Episode 6: The Expendables

Geoff Weers and Adam Patterson of The Expendables join us for an exciting walk down memory lane as we celebrate their remarkable 25-year journey from childhood friends in Santa Cruz to reggae-rock icons. We were curious as to how this band's unique sound came to be, and our guests captivated us with tales of their spontaneous creativity and the casual jam sessions that laid the foundation for their musical style. Whether sharing stories of early gigs at the Santa Cruz Surf Shop or reflecting on the dynamic shifts in the music industry, Geoff and Adam provide a heartfelt glimpse into the life of musicians who have rocked stages for a quarter of a century.

Listeners are in for a treat as we explore the rise of The Expendables alongside the evolution of the music world itself. From the early days of Napster and MySpace to the challenges and triumphs on tours like the Warped Tour, our conversation highlights the band's adaptability and resilience in a rapidly changing environment. Geoff and Adam reveal the essence of their music creation process, balancing the spontaneity of their beginnings with the maturity that comes with life's responsibilities. They share how personal experiences, especially the shift from youthful exuberance to family life, have influenced their music, adding depth and authenticity to their sound.

Finally, we take you to legendary venues like the Red Rocks Amphitheatre, where our guests recount breathtaking performances and unforgettable moments. We explore the intimate connections the band has with their music, playfully discussing which songs they'd "marry, f*&%, or kill," while delving into the personal significance behind fan favorites like "Bowl for Two" and "Sacrifice." Join us for this engaging episode that celebrates the band's enduring legacy and the shared joy of musical camaraderie and creativity that has defined The Expendables' incredible journey.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:04

this is nelly's magic moments podcast. Yeah, what's up everyone, nelly? Usually I say we got to give credit to this song and you talk a little bit about the band. Guess what?

Speaker 2 0:14

they're here, we're here. Spendables in the house.

Speaker 1 0:17

I'm so, so stoked this is our song it's not bad, I guess I guess we could add you guys play us in. We could, you could have played us in that would have been pretty sweet.

Speaker 2 0:30

Sounds so sick uh nelly nel dog. I am just so excited to introduce jeff weirs and adam patterson. Great to be here the expendables. Yeah, it's uh such a pleasure and an honor to have you guys here. We've got a long history together and you're one of my favorite bands, straight up Count me in. So what's up, boys, what have?

Speaker 5 0:52

you guys been up to Shoot man. It's been a busy year. I went through some hell shit and I had to be off the road for the first part of this year but the boys were jamming super hard and I came back eight months into it and we've been going almost every weekend. We had a little bit of a break but yeah, it's been super busy. So the tour is going good. Yeah, everything's going pretty good. Dude, we're just. I think now we're getting into new album season.

Speaker 1 1:22

Organized tour or are you guys basically just uh forever working? Is it like? Is it a? Is it? A branded tour, is it?

Speaker 3 1:29

it. Usually we in the older days, before kids and stuff, we would really tour like six to eight weeks. Yeah, this one's like an infinite every weekend tour, so it's called it. People are like, wow, you've been on tour for a long time. Yeah, we have. Yeah, it's every weekend, right?

Speaker 1 1:43

can we get it? Can we put a t-shirt out for that? The infinite everything, forever, forever it's been the, so it's.

Speaker 3 1:50

We've been a band for 25 years, so this is like the 25th anniversary tour.

Speaker 1 1:55

They're calling it unreal, unreal, just doing the whole year and, like we talked about before, the podcast, just um, you know a little bit of it, as if we're on your website and we're looking at history of the band. You know. Tell us about the band a little bit, you know, in the best way possible for a new audience.

Speaker 5 2:10

Well, we all grew up around here. I've known Adam. We were on the same little league team in farm.

Speaker 3 2:16

Yeah, second grade, first grade.

Speaker 5 2:17

Yeah, and then Adam and Raul, our lead guitar player, have known each other since first grade I I was gonna say infancy, but that's about the same.

Speaker 1 2:25

Well, we're in santa cruz. Drop the schools. Where'd we go?

Speaker 3 2:28

uh, santa cruz gardens, okay, right on. And then, uh, you went to, I went to socal elementary, and then we went to new brighton together, yep and socal high

Speaker 5 2:37

and then our bass player, ryan, went to aptos high. He's the newest member and he's been here since 2000. It's like 20 right on 40 something insane.

Speaker 3 2:45

So it's been him forever. You know we had a different bass player in high school.

Speaker 1 2:48

Yeah, amazing, right after high school my mom's a socal elementary, socal high grad. So there you go, sweet. I think she was the first third class that graduated from socal high, wow okay, so a while ago, early night, early, so that was my next question.

Speaker 2 3:00

Actually I was gonna ask it's been 25 years now yeah, right, yeah, we're still at 25.

Speaker 3 3:04

It's a 25-year anniversary. Yeah, we're calling it 25. It's hard to pinpoint it really, because we were just playing in high school. We'd play parties or, like your moms were, we were just talking about this. Basically, anywhere someone would let us play, we'd just go and jam.

Speaker 2 3:19

I think I remember that year, Didn I remember that year it was? Didn't you guys play at Santa Cruz Surf Shop one time?

Speaker 3 3:24

A couple times. Yeah, that might have been like right after high school. I don't think we were 21 yet, though I remember that.

Speaker 2 3:32

That was the first time I saw you guys and I was like hell yeah.

Speaker 3 3:37

You guys are sick. I think we did it a few times actually, but yeah, that was like.

Speaker 5 3:40

There's some old photos of those times circling around on our Instagram. I think Ryan found them.

Speaker 4 3:46

Yeah, it's a trip to see that.

Speaker 5 3:48

Yeah, it's. It's crazy to see how long young we look and like how old we look now. It's insane.

Speaker 2 3:59

So the last time I saw you that you were like busting this sick reggae song and all of a sudden it went into just this crazy rock genre, Like do you guys do that a lot?

Speaker 3 4:07

Yeah, I mean that's kind of a. I guess we are known for the most. I mean we have like straight reggae song bowl for two and stuff. But like the intro sacrifice is like kind of what we are probably. Yeah, I kind of like our style defines who we are in our genre. I think it's that a little bit more than I love listening to albums.

Speaker 1 4:23

here's so insane yeah.

Speaker 5 4:25

Where we were in Germany one time.

Speaker 1 4:26

Yeah, I think this this.

Speaker 5 4:28

Correct me if I'm wrong. Some and you know, no one knows about us in Germany. This is probably almost 10 years ago now, but one of the fans came up to us.

Speaker 3 4:36

He's like oh, so you're one of the you're the band that can't decide whether he wants to be Bob Marley or Iron Maiden. That's exactly it. We can't decide if we want to be Bob.

Speaker 1 4:49

Marley or Iron Maiden. That's pretty much it. I think it's so rad. How many albums Is the discography? 20?

Speaker 3 4:54

No, not 20. There's a bunch of singles.

Speaker 1 5:00

How many?

Speaker 3 5:00

albums did you put out? I should know that.

Speaker 1 5:03

You're on the Infinite Tour Forever and ish did you put out? I should know that. I don't know. You're on the infinite tour, forever and ish album I'm going to say like nine, 10.

Speaker 3 5:10

Yeah, there's been times where we just didn't put them out for a while. Yeah, also, this is we started when before you could just make them in your room, so you had to pay for it, so it was really expensive.

Speaker 5 5:22

Go to a studio. Yeah, real, you had to pay for it, so it was really expensive, go to a studio, do the real type thing.

Speaker 1 5:30

I've been a fan for a long time and whenever I'm going for this podcast I kind of blitz through the last week or so. And it's funny, you don't listen to albums ever that way and so, but I got the feeling talking about your jumping back and forth. Literally I press play and I'm like you can tell year to year what kind of mood you guys were in like, and some of it's. Some of it's a little bit angsty, some of it's like almost feeling a little pissed off, and some of it's melancholy, some of it's like hopeful for sure it's trippy to listen to it.

Speaker 1 5:56

I've listened to it all the whole time, but never in an eight day period did you kind of go through and you're like, oh, these guys almost now. Me, being a dad, you can tell when you guys became parents, when you guys were kind of like maybe like not too happy with each other.

Speaker 2 6:09

I don't know, there's a lot in there that's kind of what I was trying to get at is, uh, it was at cali roots I'm not sure which, what the name of that state. It was the cali root stage, right what year?

Speaker 3 6:20

last year the year before year before, when all of us were jeff wasn't able to do their shooting photos and oh yeah, that was the.

Speaker 5 6:26

Uh, the bowl, the bowl yeah okay.

Speaker 2 6:29

So I I walked out and I was shooting photos of you guys from a distance, you know, I mean, and that song came on where you guys started jamming in the energy. I had chicken skin it was like crazy. The whole crowd was just. It was vibrating in there. It was. I know I've heard that song before, but man, it sounded so good and the energy in that place was just. Yeah, that was a really cool show.

