem like a Nashville native, he grew up in Franklin, TN, a smaller suburb of Nashville. “I hated it. It was nice enough, and I grew up, played in the trees, and had cows for neighbors. My parents wanted me to go to Catholic school, and I wouldn’t do it, so I went to this real liberal boarding school where you could just get away with whatever you wanted, to some degree.”

However, the proximity to Nashville paid off, and Cy started going to shows in the city. “This guy Matt Walker moved here when I was about 12 or 13 and started booking shows, started booking bands that are now Jeff the Brotherhood and stuff when they were 13 and put them on shows with really good bands. For about a year or two, it was really exciting to live here, especially at that age cause I got to see Municipal Waste, EPA, Tragedy, all these bands, but a lot of them in basements, at these really small venues.”

But talking to bandmate Josh Shearon, growing up in the city had its own obstacles. “Since I did grow up here, when I was younger, I was extremely bummed that it was this hick town. No one liked the music I liked, I didn’t know that many kids who skateboarded, and then, I got into hardcore and punk, and all of a sudden, I knew tons of people who liked the stuff I did. Who loved to skateboard, loved to smoke pot and drink beer. Hopefully that didn’t happen when I entered college cause that’s such a stereotypical thing. But that might have happened, it’s kind of cloudy right now. But at the age of 18, 19, I really fell in love with Nashville. For the longest, I wanted to move away, but now I definitely call it a home. It’s pretty awesome.”

As for Cy Barkley the band, it’s been a long road of starts and stops. After leaving Nashville to try his hand at some Boston hardcore, he came home to visit, started a side project with members of Jeff, Heavy Cream, and Natural Child, and before he knew it, that Southern charm won over, and he moved back home to try, try again. But as side projects go, the main bands got busy, and once again, Cy found himself bandless. “I got back home, and we played one more show, and then everyone in Natural Child got busy, and Jeff got busy, and we didn’t do anything, so I was really bummed out. For a couple months, I kept starting bands that just didn’t work, and then finally I just said, I’ll start my own band. Josh wasn’t originally in it, and it was this other guy David Stein that was going to play bass, and Cam was going to play drums. And it wasn’t going to necessarily sound like this band, but I wanted to play in a band with Cam and this guy David Stein. But David had to go to college, and Cam was going to Spain for four months, so I completely ruled it out and wound up with Josh and other people, and that went well. But Cam had always been in the back of my mind, but he was in Spain. Well, by the time he got back, his old band had started a new band Diarrhea Planet, or joined it or whatever, so he needed new guys, and I immediately scooped him up as quick as I could, just like a vanilla bean ice cream scoop and ate that right up.”

Ever since, Cy’s been raging all over Nashville and the Southeast, playing about as many shows as will let him on the bill, but before anyone knew them as their current incarnation, they still managed to debut at Next Big Nashville back in 2009.

“Well, when I was trying to start a band, one night, I grabbed this keyboard and started making this really dumb band. I wrote this song that was 15 minutes long, and I called it Battlestar Hooker Cy. And I wore a big costume, and I put it through a big amp so it was really loud. It wasn’t puny, and big bass and drums. It was electronic music kind of. I don’t know… It was just kind of dancey music, but I didn’t really know how to play keyboard. And it got really popular to some degree. And then they said, hey, we want you to play NBN, it’s this big show we have with Jeff and all this stuff. I said, alright, we’ll do it. I’ll do it, you know, I’m there. And then last minute, I was starting my band with Josh and Zack, and like two days before, I was like hey, I’m gonna do this different thing where I play guitar, and we just play the synths, so I basically just talked myself into a sold out show, and that was our first show.”

“And it was a really good spot, too. It was like third,” Josh added.

“We went off with a bang. You gotta think about things bro, before you get torn up.”

Now that the band’s had a few runs around the block, and with the new members contributing more to the song writing process so that it’s no longer just Cy Barkley but Cy Barkley and the Way Outsiders, they’re releasing a new record.

“We have a new EP coming out on Infinity Cat called Rock Together. It’s a song about our neighborhood, a song about huffing duster. I experimented with duster a little bit not too long ago. I figured out I won’t try it again. I’ve done it about three times. Listen to the song, you’ll learn all about my experience with duster. And this guy who got me to huff duster and what it did to me,” said Cy.

“At a dinner party,” Josh added.

“Yeah, at a dinner party. Well, a nice pot luck kind of thing. Someone whipped out a can of duster at one point, and the whole party, everyone, didn’t matter who you were, said, oh, I’ll try that, and was huffing duster and talking like a robot. So yeah, what other songs are on it? ‘S.O.S.’, it’s about lady luck. ‘Skin’, yeah, it’s more about lady luck.”

“B-sides, they’re for the ladies. A-sides for the men. B-sides for the ladies.”

“They’re both for the ladies.”

As for their Nashville base, the scene’s growing, and things are only looking up. “I think part of Nashville is that I love all the local bands. There are so many good local bands that I don’t really have to branch outside of Nashville for a new band playing that I like. Natural Child’s awesome. Heavy Cream rules. I can just go through the list of Infinity Cat records; they pretty much have it on a lock,” said Josh.

“Everyone keeps saying this is the new place to play. I get hit up daily with bands trying to play here. Too many, I can’t deal with it. So I don’t think it’s getting skipped over; I think it’s getting out of its bubble,” said Cy.

Josh added, “Yeah, I definitely agree. Finally people are starting to notice that Nashville has a lot to offer. But it’s not as big as the hype leads you to believe. It’s small. Everyone knows everyone else. But as long as the hot girls keep coming out to shows, we’ll keep playing them.”