Distracted

BY: ALLIE RUSSELL

When I talked with Milwaukee indie rock band Alley Eyes, the conversation started not with music, but with vices. Lead singer and rhythm guitarist Colton Schroetter is explaining the depths of his Diet Coke addiction. Drummer Jason McCullum is fresh off a casino trip and riding the high of a 25-dollar win. And for bassist AJ Folino? He’s the workaholic of the group. Jason was quick to denounce the term “gambling addict”, settling for “gambling enthusiast” with a laugh. That self-aware, satirical energy flows through everything Alley Eyes does. Their chemistry is immediate and unforced, the kind that only comes from years of late nights, messy basement writing sessions, and shared ambition.  

Originally a college cover band at Marquette University, the group’s beginnings were as unassuming as they were scrappy. Colton and AJ barely spoke back then – Colton hosted the house parties, AJ attended them – but they reconnected after graduation and began reshaping the project into something more deliberate. Eventually, Alley Eyes was born. “It’s been a journey of finding our roots as songwriters, figuring out who we are,” Colton says. “Now we’re a band that knows what we’re about, and we’re ready to ride the road to stadiums and stardom.”

AJ laughs. “That’s a good tour name.”

“Or my self-published autobiography in 30 years,” Colton adds with a grin. 

The band’s most recent single, “no good.” is a sharp, emotionally fraught track about the spiraling feeling of not living up to your expectations. What started as a guitar riff quickly snowballed into a complete song. “Maybe within a week, [Colton] had the whole thing,” AJ recalls. “The form, the vocal melody, start to finish.” Lyrically, the track cuts deep. “I’ve called it a ‘dark night of the soul’ kind of song,” Colton explains. “I set expectations for myself that I’d never place on anyone else, and when I don’t meet them, I tear myself apart.”

The single’s music video, shot in a junkyard, reflects that emotional debris. It was the directorial debut of lead guitarist Griffin Larson, who not only conceptualized the visual but eagerly took on the project for the group. “Griffin really showed a cool level of ambition and follow-through,” Colton says. “We’re a band with a zero-dollar budget most of the time, but he found a junkyard, talked to them, and they let us shoot there. It reflected that feeling in the song of being broken or discarded…sometimes how I feel about myself.” Jason nods: “It really feels like a full-band creation. It has everyone’s fingerprints on it.”

That collaborative spirit is becoming more central to Alley Eyes’ songwriting process. Colton may still be the obsessive tinkerer, but with a lineup more solid now than ever, the group feels as if their puzzle is complete. “I’ll work on a demo for hours and send it to AJ, and then spend the next minutes or hours sweating over what he thinks,” Colton admits. “I almost don’t care what anyone else thinks – just the band.”

“We all know how to set ego aside for the sake of the song,” AJ adds. “Jason, for example, is probably the most selfless drummer I’ve ever worked with. Everyone wants what’s best for the music. I just know it’s never been a combative feeling.” 

That clarity carries into their live shows, which are high-energy, tightly executed, and meticulously planned. At their earlier gigs, things were far less polished – at one point involving an uninvited harmonica soloist and a well-intentioned nod from AJ that backfired spectacularly. The details have since become band lore, but the takeaway is clear: an Alley Eyes live show is never to be missed. 

“I think we’re really good at picking our moments,” Jason says. “We have always put a lot of importance on being an engaging live show despite being an indie band where things can sometimes feel very choppy and you’re very limited in terms of things you can do.” Colton agreed, adding, “What really defines us is the amount of thought we put into it. We want to make sure there isn’t anything that happens during a set that is thoughtless or comes off like we don’t care. We spend a lot of time thinking and finding ways to improve our set every time.”

The band has been tied to the indie sleaze revival – a trend they’re aware of and even lean into. For Colton, that connection goes beyond the nostalgia of the early 2000s icons that have become some of their biggest influences. “To me, that era captured a kind of young aimlessness,” he says. “You drink a little too much, you party a little too hard, you have messy encounters … It’s like, ‘I don’t care, I’m just trying to sleaze my way through life.’” Rather than revel in recklessness, though, Alley Eyes leans into something more hopeful. “If anything, we want to add to that,” Colton continues. “It’s optimism. Like, yeah, I don’t know what I’m doing or how I’m supposed to act, but I have this faith that it’s all going to work out in the end.” 

AJ sees the tension between aesthetic and intention as central to the original indie sleaze era. “It’s almost contradictory,” he says. “How we described our live performance, and being very intentional about this. It seems not to align with that ‘indie sleaze’ label. But I think you could apply the same thing to those bands, too. They cared a lot and wanted to make music the priority, and chase that. It’s almost just the presentation of it and the aesthetic that you associate with that term.” Jason agrees, adding, “We’ve always liked wearing our influences on our sleeve. Some of our favorite bands worked really hard at their craft, but still smoked a few too many cigarettes in the process of doing that.”

Spending time with Alley Eyes, it’s clear that the band thrives on contrast: the polished and the chaotic, the intentional and the impulsive. Every joke is balanced by a thoughtful reflection, every story is laced with the kind of camaraderie that can only come with time. Watching them talk, riff, and finish each other’s sentences, you get the sense that Alley Eyes is on the cusp of something bigger. The band is quick to laugh at themselves, and even quicker to shout out each other’s strengths. 

They joke about their vices, but let’s be honest: the real one is how much they care. And if that’s the addiction, they’re not quitting any time soon.