Speaker 3 6:52

That was like top top 10 probably. Yeah, Cause it's just, that place is like legendary for one.

Speaker 5 6:58

Like.

Speaker 3 6:58

Jimi Hendrix, I think, lit his guitar on fire right there on that stage.

Speaker 2 7:01

Sure that I didn't know. Yeah, right there on that stage sure, so that I didn't know.

Speaker 1 7:06

Yeah, I'm pretty sure there's a lot of history. How much is that chemistry like? Like it, clearly you guys are professionals, you have to bring it, you're being paid, you have to walk in and you have a standard, but then what's like the stoke level when you walk in and in your professionalism kind of matches the chemistry of a room stoke level high yeah it's.

Speaker 5 7:24

I'm trying to think of a good analogy, but, like you're already, you feel like this, this warmth in your gut. Right, your gut's just ready to give it all and then get there and then it's like another level and you're like shit, I don't know what to do with this, yeah, and you just sometimes you kind of black out, yeah, sometimes, like some of the best shows, I'm like what really happened?

Speaker 3 7:42

yeah, kind of like kind of I don't know if you feel kind of yeah, best shows, I'm like what really happened? Yeah, like kind of, I don't know if you feel kind of yeah, yeah, yeah, I feel like we've done it for so long that you kind of can go on like not autopilot in a bad way, but like like you're saying, like you just don't like when you're driving, you don't like remember that you've been driving and all of a sudden your exit no doubt about it.

Speaker 1 8:01

Very similar you're like oh that the show's over.

Speaker 3 8:02

Like was I there. Yeah, but then you're like I was totally.

Speaker 4 8:05

Just one of those like especially when things are going good.

Speaker 5 8:08

Right when the bad shows happen, you're like you kind of remember the whole thing.

Speaker 2 8:10

The whole entire, thing, that was like that was pretty bad.

Speaker 3 8:14

Usually that's technical difficulties at this point Like we can, yeah, but you know.

Speaker 2 8:25

So I remember the year before when you guys were in. I'm going to get it wrong again, but the Bowl, yeah.

Speaker 3 8:30

And I was on stage with you.

Speaker 2 8:32

And the energy, like that time was.

Speaker 3 8:35

I think that was. Yeah, that's exactly one of those shows Mind blowing, yeah.

Speaker 2 8:38

And you had the GoPro and I still have that footage. Yes, but man, the crowd was with you guys right then, right. And it was as packed as it gets. Totally there must have been how many 15,000 people.

Speaker 3 8:51

Something like that. Yeah, and it was like at 420. It was like one of those like the perfect time on a Saturday or something. Yeah, it was insane.

Speaker 5 8:57

And that's when, all you know, it's like those times in in life when all the things come together all at once. Yeah, like the crowd was there, it was 420. We were feeling good, everything worked, everything worked.

Speaker 2 9:08

I brought like a foot long joint.

Speaker 3 9:11

Yeah, exactly right, I think, like is that the one when, like rymo came up and played like sly the stupidest drummer played for with us.

Speaker 5 9:17

We did like a, like a dr dre song or something randomly it was one of those like cool, just whoa it's kind of like surfing in swells things, all the conditions you know, the wind, the waves, the weather, all works out and you get those good days and sometime who else is out there? And and your homies, right, right, exactly, exactly.

Speaker 2 9:35

So let's we've had here lately man right on a run of swell sun and glass for sure yeah, after.

Speaker 1 9:42

Yeah, exactly, so go, let's go all the way back to the the um. Uh, pivot back to the beginning of this story. Um, so I'm assuming we're in high school when you guys start getting together coming out of high school, or a little bit right about there during yeah, during junior years and so is. Is it always as as like? Is it always let's take over the world? Or is it just more organic than that?

Band Formation and Musical Influences

Speaker 5 10:02

there was never a plan no, yeah, it was just like let's play yeah and all of a sudden it's like I think what really helped was being able to go to the catalyst and have all of our friends come out 100. We had a lot of friends. We a lot of people would come and see us play or people want to see us play back in the day. Catalyst had these things. What was it? Th Thursday night showcase and they gave every band a certain colored ticket. Yeah, and the catalyst would judge the band on how many of those colored tickets would come back. So you get the group the bunch of tickets, like a week or two before, and it was your job to either sell them or give them out. That's how you got paid.

Speaker 1 10:41

They do that with comedians in New York. They do that Like they do like those like midnight shows and shit for comedians.

Speaker 5 10:46

the same thing, the same color thing, to see who draws a crowd and so you know we'd give it out at school, yeah, and so kids would be like free ticket Hell. Yeah, you know, like that was like the first free ticket you ever got, um and so, and so we were able to bring a lot of colored tickets back, and so then that would catapult us to opening slots on some of the reggae shows that came through the Catalyst and that's what really started it and we're like, okay, I guess we're playing more yeah.

Speaker 3 11:14

For a minute. There we were, like the reggae house. Any reggae band that came through, they threw us on Right.

Speaker 5 11:19

We were playing there once, twice, three times a month for a long time playing there once, twice, three times a month, yeah, for a long time and that's a cool place reps in, as they say in sports right, you're getting your reps in, but then those friends went to college, yeah, all over the state, and then they'd call us and be like I got a party, yeah, and so we'd go down and play san luis obispo, santa barbara, san diego, uh, ucla, chico, yeah, and do all the party schools and then you know, and that would just kind of help spread the wildfire even more, and that was the time of napster and stuff.

Speaker 5 11:54

So I think we were on napster and yeah, um, that's my space.

Speaker 1 11:57

Yeah, it's a question I have down the road as far as it's kind of an amazing 25 years. There's 25 years being a band and there's 25 years being a band, from 99 to 2024, which is transformation that that's down the road. But um, you know the other. The question I had like, as far as also listening to your music early, is this like um junior high, high school, classically trained stuff, or ear, or how do you guys pick this all up?

Speaker 5 12:27

You? How do you guys pick this all up? You, you were a little bit right, yeah I mean, I just took lessons from the boyfriend of my sister sister, my sister boyfriend. All right, sorry, uh, the boyfriend of my sister that works yeah um.

Speaker 3 12:36

Sister's boyfriend taught you to play guitar.

Speaker 5 12:37

Yeah, yeah he was in a band and I thought it was cool and she's like yo, so I learned from him. And then he, he was the jazz band guitar player at so-called high. So he kind of taught me how to become that guitar player. Yeah, like this is what you do. Know these chords, know how to read this chart? Yep, and I kind of did it. I'm more or less winged it.

Speaker 1 12:55

Yeah.

Speaker 5 12:57

That was my formal training, right Adam.

Speaker 3 12:59

On the other hand, I learned from the streets, this guy, I learned from the streets you're heavily in charge or in responsible for a lot of the recording, right, yeah, I do a lot of recording stuff, but I learned that again from the streets as well. I didn't have any formal training, I just learned on my own same with drums. I didn't know what I was doing, I still don't really, but I just kind of taught myself and watched bigger, know, bigger, bigger bands and I'm hip to your game though, because you're very self-effacing.

Speaker 1 13:30

But I think, when you do your homework, it's like I can't sing, I can't write, but then the words come out. It's like all right, you can write a little bit, and then he does wicked game. It's like he can sing a little bit.

Speaker 4 13:39

It's like hold on a minute.

Speaker 1 13:40

It's like no, I think the thing that I that I was looking at a couple interviews and listening to you, that reminds me of those chefs that are super good but they never write down the recipes. I think it's genuine, like when you people ask him in some of these interviews, here and there at least one I heard about the shitty band question, which is what's your process, which I won't ask you today, but what's your process? Yeah, no, you mean it's a tough one to answer.

Speaker 3 14:04

Yeah, no, you mean it's a tough one to answer. Yeah, it's not.

Speaker 1 14:06

For me it's never the same, so it's impossible to answer and I think it's kind of rad. I think in that interview it was kind of going down the right path, but I wanted to kind of like stay there a little bit because I think it was in and around something kind of amazing, where you seem to be observant and you seem to be inspired, but it comes in bits and pieces.

Speaker 3 14:25

something is that about yeah, I'm not sure which interview it was, but uh yeah, yeah, sure, yeah, I mean it. Just it depends on the day or the month or whatever yeah, yeah, and do you, do you like write it down you mean like the song or just as an idea?

Speaker 1 14:41

like, like when it, when it starts out, is it? Is it something that you wake up at 2 in the morning? If you have a lyric, all you got to do yeah.

Speaker 3 14:47

I use notes on my phone or voice notes a lot of times and a lot of times it's like gibberish melody, like whatever, and then it's embarrassing. You listen to it back and don't show anybody. But yeah, I do that. Or like I'll play the piano really bad and just almost sound like I'm speaking in tongues or something. But it's just the melody. I'm looking for a melody and maybe one word.

