Meet Will Hayden of Television Generation in Northglenn

Today we’d like to introduce you to Will Hayden.

Will, before we jump into specific questions, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I grew up La Junta CO and was introduced to the Beatles at an early age. In high school I played bass in a band, we built a studio on our drummers’ farm and called it Barnhouse records. After high school, I left for Boulder to ‘go to school’ (aka start a band in a place that isn’t primarily occupied by cows). I met my drummer, Ants, in a poetry class there and our future bassist, Katy, at a party. He wrote a poem about pigeons taking their revenge and looked like he played an instrument, so that was enough for me.

After college we all moved closer to Denver—Boulder didn’t really have a rock scene. We fell in with the guys at Swinging Noose Productions who booked some of our first ‘real’ shows, helping us meet more people in the scene and build a fan base.

We sucked for a long time (maybe we still do, I dunno) and DIY’d our recordings. Eventually, a producer found us, he kinda whipped us into shape. Our first real EP, ‘Fuchsia’ came about after we ended up at Silo Sound. Todd kicked our ass recording that EP. He has a saying, “no one leaves here a worse musician”. That record started getting us some attention, which was cool. Since then we’ve done another EP there called ‘Peel’, and we have a full length coming out called soon called ‘Cassum’.

In my downtime, I’ve been kinda collaborating with some other bands. We wrote a song with Tammy of Dressy Bessy, and I’m currently working with Mr. Atomic on their new EP. Other than that I like photographing bands and making music videos. It’s a pretty cool scene.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Nothing’s ever smooth. The road was bumpy, twists and turns. After college the band kinda imploded and we went through a few years of trying to rebuild. We all struggled trying to stay financially afloat while still playing music. As an audiophile DIY recordings weren’t cutting it and going to studios broke and rebuilt our spirits. Our tours have gone suspiciously smooth, though. Every record is a new challenge to become a better band and write better songs.

Can you give our readers some background on your music?
I write and sing the majority of the songs. Catchy melodies is something I’m pretty good at. I’m not the best guitar player but I can play my songs, so that’s all you really need. Ants is a crazy energetic drummer, really fun to watch and makes our live shows pretty intense. I guess the songs are what I like about what we do the most. It’s all about writing a good song.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Getting to do UMS and Westword showcases was a great experience, and we get to open for some cool legendary bands but nothing feels like sitting in the studio and working my ass off on making a good record. ‘Cassum’ is the first thing we’ve done that I can say I’m proud of what we did.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://televisiongeneration.com
• Email: info@televisiongeneration.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/televisiongeneration
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/televisiongen
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/televisiongen

Image Credit:
Tammy Elon

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