Tory Silver and her band don’t play together often, but when they do, there’s a noticeable chemistry. The electricity is palpable as the band plays in the video for “Why Oh Why,” Silver’s newest single. The video features bassist Daniel Soghomonian and drummer Vernon West earnestly leaning into each note, while Silver nods along, smiling, wielding her guitar like a weapon.
She first picked a guitar up as a child attending the School of Rock summer camp, with an ambition to play the drums, only to receive a guitar after a misunderstanding from the staff. She thought about leaving the class but decided to stick with it—she went on to take lessons and has been playing ever since.
“You never know how something’s going to affect you,” Silver said. “Don’t judge something right away, it could be something you really love to do, which is how music came to be for me.”
The guitar on “Why Oh Why” is bluesy and subdued, ushered along by crash cymbal and an insistent drum beat; Silver cites The Black Keys as a source of inspiration for the song. Silver recorded the video at The Bridge, a recording studio in Cambridge in the same building that used to house the Fort Apache Studio, which has played host to some of Boston’s most recognized acts, like The Pixies and Buffalo Tom.
“I was really feeling it. It has a lot of new elements I want to bring out in my songwriting—like a blues sound,” Silver said. “And I really liked where [‘Why Oh Why’] was leading to so I thought it was worth recording.” She added that she felt the song had a lot of raw energy to it that she sought to capture in the video. And it’s no different from a regular performance, really. “There are eyes watching the thing either way, it felt similar,” she said.
“Why Oh Why” is about unshared interest in other people, according to Silver. This is felt through the lyrics—“Who am I kidding?/Most of my words are for nothing/Am I wasting my time?/Does it mean anything to you?”—as well as the shifting direction of the melody, which creates a sonic tension throughout the piece.
The song meanders instrumentally; the guitar adds layers of intricate chords, then changes tempo and key suddenly, while the bass takes the lead at certain parts, plunking out a measured melody. The drums become more spontaneously struck, as West plays ahead with abandon. Towards the end of the song, the trio dives into an instrumental break, with Silver strumming rapid-fire and Soghomonian clutching his bass so close to his body as if the instrument is a part of him. It’s the cathartic release of energy “Why Oh Why” has been building to the entire time.
“It goes a little all over the place, there’s not one specific direction,” Silver said. “The end is a lot different from the beginning. I like it when songs go different places and sound kind of messy but still have one specific goal in mind.”
This is indicative of her songwriting process, which she said she approaches in search of a feeling for each song to embody. She puts together sets of chords like puzzle pieces, building a canvas for each song to grow out of. Silver mentioned The Kinks and The Beatles as groups she enjoys listening to and, in an effort to emulate the simplicity of their sound, she said she doesn’t like adding too many extra sounds to her music.
Describing her sound without genre names, Silver said her music sounds “like driving down a long highway, thinking. It’s a good sound to just sit and think to.” Sigur Ros is one of her favorite artists to listen to on long drives due to their big, unique sound, which is something she hopes her music can achieve.
You can see Silver and her guitar at Club Passim tonight and watch the video for “Why Oh Why,” due out on 1/31, below.