Speaker 2 15:09

Who wrote Bowl for? Two? That was what.

Speaker 5 15:15

I think Ryan and I are bass player. He used to write a bunch of songs and how I remember is I was like yo check out these chords, so I started playing chords. Yeah.

Speaker 2 15:31

And then he started just going. I packed this bowl for tea. He's like, oh, that's pretty cool.

Speaker 5 15:33

I was like okay, that song is messed up, and well, that's all, adam. Adam is like a brilliant singer, like yeah, he won't like you say, he's, yeah, there's no doubt, but he's adam, credit for it. Always like I'll be singing a thing and then he comes in with his harmonies and it's like whoa, or during the recording process he'll do harmonies and it's like these cool things where he's layering, making cool chord structure with his voice, and it's like brilliant, yeah. And I think that's part of his genius is that he's got insane pitch, like he can really hit pitches really well, and then he delivers with his silkiness, yep. And then he's got rhythm, yeah, and he could play drums.

Speaker 1 16:19

Yeah, usually the drummer sort of you know like the classic kind of story of the drummer is sort of the guy back there. But I think that's the rad part about the Expendables is there's an equity in the band. It feels like when I watch you guys play because the drummer isn't on the mic. It just feels it's a cool scene to watch, because you don't, maybe you don't see it enough but I don't see it a lot.

Speaker 3 16:46

It's very, it's very, it's so hard to do it, it's yeah it's just. It's just different than a guitar or something, for sure. You don't see it a lot, but there are drummer you know drummer singers for sure out there that have done it. Yeah, phil collins, I think the carpenters, I think she was like an insane drummer right, yeah, yeah, she's an insane singer, but I never translated to that.

Speaker 1 17:00

She's like really good.

Speaker 3 17:02

Yeah, drummer, if I'm I could be wrong, but yeah, right, it's not. I mean, they're out there, it's just not as much as like a dark yeah singer but no, I think it's.

Speaker 1 17:10

I think it's amazing now in staying in that vein a little bit. Um, any like any the music genre that you guys are in, are the influences kind of wacky or you guys kind of follow a line to this style, like your early musical influences. I think they were pretty wacky.

Speaker 5 17:26

Yeah, pretty wacky. Well, I think our style it's pretty eclectic. We have all kinds of music in one album and I think that's a testament to each one of us listening to different things, being influenced by different things and bringing all that stuff to the table and not having one single songwriter in the song. Everybody contributes songs, Everybody contributes writing, and no one's really that discerning on like hey, we can't do that Right, Like if it sounds cool, let's just fucking do it.

Speaker 2 17:58

That's the best part of your guys' energy. You know what I mean, especially when you see you guys live. It's like no one has more energy than you guys on the stage.

Speaker 5 18:08

It's like incredible and uh, and I think we don't get bored.

Speaker 5 18:10

We, you know, we don't play the same thing all the time, we play different stuff there's no real rule, like we played ska, pokey kind of things and like reggae or uh, like country and yeah like there's not really a genre, like you know, that's off limits, yet yeah, we're working on new material and there's like two pretty country-ish songs and on the last album Adam has a country-ish song, and then we have like this you know, raul brought this quirky kind of I don't know moody thing, and then there's like a metal song, there's like a punk reggae song. So it's like in the five songs that we're working on right now it like covers a huge broad thing and that doesn't really stop back to.

Speaker 3 18:49

He was saying it's because we were into so many different right, like let's drop some names, like what?

Speaker 1 18:55

yeah, like trying to get frame so frame where. So you guys listen to walkmans in the. What would we listen to in the 90s?

Speaker 5 19:00

tape, tape players, yeah, disc mans and stuff.

Speaker 3 19:03

Yeah, players, uh, so what was on your disc? Man in 1998 I was I was into like no effects and pennywise and that kind of like punk, whatever, yeah and um, some of the old punk too, but like and I never was really that into reggae and I think you kind of brought that around that was like hanging out with the surfer bros from Pledge Point, you know, like these longboard kids would show me.

Speaker 5 19:23

I went to my first reggae show, which was Icomouse. And these, you know, that was that was my first reggae show and I was like dude, I was the first time I ever heard one drop played like with such groove and I was like this is just as heavy as the metal I was listening to. I was listening to Pantera Metallica. You know all the shredder like Yngwie Malmsteen, like you know guitar, you know heavy guitar into guitar.

Speaker 2 19:48

It hardly gets better than Metallica.

Speaker 5 19:51

No, yeah. And so as soon as I heard that, I was like, well, I still love metal and there's like this sweet new thing that I found here called, you know, roots reggae. Or you know, I listened to bob marley but that was like when we were kids and that's just scratching the surface of reggae.

Speaker 2 20:09

you know, like there's such a depth of yeah reggae stars, reggae artists, reggae bands, reggae types and the history of jamaica and all the ska and dance, correct yeah, it's just crazy how deep it goes yeah like once you kind of pop the lid to reggae, you have you know miles deep of exploring to do.

Speaker 1 20:31

Yeah, I must feel like I love that john. It's like it's um it's all of these interpretations you know it's an interpretations of an emotion, kind of almost. It's like it's like this, this amazing, like uh gift was given and then it's gone down, it goes over the oceans in the it's in the uk and it kind of comes back with a different beat, a very unique beat you know, and I think, um, and you guys have added your own, so, but so, no, no shocker, um, no shocker influences or guilty pleasure on those, those discmans back in the day that we would be surprised to hear.

Speaker 5 20:59

Oh, I don, I don't know, I mean, we were like nineties kids, so like it was also like Dr.

Speaker 3 21:03

Dre and stuff like that.

Speaker 5 21:04

Yeah, I was, you know, I did. I was like I went to see parliament and P-Funk at Shoreline when I was a kid and ended up seeing when we were growing up. True, true, good Riddance, you know for one.

Speaker 3 21:24

Yeah, no doubt, good Lord, they were insane.

Speaker 5 21:25

Slow Gherkin.

Speaker 3 21:26

Slow Gherkin. Yeah, I saw them a million times. They were really Lost Cause. Yeah, well, yeah, lost Cause, but there was a lot of local bands crushing it Mock.

Speaker 2 21:36

Do you remember Mock yeah?

Speaker 3 21:38

They were playing in weird places like Jade Street Park and all these weird little spots. We kind of came after all that, though, but yeah, there was a lot of local bands, dub Congress, I mean, they're probably one of our biggest influences, yeah, absolutely Honestly.

Speaker 1 21:54

Tragedy there yeah. I'm right outside of my house. We live on Park Ave. Wow, yeah it there. It's in Milwaukee every day.

Speaker 2 22:01

So when you sorry to interject this but when you recorded Bowl for Two, did you guys know you had something like right off the bat?

Speaker 3 22:10

No, and I don't think it did anything for kind of a while.

Speaker 4 22:13

Yeah.

Evolution of Music Industry Trends

Speaker 3 22:13

It wasn't. It was a slow like stew, A slow yeah yeah. Sacrifice was like our song, Right and Burning Up. I think those two were like the ones we always ended with, or whatever.

Speaker 1 22:23

Did Bullfartiga get picked up on his TV? Short no, sometimes that happens. It didn't, it just happened?

Speaker 5 22:27

No, it got picked up by a bunch of people smoking for the first time.

Speaker 3 22:30

I think College Napster or something like that. Yeah, it was kind of like.

Speaker 2 22:34

Let's go into that 2000 really something like that.

Speaker 3 22:40

I think 2000 we recorded in 2003, so it was such a.

Speaker 5 22:43

It was a song that was like okay, it's just another song. The album it came out on had like 20 songs on it, yeah it wasn't which nate was on that album yeah, and it was on that oh, was it really? It's like such an honor to have him on there. Yeah, he crushed it. He came up like one night at the studio and just went in and just riffed if you listen to to the song, what's it called?

Speaker 3 23:01

Uh, newbies not it's a dub, something dub. Um but he just.

Speaker 5 23:07

I think he just like kind of just went in there. Yeah, just one take it for whatever Freestyle Pretty much Do you remember what album that was?

Speaker 1 23:13

No, okay.

Speaker 3 23:16

Filthy from Dub Congress yeah we recorded it up in San Francisco. It's no longer there Cyclops Studios. I think it was because of them. They said you should go up there, or maybe we meant those dudes. It was through Omar, yeah no, that's right, Omar Echeverry.

Speaker 5 23:29

Yeah, oh sick. Yeah, he got us dialed into that studio Filthy Dub.

Speaker 3 23:37

Yep Fil yeah A little.

Speaker 1 23:39

Yeah, no.

Speaker 3 23:40

And it's just him, like we're not even singing on him. A little pain tribute here, yeah, because he was a huge influence on us. Huge.

