1. Stephen Hund: Veteran Drummer, Touring Musician, Vocalist, Entrepreneur -- on Dissecting Some of the Best Drum Beats of All Time (With Drums), and the Transition From Musician to Strategic Management Consultant and Back

Guest: Stephen Hund:

• Stephen is a veteran drummer and musician who has played in numerous bands and toured the country.   His stack of skills, perspective and story are awesome.  
• He’s a business owner - he started Manhattan Drum Studios, a drum school in New York and Barcelona, and has taught over 25,000 drum lessons.
• He's a singer, songwriter, self taught guitar player, and union actor.  He has a degree in psychology and worked as a strategy consultant at a major consulting firm.  At one point he was a scratch golfer, and he speaks Spanish and Catalan.  
• Stephen brought his drums, treating us to a mini master class, and we talked about everything from his "Best Drum Beats of All Time" to what it was like on the tour bus back in the day.  
• We grew up playing in bands together and it was a blast talking with my brother and friend, Stephen Hund. 

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Music referenced in the episode:  Spotify playlist.

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STEPHEN HUND:
- Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ManhattanDrumStudios/
- Stephen's list of "Best Drum Beats of All Time":  https://9b0e25e5-415f-4a5e-80ce-c217507eec43.filesusr.com/ugd/3b83c3_89cdb10771a345b9a6898c5bc31801ed.pdf

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BRENTON HUND PODCAST   
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- Email:  brentonhundpodcast@gmail.com

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SOCIAL MEDIA BY:  The Social Sweetheart
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LOGO DESIGN BY: Taylor Hembree
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Transcript

Brenton Hund: 0:26

Welcome to the Brenton Hund Podcast where you and I get to sit down and talk to some people who have cracked the epic combination lock that is the music business. These are people I've met over a decade's long journey in the music industry, scrappy and clever folks. From turmoil, to triumph, disarray to discipline. We're about to find out what they know. Here we go. In this episode, you and I get to sit down with Stephen Hund. If you ever wondered how playing the drums is like slalom skiing, or if you'd like to be more conversant in the basics of rhythm and percussion, then stay tuned. Stephen is a veteran drummer and musician who has played in numerous bands and toured the country. But that's not all. He's a business owner. He started Manhattan drum studios, a drum school in New York and Barcelona and has taught over 25,000 drum lessons. He's a singer, songwriter, self taught guitar player, Union actor, he's got a degree in psychology, worked as a strategy consultant at a major consulting firm, at one point was a scratch golfer, and he speaks Spanish and Catalan. His stack of skills, perspective and story are awesome. Stephen brought his a game for us as well as his drums treating us to a mini masterclass, talking about everything from life on the tour bus back in the day to a hilarious cross country trip story. We grew up playing in bands together, and it was a blast talking with my brother and friend, Stephen Hund. Welcome Stephen Hund.

Stephen Hund: 2:23

Thanks for having me.

Brenton Hund: 2:24

I thought we'd just kick it off and go straight to the jugular and talk about high end world class drumbeats.

Stephen Hund: 2:31

Okay.

Brenton Hund: 2:31

What do you think? Are some of your favorite drum beats that you know from the first notes drummers that, you know from the first note, what are up there as as the most identifiable drum beats or drummers for you? And why?

Stephen Hund: 2:47

Well, you know, that's a big question. And it like, of course, every drummer is going to answer differently. And I think what's interesting about this is that we're probably talking about Western music and rock and roll music, right? Okay. So music within the past 50 or 60 years. And to boot, almost all of that music is going to be in four. And almost all of that music is going to have a snare drum on two and four. And almost all of that music is going to have a kick drum on the one. So I'm getting a little bit technical here. But I think the point I'm trying to make is that all of the beats that we play, and all of the beats that we hear are so incredibly similar. So therefore, how do you differentiate? So when I was starting to teach a lot of online lessons, I started creating a lot more content for my students. And one of the things I wanted to do was the greatest beats of all time. And it's just like the question that you asked, you know, what, what are they so I started writing down beats on paper, and I thought, well, what makes these beats great. And sort of the criteria that I came up with was, when you hear it, you know this song, because there are so many beats that are so similar that they could be it could be any song, if you heard only the drums. So for example, when the Levee Breaks that song by Led Zeppelin, john Bonham is the drummer, that's definitely going to be on my list, the beat does not have to be technically amazing or really difficult to play. It just needs to be in my opinion, to make that the cream of the crop is what I called my top five list, I made various lists, and my top five are called the cream of the crop. And those are drummers who were legendary, and drummers who changed sort of the the present and future of drumming bands who were also equally impactful. And also that when you heard the beat itself, you knew exactly what it was. And of course built into this is that the beat itself is going to be cool and interesting. So when the Levee Breaks is on my list there, because of all of that it's got john Bonham, who everyone would agree, is one of the most influential drummers in rock music, like zepplin the same deal. And as soon as you hear that be, you know exactly what it is.

Brenton Hund: 5:05

You brought your drums? Do you think you can play us a measure or so of that?

Stephen Hund: 5:09

Yeah, well, that song is really it's, that's it pretty much once you learn, I can teach a student this beat in no time. And that's pretty much it. That's the whole song once you've got that one measure. That's the whole song. So yeah, I'll show it to you.

Brenton Hund: 5:21

And a technical note here, Jimmy Page produced those records. And on that particular song, there's an echo that's added to both the kick drum and the snare as I understand it. So actually, the the cool, repeated kick and snare sound are, I think, actually from a delay, and not from the actual beat itself.

Stephen Hund: 5:40

Right, exactly. So it's hard to tell exactly what is delay and what's being played. The way I teach it is as if it were discrete kick drums. And the way I play it is as if it were a discrete kick drum. So let me make my way over to the drums here, I'll try and play quietly, because drums are a lot louder than my voice. Um, just a quick note, I said earlier about the two and the four and the one and all that stuff, this beat adheres to all those principles. So it's in four, four time, it's got a kick on the one, and it's got snares on two and four. So if I played only that, by the way, it would be this. Okay, so right there. That's like the root of every beat pretty much. But here is when when the Levee Breaks is gonna go like this. And that's pretty much pretty much the whole song. Now it's got it's got a little bit more attitude to it. If I were playing that, in concert, I play it louder and a little heavier, but that's pretty much it. It's a slow medium tempo, a drummer of an intermediate level could learn how to do that. In no time. And there you are, you know, playing one of the greatest beats of all time.

Brenton Hund: 6:59

Yeah, let's Okay, so let's break that down. Let's start with the snare. Okay? Two and Four, in in music is called the backbeat.

Stephen Hund: 7:06

Yes. Now, let me tell you something really interesting about this. And I would actually really like to write an essay on this, this is on my to do list. So I teach a lot of music. And I teach a lot of different types of music. And one of the things I do is I teach this really little kids class called baby Bongo. And it has a different name. And when I teach it in the States, it's called toddler tom toms. And over here in Spain, I call it baby Bongo. So in that class, I sit and I play guitar, and I sing old rock and roll songs, you know, by buddy, Holly, and the Beatles, and wham, and everybody in between. And when I do the class in the States, they end up clapping along with the song. And they always clap on two and four. Always, everyone in the states always claps along on two and four, with some exceptions, of course. So when I came over here, 10 years ago, and started doing the same class, what I was immediately struck by is literally every single time, I sit in a group in play, and the parents start to clap along, they clap on the one and the three. And it wove me crazy for so long, and it's still every time I go anywhere, and people Clap along, even to the point where when you go to concerts here, and the crowd gets into it, and starts to clap along. They clap on the one in the three. Okay, so why is that? And my suspicion is that because in the States, our musical heritage, our music is rock and roll. That's the only music that we have that we that we built. Well, there are some other offshoots, you know, maybe jazz, of course, but this is the same thing in jazz, the two and the four are the same importance in jazz as they are in rock and roll. So whereas here in Europe, the musical heritage is much older than that probably rooted in more classical type stuff, where the emphasis rhythmically is on the one, not on the two in the four.

