Photos by Connor Pratt and Julia Rusyniak
“I made a goal for myself to listen to a new album every single day this year,” says Brian Healey. “I did 429.”
An unusual mission for a guy in his early 20s—even one who’s a music enthusiast. After all, music demagogues have been debating for years whether albums are a dying art due to the ubiquitous rise of streaming services. Regardless of whether or not albums are on their way out completely, their decline is undeniable, leading many aspiring musical artists to focus on putting out singles and EPs before they even think about making whole records.
But somewhat throwback methods are perhaps what distinguishes Six Foot Blonde—the indie band drummer Healey composes with vocalist Julia Rusyniak, bassist and vocalist Dom Heyob, keyboardist John Alex Rusyniak, and guitarists Elliott Obermaier and Zach Patrick—from other bands of their generation. Not only do the ambitious young artists have an unusual reverence for the album format, releasing their first, Ask Me How I Am, this past August, but they also place exceptional emphasis on delivering fun and frequent live performances, another seeming casualty of the age (it’s no secret that small-time venues, too, struggle to compete with streaming and YouTube, among other obstacles). They do this in spite of the fact that their band is less than four years old, and some of them are, amazingly, still in college.
The ease with which Six Foot Blonde gets in front of a crowd and drums up hype while performing a fun set of exciting covers (attendees of their shows can expect anything from “What’s Up?” by 4 Non Blondes to the Ghostbusters theme song) and original songs makes it no surprise that this is where they got their start—as, essentially, a college jam band. Their presence on stage is both well-oiled and magnetic. But their comfort with each other, their impressive musicianship, their smartly curated selection of songs, and their ability to get their audience pumped—not to mention frontwoman Rusyniak’s impeccably powerful, standout vocals—push them a step beyond and make them a rare mix, especially considering their size and their youth. Theirs is a remarkable, spark-that-started-the-universe connection, a right people, right place, right time kind of story.
They first met at an IU Bloomington music club founded by Obermaier, who plays slide guitar, as “a kind of pickup basketball for musicians in the area,” says Heyob. Initially made up of a hodgepodge of random musicians and vocalists just there to have a good time, they at first didn’t have any aims to go big or go professional. “We started doing covers originally. We were just really wanting to put music out there because Covid had us craving live music,” explains Rusyniak, who graduates from IU this month.
Photo by Gail Scoggins
But things evolved quickly. “We would get gigs either through the university or through local house show venues. It started out super DIY with people just meeting in each other’s backyards jamming,” says Heyob. “And then getting together these little groups that would rehearse a number of times before shows and then go play these little shows around. … So [it was] very communal, very organized around the participation of its members.”
After getting a few years under its belt and a few personnel changes, Six Foot Blonde gelled into what it is today. But its members haven’t lost their sense of connection and fun. In fact, those are the elements that made them realize they had something special they wanted to keep pursuing.
And those elements go hand-in-hand with their retro vibe, from their playful visual aesthetic (warm, whimsical pops of cerulean, pink, and orange make frequent appearances in their artwork, mostly designed by Rusyniak, an art major), to the eclectic influences in their original music, to the aforementioned full-length album and feverish schedule of live shows.
Requesting listeners to take a chance on a full album or a live show is a highly intimate and personal ask, requiring you to invest not only your time but also your trust in a group’s ability to deliver a good, meaningful experience. In that sense, following Six Foot Blonde’s development feels the way following your favorite local band used to feel decades ago, their engaging approach drawing you in like an interest-piquing poster in a record store window. It takes you back to a time anyone over the age of 35 remembers when you could pop into the shop to discover the musicians behind the poster, getting lost for hours perusing their catalog while hogging a listening station. This band is well worth the investment.
The debut album, Ask Me How I Am, available on Spotify, is dreamy, nostalgic, self-reflective, and a little bit sad and bittersweet, softly tilting from coolheaded, ’90s-inflected indie pop-rock, to something a bit jazzier and more up-tempo, to atmospheric and folksy—at times all in one song—giving it an overall gauzy, easily flowing vibe that feels like it’s over too soon. “Hard Feelings!” emerges a little more aggressive in both lyrics and tone, but it’s still rather chill and funky, while “Refuge,” a country-adjacent melody that makes you want to lay in a field of flowers in a maxi peasant dress and cry, is just damn pretty. Heartrendingly so. The urgent, gently angsty “Miss America,” which slowly builds toward greater intensity as it reaches its denouement and gorgeously demonstrates Rusyniak’s range and ability to belt, is a favorite. But if any one track is representative of the album as a whole, it may be “Landgirl,” a fun-to-dance-to little bop that captures both the softness and the elation of the band’s homegrown flair.
Six Foot Blonde brings that flair to the Hi-Fi on Saturday, December 28, in a special holiday spectacular that will range from their original music to covers that celebrate the season. They will go on to perform several more Midwestern gigs in early 2025, including one at The Bluebird in Bloomington on March 1, before heading to a series of shows in Colorado.
End-of-the-year recap time! Here are the top albums some of the members of Six Foot Blonde listened to in 2024:
Healey: Marmalade, Phoebe Go. “My top song was ‘Something You Were Trying’ off that record. It’s just a beautiful song composed really, really well. The instrumentation and vocals just make me feel some kind of way, and I love it.”
Heyob: atrás/além, O Terno. “It was kind of the soundtrack of my winter last year through my spring into my summer. [O Terno is] really great, really calm indie rock music. I’m a big believer in listening to music to calm me.”
Rusyniak: Say I Am You, The Weepies. “Whenever I have a hard day, I put it on. It’s got such beautiful imagery.” The Rise and Fall of A Midwest Princess, Chappell Roan. “That’s my good mood album.” Empathogen, Willow. “It’s one I’ve been listening to nonstop.”
