ty champion detroit punk’s “hell yeah” moment

On an overcast Friday night in Hamtramck, I pull into a parking lot next to Plav Post 10 and get a really good spot. The reason the spot is so good is because I’m not allowed to park here and the reason I know I’m not allowed to park here is the three members of Detroit rock trio TY (pronounced tee why, despite the name being inspired by Beanie Babies) very politely pointing out the “unauthorized vehicles will be towed” sign, before telling me where to move my car to. They’re coincidentally parked right next to me to unload their gear. “Thanks. I’m about to interview you, by the way,” I say, and we all have an awkward chuckle. This awkwardness doesn’t last a minute once we’re inside and it becomes immediately clear to me that these guys are cool as hell. 

We grab drinks from the bar and head upstairs to a mostly empty, wood-floored room with a stage. Strangely, there are two rope light palm trees that the band will later move. Less strangely, given the setting, there is also a gigantic painting of ’60s pop idol Bobby “The Polish Prince” Vinton, signed by the man himself. Lastly, there is a round card table in the back of the room with two boxes on it—one with fifty or so free pins (that many of the people who show up will be wearing by the time TY takes the stage)—the other with the precious few remaining tapes of their debut WE R TY, which has sold out on Bandcamp for the second time. All of this, combined with the smell of the fish fry happening below, give this place the vibe of a tropical Polish church. 

They all sit down before the show to discuss a wide variety of subjects, including the similarities between Gene Hackman’s tragic death and the David Boreanas-starring forensic archaeology/crime vehicle Bones. In the final moment of the conversation, Jay Kill jokes about saving up to buy a Cyber Truck and Blic wishes a certain unpublishable something would happen to a certain Tesla CEO. While waxing on egg punk, hot rods, and local Nazi biker bars, laughter seems to dominate the conversation. The word “fun” comes up a few times and I try not to roll my eyes, knowing it’s the type of thing you’re supposed to say when you’re being interviewed, but it quickly becomes clear they aren’t bullshitting. 

Following the interview, photographer Doug Coombe sets up a light stand and the band jokes about how much more official the shoot is than they expected it to be. They successfully extract every ounce of humor from the near-empty room. They stand, hands on hearts, in front of the Bobby Vinton painting in a touching tribute. They silently do rock poses onstage—a sort of alien impression of themselves. Not even the comically small men’s room is safe.

The other bands (Cheddar and Mènage Dètroit, both excellent) and concertgoers show up and I notice the guys from TY are running the door for their own show—presumably because they don’t want to burden any of their friends with the thankless task. From the moment I meet them, up to and including their set, these guys are constantly laughing and having a good time. Blic finally begins their set: “Yo, we’re the Doormen.” These guys are certified fun-havers. 

The members of TY are referred to here not by their actual human names but rather their punk names. Punk names are better. We begin with introductions.

Blic: I’m Blic, I play bass and sing… or yell or scream.

Jay Kill: I’m Jay Kill, I play guitar.

Beej: Beej. I play drums. And I record stuff.

Jay Kill: And have fun.

Beej: That too.

Blic, you don’t have fun?

Blic: Not me.

Jay Kill: No, just us, we have fun. [everyone laughs]

Jay Kill and Beej, you two are in Fen Fen, and that’s ongoing, and Blic you’re not in Fen Fen. What made you guys decide to start doing this TY project instead of the Fen Fen thing? 

Blic: TY’s been a band since 2019, probably. It started out as an indie rock, classic rock, punk thing that was just an amalgamation of music between me and two other friends. And then the pandemic happened, I don’t have those friends anymore, and I liked the name of the band. Just kept the name, basically, and started writing new music. Jay Kill came to me and was like “you ever heard of egg punk” and I was like “no,” so we started listening to it and I thought this is sick, makes me want to make music. Not that we’re particularly eggy, but “Murder Bank” is.

There’s a couple tracks for sure.

Blic: There’s a couple tracks, yeah. “Choked Up.” Jay Kill and I were friends for a while. He played in TY when we tried to revive it as what it was before.

Did you do shows then with TY? 

Blic: Yeah. We played Loving Touch for this Old Soul Vintage thing. It was pretty cool. It was definitely a more CCR rock that I was going for, I guess. Then it just evolved to this. We wrote pretty much half of the album in the first two months of 2024, then more music just kept pouring out of us. We had another drummer for a second, but then we had Beej join the band.

Beej: I was gonna play synth originally, I practiced once on synth. Then I was showing them some demos of some stuff that I was recording at home, which I played all the instruments on and they were like…

Jay Kill: Damn, that’s the drums that we want!

The Detroit scene right now is so fuckin’ good. There’s so many good bands, but it’s both the quality of the music and the community. You go to a show and there’s like three other bands there—good bands. Between Fen Fen and TY, where do you guys feel like you fit in the Detroit punk scene right now?

Beej: I think we just fit in, yeah, with all the bands.

Jay Kill: There’s a lot of bands that just sound really different. There’s not a scene of like “here’s the garage punk bands that all sound like the Spits,” everybody has their own thing that they’re going for. So we just fit in with everybody. I feel like everybody’s friends. 