Brenton Hund: 8:57

So the one is called the downbeat, right? And the two and four are called the backbeat, right? And now the offbeat,

Stephen Hund: 9:06

these are important terms. So okay, and there's another term, which is the measure. So really, we're implying something called the measure so and we're implying the pulse. So when we talk about most music has a pulse and the pulse is like, if you were to watch it, director, counting it off to the band before they play, or clicking the stick or doing the hands in the air like a director does. That's the pulse. So the one is where the measure starts. And for that reason, it's called the downbeat. It's where the music comes down. Okay? The backbeat is like the reaction to that the backbeat assumes that the one is there, the backbeats presence is based on the one being there, it's like a, it's like an echo to the one it's 12341234. So now the off beat would be a reaction to the very number itself. To every number. So if I say like, if I'm saying all, you can probably hear my foot stomping on the ground, if I hear a song that I really like, and I'm stopping along with my foot here, that's the number that's 123412. What the offbeat is just the opposite of that or the reflection of that. So, that would be musically speaking, those would be the eighth notes or the ends. So one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four. So the offbeat is a reflection in the same way that the backbeat is a reflection. Awesome.

Brenton Hund: 10:37

So going back all the way back to when the Levee Breaks, we and and your basic, almost introductory drumbeat, what you refer to as rock one, yeah, exactly. The hi hat and the snare drum are exactly the same as the most elementary drum beat, and it just adds to is a two or three extra kick drums, re extra kick drums. Yeah,

Stephen Hund: 10:59

that's it. But the thing is, is that that's like every beat. That's that's like every single beat has that skeleton, there are so few beats that you could come up with, that don't have that skeleton, meaning that they don't have the kick drum on one. Even just start there that don't have the kick drum on one, I'll give you an example, that follows almost all of those rules, but but doesn't follow all of them. Because it doesn't have a kick on one. And that is Roxanne by the police 1977.

Brenton Hund: 11:29

If you pull the kick drum off a one, what effect is that have? What kind of genre is that pulling from?

Stephen Hund: 11:35

Well, it could be jazz, and it definitely could be reggae. So reggae music does not express the one. It implies the one of course, it relies upon the one the one is there. So everything that's played is based on the one being there, they just don't actively play it. And the same thing can be true of jazz. In fact, there's a great quote from I think it was like Art Blakey, or one of the greats over to Europe to play in the 60s and jazz in Europe had really taken off. And there was a lot of guys who, and girls who were new really knew what they were doing, and were very well trained, and we're playing really great. And he in Art Blakey, let's say it was Art Blakey came over, and played as a drummer sitting in with bands across Europe, during the real peak of jazz time. And he came back and one of his friends asked him, How are they How were the cats over there? And he said, he said, Man, they were really good, but nobody knows where the one is. And he said, Really, why is that? And his answer was, because they're all playing it all the time. And the idea is, if you really know where the one is, you don't have to play it, you can play them all around it. And that's a real hallmark of especially some more sophisticated jazz Is that the one is there. So just don't play it. If you want to do a crash at the end of a measure, play it on the end of four or maybe play it on the end of one you can you can surround the one and almost give its presence, you know, an implied presence. And in reggae music, it's the same kind of a deal.

Brenton Hund: 13:00

Can you play us a little bit of the roxan beat that drops the one and or a reggae beat. That would be a classic reggae beat that drops the one and kind of counted out for us. Yep.

Stephen Hund: 13:11

Okay, so I'll start with, I'll start with Roxanne. Now, Roxanne follows our rules that we lay down that it's eight notes on the hi hat and the back beat on the snare drum. So that's on 134. Okay. But instead of but then and my skeleton beat was this. And you can really hear early that that kick drum on the downbeat, very clearly expressed Well, what Roxanne does, or actually, let me even give it to you this way. Watch this. Now, if I put two kick drums there, if I play the kick drum on one and the end of one with the skeleton I've got which is almost Roxanne but you're like, yeah, that's not quite it. Well, here's what happens. He takes those two kick drums from the one in the end, and he bumps them back to the end of one and the two. So it just moves it one eighth note back. So now we've got 1234. And there again, you know, right away. That's right. You hear that? And you know, that's Roxanne By the way, it's on my list. For all the same reasons that you asked way back in the beginning. This is on the list of those greatest beats why Stewart Copeland incredibly influential, one of the greatest drummers of all time, the police same thing as far as a band goes, and you hear that beat and you know, that's Roxanne right? So and there's that little open hi hat at the end and there's a little more to it, but that's basically it. I can teach you that beat in no time. And there you have one of the greatest things of all time. Oh, your mic back.

Brenton Hund: 14:59

Can you play Can you play a reggae beat and compare the similarities between a reggae beat and Roxanne?

Stephen Hund: 15:06

Okay, so reggae for a drummer who actually already plays fairly well, but doesn't know anything about reggae. What I'll do is I'll put on a reggae song and I'll say, Okay, now play along what, you know, what would you do here. And if I do that with a regular rock song, the person could never have heard rock the rock song or never have heard the song and be able to play along perfectly well. But if I put on a reggae song, it's a different type of beat with some different principles. Okay, hold on, basically, anything from old toots and the maytals are Bob Marley or Jimmy cliff. Here's the thing, if you give it a fast count, it's 12341234. A slow count would be one and two and three and four. And it's the same thing depends on how you want to count it. I'm going to use the first one, okay? 12341234. There's nothing on the one nothing. The one is empty. And the hi hat is going to play only two and four. Which, by the way, which by the way, it's not really a backbeat anymore, because it's not rock and roll. Okay? backbeat really only applies to rock and roll. Because other kinds of music don't necessarily use the backbeat. So I'm going to play two and four on the hi hat, which also, by the way, is the exact rhythm that the guitar will play in classic reggae. So when you hear that reggae guitar going, chick, chick, chick, chick, that's the two in the four. So I've got 123413132 and four, okay, to put to make that into a classic, what's called a one drop, reggae, beat one drop reggae, all I got to do is I put a kick drum on the three, just in between those two high hats. So here we go. One, two, a 1234. And right away, that's reggae

Brenton Hund: 17:04

immediately.

Stephen Hund: 17:12

So you can tell that that's reggae, right? Yeah. It's got and it's very simple to play. And it's got really specific rules to it. So that's your reggae beat. And now we're talking about Stewart Copeland and the police and Roxanne. Well, a lot of their music was what people would call back then reggae pop, or reggae, punk pop, and punk music was pretty hot back then, and it was becoming pop. And also at that time, reggae music was definitely on fire, and ska music Eve,

Brenton Hund: 17:45

I was gonna say it comes back in and ska in the 90s and 80s and 90s. So,

Stephen Hund: 17:51

you know, Stewart Copeland was using a lot of these real offbeat principles. These like that we've been talking about because reggae music doesn't really it stays away from that down, it stays away from the one. And it's playing all these off beats and the bass drum instead of being in the front of the measure. It's exactly the opposite. It's right in the middle of the measure. Yeah, so it's playing everything upside down from what rock music had been establishing for for decades, already. And so Stuart Copeland's B, do a Copeland's beats us a lot of that.

