Header image credit: Sorena Dadgar
Jack Carmichael writes feel-good songs the way some folks hum or whistle: constantly and without much effort. As Jack the Songman, the Chapel Hill pianist has built a sound he calls sunshine funk rock, where yacht rock polish, funk bounce, and Ben Folds-style melody all blend together. Yet he didn’t start writing seriously for himself until a pandemic-era stretch alone in his bedroom, and he didn’t feel ready to put his own name on the marquee until 23.
His 2024 debut, Love Songs and Other Songs, features one subject – his high school sweetheart turned wife – but his latest project, Faces, Places and Warm Embraces, turns the camera outward. Written and released one song at a time, then stitched together from two EPs, it reads as a series of character sketches that add up to a portrait of Chapel Hill and the people who make it what it is. As he puts it, the title is hokey on purpose.
The effort culminated in Jack’s performance at Hopscotch’s Moore Square stage in September, his first chance to bring the full horn section together for an entire set. We talked shortly before that set, covering (among other things) why he can’t write a breakup song and how a pile of individual portraits became a record.
What have you been listening to lately? Anything new, or an old favorite that’s been sticking out?
Jack: I’ve really been loving a band from Florida called Katara; I got to play a show with them a couple of months ago. I didn’t realize until we booked it that my brother, who lives down in Florida, had played with them before, so they should’ve been on my radar already. They’re a harp jazz fusion group, groovy and cool, and I feel like I discovered them right before they blow up.
I’m also a big fan of a Dutch artist named Benny Sings. I’ve loved everything he’s done for a long time now, and he’s got a new album coming out next month that I’m excited about.
Locally, I’ve been digging the new Fake Jr. stuff. And I finally caught Lennon KC live in Hillsborough a couple nights ago. I don’t know what took me so long, but it was incredible, just a bananas performer. I was actually there for a friend’s anniversary; Jesse Fox and Lennon were both playing. Jesse’s been a friend of mine for a while, and his new album, Magnolia, is really good. He writes these earthy songs that just pierce straight through your soul.
Going back to when you were first getting into music, was there an artist you discovered on your own and obsessed over?
Jack: That’s a hard one, because I can’t really pinpoint a moment of “discovering” music. It was always just around. I was born to two musicians — my dad’s a high school band director, my mom’s an organist and choir director — so I was always singing in a choir or listening to whatever my dad was obsessing over. If I go all the way back, that’s the Beatles. My dad put Revolver on in the car when I was maybe five or six.
Fast forward to around 14, when I started finding stuff on my own through YouTube. That’s when I really fell for Two Door Cinema Club‘s first album [Tourist History]. That record opened my brain up. So much of what I was doing in my first band, in high school, was just me trying to emulate them, whether I realized it or not.
That band was called The Necks, out of Chapel Hill High School, and it was formative. After high school, I didn’t get back to seriously writing songs, which is basically my solo project now, until I was 23. It took a while to feel like I could be the name on the marquee. But getting to write songs and be bad at it in a safe, supportive place like the Chapel Hill High marching band community was a huge gift.
“Sunshine funk rock” is such a specific way to describe your sound. What drew you in that direction?
Jack: Honestly, I’m not sure. I just find myself writing feel-good songs over and over without trying that hard. When a song idea comes to me while I’m driving, singing in the shower, whatever, and I get to the piano to flesh it out, it just ends up being a happy groove thing.
I do listen to a lot of bands built around joy as their mission statement. Vulfpeck is probably my favorite band ever. I don’t think anything I do is as crisp or as funky as their stuff, but they were a huge influence on me, especially when I started writing during the pandemic. I quit my bartending job in 2020, was unemployed and stuck in my room with no one to make music with, and started writing just for myself. What came out was mostly happy-go-lucky. Some of those songs ended up on my first EP.