Speaker 5 23:45

Their whole band was so.

Speaker 3 23:47

We have direct ripoff, listen to this guy.

Speaker 5 23:49

He's so good.

Speaker 1 23:52

Yes, I the thing about Dub Congress. It's like he just has that kind of like silky fully produced sound.

Speaker 3 23:58

Oh yeah, and I bet you could do this right here, right now. They were just like a little bit too early to hit that. Like what we hit with the new kind of reggae they would have crushed.

Speaker 1 24:10

I mean like the problem with Dub Con, because you hear it and it's all time and place, because then you figure out these bands that you see on the award shows same level. Oh yeah, just wrong time, wrong place.

Speaker 3 24:22

in a way, like you're saying yeah, I mean, if they just were eight years later, they would have been just ginormous in my opinion. I don't know.

Speaker 2 24:32

They were in between the reggae explosions, right, yeah, they just weren't.

Speaker 3 24:37

And then you know, people go to college, they have kids and they can't really keep going. Is this mid-90s, that would be 2003, 2004.

Speaker 1 24:46

I can't blame it on new kids on the block. I want to.

Speaker 2 24:48

They still play, though the Congress is playing right now I think they are, I'm not sure exactly.

Speaker 1 24:53

Well, that was the whole thing is, he died right before a big show. I think oh really.

Speaker 1 24:58

Right before show, I think they were oh really right before. They're like it was kind of their comeback show, yeah. And it was like a month before um I I had an interview with him on a thursday or something like that. Four vibes, uh, set up through a friend of mine that we was kind of a common friend. But um, that's heavy. But the, the, the conversation is a perfect segue for the conversation about um, as much you guys, I'm fascinated by it, like so you guys get together 99, 2000 ish is that about?

Speaker 3 25:23

right, yeah, we'll call it whatever.

Speaker 1 25:24

Yeah, 99 but, but, but it's a the massive landscape change almost every 5-10 years. As far as, what do you do with your music? Right, like, what has that been like?

Speaker 3 25:34

as far as you know, like you're right, napster and then this we had were selling physical CDs and CDs, so they weren't we weren't on anything else. Quite a bit Like, I think, our self title. We sold like 50,000 of them, which is a lot for a band our size.

Speaker 5 25:51

Yeah, crazy yeah, which that album was paid for by the winnings of winning the battle of the band. Was it really yeah or no? That was that was really yeah.

Changing Music Industry Landscape

Speaker 3 26:00

Well, no, that was, that was a open container. Yeah, but we've. Yeah, no, that would, totally was, but we didn't. Said that. I think the self-titled one was the first one that was on a real record label, or you know, back then when that mattered, um, but then that was like streaming started kicking in and it was weird. We were like the it changed.

Speaker 5 26:16

Things changed, yeah, in the span of a few years but I think we would never have gotten to where we are if it wasn't for the Napster and MySpace era.

Speaker 1 26:26

Yeah, for sure, for sure.

Speaker 4 26:27

I think that College kids yeah, when our friends were all in college.

Speaker 5 26:32

they were, it was MySpace time and Napster that was our distribution.

Speaker 2 26:39

Is that the same as as Revolution? And those guys, I think Revolution was similar.

Speaker 3 26:44

I think they blew up because of the college sharing music type thing, because they hadn't toured. We took them on their first tour, actually.

Speaker 1 26:51

Did you really?

Speaker 3 26:52

Yeah, but they were huge, we knew it, they would open for us. We're like oh crap.

Speaker 1 26:59

It was a ton.

Speaker 3 27:03

But they weren't allowed to headline because no one was going to take a chance on a band that's never toured that no tour history. So we were like they're like go with them, like okay, bringing them along and got along great, and it was great tour.

Speaker 1 27:12

I mean like there's a lot of stories. There's a lot of stories in motown like that, like back in the the day in motown where they would, uh, you know, from an economic standpoint standpoint they'd get three, four, five, six bands, and it's almost exactly. You said that, you know. The fifth guy you know was where the band was the Temptations, and the other one was like we're fucked, those ones that just played two songs. That's the best one here. That's an amazing story.

Speaker 2 27:36

It's an amazing era right now. You know, and has been for the last 20 years with you know, the expendables, the revolution, tribal seeds. Oh, it's gone it's just like it's crazier than I ever could, imagine.

Speaker 5 27:49

I mean when we first started, the genre was slightly stupid pepper, and then us emerging and so john the east yeah. So john, these guys, yeah maybe there's like I don't know.

Speaker 3 27:58

Ballyhoo was for a long time ago too, but there was a few. There's a handful of bands and now it's like an entire crazy weekend. They can fill, fill with right, right and you guys ever play warp tour.

Speaker 5 28:10

What, yeah, one year I saw ballyhoo at warp tour back east yeah, I think we were on warp tour, maybe five years too late, or yeah, you're it was a little rough because there's a lot of the metal stuff that doesn't really.

Speaker 1 28:24

It just was hard and then you're on blank, blank, blank stage.

Speaker 3 28:27

We were on middle stage whatever, yeah, um, we also didn't know what we were doing, right it's a whole thing. It's a really cool tour. We just were kind of new and it was one and done. We did the whole thing too. That was eight, nine weeks. It was insane it's.

Speaker 5 28:42

I can't believe. I mean we, we were did it in a bus and we were super luxurious like I can't believe bands do that in vans oh it's brutal. I don't because you're traveling as much as you travel in a bus, but you're doing it in a van and you got to be there early in the morning and you're leaving late at night yeah and so you are jamming.

Speaker 2 29:00

You're driving to the next stop.

Speaker 3 29:02

Jam, yes you don't know when you're playing so like they roll dice. I don't know how they pick it, but you could either play 11 or like 7, right? So 11 am or 7, and every time we did the 11 one I was so hung up every time.

Speaker 4 29:17

It's almost like they knew I would be like I swear to god, yeah, kevin lyman the guy was.

Speaker 3 29:23

I swear he would look for the drunk as people go up man. Okay, have fun at 11 am tomorrow I'd be just brutally hung over playing, oh man how was the show at the surf ranch?

Speaker 2 29:34

you guys played the surf ranch a couple years ago we did.

Speaker 5 29:36

Yeah, it was a lot of fun it was cold as hell yeah, oh yeah, yeah, it's freezing. It was fun, though, yeah, like their.

Speaker 3 29:40

Was it cold as hell. Yeah, oh yeah. Yeah, it was freezing. It was fun though. Yeah, Like their.

Speaker 5 29:42

Christmas party. Yeah yeah, the place is kind of sick, huh, oh yeah.

Speaker 3 29:45

It's really cool, kind of It'd be really fun.

Speaker 2 29:46

The place is really sick yeah. I wanted to be there for that show. They told me.

Speaker 3 29:56

Oh man, that was super backyard party style, like the old days. We don't do those too often.

Speaker 1 30:00

On the business side of the. I'm still going back to like did you guys find a groove with like other than momentum of like a Napster? Did you find a groove, a way to market the band Like, how do you manage that?

Speaker 3 30:13

Well, it changed Like we would go and flyer around the point on the west side, literally hand flyer, you know, like our staple.

Speaker 5 30:20

We would get together. Staple guns In the living room of our band house. I remember one night we put the maps up. Yeah, strategic. But it helped. We outlined the area that you and your homie were going to go to. We'd divide ourselves up into groups of two, I think.

Speaker 1 30:36

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 5 30:37

And we'd just be like, okay, you got that part of town Straight up guerrilla market.

Speaker 3 30:39

Yeah, like you take the point, you guys go the west side, you guys go downtown, you guys go Aptos, and we would do it and it worked. It really helped a lot.

Speaker 1 30:48

And then I forget this you guys, since you're in the industry, you'll help me.

Speaker 2 30:51

So those lawsuits happen, that fades away right a to do we move right into I almost forget lawsuits.

Speaker 4 31:03

Well, I mean like, like you know, napster as far as the show, oh, I'm not against you guys. Sorry you guys. You guys thought you had some fucking money too much flyer or something you know.

Speaker 3 31:09

That's what this is all about, you're being served.

Speaker 1 31:10

This, this podcast, is you guys squad team comes in uh yeah, touche got us. This is where I sometimes get my words going too quick. No, that's fine. I missed some key connectors there when they got sued.

Speaker 3 31:24

Napster got sued. I want to say some of the big artists like Metallica.

Speaker 1 31:28

It was Metallica. Yeah, they kind of headed that.

Speaker 3 31:30

Which was, I remember, being there's definitely like both sides. For us it's kind of like well, it's pushing our music out there, but I get it, it is stealing, so I don't know.

Speaker 1 31:40

I think the narrative was exactly what you said. It was terrible for Metallica, great for you guys.

Speaker 3 31:45

Right and they don't need the Napster, but we kind of did at the time. It's hard to know and that kind of democracy.