Brenton Hund: 18:22

Going back to your list. What else is on the list of the most recognizable beats, or the most classic beats of all time are your favorites.

Stephen Hund: 18:29

So here's another one, going a little bit off genre, which is more big band jazz, but Sing, sing, sing, Benny Goodman. And Gene Krupa is the drummer, this one again, now it's jazz. Okay, so it's not rock. But jazz, bled into rock and rock was born from jazz. So I think it's okay. And if you hear that beat right away, everybody knows what that is. You might not know the song, you might maybe have heard it from a movie or a commercial or something. But everybody knows that B. It's a it's a very unique beat. And Gene Krupa was the drummer who's a household name among drummers. And Benny Goodman was one of the greatest band leaders of all time, so it covers all the bases right there.

Brenton Hund: 19:09

Okay, and what else

Stephen Hund: 19:10

I have Smells Like Teen Spirit. Okay, okay. Now again,

Brenton Hund: 19:15

that was at late 80s. Pretty

Stephen Hund: 19:17

cliche. No, I think it was later than that. I would say that was probably 91. Okay, maybe maybe later because that was their second album anyway. From nevermind, and again, Dave Grohl is an amazing rock drummer. And Nirvana of course, is one of the most influential bands in the history of rock and that beat and also the intro fill the first fill that you hear when the drums come in on that song, you know it that's Smells Like Teen Spirit right away and the beat is a is an amazing rock beat. Yeah, by the way, the beat itself adheres to all the same principles. I know there's a lot more there, but it's got eight notes on the hi hat. Got a snare drum backbeat on two and four, and it's got a kick on one. So the skeleton is there. It's just got a whole bunch of other stuff in there as well, sort of helping to decorate that.

Brenton Hund: 20:09

I want to jump into the topic about limb independence. Okay, I think it's interesting to think about this in terms of your skeleton rock beat. And you're just tweaking a couple things here. And there. I mean, as you mentioned, taking the kick drum off of the one and putting it on on the one end, just drastically changes the entire sound of the whole song. Yeah. And but you're still doing the same thing with the hi hat and the snare. So in other words, both of your hands do the exact same thing and all your foot does is play a half of a beat later, and you get an entirely different beat. And just from a technical perspective, as a drummer, in order to do that, you have to have complete limb independence, meaning your brain is not operating on one track, but on four, where it's got one track, go into one arm, another track, go into another one track, go into a foot and one half track, go into the other foot, so that you can just tell Okay, foot play slightly different, but everything else stay the same. Yeah, from a, from a technical perspective, either for yourself or for your students. What do you do to teach that?

Stephen Hund: 21:20

repetition, repetition, repetition. And and also, you have to be thoughtful about it, you have to try and think of, of what you're doing. I mean, in the beginning, there's kind of a lot there again, but I mean, I, one thing that I think about when I'm teaching music, or learning music, or teaching rhythm or learning rhythm is, I like to think that the process starts with with a lot of thinking and a lot of thoughtfulness. So I'm thinking about what it is that I'm trying to do, maybe if I know how to read and write music, I can even write it down on a piece of paper or read it from a book or whatever. So I'm looking and I'm thinking, and I'm being intellectual about it. And then slowly, I start to pass that thinking to my ears, from my brain to my ears, so I start thinking less than hearing more. And and the more I hear, the less I have to think and then I pass it from my ears to the whole body. And that's feeling so for me the learning process, when you've really got it, you're not thinking about it so much anymore, you're definitely hearing it a lot and you're feeling it a lot. And it becomes sort of a natural type of movement. And all of that comes from a lot of repetition, I think the drums more than any other instrument. I mean, I know repetition is crucial with every instrument, but with the drum set, because it's such a physical instrument that demands so much of us physically, like you said, with this lemon dependence, that repetition is crucial. And it helps us pass from that thinking to hearing to feeling phase now in terms of what limb independence,

Brenton Hund: 22:49

you start by writing it down and thinking about it and and and analyzing it from your brain from a very clinical standpoint, and working working repetition, repetition, repetition, in any number of different tricks to get your limbs to do that, whether you're listening to music, or having somebody help you move your arm at the right time. Yeah, because your brain doesn't fit with your brain. And then all of a sudden, it goes from thinking to I forget the middle one was but then hearing only to hearing and then to feeling Yeah, where when you feel it, you're no longer thinking you're hearing it, but it's hearing is almost subconscious or unconscious to where you're feeling it. Yeah. And you may feel it different ways on different days.

Stephen Hund: 23:33

That's right. And also I mean, even just to the most simple and basic is like I can feel when my right hand and my right foot hit at the same time, I can feel that, whether I hear it or not, I can feel it, I can get that they send the sensation into my body. And I can feel that. And I can feel if they hit it a separate time. And I have to be paying attention when that happens to you know what I mean? So there's always going to be a little bit of thinking, there's always a little bit of each thinking, hearing and feeling. But as I learned something from the beginning, until I can master it, I'm thinking less and feeling more. And whereas when I'm first approaching it, I'm thinking a lot more and not not feeling it as much. I mean, when we're working on very simple drum beats, we slow it down so much. So we might be trying only a small portion of the measure where it doesn't sound like anything and it doesn't feel like anything, we're just thinking about it. And you have to just get through that repetition and repetition and repetition. And along those lines. Also, you might do something 1000 times I might work on a fill, for example, a specific little fill around the drums, I might do it 1000 times, so that if it comes up once during a three hour concert that I can go right to it, because I've got that muscle memory even though it's just one little time out of a three hour concert.

Brenton Hund: 24:51

When I was a kid I would learn an epic guitar solo like the stairway to heaven guitar solo that's got let's just say it's got 500 notes in it. I Learn the first four. And then I learned the second four. And then I try to play those eight together. And then I learned eight through 12, and then 12, through 16, and play, try to play eight through 16. And then I try to play one through 16. And just just on like that, with just incredible frustration and repetition, until I got it. And then eventually, it's like magic. It just happens.

Stephen Hund: 25:27

It becomes automatic. Yeah, and, and some of that, and some of that is like, of whatever your your brain capacity is, like, not not meaning your personal brain capacity, but like how much of that musical brain capacity you you are using actively to play the thing that you're playing. So I do this little game with students that I just developed it recently, in the last year or so where I asked you really simple questions while you're playing the drum beat. And it's really fun to do. And it's a perfect way to explain and understand what this brain capacity is. So let's assume I have a fixed amount of brain space that I can use to play music. If I'm learning something brand new, I'm going to need to dedicate like all of that brain capacity to the thing that I'm trying to learn, which comes with what, what's the order, what kind of independence Do I need, and so on and so forth. As they repeat it and get it and get it better every time. I don't have to use 100% of my brain capacity for that thing. I can use, let's say 80% of it. And then I've got 20% leftover, and I can do whatever I want with that 20% it would probably I could think about what I'm going to have for lunch, I could do whatever I want with it. But if I'm playing a song that I might want to use that to look forward to what the next part is, or if I'm if I'm improvising to thinking about, you know, what kind of thing do I want to do here with this next little bit, and the better you get at something, the less of your total brain capacity you need to use in order to play it. If you ask me to play basic rock one, or you to play basic rock one, I could sit and play it and I need so little of my brain capacity in order to do it. Because it's such a muscle memory for me at this point, you could ask me questions, and I could do complicated math problems in my head and never lose the beat. So the game that I do is I get the student to play a really simple B, let's call it basic rock one. And then I asked the student questions like, what's your favorite color?

