Secondhand Dreamcar on their beginning, and writing

Edmonton nine-piece folk group, Secondhand Dreamcar, played a set at the Edmonton Folk Music Festival on the festival’s second day. After their set, a few of the band’s members sat down with The Gateway to chat about their beginning, writing process, and their next record. 

On the band’s coming together, Dana Wiley, the band’s vocalist, explained that initially, the band was her, Jamie Cooper, the band’s drummer, and Harry Gregg, the band’s bassist. 

“We were originally hired to be a house band for something called Pro-Jam at Soho, which no longer exists, unfortunately,” Wiley said. 

Wiley explained that during their time as hired guns at Soho, they come together every week for a jam. This was for them to learn a few songs to cover. “After six months of doing that, we realized we had chemistry and that there was something going on. So we decided that we were a band, and we brought Kyle [Mosiuk] into the equation. It snowballed from there and we had a residency at Blues on Whyte for a few months after,” Wiley added.

The band’s residency at Blues on Whyte lasted nine months in total. 

During this time, Gregg said that they were able to stage test their originals and get used to playing together as a band, as they played three one hour sets a week. 

While the band started off doing covers, they have all individually been involved in original projects. 

Gregg said that their prior experience made it “a no brainer” to transition into an original project.

“We like making music in a more natural, organic, holistic way,” Wiley says

“All the experience that we have individually amassed throughout our lives up to this point brought us here to be able to do this together perfectly,” Wiley said. 

Cooper added that while they were doing covers, they weren’t the usual cover band. “We weren’t a cover band in that we played ‘Don’t Stop Believing,’ or any classic rock or top 40.” 

Mosiuk added that they didn’t play covers to the record. They would add their own sounds and feel to the tracks, making them unique to the band.

On their debut record, Answer the Call, which was released in October of 2024, the band joked that they liked it. 

“It’s pretty indicative of what we do. There isn’t a lot of extra gravy in there beyond the people that we bring on stage. We recorded it mostly live off the floor,” Gregg said. 

The band said that the record is a full capture of their live sound. And that this is something they want to do. 

On not wanting to have any sort of non-live replicated tracks or sounds in the record, Wiley said “we like making music in a more natural, organic, holistic way.” 

One addition they did make in the record, was adding horns, which they eventually brought into the fold as members.

Between nine members, their song writing process is usually isolated to a few. “It’s never all of us working on a song. The horn section is never involved with song writing, they come in after. In terms of the core people of the band coming together to write a song, it can sometimes be two of us, sometime it’ll be one of us. But then they bring it to the band and we flesh it out,” Gregg explained.

And the song’s sound depends on the combination of writers who begin the writing process. 

On their next record, the band said they aren’t looking to change much. Just that they want to keep on going with their current flow.