Ever since I got back from the States, this whole cowboy thing has been following me around a little, so I had to laugh when Stetson Heat Seeker landed in my inbox. Even punk rock seems determined to keep pulling me back there. And honestly, this Seattle crew fit the mood pretty well.
The cowboy thing began as an Actionesse joke. The idea was to announce that the band had gone country, then play exactly the same music. Ian Reed never got around to using it there. When he started Stetson Heat Seeker in early 2023, he took the joke with him.
Three years later, the hats, boots and western language have become part of the band’s identity, while the music underneath them is still pointed firmly at loud Seattle clubs. Their debut album, “This Is No Place for Cowards,” comes out September 4, with nine tracks built around garage punk, baritone and tenor sax, guitar hooks, group vocals and the live energy Ian wanted to keep from his previous band without simply rebuilding it.
“Moving from Actionesse to Stetson, I wanted to bring the overall intensity, especially our live show but I wanted to make it less heavy and have a broader appeal,” Ian said. “I’ve also wanted to form a garage rock band since I was in my teens, something about that genre always appealed to me. As far as the cowboy aesthetic it started as a joke idea for an Actionesse ep where we would say we had gone country but in reality it was just still the same music. I ended up carrying that idea over to Stetson.”
Ian formed Stetson Heat Seeker with bassist Megan Slavich, fellow Actionesse member and baritone saxophonist Obi Guinn, and drummer Mark Etherington. They got an original set together quickly, recorded the “Someone Call My Phone” EP and started playing shows.
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The lineup did not stay there for long. Mark was preparing to leave, so Ian called his friend Joshua Ihler, drummer of Bad Optics. Joshua joined around a year into the band’s existence and initially kept his head down.
“I joined after Mark (the previous drummer) left, right around a year or so of the band existing. For a while, it was me, Ian, Meg and Obi. I was still finding my footing and role in the band, and took a backseat for the better part of the first year, focusing on just learning the songs.”
Another change came in summer 2024, when Obi needed somebody to cover sax while she volunteered at Burning Man. She and Katie Cassidy already played together in Seattle street brass band Filthy Femme Corps, which made Katie the obvious person to bring in. She started as a substitute, then occasionally played alongside Obi. Obi left Stetson Heat Seeker in late 2024 and Katie stayed permanently.
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For a short stretch, this meant two saxophones moving through a garage-punk band at once. It could get very full very quickly.
“Saxophone adds a robust dimension to a punk band,” Katie said. “When Obi was in the band on bari, the low sound danced around Meg on the bass. When I joined the band during summer of 2024 to cover some shows, the tenor could go in a different direction. The tenor sax has a higher tone that can play around with lead and rhythm guitar lines. When both saxophonists play together it fills out the sound almost sounding like additional synth and bass to fill out the tracks. I also set up a pedal board in 2025 to distort the sax and make it sound unique.”
Ian hears Katie’s part in simpler terms.
“I basically think of the sax as another guitar, having it doubling or accenting the other guitar lines and with the use of effects, Katie is able to add a lot of different layers! We had a brief stint with both Katie and Obi in the band, and while it was cool, I feel like having one saxophone is the better sound.”
That background in Filthy Femme Corps also meant Katie came into Stetson Heat Seeker with years of playing directly at people rather than standing still behind a music stand.
“Playing in Filthy Femcorps gave me experience playing for Seattle crowds at festivals, bars, and busking on the street. I honed my skill for high energy performance and visually engaging choreography. Playing in a brass band also helped me with ear training which allowed me to learn the setlist, and help write by ear despite having grown up reading music.”
Madison “Mads” Moilanen completed the current version of the band. She originally came in for a couple of shows to sing background vocals, then became a permanent member after only a few appearances. She now plays guitar and tambourine as well as singing, alongside Ian on lead vocals and guitar, Megan on bass and background vocals, Joshua on drums, percussion and background vocals, and Katie on tenor sax plus lead and background vocals.
Joshua dates the point where things really started clicking to Katie and Mads joining.
“I think once Katie and Mads were added to the band, it really started to feel special and more natural playing and writing together. We all kind of just naturally fell into certain roles of the band as well, some focusing more on the managerial aspects, merch, social media, etc. We’re one big stupid family, and I think that’s tremendously important when you’re playing music with people. It’s a very intimate thing and you’re going to be around each other all the time. It’s important you like the people you’re making music with.”
They had already played enough shows to wear out the first batch of songs before starting on the stuff that would become the LP.