Brenton Hund: 27:26

Right?

Stephen Hund: 27:27

And what and what happens is the student will stop, like, and then answer the question, because just that little extra bit of brain space that was required in order to think what's my favorite color, and the whole machine falls apart. So there There you have it, it's a really, it's fun to play because the students are like, Whoa, and then they start to get it and they're able to answer questions. And then you think of a drummer singing and playing at the same time. And and now you're really talking about you need some extra brain space to do that.

Brenton Hund: 27:57

Got it. And it's probably also an indication of how far along the curve you are from going from thinking to hearing to feeling. Because if you're able to just feel the drumbeat, that's probably a program that's on repeat, in your subconscious, that you're able to do that almost subconsciously, to leave the rest of your brain free to do whatever answer questions or think about what you're going to play next. But if it's something that you're that's newer, or that's different, that's requiring a lot of your brain capacity, and you're not able to answer a basic question while you're playing it, like what are you going to have for lunch? Or what's your favorite color, you know, you you're still working on moving it from thinking to feeling

Stephen Hund: 28:38

Absolutely, and this type of learning. And this type of experience is not just with drums, of course, it's with all the instruments and with things that we experience in our daily lives. Okay, so, for example, if I'm someone who's just learning how to drive manual transmission in a car stick shift, and it's my first day or my first week I get in that car, it's all I can do is concentrate and focus on driving that thing, and I gotta press the clutch this much in the gas, and then I move it and so on and so forth. If someone's trying to have a conversation with me, while I'm doing that, it's not going to happen, I don't have the brain space for it, I'm gonna, I'm gonna stall out, I'm gonna wreck the car. But as I get better and better and better at that I can drive stick, I can turn the radio on and off. And I can have conversation about politics on the side, because I've got that extra brain space in order to do that. So it's the exact same concept there and with drums, you know, it's multi layered, and we've got four limbs and so the repetition factor is probably a little more intense.

Brenton Hund: 29:37

I'm curious about the the techniques on the drums and how they may carry over to the rest of your life. Do you think having the drums be of your formative years early on this repetition, trying to perfect something and train your brain to do things and think of things in a way that it's not used to doing or thinking. Do you think that that thought process carries over to other things you do in your life.

Stephen Hund: 30:05

Hmm, you know, I never I never really have thought of it that way. And I don't actively think of it that way. But But then again, if you, you know, the first part of the question is like, how I learned how I learned music and learning it as a young kid and this analytical process, like, it's probably the same for you, I don't really remember how I learned music. I mean, I was young enough, where I'm like nine or 10, or 11 years old, when I'm starting out. It seemed just natural. I wasn't really trying to learn all this stuff. It was just kind of happening really naturally. And I also had some great teachers, like in middle school band, Gary Fagan was a legend is a legend. Absolutely. And was an amazing teacher. And I maybe as all kids do took it for granted. But I was just learning this stuff. And it made such sense to me, it didn't feel like a big deal. It just all this musical stuff just absolutely made sense to me, like right away, in fact, to the point where then, years later at University of Virginia, studying with a guy named Robert Joss Bay, who still teaches there, it's an incredible drummer. He would teach me things which I felt like I already knew them. But I just didn't know how to describe them, or explain what they were. I knew how to play it maybe. And I knew what it sounded like. But I didn't, I couldn't explain what it was. So he was almost giving words to things that I already sort of knew and understood naturally, maybe just because of the way I learned when I was young, or the fact that music sets so naturally with me. And so in terms of in terms of like how that impacts other parts of my life, I would say that the similarity I could find is the sort of take it as it comes sort of approach, which is sort of the way that I treat like my entire life. Pretty much everything like in my life is just I don't think that far forward. And I and I don't think that far back. I just, I take it as it comes. And that's the same way with music. And I don't plan well, in the future. I don't think I'm going to be this one day, I just sort of take it as it comes. And I think that's that i think i think that's a good way to play music also. Actually,

Brenton Hund: 32:15

that's that's amazing insight. You know, I had someone tell me about a tip on playing a guitar solo one time, because the advice to me was let it come to you feel in that moment. Just see what you're feeling. Let it come to you. And so when when you said take it as it comes, I think is what you said how you described it. Yeah, that reminded me of that. That was very, that was very interesting. That sounds to very much like a live performance mindset. And so I wanted to delve down into that just a little bit more take it as it comes in terms of the drums. What What does that describe what that means to you in terms of the drums?

Stephen Hund: 32:48

Well, I think there's a lot to be said for like being present. And being in the moment, right in the moment and absolutely never in the past. Like I teach this also like you, you cannot be in the past at all. It doesn't, it has no service to us at all. Anytime that you're thinking about the past and music,

Brenton Hund: 33:11

like I just made a mistake.

Stephen Hund: 33:13

Exactly, then that's it, it's over then at least temporarily that's over and the analogy that I give to help drive the point to my students is is like a slalom skier, a downhill slalom skier. Okay, if you're thinking about anything that just happened, you're doing yourself a disservice. So the slalom skier is going down, he's got to, I got to hit the red gates, okay, boom, I got it. And then I missed the blue gate. Oops, if you think even that, oops, I missed the blue gate, I can't believe I did that, well, then guess what you're barreling down towards that next red gate, and you're not prepared for it, because you're thinking about missing the previous blue gate. And then what happens? Well, now I missed the red gate, because I was, I didn't have all my attention focused on that one. And now I'm thinking about that I missed two in a row and my score is gonna be bad. And that's it, it's over. So what you need to do, instead of that is the slalom skier needs to, if you missed that gate, it's gone. It's over. And all I can do is thinking about getting that next blue gate. That's all that matters. If I want to think about the past, I have to wait until my run is over. And then I can complain to my friends in my coach about it. Same thing in music, you have to immediately let it go and accept it again. Take it as it comes. You never know it could actually be some sort of secret, surprise, interesting thing that happens musically. And then if it is a problem, then wait till the show's over and talk to your bandmates about it. But if you react to it in the moment, if you if you react to it in the moment, then it's going to do nothing but negative towards what you're playing.

Brenton Hund: 34:36

I always refer to that as a jazz note. If I made a mistake, play the wrong note, especially if I played a swanky note on the guitar totally off key I just called a jazz note and move on. So it's interesting, you know, to what your mindset what you're talking about is you got to stay in the present so you're gonna make it what in terms of you mentioned live music? What are some of your favorite live experiences? Live Music experiences favorite bands to see live, or favorite concerts, best concerts you've been to.

Stephen Hund: 35:07

Um, I really like to see a concert, where I can't get that same sound from the recording, okay, of that band. So which is, of course, very different from a lot of the way people do want to experience their concerts. A lot of times, you go to a concert, and you hear people complaining at the end that it didn't sound anything like the record. Mm hmm. You know, which is funny, because I'm the best. Yeah, I mean, I can put the record on at home and have it sound exactly like the record. I know that the concert is different, because they're all the people around and you can feel the music and so on and so forth. But I have always loved improvisation, it goes right along with my thought process of being in the moment and taking it as it comes and not being in the past and not going too far in the future. So I like music that's pretty improvisational. I also really like funky and grooving music. So most of the favorite concerts that I've been to are not like big Stadium, massive stadium concerts, because those concerts usually end up sounding a little bit like the record, which I don't enjoy so much. I've had so much fun, like fish concerts, for example. Okay, um, fish is a fun, really fun band to see because it's very highly improvisational, and you never know exactly what you're going to get. It's also got a pretty good groove. And it's pretty funky. So I've had some great times at fish concerts. I also there's, there's a band called soul live.