Speaker 5 31:52

You know it spread the money around to all the bands Totally. Before that you had the big bands, the metallicas, the red hot, chili peppers, whatever was on the the radio. Yeah, they took all the money. Basically, if you were as tiny band, you were scrambling around for crumbs. As soon as that napster came out and was able to get distribution to all the small bands, it spread the money out. And that's why we benefited, because we literally got a call from a major label. I remember this. The guys told us he's like I don't hear the next what I Got, sublime song. He's like he heard of us yeah, we sent stuff into him and he's like I don't hear the next what I Got. And, you know, just took us off the list.

Speaker 1 32:37

And you're like you dick.

Speaker 5 32:38

Some people would pursue, took us off the list and you're like you dick Some people would pursue. Yeah, it was like A&R reps.

Speaker 3 32:41

Yeah, A&R reps Is that still a thing I don't know.

Speaker 1 32:44

That's eventually where this conversation is going. I love this, this kind of I'm nerding out because I don't know it.

Speaker 1 32:50

The landscape is incredible to me because from a layman standpoint it sure for the longest time was touring to make money to support the lower end of record. Then you get in the 80s and the 90s and it was like record contracts, like right record baking. You got a record contract like an author and you were set for a while and you do limited touring. Then napster and all this happened and but it seems to be touring again yeah, it's back to.

Speaker 3 33:16

Yeah, I think touring has always been pretty. You can't like download a tour, right? You have to no, right. So, like it's always gonna be there. It always has been, always will. Some artists don't have to Like I don't Eminem's like I don't really want a tour. Right, he doesn't have to right.

Speaker 1 33:39

That's great, you know, but we always had to yeah, and it's $575 for a ticket.

Speaker 3 33:42

When we were younger there was no festival for us to play. No, we weren't a popular mainstream band and we also were kind of weird. Right Warped tour kind of worked, but we barely got festivals when we were younger. Now there's a bunch in our genre, yeah, which is amazing.

Speaker 2 33:57

Yeah, which is amazing. Yeah, how many years did you guys play Cali Roots?

Speaker 3 34:00

Cali Roots has been around for how long now, I can't remember 10 years, no more than that, more than 10?

Speaker 5 34:05

Yeah.

Speaker 3 34:06

We didn't play the first one. I want to say we played the second one, maybe, yeah, yeah, and then Every year since. No, we're about every other year. Yeah, not everyone.

Speaker 1 34:22

Yeah, I think revolutions plays every year, but you know, but every other year um pretty much, yeah, yeah, you guys playing this year next may, I don't believe.

Speaker 3 34:26

No, we put this oh I'm tracking you, I'm tracking we'll probably be there, though, yeah, hanging out.

Speaker 1 34:31

I think we're gonna be there now, doug we're gonna be there yeah I love cali.

Speaker 5 34:34

It's such a fun thing, isn't? It it's like it's turned into such a sweet event that's kind of grown so organically and from where it started to what it is now it's. It's really it's like such a it's such a collection of bands that you've toured with a bunch all over the throughout the years and so you get to that that festival, and it's like, oh bro, what's up?

Speaker 5 34:55

You know it's this big like bro fest of people you haven't seen in a long time, that are in other bands, that have, you know, gone out and done their thing, and you get to see them and catch up and it's yeah it's a big reunion, yeah, yeah and an influx of some artists that are not so obvious, like, like that are clearly inspired by.

Speaker 1 35:11

You know the, the kind of like the spirit of that, the you know of the, the majority of the musicians there, but there's some that are just kind of um, I love you know going. Once they set it every year, you're like that's not the most obvious. Cali Roots band. I've ever seen so no, I'm excited for it. So then, Nellie, do you have anything cooking in your brain right now?

Speaker 2 35:31

I do. It looks vacant to me. I was going to ask Adam about it.

Speaker 3 35:35

That's mean dude, I'm joking, I was going to ask Adam, I heard you've been cooking up some bread. I have. Randomly my wife.

Speaker 5 35:49

I underestimated you, nelly, who told you Give me some background on Adam.

Speaker 3 35:54

Is it that obvious? I, I mean, I hit that.

Speaker 1 35:58

Nelly shook him up with that question.

Speaker 3 36:00

No, I have been. Yeah, I've been working on some sourdoughs Starters. Yeah, yeah, I got the mother dough Just chilling, all right.

Speaker 2 36:07

Well, you know, I'll send you my address. Yeah, yeah, I'm a big bread person.

Speaker 3 36:11

They're getting better. You know, once you say it out loud, you got to start like a little Ziploc bag, I'll bring a big roll or whatever. Yeah, also.

Speaker 2 36:22

I got a good story.

Speaker 2 36:23

I got a good Jeff story, all right, so I don't know how many years ago it feels like a few years ago, but it might be more like 10. Me and Jeff were playing golf together and he's like so, nelly, we were on the 15th hole at De La Viega and he hear you got a hole in one club going on. Oh God, and he's all what's up with that. And I like pulled out this list and it was all torn up and there was all these names written on it and so basically there was 28 of us in the club and everyone pitched in a hundred bucks and the first person that gets the hole in one gets the the whole pot oh right on yeah.

Speaker 2 37:02

Jeff, the whole pot. Oh, right on, yeah, Jeff's like I want to be in that. It sounds great. I'm like all right, sign the paper. And it was like this literally shredded up little piece of paper that I kept in my wallet. He signs the paper and 12 hours later I got a hole-in-one.

Speaker 1 37:11

I tell him a little later.

Speaker 2 37:14

I'm like hey, Jeff, bad news I got a hole-in-one I'm pretty sure.

Speaker 5 37:17

Like a week later someone else got one and like I think it was like two or three hole-in-ones in like a three-month period. I'm like this is rigged shit yeah there for a while. So I'm like nelly, get me off the list bro I think, everyone got off this there was

Speaker 2 37:34

like three or four within a month yeah well, that was when I signed up disintegrated the hole-in-one club it might have been.

Speaker 1 37:40

One of the things I dug up in the homework was somebody in the band was cleaning carts while you guys were still kind of blowing up a little bit for free golf.

Speaker 5 37:48

Oh me, Was that you? Yeah, I would caddy and clean carts up at Pastiempo.

Speaker 1 37:52

And it wasn't at a time you guys were hurting in the band.

Speaker 5 37:55

No, it's just because I love golf and I love Pastiempo. It's and I love Pastiempo is just. I mean it's worth it to caddy.

Speaker 5 38:00

I mean, caddying is a great if you're a musician and you could find the love of golf and start caddying at a great spot. It's such a great job because no one gives a shit when you leave Right, you always have a job. When you get back, if someone wants you to carry the bag, you usually get free golf and you'd get a. You know it's a pretty solid amount of money for you know three, you know five hours of work.

Speaker 2 38:23

Plus, you get to Zen out on the course. Yeah, you're like writing lyrics. Yeah, geek out.

Speaker 5 38:27

Well, just geek out with other golf geeks and be like bro, do you got to hit this line and you know, and I don't know, I I love golf but it's a great gig.

Song Preferences and Band Dynamics

Speaker 1 38:39

So, yeah, I would work at Pastiempo Do you have any songs that you hate, that you guys have done Hate to play or hate that we made. Just hate the song that you made it that you play it. Is there any songs that you and maybe you, don't play it?

Speaker 3 38:51

Maybe it's one you don't play that you hate, probably. Just we don't play them.

Speaker 1 38:54

Honestly, I don't know, I haven't thought of that. To play the marry it, kill it, fuck it, game with your songs, oh God, oh.

Speaker 4 39:02

God, I want fuck it.

Speaker 1 39:04

But it's a very difficult game to play. But I figure, with that many songs there might be one you could. The song's not a human.

Speaker 5 39:10

It's not like the song in particular, it's like the recorded version. Usually That'd be fine when I'm like oh man, I wish I would've Can Play the game.

Speaker 1 39:17

Sure, all right. So separate questions, let's do it. So remember one's very specific, because one of them is you love it so much but you don't want to necessarily have coffee with it and wake up with it. That's the Marriott, no, that's the fucking. That's the fucking.

Speaker 5 39:31

Okay, marriott is the one that you just can't play enough Every scene acoustic everywhere you

Speaker 2 39:37

go.

Speaker 1 39:37

Okay, let's go marry it first.

Speaker 5 39:38

Okay, marry it.

Speaker 1 39:40

I mean.

Speaker 5 39:43

I guess both or two. I'm married to it. I mean, we're married to both or two, you are. He hasn't answered yet.

Speaker 1 39:49

He's his own person on the planet. So you're marrying both or two, yeah who?

Speaker 3 39:53

are you going to say?

Speaker 1 39:58

I am fucking both or two, okay. So I'm glad you asked that, because the way you said fucking yeah, because if he said both, I got close to him I guess, if he used both or two, that was poly.