“We played enough gigs to finish the original set of songs before we set out to write new material that eventually ended up on the album,” Ian said. “It took some time to lock in our roles but once we did, it felt like it made the songs that much better, which made the time we had waiting to record these songs feel all the more worth it.”
The western presentation gave them another thing to play with. “You’re No Cowboy,” “Sharpshooter,” “Baker Butcher Maid” and “White Line Career” can sit inside that world without forcing the band to actually become country musicians.
“I love the country aesthetic of our band,” Joshua said. “Obviously it helps with making us stick out from other bands, but it’s fun having one overarching theme that we can tie into our attire, art and music. While we’re not really a country band, there are elements and inspirations of country in there, and it’s fun playing around with people’s expectations of who we are before they hear us and completely destroying those preconceived perceptions of us.”
You can hear that joke working on the songs already available from the record. “Minimum Wage” is only 2:27 and turns the clock-watching irritation of a bad job into a repeated group refrain: “That’s the minimum wage / That’s just the minimum now.” The lyric gets nastier as it goes, imagining a boss measuring every stolen minute while the workers are left with almost nothing.
“Sharpshooter,” co-written by Ian and Katie, takes the western image somewhere more theatrical. Annie has an apple balanced on somebody’s head, a pistol at her hip and absolutely no patience for anyone moving at the wrong moment. The verses keep pushing the shooting metaphor through flirting, cards, chain smoking and risk, while the repeated “Point, aim, shoot” gives the song an easy physical centre.
Katie also co-wrote “Baker Butcher Maid.” The rest of the album was written by Ian.
The western signs loosen further on “Oh Sweet Pain.” Fast cars and cheap bars sit next to getting up in the morning, refusing to behave like a machine and the repeated line, “This hurts you more than it hurts me.” Across these tracks, the sax is not sitting politely behind the guitars. It doubles lines, moves against them and, with Katie’s effects board, can be pushed into something much closer to another distorted lead instrument.
That has been part of their appeal live from early on. Wash Magazine caught the contradiction well: “It quickly became clear that while they were decidedly country in attire, name, and sometimes banter, they were garage punk in every other respect. Still, with a sax as one of four essential pieces of the puzzle, you could expect Stetson to put their own spin on things. They did so with technical skill, rhythmic complexity, and unabashed head-banging.”
By October 2025, Stetson Heat Seeker were also putting that live set under much closer scrutiny. They recorded a Band in Seattle performance just as preparations for the LP were getting serious.
“Well for one thing, there’s giant cameras mounted up in the air and people recording you from a bunch of different angles,” Joshua said. “It’s still a show, but you feel like you’re being perceived more than usual, if that makes sense? Also the incentive not to fuck anything up is heightened, since it’s being recorded.”
The timing ended up being useful. “We played our Band in Seattle set in October 2025, right when we were gearing up to record, so I think we did put a lot of focus and emphasis on what was and wasn’t working on some songs, and making changes. There’s even some small differences between that performance and what’s on the album.”
They recorded “This Is No Place for Cowards” at Earwig Studios with Don Farwell, who engineered and mixed it. Evan Easthope mastered the record. Ian Reed and Goldi Schumacher handled the artwork.
It is a much more considered studio job than “Someone Call My Phone,” even if Ian is pretty unsentimental about that first EP now.
“Someone Call My Phone was definitely done on a tighter budget, both in terms of money but also writing. Looking back I feel like those songs were only half done. It was awesome to work with Starlight Studios, those guys rock but I’m always interested in seeing what other folks have to offer.”
At Earwig, one request was clear from the start: make the drums bigger.
“We went into Earwig Studios wanting higher production across the board, but really wanting to focus on getting a bigger drum sound,” Joshua said. “Working with Don was a great experience, he really just let us do our thing. He was extremely easy and personable to work with, and let us try weird things while overdubbing.”
The sessions took three to four days, apparently giving Don plenty of time to discover what happens when all five members spend that long together in one room.
“He also managed to not go insane being in a room with us for 3 to 4 days straight. When the five of us are together, we get really stupid and joke around a lot. It’s amazing we get anything done.”
Stetson Heat Seeker have continued playing extensively around greater Seattle in 2026, with another West Coast run planned for the summer. “This Is No Place for Cowards” arrives September 4 digitally, including a 24-bit/48kHz download, with three tracks already streaming through the pre-order.
Three years after Ian recycled an unused joke about Actionesse going country, Stetson Heat Seeker have at least made the joke complicated enough to require five people, two studios, several lineup changes, a distorted saxophone and an entire debut album.
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