Brenton Hund: 36:42

Yeah.

Stephen Hund: 36:42

SOULIVE, and those guys are amazing. And it's, again, it's got a lot of improvisation to it. It has some jazz to it. But it's very funky and soulful. And I saw them play a few times in San Francisco years ago, once at a place called the Great American Music Hall, which is a venue that's Oh, definitely under 1000 people and it's got sort of a, an upstairs level, where sort of a wraparound balcony type thing that looks over the stage and looks over the downstairs and the size of the venue and the sound in there is amazing. The band soulive has a whole lot of improvisation, it doesn't sound like what you're going to hear on the record. In fact, it's the kind of band where you wouldn't even bother listening to the records almost because the whole thing is about the live experience. It almost sounds

Brenton Hund: 37:33

like the Grateful Dead. You've just basically described the Grateful Dead. Yeah, almost to their detriment. I mean, they tried really hard to make a hit record, I think, touch of gray in the late 80s was their their only even close attempt to get in something that was somewhere near the top of the charts ish. Yeah, they were selling out stadiums full of people. I know you're you're a big you were at least back in the day a big Grateful Dead fan. Were there some Grateful Dead shows that you saw the regret or some some tapes you listened to or anything in particular, you remember about a particular show? I never saw the Grateful Dead. Actually, I think you saw the Grateful Dead to see the Grateful Dead. And I never saw them 1991 RFK because we were like top row we were in high school didn't have any money but tickets as cheaply as possible.

Stephen Hund: 38:22

And yeah, cuz you would have been 717 years old. And I was 15. I mean, Jerry died in 95. So I was 21. No, I was. I was 19 when Jerry died. So I never got to see a dead show. And I didn't really like the Grateful Dead until I got to be friends with a couple of guys in college at UVA, Morgan and Marshall, who were big deadheads, and tape collectors and everything. And I didn't like them in high school only because I associated deadheads with, like, you know, the hippie girls from school, and all of the things that that entailed, you know, so I, I didn't like them. Not necessarily because I didn't like their music. I didn't necessarily like the whole thing that went around the Grateful Dead. But when I started to listen to it, I really really appreciated the the improvisational nature of the music. And the fact that every show was different, you know that every time the song was a little bit different. Every time that reflected sort of the mood of that present moment, you know, it didn't seem ever preconceived too much. And I really appreciated that element of the music.

Brenton Hund: 39:26

I actually consider Jerry Garcia to be on on a list. What guitar players would I hear on the first note and know who exactly who it is. And there's very, very, very few people on that list. I think BB King would be one. Immediately first note, you know, it's him. And Jerry Garcia is another one. Interestingly, there's just his tone. His phrasing for me as a guitar player from what I like it's it's diff it's it sounds thin, you know, back then I was really into my Classic Rock stuff like Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, you know, much heavier guitar, distorted guitar and then there's this you know, Jerry Garcia little thin kind of guitar sound but but it's, it's more difficult to you have to be more precise where it's closer to a clean tone. And many, many years later, I discovered that I'm just constantly amazed by what Jerry Garcia did I so I think on guitar, that's a small small list, but I put him on

Stephen Hund: 40:31

the Mount Rushmore of guitar.

Brenton Hund: 40:32

Yeah. What other what any other concert experiences that that were, that were cool that you? So

Stephen Hund: 40:41

probably, if I think about, like, my favorite place to go see concerts, was this little jazz club in New York called bar 55. Mm hmm. And bar 55 is at 55 Christopher street, and it's still there. And they it's a tiny little place. I mean, it's like a, it's just a bar. I mean, it's a small bar, and the band comes in and they and they set up the band. If the band supposed to start at 10 o'clock. There. They don't even show up until 945. And they mean they're underneath that you go in there at 930. And they're literally there aren't any instruments there and you're like, well, I thought there was a concert and then they they set up it's a jazz club. So they set up their instruments and then they just play and and they and there's not a stage they just set up in the corner of the room and you're talking about the greatest musicians in the world Breton that go there and play. Wayne Krantz and Mike stern. Are these incredible guitar players Keith Carlock, you know about as an amazing drummer, I saw Keith Carlock play at bar 55, before he was the legendary Keith Carlock, and he was this he was a kid, I think he's a little older than me. And so I was in my 20s. And he was in his 20s. And he's this drummer that came from somewhere in Texas, and he came to New York to sort of make it. And he just was an incredible drummer. He started going to the 55 bar and plan with these guys.

Brenton Hund: 42:09

I think you've described him as john Bonham meets a jazz drummer.

Stephen Hund: 42:15

He is He's a monster. And who's he played with? He's played with the first guy. I think the first one that got him was Steely Dan. Yeah. And he played with Steely Dan. And he played with sting. And then he played with James Taylor. I mean, you're talking about what variety and now now he can play with whoever he wants to. But he's the kind of drummer Why go see him play at 55. And it was like, it's inspiring to a moment. And then it's like defeating, you know, yeah, after watching him play, I'd be like, Oh, my God. You know, it's like, I've got so much work to do. And it's the kind of drama why I would be in the studio the next day just working on stuff, because we will be thinking of myself as I have so far to go to ever get to that level. So some of my favorite concerts were people, I don't even remember what the band is called. because there wasn't the band. It was just guys that showed up and started playing kind of stuff. And not necessarily not necessarily jazz either. I mean, it's a jazz construct in the sense of, it's kind of thrown together last minute, lots of improv and so on. And maybe some standards, but more like funky rock music, but highly improv so in true form.

Brenton Hund: 43:24

Then you've got, you know, the greatest musicians in the world, just showing up 15 minutes before the show, I thought when you were going to talk about a famous jazz club that you are going to mention Miller's in Charlottesville, where we used to go listen to john dearth playing on Thursday nights, when when we were growing up,

Stephen Hund: 43:41

Millers is Miller's is one of my very favorite places to see music. I mean, it's changed a little bit over the years in terms of like the actual physical space, but the energy of that place is great. And I think they still do it on every every Wednesday and Thursday. I think john dearth and Keith Decker is his name. I think Jeff Decker Jeff,

Brenton Hund: 44:02

we we would go there and have a Guinness and listen to music on Thursday nights and for years, it was amazing. You we were talking about the dead and fish and Jerry Garcia and that that triggered in my mind, I wanted to ask you about playing with Melvin seals after Jerry died, you, you graduated from Virginia. You took your long hair and went out to California and became a consultant because that's an obvious transition for you as a life long drummer. He became a consultant you were doing that. Then you heard an open call on the radio for stop and then Blue Man Group which you just went in your khakis and audition with 1000 other people who wanted to be in those shows you sort of got all the way down to the finals didn't make it but then you got the bug to play your drums again, you wound up pretty soon thereafter quitting your your corporate job and playing drums full time starting to drum school and touring in the late 90s. I think soon after, was one or two tours after Jerry died with what what were the remnants of the Jerry Garcia band? Yeah. Talk to me a little bit about that experience what it was like at that time you're in your early 20s going on tour with some of the people who I presume you idolized?

