The Secret Seven

The day singer/songwriter Zachary Goode was born, The Beatles publicly announced their break-up. He’s been trying to bring them back ever since.

Following the critical success of their debut album “Turn Your Back to the Sea” (Nominee – Best Rock Album – San Diego Music Awards), The Secret Seven has picked up stakes and moved from San Diego to Los Angeles, in the process taking a major artistic leap forward with their powerful, eclectic new album “How to Imitate Thunder”.

“With the first album, we really wanted to give people something tangible, something that would arouse their tactile senses, that they could feel was made just for them. These songs were handmade. Every note and every word was self-recorded, and we wanted the packaging to reflect that.” Goode says about the decision to release the album in recycled chipboard packaging, with custom-stamped artwork and a blue wax seal on the cover. The limited-edition run was also hand-numbered by the band. “When you felt the wax seal, you could tell that each one was made by hand, but it was quite frankly exhausting to keep up with demand, so we decided to release the new album on a larger scale.”

The addition of guitarist Oliver Fiedler yielded a bounty of soulful leads on standout tracks like “The Deep” and “Junk/Flags of Forgotten Countries”, while backup singer Shani Ayanna lent her hypnotic voice to the acoustic-based “Santa Monica” and Neil Young B-side “Winterlong”. Vintage Korg keyboards cut through the mix of “Summer Streets” and the Tom Waits-meets-Paul McCartney confessional “Note to Self”, and Goode even delves into the world of theremin on the album’s centerpiece, the Bowie-esque “Distant Transmission”.

Although this is only The Secret Seven’s second long player, Goode is not new to the music scene. Born in NYC and raised in the small artist’s community of Provincetown, Massachusetts, he began writing, acting, and singing at an early age. Attending the legendary Saint Ann’s Performing Arts School in Brooklyn alongside future stars like The Beastie Boys and Jennifer Connelly and receiving classical training at Stagedoor Manor and Appel Farm in New York, he sang and acted in dozens of plays and musicals. As a child, he performed in an Off-Broadway production of “Runaways” in NYC and more recently starred as Roger in a production of the musical RENT.

Armed with a backpack and a guitar, Goode left home at age 16 and sang in rock bands while putting himself through High School, picked coffee in Hawaii for several years, and eventually landed in San Diego, where he fronted the bands Ghoulspoon (Winner – Best Hard Rock Band – San Diego Music Awards) and Divided by Zero (Nominee – Best Hard Rock Album for The Black Sea), playing hundreds of shows with bands like Foo Fighters, No Doubt, Deftones, Incubus and Sublime, and releasing 5 albums along the way.

Most recently playing bass, singing and rapping in mock-senior citizen Weezer/Beastie Boys tribute band Geezer (Nominee – Best Tribute Band – San Diego Music Awards), and still performing solo shows and stockpiling original songs, Goode formed The Secret Seven to help add the soundtrack to his quirky acoustic songs of lost love and nostalgic Cape Cod summers.

Informed by the classic songwriting of The Beatles, Bowie, ELO, and Elvis Costello, but keeping one digital finger on the sonic innovations of bands like The Shins and The Flaming Lips, The Secret Seven has already cut its teeth in Southern California hot spots like The Casbah, Beauty Bar, and House of Blues and been played and featured on Fm 94/9’s Local Member of the Day.