Protomen: Music that defines Rock Opera, Rebellion, and Rhythm

Behind the Scenes with The Protomen: A Rock Opera Odyssey
In this episode of 'Almost Live Nashville,' host Tony Mantor delves into the fascinating world of The Proto Man, a Nashville-based band known for their unique blend of rock opera, sci-fi storytelling, and raw energy. T
he band members, who go by the names Murphy, Commander B. Hawkins, and Panther, share insights into their creative process, the evolution of their concept albums, and their journey from humble beginnings to their ambitious endeavors today.
They discuss the intricate storylines of their music, their experiences performing live, and their aspirations for the future, including playing in Japan and potentially creating a Broadway play.
Listeners will get an in-depth look at the band's influences, the themes of rebellion, sacrifice, and legacy in their work, and the strong connection they share with their fans.
Introduction to the Podcast
Meet the Protomen
The Concept and Evolution of Their Music
The Storyline and Themes
Live Performances and Audience Reactions
Future Aspirations and Goals
Animation Opportunities
Upcoming Shows and Events
Reflecting on the Band's Legacy
Fan Interactions and Inspirations
Quickfire Questions: Between the Beats
Favorite Songs and Tour Memories
Dream Collaborations
Heartfelt Message to Fans
INTRO/OUTRO Music: T. Wild
Mantor Music BMI

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:14

My career in the entertainment industry has enabled me to work with a diverse range of talent. Through my years of experience, I've recognized two essential aspects. Industry professionals, whether famous stars or behind-the-scenes staff, have fascinating stories to tell. Secondly, audiences are eager to listen to these stories, which offer a glimpse into their lives and the evolution of their life stories. This podcast aims to share these narratives, providing information on how they evolved into their chosen career. We will delve into their journey to stardom, discuss their struggles and successes, and hear from people who help them achieve their goals. Get ready for intriguing behind-the-scenes stories and insights into the fascinating world of entertainment. Hi, I'm Tony Mantor. Welcome to Almost Live Nashville. Joining us today is the members of the Prono Man, a band that doesn't just write songs, they build worlds. Straight out of Nashville, these guys have carved out a sound that blends rock opera, sci-fi storytelling, and pure, raw energy into something completely their own. Their albums feel cinematic, their live shows are full-on experiences, and their music hits like a rebellion you can feel. They're bold, unapologetic, and unlike anything else out there. I'm beyond excited to welcome them on today. So before we dive into our episode, we'll be back with an uninterrupted show right after a word from our sponsors. Thanks for coming on.

SPEAKER_03 1:51

Thanks for having us.

SPEAKER_01 1:52

Oh, it's my pleasure. So tell me, anyone that's discovering the Proto Men for the very first time, what do you tell them about yourselves and what you do?

SPEAKER_02 2:04

Interesting. Uh interestingly, we have no idea. Um, so I think honestly, my favorite thing that I've seen recently is what Metal Sucks uh magazine just described us as, and it was basically like if if uh Queen and Rush got drunk listening to Devo, and what was the rest of it? But basically it was like a big long thing about uh combining all these bands and a I don't know, it was it was good. So um yeah, a bunch of different musical references and film references and things like that all jumbled together to make whatever it is we are.

SPEAKER_03 2:50

We've we've long called ourselves rock opera, um but I'd say that it's more uh I mean it's story rock somehow. Or I mean it's I guess concept rock is it's sort of like listening to a film.

SPEAKER_01 3:05

Now what I've read about you, you have this kind of rock opera concept. It mentions video games, music, and how you tie it all together. Maybe an Orwellian type style. Yeah. We don't If you kind of tie all those three things together, how does the audience relate to the features and the different things that you're doing?

SPEAKER_02 3:29

Well, one of the features in there we don't really do, like uh we don't play music from the games or anything. There's no it's just all original concept, all original music, you know, that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_03 3:39

So I think a lot of our fans don't know that all of those pieces of the puzzle exist. I think we have fans that come and they say, Hey, I really like Mega Man, which is the video game that we referenced, and they show up dressed as characters, and then we have fans that um just pure rock and roll people. Yeah. And they don't really they walk, they walk in and they say, Why are we dressed as Mega Man? Uh and but you know, I think somehow in the midst of the you know floor that they're standing in, they find a way to coexist.

SPEAKER_01 4:13

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. Now you have what you described as multiple acts, like an act one, an act two, and an act three. Can you give us a little information on what these acts are and how you put everything together as a show?

SPEAKER_03 4:29

So we started more than twenty years ago, um with a song. And it sort of we recorded it, we recorded another one, we played a show, and it's just sort of grown uh exponentially from there.