Speaker 2 40:06

Yeah, we're getting into a weird thing. So wait, so you're and.

Speaker 4 40:08

I'll tell you why.

Speaker 1 40:10

You're marrying both or two. Sure yeah. You're fucking both or two. Why are you?

Speaker 3 40:19

it's not like my favorite song to play in the world, but I know how much it means to people and I know how much like we have to play it. Yeah, and the my Mary song, I could tell you.

Speaker 1 40:28

Yeah, let's go Mary.

Speaker 3 40:29

I would say sacrifice or songs like that, because it's so us, that's like our song. I want to have coffee with that. I want to copy your answers here. Sorry man, you is here. Sorry man, you can't Wait. Are you going to? I'll figure out my own layman.

Speaker 1 40:43

But I get why you would marry Bolford. I'm not saying, but it's just not for me.

Speaker 3 40:46

I didn't know this came with you so much fun. The kill one is hard because I don't know. I feel like we just Did you fuck yet? No, I haven't. What are you fucking? You're already marrying Bol of you, which I get, though I totally get that. That's not a bad answer, it's just that's what my answer is.

Speaker 1 41:04

I just want to have the sense of pride, on Nelly's Magic Moments podcast, that you've never been asked this question. No.

Speaker 5 41:09

No.

Speaker 3 41:10

No, no, I'm having a hard time.

Speaker 1 41:12

Do you want to jump to? So marry fuck kill. The kill to me is hard, I know, but that's a hard, I know, but that's why I asked if we could even play.

Speaker 3 41:19

Well, I'm like don't want to play that one ever.

Speaker 1 41:21

I think that's the way to answer it, not the one you hate that you did, the one that you don't necessarily, or that we don't just whatever that'd be an impossible.

Speaker 2 41:29

It's the reason it's hard is because there isn't a song.

Speaker 3 41:32

I'm like that. We play that. I don't like playing. We'd have to pick that there isn't.

Speaker 4 41:37

Oh, there's something. That's why it's so hard.

Speaker 3 41:39

There's songs that we probably have they all have history right.

Speaker 1 41:42

There's a bunch of songs we've killed by just not playing them. Do you want to kill a song in the outer atmosphere of other people's music?

Speaker 4 41:49

No, Will there is this revolution song Do?

Speaker 3 41:53

you guys want to start a little turf war. No, no, no Kill was the hardest one.

Speaker 5 42:08

I'd have to really think about. All right, so we'll leave kill off. I'll be fucking a song called surfman cometh.

Speaker 2 42:11

Yeah, okay, I've fucking that song. I like it a lot. Yeah, um, yeah, for sure, it's a good time you like that. I wore my surfman I do looks great

Speaker 3 42:16

and to me, like that one's in is a cousin of sacrifice yeah, there's a bunch of those that are real similar Right.

Speaker 5 42:22

Our mixture rock.

Speaker 3 42:23

But that to me is us Like the most, us For sure. Where Bowl for Two isn't as much in my mind, yeah Right, but it is us, but it's not us.

Speaker 5 42:33

You know smoking hella weed you know. So that's kind of us?

Speaker 1 42:38

No, totally.

Speaker 3 42:39

This has got that Western that was just me throwing a weird whistle.

Speaker 5 42:43

Yeah, but I think it's so us it's so like where'd this come from? The reason why it's us is because this is a reggae song, but then you get Adam with his country influence.

Speaker 3 42:55

Yeah, your guys' stuff sounds so tight. And those waves are Raul, and I recorded them right at the point there. It was huge that day.

Speaker 1 43:03

Right here.

Speaker 3 43:03

Yeah, the waves in the beginning are real. We recorded it. It's not like a stock wave. Oh, I don't know about that.

Speaker 1 43:08

No, no, I'm listening to it here.

Speaker 3 43:10

But the waves in the very beginning are.

Speaker 1 43:12

That's some hometown shit right there.

Speaker 3 43:13

Yeah, we just went out there with the two mics and we just recorded like man, the wave's gone, nuts.

Speaker 5 43:23

I mean, this song is. I wrote the lyrics and it's like all I can see in my head is looking at Pleasure. Point when it's pumping and it's cold and you don't want to really go out but every nerve in your body is telling you to go out because it's firing. Yeah, but it's 6 in the morning and you're putting on your wetsuit that's got frost on it.

Speaker 5 43:44

It's like that duality of the ultimate high with the ultimate sort of like pay the sacrifice harsh, right, yeah this is kind of nothing good comes without a little bit of sacrifice correct, and you and like the waves are gnarly and it's it's dangerous, but there's a chance you're going to get the wave of your life or's amazing and mesmerizing, but it's dangerous and treacherous and you have to be flowy, stylin', but you also need to be aggressive. There's a lot that's what I love about surfing. It's like this kind of duality of it.

Speaker 1 44:35

And let's balance it out, because I think we got one side of it. Do you have a particular? When you write, write, is it a process? Is it?

Speaker 5 44:44

it changes. It changes. Yeah, uh, it's been changing. I try to. I try to do as much. Um, nowadays it's like free writing and like trying to get better at staying in the flow, where earlier on I just smoked massive amounts of bong hits and see what happens Hell yeah. Now it's more of like I'm actually consciously trying to do stuff. Both work.

Speaker 2 45:09

So I heard that you guys have at least five songs you're working on right now.

Speaker 3 45:12

Yeah, there's a whole bunch more in the. We're just five. We're recording. Like I'm going to go to the band room after this and set up my drums to record tomorrow. So yeah, we're trying to record five and then just record another five and record another. We're trying to record, just never ending.

Speaker 2 45:28

Are you going to play some of them at the catalyst on Saturday when you?

Speaker 3 45:30

man, if we can, we have to. We we're going to practice this week, so that's a possibility. We'll have to see if we're ready.

Speaker 5 45:38

Um that's always fun. That's a maybe, yeah that's my favorite part.

Speaker 3 45:43

Yeah, that is, we'll see how we feel after we jam, you know. Yeah, we might be able to pull it solid do you want to play a little something here?

Speaker 1 45:54

sure, uh just fuck around with something, oh sure yeah, and then while while he's, while he's grabbing the guitar, um, I I think I want to kind of get both ways here, because it's one of the, I think, looking at it anytime, there's two questions I've got. One of them is a band question. That I think would be helpful. It's like Nellie and I always try to get to eventually a question. That's kind of like that TED Talk question. It's like not what makes you great, but kind of what makes you great. But the thing I think would be important with you guys is how do you stay together? Um, you know, I, I, if you were to give, not give advice, but keeping a band's heart together for five really hard, three years, two years, one year, 25 years is there, is there a secret sauce?

Speaker 3 46:36

I think, kind of like, at some point you just give your entire everything to it. Yeah, so, like none of us. This sounds maybe it's bad, but we didn't have like awesome jobs or rad girlfriends or whatever, so we weren't, we weren't gonna go there like we weren't gonna be like, well, I can't tour this girl's too awesome, right. Or we'd ever say, I don't know, like we just, and I have a to get a job, I can't get in the van I I can't go with you guys.

Speaker 3 47:01

Yeah, once you do that, you're done. So if you can just kind of like, oh, I'm doing this, yeah, kind of go all in yeah, yeah. Eventually, I feel like if you're okay enough, you're going to do all right. If you just keep doing it, you guys.

Speaker 5 47:22

Yeah yeah, that's hard to find for people. There's other bands I know that were killer. They just didn't have that. Back in the day we were like very, we thought all of our goals were aligned.

Speaker 1 47:29

Yeah.

Speaker 5 47:29

All had the same.

Speaker 1 47:30

Yeah.

Speaker 3 47:31

Sort of vision At the right time.

Speaker 5 47:33

Yeah, yeah and it made sense to each and every one of us and the fact that also, like every year, something better happened. There's like another kind of level up of something else and we go on and, yeah, we got on a management company and then all of a sudden we're touring and then this next tour hit to another bigger tour, and then we just kept going up and so it's, you know, kept feeding our interest and like never, yeah, really took a dive nelly the wow, and now it's a.

Speaker 1 48:02

It's five for five in this burgeoning monster podcast that nelly's got here, but the thing about it is, um, uh, poncho zoe jackson talking about barney with wills in here. Um, who am I missing? Is that? Who's jackson taylor, zoe, sean dollar, sean dollar, yeah, dollar but here's the word that keeps coming up at every single podcast. I've said it in four, fours. This question is of being there's a commonality between Nelly himself in the water with what he did, and his friends and the people that he it's commit yes.

Speaker 1 48:34

It's commit and for us growing up here it's sitting in Soquel Skate Park and standing on the edge of that bowl and committing to dropping in. It's a weird feeling because it's counterintuitive and sometimes maybe careers and maybe life and music is that way too. So I'm down with that. And then I have one follow-up. So let's just rock something out here. Listen to you guys play something live.