Stephen Hund: 45:24

Yeah, that I mean that that was absolutely amazing. And I mean, it the Jerry Garcia band is not the Grateful Dead. Right. So Jared, the Grateful Dead was the Grateful Dead. And that was the big band that played for so many years and sold out these massive stadiums, but the Jerry Garcia band was his side project was his primary side project. And, you know, the style was fairly similar, but the music was, if you consider the Grateful Dead to be sort of almost like jangly hippy rock, highly improv The, the Jerry Garcia band had a lot more soulfulness to it, it had a lot more soul to the music. And there was a little reggae kind of feeling in there and had a little folk to it with some funk and stuff like that. And the musicians reflected that type of attitude. And so we listened to a lot of that music in college when I became a fan of the Grateful Dead and the Jerry band, and really just that music was like, iconic to me and to us. And so I was, I, like you said, I took that job at a consulting firm, Bain and company. And I realized, like, right away that I did not like that job. And

Brenton Hund: 46:40

that is not a real live in the moment kind of way No, for you.

Stephen Hund: 46:44

The only reason the only reason I took that job was because it was the, the late 90s. And like, you know, it was and they offered it to me and and it was a really, really prestigious job. I mean, it was a super high end job and they were going to pay me this money and then they were going to send me to San Francisco. So I thought well, sweet, you know, I'll go out to California and see what's up and then just see what happens and that's exactly what went down and and it took me a while to get out of the job because the the golden handcuffs I guess you know, they they were paying me and I realized that if I quit the job that I was gonna have a lot of trouble making that amount of money doing like whatever the heck I wanted to. Yeah. And But finally, I did and that with stomp, you mentioned that I auditioned for stomp and then I auditioned for Blue Man Group and it got the burning going inside me and I realized I had to quit the job. And I did I really dedicated to playing drums and I acted I enrolled in acting school and I did a lot of acting classes and auditions and things and anything and everything I could creatively to get the thing going and I was I joined a band called brother freak, where we formed a band called brother freak, which was was an incredible band, it was amazing band was probably the favorite band I've ever played. And musically, even more than the Jerry band and the guitar player from that band, Daniel freddo got a call to play. He was in the scene. It was a very jammy band. And he was in the scene up there in Northern California. And he eventually connected with Melvin seals, who was the organ player from the Jerry band, and he ended up getting the job as the guitar player on a tour, okay, playing with the Jerry band. And that was just one tour and he quit doing it there. He didn't he didn't get called back and. And that's how I got the intro to Melvin and the band. And so they needed a drummer for the next tour. Now at this time, I had already quit working at the consulting firm. So I was 100% dedicated to music and art at that time, and I got an audition to play with Melvin. And he brought me down there to talk to to jam with him and the band at his house down south of San Francisco. And it was just it was incredible to sit there and see him and hear the sound of that Hammond organ and to be playing these songs that I knew inside and out from being like a fan. And I was so much younger than them. I was like 2425 years old and they were all in their 40s I guess so there was a big age difference and experience difference as well. I mean, I played music it seemed like forever but really just for like 10 years I'd been playing as a real musician and as a pro hardly at all so I played well,

Brenton Hund: 49:32

I What was it like that first show? When you if you remember it getting up there with for

Stephen Hund: 49:37

the for the first show. Well, even before even before that happened though, I I audition with them and I played with them. Like I think twice. And I did not get the gig. Hmm. And he and he told me that that my time was a little too fluid. He told Melvin told me that he said Your time is up Fluid he says you get in the studio and by metronome by flow like I wasn't, I wasn't holding steady time as much as he wanted to maybe I was speeding up and slowing down a little bit. And probably because I was excited and nervous or probably just because I didn't hadn't trained myself enough. So what I did is I went like the next day and I was with a metronome. Everything I ever played was with a metronome. And I had already played with a metronome plenty of times. I mean, all the stuff we did in the studio was with metronome and so on, but I just yeah, you had a metronome a decade of playing with a metronome. It's interesting. Yeah, but so so but my time wasn't perfect. So I really worked on it when he was right hard on that UI.

Brenton Hund: 50:40

Did you agree with him in the moment?

Stephen Hund: 50:43

Yeah, I did. I realized that I mean, I wouldn't have necessarily pointed that out. But when he said it, I realized that, and I knew that from just being in the studio, I knew that like when it came time to play an emotional part of the song or a fill or whatever, I tended to speed up like any drummer would.

Brenton Hund: 51:00

Was it hard to take that criticism?

Stephen Hund: 51:04

Uh, no, not really. I mean, I agree. I agreed with it. And I was honored to even be there in that scenario. And yeah, maybe disappointed that I didn't get the gig then. But what it did is it made me focus on that element of my playing. And then I and then the next tour, he called he called me again,

Brenton Hund: 51:22

you went into chop wood, though? And yeah, and that fueled a fire for you to you know, go from A to A plus on that one element. Yeah. Okay, I've got a and that and that difference to go at that level at that margin, to take an already experienced drummer and perfect and tweak one little tiny item that that must have taken a long time for you to lock down.

Stephen Hund: 51:44

Well, and also, it's something that you can't just say, Okay, now I got it, you know, you can't just go into the studio one day and be like, okay, I can play with the metronome now. Now, it takes like forever, and you don't even hardly notice when you're getting better at it. And but he called me back in and I got another shot at it. And then I got the gig. And the thing is, the thing I remember most so

Brenton Hund: 52:04

how much later was that

Stephen Hund: 52:06

it was probably just six months later or less. Okay, maybe four months later. This is back in 2002.

Brenton Hund: 52:15

And you went out with them. Do you remember where your first show was?

Stephen Hund: 52:18

Yeah, our first Well, before we went on tour, we did some, like live recording sessions in Oakland, which were pretty cool. But that was still based in in town. And then one thing I remember most is go is going on tour. The tour was like five weeks and it was all around the US like all the way from West Coast to East Coast and everything in between. And it was a bus tour. So we had at one of these giant tour buses with the What do you call the the thing that you carry behind like the What do you call trailer we put all the the trailer you put the the gear, the gear trailer behind, and we had a crew and a driver and the whole thing. And then we went down to the bus to get on the bus. And you know, we just took my giant backpack full of clothes. And Ellie was my girlfriend at the time. It's not my wife and a friend Jeff took me down there and dropped me off. And it was like I'm getting on this bus and I was going to live live on this bus for six weeks or something. And we slept on the bus. We had little bunk beds, there were six bunk beds, like three, three in the you go you walk in the bus, and then there's a little dining area. And then there's like a little bathroom and then in the back or the or the bunks and they're three bunks on each side. And that's where we all slept. And I remember looking at Le as if we said goodbye. It was almost like we were gonna cry like oh my god, I can't believe I'm gonna live on this bus with these 40 year olds for six weeks, you know what I mean? Right. And that was the really striking. And then our first show was in San Diego. And it was off, you know, from there. The tour was we were off and running. And it was very, it was a very weird experience, especially the fact that I'm playing with this band that I idolized so much. And I was the new guy and I was the kid. And it's a band that was called. They did we didn't go by Jerry Garcia band, we went by jgb which is what everybody called the Jerry Garcia band anyway, but they call it that because Jerry had died already then five years before that, or so. So, you know, it wasn't it was it was under transition anyway. And Melvin the leader of the band, Melvin seals, who plays the Oregon was trying to sort of move away from the Jerry name and making it a little bit more of his own project but every time that he every time that we played as the Melvin seals melting pot, which is what he called the band, same band, same songs. There were like maybe 100 people in the in the audience know and then the next night next night we'd be jgb same band, same songs and we got 7000 people

Brenton Hund: 55:00

Wow. Wow.

