It all began in 2013 in the CU Boulder dorms when roommates JD Rodgers and Evan DePuy wrote a song called “Long Distance Paranoid Blues.”
The friends enlisted the help of two guitarists to give the song the boost it needed and had it professionally recorded. And Intergalactic Peace Jelly was born.
“Intergalactic Peace Jelly took the stage for the first time ever on February 27th, 2014 at 9pm to a crowd of about 35 of their closest friends. Their time slot was only 30 minutes, but it was a raging 30 minutes—and that was about the length of all the material they had ready anyway. They played “Long Distance Paranoid Blues,” “Bird,” and the new original “Study Drugs;” as well as covers of Martin Sexton’s “Can’t Stop Thinkin’ ‘Bout You,” and The Beatles’ “Come Together.” A few weeks later, they were back in the studio—with Andy in tow—for what would turn out to be the final time with the acoustic lineup.”
Read more on the history of Intergalactic Peace Jelly.
Interview with J.D. Rodgers of Intergalactic Peace Jelly
Q: What is Intergalactic Peace Jelly?
A: We are a Guitar Rock band that started in 2013. We’ve had a bunch of people come through the lineup, but mostly I’d say its Andrew Schuster and I’s baby if you will.
Q: What are your inspirations?
A: My big three are Phish, Pink Floyd and Bob Dylan. That’s pretty much the trifecta right there.
Schuster is way into Rock n Rolly Rock n Roll. Like AC/DC or bands that sing about how they are playing Rock n Roll.
Q: How has your sound evolved?
A: When we first started it was essentially just me writing the songs. I went to Schuster with these songs and together we recorded some tracks. Eventually, Schuster started writing more too. His style is more compositionally focused while I am more focused on the lyrics. Schuster lately has been writing a lot and he has been taking on more vocal duties and I have been taking on more guitar duties. As opposed to the past where I was the lead singer and he was the lead guitarist, we both kind of split both of those roles at this point. I guess overall of the general direction of the music has gotten more complicated. Our songs have many more parts than they used to. Although I still every-now and again write songs that are easy and quick.
Q: Future plans?
A: Right now, our main focus is this album we have been promising for a few years that we are finally finishing. We started to figure out how to record at home and mix and everything. We are also working on a live album with some songs from our Camera Jams session. From there we are thinking we can gear up and plan shows again in May or so. We are not in too big of a hurry because we also want to write some new stuff, you know, we have plenty to do until then.
The Intergalactic Peace Jelly Photoshoot