Speaker 3 48:54

What should we play? What do you guys want us to play?

Speaker 1 48:57

Maybe that would be we always play both honestly, what I want is what we want selfishly is we want a. We want a world premiere of something. Is there anything you just haven't played acoustically? There's, it doesn't seem some small. There's, not to rip it off, anything fun that you haven't played before that we would enjoy sorry, we got, I don't know yeah, I know, you can throw whatever you want together what's the easiest thing for you to do.

Speaker 1 49:20

Let's go that way. I like the harmony Easiest thing, Don't you like when people talk about your career and say what's the easiest thing you do?

Acoustic Jam Session Chemistry

Speaker 3 49:27

That's my favorite one. Well, one part. It's just me and Jeff, so we're missing another guitar at least, and some bass. We're a little limited Sacrifice wouldn't be that cool. Do you have your shaker?

Speaker 4 49:39

I do. Yeah, I can't believe this didn't make a noise until right now.

Speaker 3 49:43

That's insane.

Speaker 5 49:44

That's a miracle. I mean you got a shaker. Sometimes I'm just trying He'll play a box of nuts or a can of nuts or a coffee can. He just gets real creative. We do these meet and greets in our bus, on the door, and he'll grab something out of the cupboard to play drums on, and sometimes it's a box of matches, I don't know all right, let's do it.

Speaker 1 50:05

We're doing a meet and greet right now. You want to get us the hell out of the bus. What do you play to get us off the bus?

Speaker 3 50:09

we kicked it crazy old school this is. This is a little weird, but uh, this song, I feel like we completely ripped off dub congress back in the day at write time. Oh gosh, do you remember that? Though, like going, do you know it?

Speaker 1 50:29

Oh shit, it's old.

Speaker 4 50:30

This is awesome.

Speaker 5 50:32

But we did though I'm blanking on it.

Speaker 3 50:35

It's okay, I put you on the spot. This is really cool. We could do some Desmond Decker some Peter Tosh.

Speaker 1 50:41

Peter.

Speaker 2 50:41

Tosh did Peter Tosh Old school expendables.

Speaker 1 50:43

Now you're getting to Brian. Now you're getting on the back end of Jimmy Cliff. Peter Tosh, you're starting to get into Brian's world there a little bit.

Speaker 3 50:50

Yeah, you got it. Do you know the change?

Speaker 2 50:57

Oh that's closer.

Speaker 4 51:08

Okay, right time is the right time. The other right time.

Speaker 3 51:12

Yeah, yeah, this is awesome. This is awesome All right, this is like 25 years old.

Speaker 5 51:19

We played this in like we were practicing this in my parents' garage. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Speaker 3 51:23

And the lyrics are oh, the lyrics are nothing, it's just whatever.

Speaker 1 51:28

It's the gibberish you were talking about. Yeah, no it's totally.

Speaker 3 51:29

The nighttime is the nighttime. Yeah, yeah, it came from. What is that movie? Adam Sandler, like one of his tape or whatever? Yeah, his comedy album. Okay, let's go.

Speaker 4 51:49

Three, four, Two, three, four guitar solo. The right time is the night time. Oh, the right time. The right time is the night time. Oh, the right time. The right time is the night time. Oh, the right time is it a time of the right time, the right time.

Speaker 4 52:45

Is it a time of the right time? It's me that can't remember. Yes, it's me that I cannot, but it means the spoken word from me, the spoken part. It's me that can't remember. Yes, it's me that I cannot, but it means the spoken word from me, the spoken part. It's me that can't remember. Yes, it's me that I cannot, but I need a smoking weeper. I mean a smoking pipe, but I can't remember if it's me that I cannot, but I need a smoking weeper. I mean a smoking pipe, but I can't remember if it's me that I cannot, but I need a smoking weeper, you know it makes me feel so good inside when I roll it.

Speaker 4 53:20

It's a semi-kill. Come on, join us On the 90's side. You know it makes me feel so good inside when I roll it it's a semi-kill. Come on, join us On the 90's side. 1, 2, 3, 4. 1, 2, 3, 4. Let's see. Right time, it's the right time. It's the right time. Oh, the right time. It's the right time. It's the right time. Oh, the right time isn't a time for the right time. The right time isn't a time for the right time. The right time isn't a time for the right time. It's me like an hour when I'm reading a story. You know it makes me feel so good inside when I'm all it says to me Come on, get your nose On the IV side. You know it makes me feel so good inside. Well, I really got to be. Come on, environment.

Speaker 1 55:52

I'm in my own place. That's a great choice.

Speaker 3 55:55

So that riff that I feel like it's just totally dub-toned, Totally Like that was when we were younger. We're like, oh, that's the song, Like we want to sound like that. Yeah, that's it. That was tight.

Speaker 1 56:07

That was for our little weird setup.

Speaker 5 56:09

That was amazing, that was straight amazing and that was yeah, that's not a, you don't hear that acoustic.

Speaker 3 56:17

No, I don't think that was a world premiere, though right world premiere, all right, so um, uh, fuck, kill mary world premiere.

Speaker 1 56:24

We're killing it.

Speaker 2 56:25

So they say, the biggest form of flattery is when someone has what you want. And, man, I would give anything to be able to like, harmonize and play music like that. That was just like the dream.

Life Changes and Creative Evolution

Speaker 1 56:40

So, thank you, we can teach you yeah, incredible that's called chemistry right there, and that was fun. That was fun to watch. It's exactly what it was. It was chemistry. And I got one more winding one because I'd just be remiss, because it's the first question that I had written down um, just as a, as a, as a husband, as a father, as all those ones, is um, and we'll go both here so you can get into. It's like just the evolution of that. Like you know from you guys meet in high school and you've just been through it all now and now it's like and you're still making the music, you're still progressing, you're still kind of innovating, but just the emotion of that part of it like like the decades, and now it's like you're, you're, you're different than those kids that were listening on your disc man, and decided you wanted to rock a band.

Speaker 1 57:21

Talk about that a little bit.

Speaker 2 57:23

That's why I'm so excited to hear this new stuff, because it's just like everything you've come out with up to this point has just been so unique and so innovative and creative.

Speaker 3 57:34

Yeah, and the content's probably a little different. Now. There's a phase where we're raging. You can tell Every song is about partying our ass off. Yeah, right, and there's not as much that because we're just not doing that right anymore, because we're in our 40s now and, um, like you said, we, we all have kids. Yeah, and it's um, just changes. Like kids, I mean kids, I think, change who you are. For sure, marriage is one thing, but having kids is another.

Speaker 3 58:01

Yeah, totally your priorities change, right, yeah, your priorities are not that you can still be married and party and have a good time, but when you have kids, it's all about them, at least for me and Jeff too, it's all about them. And it's just that changes who you are, and I feel like if we would have done that earlier, it would have been really really hard to be where we are now.

Speaker 1 58:22

Yeah, I hate that saying you know if you know, but sometimes where you land as a and it's not all about being a parent, it's about kind of evolving and maturing. But the thing that's hard to describe your 18-year-old self is that same dopamine, the same fulfillment If you had a meter to 10, it's identical to raging till 3 am as it is, watching your kid have success in something. Totally that's the whole thing. That's weird is like there's no way you could talk your 18-year-old self into that.

Speaker 5 58:48

No, no, you just don't understand.

Speaker 1 58:50

No, like you don't have the ability to understand.

Speaker 5 58:53

I wouldn't have understood up until the kid was born. Yeah, yeah, you could be told that's exactly it, you cannot.

Speaker 4 58:59

yeah, yeah, you could be told, that's exactly right you cannot.

Speaker 1 59:01

Yeah, it's just like. Yeah, there's that, that moment. So now, and I guess the the logical question is is it like nelly was just getting at, is it gonna make its way into, clearly, into the lyrics and sort of the emotion of some of these?

Speaker 3 59:13

I think so. If it hasn't already, I'm trying.

Speaker 5 59:15

I think it has, yeah yeah, I mean, some of the stuff that I'm working on right now is like yeah, yeah, totally more uplifting, more conscious lyrics, more thinking of gratitude, more thinking of things like that, where 10 years ago was like party. You know how to think about partying.

Speaker 1 59:35

You can be as hard as fuck, but the thing about having a kid that's weird is you live your whole life as one person. You have a kid and then two years later you're watching christmas commercial or a hallmark commercial and you're and I'm like what just happened? Yeah, yeah, it's like I've never done that, I've never felt that you have a kid and all of a sudden you're like so you cry a lot too, like I do.

Speaker 4 59:54

Okay, cool I just want to make sure how dare you?

Speaker 3 59:58

no, no, no, no. I agree with you, like I, emotionally it's, it's totally just yeah thoughts. Or you read something like maybe terrible, sometimes on accident, and you're like, oh my god, like I can't, yeah I can't even watch right negative stuff the news.

