Members of Columbus native band “The Cordial Sins”. Credit: Courtesy of Emma Parker
In an attempt to shine light on local music, The Lantern’s “Columbus’ Own” is a weekly series that will profile a new Columbus band each week.
The members of The Cordial Sins used their time in school to not only hone in on their individual musical talents, but also to form the band.
Corey Dickerson and Liz Fisher started their music collaboration shortly after high school.
“I wanted to add some strings parts to the music I was working on and everyone referred me to her,” Dickerson, guitarist and vocalist, said.
Fisher started playing the violin when she was just 3 years old and went on to major in violin performance at Ohio State and graduate in 2014.
“That’s what I chose to go to school for because I didn’t really know what else to do with my life. I’m happy about that because I spent a lot of time in college really honing my skills as a musician. My teacher was very open to the idea that I wanted to do more than just play violin,” she said.
Drummer Jeremy Miller was added to The Cordial Sins shortly after its conception in 2012 after Fisher and Dickerson saw him playing in a Beatles cover band.
Miller, who graduated in 2009 with a degree in architecture, also found his time at OSU to be formative.
“I was at Knowlton from 7 a.m. ‘til 11 p.m. like six days a week, so I didn’t really have time to play music,” he said. “I think that was really good, because I used to be interested in drumline type of stuff, technical pieces, but then I realized that those aren’t enjoyable to listen to at all.”
But his time away from music wasn’t a loss.
“When I started playing again, I listened to records I really loved in my headphones and would just play along. I think that period of not really being able to play in college was really beneficial for me,” Miller said.
Bassist Alex Randall and guitarist Kyle Edwards were added to the band in January to help form its new sound.
This is Edwards’ first real band after having dabbled in music throughout his career at OSU and graduating with a degree in electrical engineering in Spring 2015.
“I chose electrical engineering because I knew you could get into the audio side of it,” he said.
Randall has a degree in audio production from Ohio University, but he met Dickerson when he was in the band Chinese School. When Randall’s previous band dissolved, he took Dickerson up on his offer to join The Cordial Sins.
“It’s different for this band, because my bass playing has to be a little more choice, I can’t just go full throttle. This is more groove-based,” he said of the transition.
Dickerson took an alternative route compared to the rest of the band.
“I went to school for smoking weed and writing songs,” he said jokingly, adding, “I went for a semester and it blew. It wasn’t for me so I went back to focusing on being a songwriter because that’s what I’ve been doing since I was 13.”
The new material, all written and produced in the past eight months, is reflective of the band’s transition.
“A lot of the songs are about the developments we’ve gone through and really trying to do this as our career. I think that really fuels a lot of our songwriting, our general passion for this. Hopefully that comes through,” Fisher said.
The band has released a single, “Places,” from its upcoming album.
“We released it because we thought it was most representative of what we want to do,” Fisher said.
The 11-song album will be released on Nov. 7 at the Big Room Bar.
The Cordial Sins’ next show is Sept. 19 at Spacebar with Mobros and previous Columbus’ Own feature, The Helionauts.
Editor’s note: This story was updated on Sept. 16 to clarify when Dickerson and Fisher collaborated, when Randall and Edwards joined the band and to properly attribute the photo.
