Of Gentlemen & Cowards are not of Montreal but close — eastern Canada around Toronto, a swinging Toronto suburb called Hamilton on the shore of Lake Ontario. There this quartet of nice guys met as undergraduates and formed a rock ‘n roll band. Then they did what any sensible Canadian band would do during lake effect snow season. Book a six month gig aboard a cruise ship touring the Caribbean.

Brilliant, right? Not so much. It ended with holding cells and fingerprints. They got deported back up north, and then came the breakups.

Fortunately this kind of stuff makes excellent source material. The drama fueled the songwriting and soul for vocalist Simon Edwards which the band channeled into a debut record. Edwards tells us the whole story of how Modern Jukebox came together when things were falling apart. Bandmate Joshua Dawson provides support here as any good bassist would.

Hometown: Hamilton, Ontario

Homebase: Toronto, Ontario

Did you guys know each other before starting the band?

Simon: Jake [Warren, drums] and I played in a previous band together, having met in high school. Just after our first year of university we were looking for a guitarist and bassist for a new musical project, and immediately joined up with Christian [Fedele, guitar], who was a really good friend. We held auditions for a bassist, and Josh was added to the band’s lineup just a few months later.

What sparked your interest in playing music?

Simon: I grew up in a pretty unique household, with my mum fully deaf, and my father also slightly hard of hearing. It essentially lead to me growing up with relatively zero musical knowledge beyond ‘90s pop radio until getting to university, where all at once, I was exposed to the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Eagles, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd… In terms of musicianship, I had been singing all my life, but began meddling around with my sister’s guitar and our piano, which no one in my house played, around the age of 13 or 14. My chops developed to a totally different level when I began playing in Of Gentlemen & Cowards.

How about local bands? Was the Hamilton scene happening?

Simon: We’ve always drawn a lot of influence from our fellow Canadian and Hamiltonian bands, such as The Tragically Hip, Sam Roberts, Arkells...

Joshua: ...Teenage Head, Junkhouse, The Killjoys, Monster Truck… Southern Ontario in general has produced great talent, and our music has definitely been influenced by all these bands we listened to growing up. The general culture of the city, and lots of venues to take in new music--it’s a great incubator for local talent. There's room for a lot of different styles.

I always think of Rush when someone says Ontario. What bands do you name when describing your own sound?

Simon: Just last week an Italian blog posted that, “If you like Kings of Leon and Band of Horses, this band’s for you!” We’ll take that any day, we’re fans of both of those bands.

I can dig it. You guys share that old-timey vibe in your band name.

Simon: Christian’s always been interested in historical events. While reading a book about the Titanic, he read a story of a man who paid a lifeboat to leave when it was only halfway full. During the investigation later on, this event came to light, and he was brought to court. After all the evidence was put forward, the judge called this man to the front of the courtroom, and asked, “Did you act as a gentlemen? Or a coward?” From that, we got our name Of Gentlemen and Cowards.

Besides Billy Zane, who is in your dream collaboration project?

Simon: There’s tons of artists on our wishlist, but if we had to pick just one person to collaborate with, we’d choose to write a song or record with Max Martin. That guy’s written over 20 Billboard #1s and is a creative mind we’d love to bounce ideas off of. Not to mention, he helped write Taylor Swift’s 1989!

A sense of the classics is important. What do you do when you’re not playing in the band?

Josh: We’re all music fans first and foremost, and find ourselves going to concerts pretty often. We have also been know to get into a heated game of Settlers of Catan or two. We have stopped playing before shows because it was getting too competitive.

Is that what happened on the cruise ship?

Simon: In March 2014 we signed a six-and-a-half-month contract with a cruise line. Nine days after signing they flew us down to Miami and we boarded the boat and played 42 sets over two weeks. The music director then called us up to his office and told us we were fired. The cruise line had meant to hire a jazz band.

Yikes. I’m guessing you didn’t have a Real Book with you. Then what?

We were taken off the boat, put in a holding room under supervision, and then had two armed TSA agents lead us through the airport-- fingerprinting us and everything--deporting us back to Canada. One of the guys doing the fingerprinting asked if we were a metal band…

Yeah, the TSA hates metal and liquids.  How'd that mess turn into Modern Jukebox? What else is the record about?

Simon: Early on, we knew that we wanted to write the album that we were missing from our record collections. One that fit in with other favorites, and that we wanted to listen to when we were driving. While writing after the cruise ship, we found that each of the various genres we’d been playing on the boat were finding their way into our writing, and that each song sounded just a tiny bit different than the previous one. The album name ultimately came from our relationship with the record, as a curated playlist, or a Modern Jukebox. With regards to lyrical themes, most was drawn from what was going on at the time--not only with us, but other people around us--breakups, new relationships, changes in politics, changes in the music industry, that kind of stuff.

If you were a hashtag, what would you be?

Simon: #Theonlythingwecruiseanymoreisradiowaves

More characters than a George R.R. Martin epic. About writing your first song, what do you remember about it?

Simon: The first song I ever wrote was called "The Difference," and it was a terrible song about changing the world. Cut me some slack, I think I was 14? 

If Michael gets a pass for “Heal The World" you're all good. Did you have a Myspace account back in the day?

Josh: Actually, yes, when I was auditioning for this band, Simon sent me a link to the first couple songs they had written. The link was their Myspace account and so I actually practiced for the audition playing along to their Myspace recordings.

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