Speaker 2 1:00:12

Yeah, it's wild so me and christy my kid took our daughter kiala to the airport this morning let's fly back to.

Speaker 5 1:00:18

Hawaii.

Speaker 3 1:00:21

That's hard right.

Speaker 5 1:00:22

I follow you, nelly and I see your posts and I have a daughter and I'm like, dude, you're letting your little child go and it's got to be so hard she's making us so proud, though.

Speaker 2 1:00:36

Do you remember that one we paddled out at 26? She paddled right up to Jeff and she was looking at him and I was like she paddled right up to Jeff and she was like looking at him. I'm like you know who that is, and she's like no, I'm like I started singing your song and she's like no way, yeah, yeah, that was great. She was so starstruck.

Speaker 3 1:00:52

That's rad, is that who I met at Costco?

Speaker 2 1:00:56

Yeah, we ran into each other at costco not too too long ago.

Speaker 3 1:01:03

She's just, yeah, she just idolizes you guys too, but, um sweet, but she's just such a sweetheart, you know, that's awesome and that's like the next phase, like we're going through the little kid phase where you're just like I can't even imagine sending my kid on a plane to be gone from this trip for so long. How old are your kids? I have, uh, two and six. Okay, six, yeah, yeah 32, 29 and.

Speaker 1 1:01:19

Yeah 32, 29, and 28. That's wild, so you've been through it. My kids are getting the AARP cards. My kids are literally it's like people are like and they're still your kids. The only difference with kids like you have right now is it's school supplies, shoes, things like that. Now they just want to co-sign on like houses and things like that. So everything changed, but there's still forever. Oh yeah, your little kid. There does not go away.

Speaker 2 1:01:44

You guys are in the golden era, six years old yeah, like from six.

Speaker 3 1:01:48

And we both waited. So it's like we're older than we should be, probably, but it's fine. I will tell you this though A bunch of years of bliss, yeah.

Speaker 1 1:01:56

And the thing no, no, this is your podcast dude the. The thing about nelly that I love is he's such an emotional guy. But the thing at this table and a little bit of mine comes in the written word is that it's nice to be able to pour that somewhere, that emotion, because you know my real life job is landscaping. You know I run a landscaping.

Speaker 1 1:02:14

Not a lot of emotion in that sure you know, like I can feel a certain way, but there's not, you know. But you guys have a particular outlet, a blank canvas to pour that in, and he does the same thing through the camera Clearly when you look at your images. It's not just the eye stock photos.

Speaker 5 1:02:33

There's emotion behind it so I think for sure. I mean this one right here is almost. I was so stoked, I was so honored when you guys hit me up for a photo for this.

Speaker 4 1:02:42

Such an honor.

Speaker 2 1:02:42

I was so stoked, I was so honored when, you guys hit me up for a photo for this. Such an honor. I was psyching. And then I went to Cali Roots and I was like that's my photo on that shirt At your guys booth.

Speaker 1 1:02:50

I was so psyched the shameless plugs. Time Sure.

Speaker 5 1:02:56

Follow us on Instagram. Follow us on Facebook, our MySpace is.

Speaker 3 1:03:02

Follow us on Instagram. Follow us on Facebook. Our MySpace is expendable slash. I don't remember anymore.

Speaker 1 1:03:08

Give out your cell phone number Playing to the catalyst. Jeff's cell phone number is 831.

Speaker 3 1:03:14

We'll hype it up, show it to Catalyst yeah, catalyst. This weekend there's a couple tickets left, maybe not.

Speaker 1 1:03:20

Yeah, I called them today. I think it's the classic little push right now of just not a ton left.

Speaker 4 1:03:25

Which is awesome, which is always the case here.

Speaker 1 1:03:28

Who's opening? Or are you guys just rocking it? A band called Trestles. Oh, I've heard Trestles.

Speaker 5 1:03:32

They played yeah, I can't think of. Should we look on our phones? Yeah, we got time.

Speaker 2 1:03:41

Nelly, did you have any other? Uh little, I think we got it in right. I just I just gotta say how grateful I am for you guys and just how rad it was to watch you guys whole career from the very, very beginning and just like the explosion and being involved. You know, having a book signing with you guys, like everything we've been through together, means a lot to me and um, you know, same here, nelly the do your guys.

Speaker 2 1:04:05

Music is really influential in my life, and did no brian's as well, and um, just having you here is is really special, you know.

Speaker 1 1:04:13

I mean that means a lot, thank you yeah, it's kind of rad that, like, I'll be honest, this is, this is part of the drill with hanging out with nelly and you know, we just met four or five years ago, so I'm new to the game with him. But, um, yeah, to sit down with somebody that's a small little soundtrack of your life is pretty amazing. You know the, you know, like the kids I'm talking about would have been playing in my volkswagen fastback. You guys were playing in denver in 2002, I mean. So it's just amazing to be sitting here and watching you guys play. It means a lot to have you around, I do. I have one more question. I knew he did. See, I know this guy.

Speaker 2 1:04:45

What was your favorite venue and show that you ever played.

Speaker 5 1:04:49

We'd ask that a lot. I mean that one show we were talking about at the Bowl was one of the really cool ones.

Speaker 3 1:04:54

It's hard, it's easy to be top 10. Because the number, the number one. There's a few like at Red Rocks. There's one where it was raining on all of our stuff and nothing was working and all of a sudden they're just like playing. Jeff started playing because bass wasn't working and it kicked in the right time. Red Rocks, pouring rain.

Red Rocks Concert Experience and Reflections

Speaker 2 1:05:13

Can't really beat that one. That's the story I'm looking for right there. That's the Red One. Venue that I haven't been to yet is Red Rocks. Oh, dude, and I really, really want to go. You should go. That's my favorite venue. We lived in Denver.

Speaker 1 1:05:22

Oh yeah, I mean we went on the regular for concerts and you catch that sunset, or it's spiritual, yeah, it's spiritual.

Speaker 5 1:05:30

It's always like a thread of rain.

Speaker 1 1:05:36

It's always kind of thunder, lightning-y, and it's red rocks is. I've sat down close, but is it what's your perspective looking up there? I mean the lights than the unlike any other venue.

Speaker 3 1:05:46

Yeah, right, shoots up like for you guys almost gives you vertigo, yeah it goes like when you're sitting playing drums, the top of that right, uh, it's known, you're listening, but like it shoots up like eight feet, yeah, like I don't know how to explain it. Normally it's just straight out and you see a sea of people, but they go straight uh nelly, it's so steep that it's a very popular like.

Speaker 1 1:06:06

My daughter owns a crossfit gym and yeah, that's the sunday workout.

Speaker 5 1:06:10

You'll be sound, you'll be sound checking to people like doing crushing, yeah, like doing sprint.

Speaker 1 1:06:14

You know they do sunrise yoga there?

Speaker 5 1:06:16

I'm like people with their mats out and they go there when it comes up, that's one of those venues, though, where I hype it up so much in my head, like the weeks before that when I actually play I try too hard.

Speaker 1 1:06:28

I can imagine.

Speaker 5 1:06:30

And having a less than ideal set. Yeah, the last time we were there, the last summer tour on with Revolution, I didn't think I played all that well. It was still great and fun and stuff. But internally I'm like, oh man, I wish I could have played better. But then the next night I was way more relaxed and I had a way feeling way better about my performance. So it's one of those.

Speaker 3 1:06:52

Okay, so you need to book something bigger than Red Rocks before you play.

Speaker 2 1:06:55

Bigger than Red Rocks, that's why they came up with the saying just for today, you know, I mean because you stay in today and then you don't get all these like wild notions of how rad it's going to be two weeks from now it's a great point.

Speaker 3 1:07:05

No, it's true, it's hard, though it's hard it's hard easier said than done, but yeah, but you know, I'll try. I guess, jeff, you got the lineup yeah, I got the lineup.

Speaker 5 1:07:13

so yeah, lot 49 is opening, trussell's is next, and then us right, the seventh.

Speaker 1 1:07:19

And we'll drop it all in the like I said. We've got a few different ways. This one will hit tomorrow and then we'll get it out to the Humanity on Wednesday newsletter and then you guys, you guys, it's going to happen anyways, but we'll try to sell one or two tickets and we're going to roll out.

Speaker 5 1:07:41

I thank you for having us. The feelings are mutual when it comes to you and your legacy and being connected with you, surfer Grom, along the point seeing you do your thing with all the pros. You're this mythical creature he is creature to play golf with you and get close in this way.

Speaker 1 1:08:02

It's really cool, so thank you can we agree that dude's a good singer and he's a mythical creature? Let's do that, guys. This was incredible.

Speaker 2 1:08:10

Thank you for having us so psyching that was such a so stoked on you guys coming and honored thanks, boys.