Touring since the release of their self-titled debut record last month, Seattle indie band Fences is set to make a stop at San Francisco’s Rickshaw Stop on Oct. 6, led by tattooed songwriter Chris Mansfield. Intermission spoke with Mansfield before the Bay Area show about his reading list, his work with Sara Quinn from Tegan and Sara and his not-so-secret passion for musical theater.

Intermission: I know your new album was just released. What has been the response so far?

Mansfield: So far, so good. Yeah, we had the Nylon thing and the Spin thing so…the press on the national level is there and that’s something that’s new.

What shows are you looking forward to in the next month or two?

I’m looking forward to mostly the New York shows, I think. I’m actually from Boston and I lived in New York for a couple years so that’s why I’m excited — to see my dad and my friends and stuff.

So what item do you have to take on tour with you?

I have to have clean clothes, like socks and stuff. Cigarettes, and coffee and hot chocolate and cheese, stuff like that. And I guess like a book or something. It’s a lot of riding in the van.

What are you reading right now?

I want to start Augusten Burroughs’ “A Wolf at the Table.” I read the book “Dry” and ended up going into rehab so I want to read his other memoir.

Let’s talk music. I’ve been listening to your album, “Fences,” and a lot of your lyrics and overall sound is melancholy and sorrowful. Are you songs kind of cathartic for you?

For sure, yeah. It’s very…exactly what you said. I think that’s the main reason I do it. I don’t really do it so that I can make records and get fans. I do it because it’s just what I do.

What’s your songwriting process? Do you have to wait until you’re feeling sad and let it all out or…?

No, it really — I think the song makes me sad. I think I’m just in a whatever mood, mostly a really creative mood and it comes randomly and I manage to finish [a song] as quick as possible. ‘Cause I don’t want the initial creative spark to go away, so it’s kind of like a panicked rush to finish something. And then, obviously, once you start getting into it you start getting into the emotion of the song that you’re writing.

My favorite song off the album is “For Russia with…” and I was wondering what inspired that song?

My first drummer, Matthew Beacham, his girlfriend was Russian. And I remember one day he was packing up his apartment. He had a picture of her by a Christmas tree with her cat and he, like, flipped out because of a picture. So I just wrote that song from his point of view.

Who would you say are your music idols?

Morrissey, The Smiths, number one. The Cure, Kate Bush, a lot of ’80s stuff. I’m not really into Bob Dylan and Neil Young and stuff like that. I’m more into pop music, you know? I don’t really like watching a lot of music so much. When you do it, you kind of don’t want to watch it.

Fair enough. I know you studied at the Berklee School of Music. How has that influenced the music of Fences today?

I’d say probably quite a lot. In most of the songs, like “The Same Tattoos” and “Boys Around Here,” those are melodies built inside the chords, using the scales that go with the chords. And that’s your basic music theory knowledge that helps me out. It’s something I don’t really think about but it comes through in that otherwise I’d be probably playing punk rock music or something. I think it comes out inadvertently, especially in the melodic sense.

You started in jazz, is that correct?

Yeah, that’s what I went to school for.

Do you think we’ll ever hear a horn section in Fences music?

Um, yeah. I’ve been thinking about other stuff I want to be doing for the next album. I mean, right now it’s pretty open. I don’t really have an idea of what I’m going to do. I don’t think — I think we definitely have a sound but the sound is kind of…it’s sort of neutral, you know? So I feel I could release something that went a slightly different direction and I don’t think it would confuse people too much.

So how was it working with Sara, from Tegan and Sara, for the Fences album?

She was great. She was really, really friendly and super creative. She had a lot of really cool ideas and I think her and I have a similar writing approach, which helped out. So it didn’t feel at all like a job or a chore, it was just fun and I think we were both just really excited to be doing it.

It’s supposed to be fun if you’re going to do it for the rest of your life.

Yeah, totally. I mean there are definitely times when you’re recording and you’re just like tired and just not sounding how you want it to. But it was pretty great. From start to finish, I think it’s rare when you have the specific vision and then just within a matter of two weeks it’s completely realized. There’s nothing I would change, so really, I’m grateful it was so easy.

So how would you say your album is different from your EP, “Ultimate Puke?”

I think in general there’s more confidence in the delivery. When I was making [“Ultimate Puke”] there was no intent to release it, just kind of little experiments basically. Making this record is — I knew what my voice was, musically and my actual voice — and I was more aggressive about the delivery. Obviously it’s recorded a lot better.

My last question is, if you weren’t a musician, what do you think you would have been?

I don’t know what I would have been, but I want to be an actor, that’s what I want to do. I’d rather be an actor rather than a musician, honestly.

Really? What kind of acting?

Any acting. I think if I didn’t have tattoos on my face and stuff, I’d want to be in musicals, like “Rent” or “Spring Awakening” or something. That’d be a good deal to combine both of them. Ultimate dream would be to become an actor. Big-time actor, that would be the best.