Stephen Hund: 55:03

So it was a very weird tour.

Brenton Hund: 55:06

And they had, they had some criticisms about your plane on that tour. I remember in particular, about about forgetting a beat dropping a beat you called a dropping a beat. And there was a really interesting difference in what you were listening to musically compared to what they were. And I remember you telling me a story once about trying to explain that what you were doing was purposeful. Can you tell that story?

Stephen Hund: 55:32

Yeah, at the time I was, right, I was listening to like this, there was a at that time, like the turn of the millennium, there was this music there was like electronic jam band stuff. Like, there's a band called sound tribe sector nine, sound nine, right? sector nine. And I really loved that music because the drums were fast and intricate. And there was a lot of beat dropping and what be dropping is is like, kind of what a DJ could do. If you're Imagine if you're playing record as a DJ, you can pull the fader down to zero, and the music keeps rolling. And then when you pump the fader back in, you're jumping back in at the appropriate time. So that's dropped, that's dropping a beat. And I really liked that a lot. And we use that stuff in brother freak a lot, when all of a sudden we'd be playing and then we'd go to zero for a little bit and we jump right back in and we wouldn't be in it the next step, we would be however many steps further along the music.

Brenton Hund: 56:29

In other words, like we stopped dropping a snare out or dropping a kick, I mean, almost like reggae drops a beat on the one yeah, you could argue,

Stephen Hund: 56:37

I would drop stuff. And I would bring in some of that stylistic stuff into the band. And I guess that's not exactly what they were looking for

Brenton Hund: 56:44

throwing them off, I think,

Stephen Hund: 56:46

maybe throw them off. Or maybe they just wanted someone to play the songs the way that that they were, you know, the way that the way that they were supposed to be. And of course, that's like, not the way I play music, you know, like, there is no supposed to be, you know, it's like take it as it comes live in the moment, like whatever it is now, and we all bring our individual things to the table. That's the way brother freak was I mean, that's the way our band was. That's the way I teach. And then all at the same time, again, I was way younger than them and way less experienced than them. And so they didn't necessarily respect me, they didn't know who I was, it wasn't like I was a famous drummer or anything. They didn't know who I was. And so they I felt like as though you're kind of like the junior guy at the at the company or at the law firm. And even though you might be just as good, or even just as experienced that you might not get the sort of the credit for what you're doing. Or you might become a scapegoat, if anything goes wrong in this kind of thing. So there was a little bit of that that happened on that tour as well. I mean, I think overall that tour, is that was a feather in my cap and was definitely you know, showed the level of professionalism that I had, especially at such a young age. But to be perfectly honest, I did not love that tour, and I did not love playing with that band. And that experience led led us to move to New York City is what came out of that as we moved to New York because of that tour. Basically,

Brenton Hund: 58:17

do you think some of it was just that when you go see a concert, you just see what two hours or 90 minutes out of that of that group's day, and the other 22 and a half hours of their day is just you just can't it's hard to imagine what that's really like, unless you live it on the air.

Stephen Hund: 58:38

Yeah, it was very, very weird. I had never experienced anything like that. I mean, I'd been on the road and we played shows out of town, so I knew what that was like, but when you're doing it like every day, and you're sleeping on the bus. You know, thinking about like showering and stuff like we shower we would we would we would stop and rent a hotel room. And then we would all go in there to the room and shower. Yeah. That and wouldn't sleep there. Like maybe there were a couple nights where we slept in a hotel but not much because we play in San Diego. Right and so you get out and you set your gear up and you play in San Diego, and the crowd loves it and then they want to get on the bus and drink with you afterwards and stuff. And and then the bus has got to go because you're playing in like you know, Phoenix The next night right? or something and so the set that whole thing happens again you sleep on the bus, you're up till four in the morning. It's totally dark you could it's always dark in the back of the bus. Yeah. And you could sleep as late as you want and you get you you know you wake up the next day you go to sleep and everybody's partying and San Diego. And then you wake up the next day and you're in Phoenix and it's like one in the afternoon.

Brenton Hund: 59:51

And it's sort of this it's like Groundhog Day. It's It's It's another club or venue you go in there setting up, you're hungover or whatever It is and you're you're trying to scrounge up some food from somewhere and then you get on do soundcheck and then go backstage and get your clothes on and the crowd starts coming in, you get excited and you do it. Oh, yeah.

Stephen Hund: 1:00:10

Right. And you know, and you makes you think about all these things. It's like, well, it's another day, and maybe I don't know, maybe I'm tired today. Or maybe I didn't sleep well. Or maybe we've done this thing every night for the past eight nights. And maybe I'm not inspired, or whatever. But that the crowd that's there that night, they don't care about all that. They don't know about all that. Thank goodness, they don't, you know, we don't want them to we want them to think that that experience is theirs. And all there is and it's only happening that one time. And that's actually true. That's actually very true. And then their

Brenton Hund: 1:00:41

energy feeds into you. I would imagineat that point. Yes, definitely.

Stephen Hund: 1:00:46

Definitely. But I mean, I think the life on the road, I think I realized from that tour, that I did not want to do that either. So I realized a couple years before, when I got to Bain and company on the 34th floor of this skyscraper in downtown San Francisco, I realized right away, Hmm, I don't like this job. And I don't want to do it. And I don't want to be the partner with the corner office and the country club membership and all this stuff. I didn't want any of that. And then and then when I got the, so getting that job was a big sort of compliment to me. And then when I got the thing with the Jerry Garcia band was the same deal. It's like the greatest thing that's ever happened. And then I realized, I don't this is I don't want this. This isn't what I want. I don't know what it what it is that I want. But I know that I don't want to be on tour for the rest of my life living in a bus. I don't like that. I don't want it.

Brenton Hund: 1:01:34

You mentioned then then you took your family. I guess it was just you and Eli at the time to New York. And I believe there's one of my favorite stories of yours is the story of where you ran out of gas. Was that on the trip across country from San Francisco to New York? Yeah. Can you tell that story? One of my favorites?

Stephen Hund: 1:01:55

Yeah. So yeah, we add on the tour. Just a quick background on the tour we went through, we did like a big circle of the US starting imagine from San Francisco, San Diego, all across the south and Texas and Southeast and then up to New York City, and then back across the north of the country, to Seattle all the way and then back down to San Francisco, just a giant circle the country. And so halfway through, we went through New York. And I had been to New York a couple of times I'd never played in New York you had. And when we went through New York, I was also acting at that time, remember, like I was dedicating to art all the way. So I've done a ton of acting and had auditions and I'd been in some theater and stuff in San Francisco. And when we went to New York, I met with an acting agent. While we were there. We had one day off in New York. And I met with an acting agent, she liked me and said, I'll sign you if you come here. And I loved being in New York, it was great. We played at a little place called the elbow room on Bleecker Street, which I think is there anymore. And it was one of the nights where it was Melvin seals in the melting pot. So there were like 17 people in the audience. It was terrible.

Brenton Hund: 1:03:00

I played at the elbow room in front of 17 people.