SPEAKER_02 4:51

After the first song we did, it was about Mega Man just by chance, and after the first one was done, then we're like, well, that was really fun. We should build a story around this and just expound on the whole situation and just make it as ridiculous as humanly possible. And so then we just started building it up and building it up, and we ended up with an album, and so we're like, okay, we've got an album. We released that album in 2005, it was act one, and so that was when it wasn't even called act one at that point because we didn't have a full plan for part two yet, other than a general story that it could do. And honestly, I knew more of what was gonna happen in act three at that point than I did what what was gonna happen in act two, and so act two turned into the prequel. So act two is the prequel to act one, and it came out in 2009, and it was a different kind of album. Whereas Act One was very post-apocalyptic, very dirty, grungy, just distorted sound. Act two being a prequel in the storyline, it was a much nicer place, so the sound is a lot cleaner, a lot, you know, more pristine sounding, you know, polished. And so then time passed and time passed, and now we're on act three, and it's kind of a middle ground. We haven't really, you know, it's definitely not as distorted and you know mean sounding as act one for sure, though.

SPEAKER_01 6:12

It's almost like you created this theater with a storyline where it's like this dystopian world. You've got fascists and other entities in there as well. So you see yourselves putting a statement out there of what you think and what you're putting across of what you think in the music. Do you think your audience is getting and grasping the show that you're trying to put across to them?

SPEAKER_03 6:39

I think they're getting it there. The statement's in there, like you know.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

I think they're getting it.

SPEAKER_02 6:43

But yeah, it's I guess as we were saying earlier today, it's very depressing when the storyline you've been building for 20 years has become so obscenely real that it's just you can barely handle it.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

Now you mentioned the story. Can you elaborate on what the story is within your music?

SPEAKER_02 7:02

Oh, you're talking about like just basically that our storyline that we've been writing all these years is happening all around us now. And it's been happening all around us, and that's why we were kind of talk about it in the beginning, but it's just gotten far more intense.

SPEAKER_01 7:16

So I think this is a great time for you to introduce yourselves. I know you have names that you go by in your music, so tell everybody who you are. Uh, my name is Murphy. My name is Commander B. Hawkins.

SPEAKER_03 7:27

And I'm um Panther.

SPEAKER_01 7:29

Okay, that's great. Now tell us, how did you come up with these names?

SPEAKER_03 7:35

Oh, hilarious. The name finds you, I think. Yeah, the name finds you. I mean, every every every character in the band has uh something has happened with them.

SPEAKER_02 7:44

Yeah, it's it's all very personal. I'll tell you that in our storyline, Sophie B. Hawkins is my great-great-great-great-great great great grandmother.

SPEAKER_03 7:54

Oh how the the lore. In the lore. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

Okay, your albums, your music, they come across more like epic films than just your typical musical CDs. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 8:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:11

When you start a new project, what comes first? The storyline, the music, or just the raw emotion? It's it's interesting.

SPEAKER_02 8:21

Musically, we always have, you know, storyline, we know where the outline, the skeleton is, and then you say, Well, this character needs to speak. What who is that character and how do they speak? They speak with this type of rock and roll. Um, this type of that this one, this person's kind of spaghetti western, this person is kind of whatever. And so you're you build from that starting point of well, we know we need a song that's like this, let's build that song. And then um occasionally you'll get into we'll have just a random riff or something that we've come up with, and then it's like, well, that fits this character, so let's build around that and build that piece of the story. So it's I'd say it honestly, it is very, very much. It's like somebody gave us a film and said, All right, write the music for it, figure it out. And then we go, okay, we'll we'll we'll figure it out.

SPEAKER_03 9:14

Yeah, I think definitely the story uh you know drives everything. I think we always have that vision in the back of our heads, even if we're just toying with a a riff that sounds cool or uh, you know, a certain lyric that that seems to fit. We you know, we're always cognizant that the story will come into play at some point, definitely. It has to fit. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

And if it doesn't fit, it doesn't fit. Okay, that's great. Now, you've been doing this Mega Man concept for a few years now. Did you have a concept where you kind of knew where it might end? Or has the story grown alongside you as you have developed as a band?

SPEAKER_02 9:58

Um, I knew where it would go. There are things where, you know, it's developed along the way for sure. It's well, it's refined a lot along the way. But in terms of just knowing exactly where it's gone, no. It was we had to figure it out. And honestly, it's a whole lot of plot hole plugging.

SPEAKER_03 10:22

Oh, yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_02 10:23

You end up that's really what it is. It's like, what if what have we done? You are holes everywhere, like we have to fix these holes, but it's like, all right, but we we've made the pieces, it's us understanding our own story. It's like us understanding, oh, we've created this hole, but we also created the plug for the hole years ago. We just have to put the piece in it in place, and it's that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_01 10:46

Yeah, now your music dives deep into rebellion, sacrifice, and legacy. Looking back from your act one to now, how have your own perspective on these themes changed, if at all? That's a good question.

SPEAKER_02 11:02

That's pretty deep. I might be deeper than my brain.