Beej: Yeah, the musicians keep the scene alive. Pretty much, if the musicians don’t come out to your shows, your show’s gonna be bad. [everyone laughs] It’s literally like 50% or more musicians at the shows. And that’s how it’s been since I moved here.

Jay Kill: It’d be kinda cool if it was more people that just wanted to go to shows, but it just seems like the people that want to go to shows are playing the shows. [laughs]

A couple weeks ago, me and my dad were seeing COFFER and it was like OK, there’s 208 and there’s Day Residue. It was like the beginning of a Scorsese movie, people kept walking in.

Jay Kill: Will from COFFER is my roomate.

Were any of you in the Stools, too? 

Jay Kill: No, Will still is.

And Chuck from Painters Tapes.

Beej: Yeah, Chuck is. He’s about to walk in that door with a PA.

Jay Kill: If it weren’t for Chuck this show wouldn’t be happening; we wouldn't have a PA. [laughs]

You mentioned garage rock, too. Blic, you said you originally sounded more like CCR then sort of did the egg punk switch. Was there a conscious decision to continue the Detroit garage rock thing, or did it just happen organically? 

Blic: I just don’t think I’m a very good technical musician, so when I wanna play guitar it just comes out garage rock ‘cause I just wanna play fast and chuggy. I don’t know. I literally play the E shape and the A shape all up and down the neck and that’s how I write every song. Nothing changes. I don’t play a minor chord. We have a seventh chord in one. Major 7.

I’ll be on the lookout for that.

Jay Kill: We’ve been exposed. [everyone laughs]

Beej: The song’s not out yet. [Ed. note: It’s out.] 

When you guys put out “Devil Tattoo,” was it like, “This project is the real deal thing?”

Jay Kill: I don’t even know if it is the real deal thing. [laughs] We’re just playin’ for fun, really.

Blic: Yeah. I mean, we’re hoping it pops off. We were excited that Tremendo Garaje wanted to put the video out.

Jay Kill: It was cool because he was really stoked about it too. He put it out and he was messaging us still.

It seems like every single person who watches the video or listens to the song is like, “Holy shit, these guys fuckin’ rock.”

Beej: It’s a very “hell yeah” song.

Blic: It has been cool that we’ve only received positivity. I’m ready for the negative.

Beej: My favorite was, what was that YouTube comment? “ZZ Top, minus the beards, but if they wrote better music?” [everyone laughs]

On “Ride My Bike” there’s a little evil laugh and it made me think that song was about the devil on the bike in the devil tattoo. 

Blic: [everyone laughs] “Ride My Bike” was written way before.

He’s talking about burning the world and he does an evil laugh, and I’m like “he’s on his bike, that’s the devil guy!”

Blic: [laughs] Yeah, Satan lives inside of me for sure. I hope.

Beej: I really wanted to do a couple tape tricks on the record, so we did a half speed on one of the laughs so it was really low and then I sped the other one up. So there’s like a vocal harmony that’s really high on that song, that’s just Blic but sped up.

Did you get the devil tattoo for the song or did you have it already? 

Blic: No, I got that tattoo from my friend Jane and I went home and I was so stoked on it and I just wrote a song about it. I think I already had the riff and I was like, “Wait that kinda goes together, that’s cool.”

You said the buzz around this was all positive, so is that what you guys are used to in other projects or is this pretty unique? 

Jay Kill: I feel like people in the scene are mostly positive. People aren’t gonna say “you suck,” you just might not get any feedback. Fen Fen’s gotten some negative comments, but nothing serious. Nobody’s writing bad reviews or anything like that.

Beej: There was one on the video for “Kill Your Parents” that was like “I could leave this.”

Jay Kill: “Not for me.”

Beej: “Not for me,” yeah!

RT: Whose bike is that in the “Devil Tattoo” video? 

Beej: That’s my bike.

RT: So is the motorcycle stuff from you or is everyone just into motorcycles?

Blic: “Ride My Bike” is about riding my bicycle. I love riding bikes. I ride my bicycle so much during the summer, spring, and fall. I’m like a fiend. So that’s where the lyrics came from.

Beej: Is “Devil Tattoo” the one with the motorcycle lyrics? 

Blic: That’s just ‘cause he’s riding a motorcycle.

Beej: I think “Hot Rod Baby” has a motorcycle/car mix.

Jay Kill: There’s like some car noises, but there’s no motorcycle lyrics. Beej is the biker, though.

Through and through? 

Beej: I mean, I’m not like a real [biker guy voice] brother, but I work on my bike in the summer, it’s fun.

There’s a nazi biker bar down the street from my house.

Jay Kill: The fourth reich?!?

Yeah!

Blic: It’s unfortunate, because there’s such a good used video game store right across the street.

This might not make it in, I’m scared of those guys.

Jay Kill: I’m not scared of ‘em… I don’t think the regular average person even knows what the fourth reich is.

The SS on the side of the building!

Jay Kill: The SS people just associate with biker culture, so I don’t even think people know where that comes from. That’s nazi shit right there… We gotta make some anti-FRMC stickers and start putting ‘em up.

Blic: I wish that grenades were easier to get. [everyone laughs]