Stephen Hund: 1:03:02

It was like that was like, and I'm like, why? I'm like Melvin, why don't we just call it JGB man and sell the place out? You know, it's like, it's the same damn music. But I realized then that man, you know what, like, I don't want to be on this tour anymore. And I moved to San Francisco to take a job with a consulting firm, which of course I'm not doing anymore. And this is exciting. So let's move to New York. So we got back at the end of the tour, and I said, Hey, Eli, you want to move to New York? And she's like, Sure. So we basically just packed it up and moved to New York. I mean, in short, that's pretty much how it happened. So along the way, we had to drive there, right? So we packed up, we packed up everything we could and we put it in the car, and we

Brenton Hund: 1:03:46

you've got to move across the mid 90s Toyota Camry that's packed to the absolute hilt with everything you own in life going from San Francisco to New York. It's just the two Yes.

Stephen Hund: 1:03:58

Right. And that was really fun. And we were driving across Wyoming at that point, which is it's incredible how long it takes to get across that part of the country. So we were driving through Wyoming it was the middle of the day, it was the summer it was like June I think. And I for whatever reason, like to see how many miles I could get in a tank. And so I I'm one of the people who led to get low before I fill it up. I don't like to push it too far. But I like to let I'd like to see how many miles I can get. And we were going across Wyoming and I'd never been there and my low fuel light went on. I think and which meant like maximum. I think I could do like 50 miles or something. Let's say it was let's call it 50 miles I knew I could get 50 miles out of that low fuel tank. So write it right is that happened we there was an exit for gas And I decided not, I decided not to pit. I decided not to pit. So we passed that exit. And I knew I had about 50 miles and and then I'm starting to realize, whoa, we were like in the middle of nowhere like there was nothing there were no or no exits, there was nothing out there. And it's it's very mountainous it's like these rolling many mountains that just go up and down and our car is absolutely packed with everything super heavy and

Brenton Hund: 1:05:33

50 miles between exits there.

Stephen Hund: 1:05:35

And it could be and this is this is back in the early 2000s. We didn't have there was no smartphone, I didn't know where anything was, there's no way to find out where anything was. And I started to realize

Brenton Hund: 1:05:46

Eli is just talking with you at this point talking to me and you are processing all of this information as you've got 50 miles left, you've just past the exit, and you don't just

Stephen Hund: 1:05:56

pass an exit. And almost almost immediately after I passed the exit, I realized oh, man, that was bad. We should have stopped there. But it's too late. I'm on I'm on an interstate. It's an interstate a big one. I don't even remember the number of it. But so. So it was after about 10 or 15 miles. I'm thinking Eli's Talk Talk talking and I'm not listening to her because I'm thinking, Okay, I think the best thing to do here is I'm gonna have to pull across to the other side of the Interstate, you could still turn around and get back within your 50 Yes, but there was no way to do that other than going across one of those police places where the police sit in the middle. So I thought if I see one of those things I'm just going to go across, because I've got to, but then I thought now I've got to tell Eli because she's gonna be like, what are you doing? And then of course, I could get arrested for doing that because you're not allowed it. So all these things are going in my head. And then I started then I and then I realized, no, I can't do that, man. I just gotta wait for the next exit. There's got to be an exit soon. And I turned off the radio, I turned off the air conditioning. And as we're going up these these mountains, of course, you're throttling the car more. So I was going up these mountains. And by the time we start getting to the top, we're going like 20 miles an hour

Brenton Hund: 1:07:13

on your site, trying to conserve gas by turning off the radio and

Stephen Hund: 1:07:18

trying to save gas. And so Eli finally she's like, what's going on? And I'm like, Eli, we're gonna run out of gas in the middle of Wyoming,

Brenton Hund: 1:07:31

with all your stuff before smartphones, I guess you'd have a cell phone.

Stephen Hund: 1:07:36

We had a cell phone, but they had no way to call and no way to know who to call. I can't just like look up next gas station. Where am I on the GPS, I had no idea. So. So finally coming up this I remember we're coming up to the very crest of one of these mountains. We're going like 20 The cars are whizzing by us and honking. And, and that's it. I could feel it sputtering I could feel it sputtering I'm like, That's it? Well, that's it, we're running out of gas. And so this is so stupid. And and and I just thought if we get over the crest of this hill, we have another chance because then we could go down and then we can go downhill then it's gonna be downhill and maybe the exits gonna be at the next one. So we're almost at the crest of the hill. I just acted on instinct. It was like out of a movie. I said I was wearing flip flops. And I said, we pulled over to the median to the full size median on the right side of the road with the with the rumble strip and everything. And I said at that point, Eli knew we were running out of gas. I said, Eli, I'm going to jump out of the car and push, you get into the driver's seat. And and, and you steer and she just did it. I can't believe she did that. She wouldn't do that now. And, and so that's what we did. We're getting almost to the top and the car was going probably 10 miles an hour. At that time

Brenton Hund: 1:08:58

was at nighttime?

Stephen Hund: 1:09:00

It was daytime daytime was daytime, it was probably mid afternoon. And so I opened the door of the Camry and I jumped out. And as I jumped and then Eli jumped into the driver's seat as I jumped out of the car. As I jumped out, my feet hit the ground and 10 miles an hour is a lot faster than you think it is when you start from zero. And I tripped and fell. Oh my god and I literally held on to the door. With my hands. I was being dragged by the car. And then I somehow pulled his I'm wearing flip flops and I scraped my foot really bad all bloody and then I and then I jumped up and got my footing and started pushing with the door open pushing the car up with that momentum that it had and we got it to the top of the hill. And Eli was in there and making sure it didn't steer off her back into the road. I'm talking about 18 wheelers are flying by honking or like what are you doing, you idiot? You know what I mean? And and we and we got past the crest. And then I said okay, Eli, jump back. So She jumped back in the in the passenger side, I jumped back in the car

Brenton Hund: 1:10:04

cars out of gas,

Stephen Hund: 1:10:05

out of gas completely

Brenton Hund: 1:10:06

just rolling,

Stephen Hund: 1:10:07

it's rolling. And then we crested the hill and started going down. And lo and behold, there was an exit at the bottom of the hill. And so and then you could see it because it's this open country, you could see it and I could see that there was a gas station in the distance and so as the car comes down the thing we got off the exit, and I'm thinking I cannot stop I cannot like stop at the stop sign. Because then I might not be able to get to the gas station which is like a quarter mile down the way so we blew through the stop sign which was a right which is a 90 degree turn, like NASCAR skidding wheel sounds and we pull we pull and then like literally pull into the gas station and slam on the brakes right in front of the thing and just kind of like looked at each other like I can't I can't believe that that just happened. And and that was that and fill fill the car up with gas and said, Well, we should just stay here for the night and that was it.

Brenton Hund: 1:11:04

What a what a live in the moment story.

Stephen Hund: 1:11:07

That was That was intense. Man, that was really intense.

Brenton Hund: 1:11:10

What a defining moment. I think that's a great place to wrap it up. This has been awesome and fun. Stephen, thanks for for joining me and, and spending so much time talking about drums and, and your life.

Stephen Hund: 1:11:24

This has been been great to remember some of these things and sharing with you and thanks for having me.

Brenton Hund: 1:11:33

A big thank you to Stephen Hund for giving us so much of his time. I love that last story and if you know him, and I feel like you do now. It's just so very him. And thanks to you for listening. I'm at Breton on podcast on Instagram and Facebook. You'll find some extras there and please follow me extra credit if you leave a comment. in the show notes. I've posted a link to a Spotify playlist with music referenced in the episode and I'll also post a link to Stevens greatest beats of All Time list. In the meantime, have a great day and I'll see you next time.