I’ve never had much of a muse for the standard heartbreak song. If I’d had more of that in my life, maybe I’d write sadder stuff. But I’ve got a lot of love songs, because I’m married to my high school sweetheart. The first song I ever wrote was for her, probably 13 or 14 years ago, and that’s kind of what I’ve kept doing. As far as the sound itself — the piano writing, how the vocal lines interact with it — I think it’s pretty clear I’m a big fan of Ben Folds and Michael McDonald.
Image credit: Adrian Douglas Gilliam
With this new record, if you had to point to one of those two — Folds or McDonald — who do you feel closer to?
Jack: There’s stuff on the new record that’s got a total Doobie Bounce happening — that yacht rock piano thing Michael McDonald did with the Doobie Brothers. If you listen to Jackson Browne or Robbie Dupree‘s “Steal Away”, you’ll hear a lot of that 80s yacht rock feel seep into this record.
I’ve been listening to a ton of Steely Dan, but also this newer band, Young Gun Silver Fox, that I’m totally in love with. They sound like they could’ve come straight out of the 70s doing that yacht rock thing with a horn section. Maybe it’s not the most original lane to be in during the 2020s, but it’s happy, and it’s what I found myself wanting to write.
When you compare this album to your first, is there one thing you wanted to do differently or that just ended up different?
Jack: I wanted a lot to be different. By the time I put out my first album in 2024, I’d been writing for a few years and wanted the songs to feel cohesive, so I tracked about a dozen songs almost all at once with my friend Cole Covington at his studio in Greensboro. Bandmates came in one at a time and spent a full day tracking. It took about a year. I liked how it turned out, but I felt like I lost the trees for the forest. Focusing on the whole album meant I didn’t get to zero in on individual songs.
With this one, I wanted to finish a song before moving to the next, and to put songs out one at a time without worrying about the full-album listening experience. What I found was that this batch turned out a lot more third-person. My first album, Love Songs and Other Songs, is basically all about one person. This time, without totally setting out to, I realized I was painting a picture of the town, the community — like I was recording the phone book, but it happened to be a little portrait of Chapel Hill.
I ended up with two EPs, Faces and Places, that fit together, plus a couple new songs, and it became one record: Faces, Places and Warm Embraces. Which is about as hokey a title as you can get, but it feels true to what I do by leaning into the cheese.
You’re playing Hopscotch in a few weeks. What’s that lead-up been like?
Jack: I’ve been dreaming of playing Hopscotch for a long time. It’s a festival that never loses sight of how special local music is. You get the national headliners, but you also get to hop between venues around Raleigh and discover people. Mellow Swells is playing Saturday, and I’m excited to catch them.
For my set, we’re trying to pack 45 minutes with the most fun stuff possible. It’ll be the first time I’ve played a full set with my whole horn section of trumpet, tenor sax, trombone with my friends Matt Wakeford, Jakob Bower, and Aiden Niemi, as well as my very talented brother, Robert Carmichael. Jake Cochran’s on bass, Eddie Burgard’s on drums, plus a couple of special guests: Eric Lee Hardt on guitar and Laura Ivy singing with the band.
I’m grateful to even be on that poster, and I’m actually opening the festival as the first act, 1 p.m. on a Thursday. Someone’s got to kick things off. Hopefully we set the tone and make it a party, because that’s what I’m there to do.
Any local or North Carolina artists you want to shout out before we wrap?
Jack: I’ve had the pleasure of playing with some great people who are also good friends, like Eric Lee Hardt, Laura Ivy, Chris Chism, who I love and hope to play with more soon. And I have to mention Johnny Sunrise; I’m bummed he’s not still here in the area, but happy for what’s ahead for him on the other coast.
Elora Dash is another old friend of mine doing very cool things right now, can’t wait to hear her new record. I’m also really loving Myka Lace and Sticky Maze’s duo sets. And if I’m not out of time, I’d love to shout out the other two bands I play with: Gaelic Áils [traditional Irish folk] and Pint Night [alt/indie rock]. Those folks are some of my favorite people in the world, and every show I get to play with them is an absolute blast.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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