SPEAKER_03 11:07

Like, as in, like, do we feel differently now or just yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

How do you feel about it?

SPEAKER_03 11:12

I don't know. I think I'm I'd say Oh yeah, I'd say it's humans.

SPEAKER_02 11:18

As a human being in the year 2026, I didn't know that I could get more jaded with society in 2005. That's really my thing, is that I didn't realize that I could hate people more. And and so now and 20 years later, it's like, oh no, no, there's a whole whole ocean of hate at ready for me to jump into. So, no, no, it's it's uh society has proven itself to be embarrassing, and that's really my um that's what I've taken from it. They're still good in people. I'm not saying that I'm just completely jaded. Right, I'm I was people are still inherently individually good people, but as a group, people are monsters.

SPEAKER_03 12:04

But we also started out in 2005 from that perspective, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:08

Like that's the age. Right.

SPEAKER_03 12:10

We started out, our first record is very much about the failure of mankind as a whole to you know to rise to heroism or the to rise to the the place that they need to be.

SPEAKER_02 12:24

The lowest level of making an effort. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:28

So we, you know, yeah, we started out from that place, and I think as we've gone through the act, we do try to keep hope alive, even if it perhaps gets more and more difficult to do it. It's still there.

SPEAKER_02 12:40

Yeah, you have to search for the hope. That's really what it comes down to.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

Yeah, I get it. I get it. Is there a lyric or a moment in your catalog that still hits you emotionally even after playing it a hundred times?

SPEAKER_03 12:54

Oh man. That's a good question, too. So we are right now working on the a couple of weeks ago we played in DC. We played all three acts. We started with act two, we went to act one, then we went to act three. Across three nights. The chronological order. Yeah, across three nights at this uh festival in DC called Magfest. So we basically played for the first time ever our entire catalog. And I'll say that there were songs, there's a lot of stuff that when you're able to play the album in its entirety, a lot of stuff you haven't played in a long time. There was a lot of stuff from Act Two that we just don't get to when we're playing just an hour and a half set in a club or a bar. So there was a lot of rediscovering lyrics. Yeah, there's uh in the second act, sort of the protagonist's partner dies, and there's a lot of there's a lot of really emotional grief that sits in the middle of that record that we don't really play because it's a little too heavy for just like a you know a a bar show. Uh so yeah, there's a couple in uh The State versus Thomas Light. Uh yeah, there's some intense lyrics on that one.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:11

And there's like lyrics on on, you know, the flip of that is like we'll make stuff like this. It's pretty good. And then we'll play a song we haven't played in five or eight years, and the kids, the fans lose it on like the stand. Yeah, that the stand is like people's favorite song, but we like never play it. Yeah, just for whatever reason, because the way it fits in the set, we pull it out every once in a while and they lose it because the lyrics in that one are extra. And we wrote that 20 years ago, and it has a very, very strong message now.

SPEAKER_01 14:41

You just mentioned playing in clubs. How do you fit in clubs?

SPEAKER_02 14:47

On top of each other.

SPEAKER_01 14:49

Well, why I ask that a lot of these clubs have a certain expectation when a band comes in, they expect certain songs, and here you come in with your own style that you have, which is completely different than anything they will have come in. So, how does that work for you?

SPEAKER_02 15:07

Uh I it's fine.

SPEAKER_03 15:09

I mean our fans, our fans show up.

SPEAKER_02 15:12

We don't we don't have random people show up to our shows. I wish we did, but there's never been a point in our entire history that a person, an individual that didn't know who we were, walked in the door and watched us. Not once.

SPEAKER_03 15:26

You get you get people that are being dragged to the show by friends that are talking us up.

SPEAKER_02 15:30

The whole idea of street, what's it called? When the people like, no, it's it's okay.

SPEAKER_03 15:34

Like the locals.

SPEAKER_02 15:35

The locals or the bar. They're gonna walk up. You're gonna have walk up and it's gonna be it's like, no, no, we've never once had a single person walk up to the door that didn't know who we were in Walmart. Not once. If they walked through, they would never leave, and they would come back every time. Except for maybe Warp Tour. That's true.

SPEAKER_03 15:53

Well, we played Warp Tour, and there was a there was a a mass exodus when we started playing of people who were there to see that the typical thing.

SPEAKER_02 16:02

They didn't leave because of us, they left because they they had already left by the time we started playing.

SPEAKER_03 16:08

That's true, but you would get those random people who are walking through looking at the city.

SPEAKER_02 16:12

They would just stare at us going, what is that?

SPEAKER_03 16:14

And we would catch their eye in the hot summer sun melting makeup off of our faces. Yeah. And uh, you know, but it was only like six of them. Yeah, six people over seven weeks.

SPEAKER_02 16:26

But no, like but generally club shows for us are fantastic. Like that's where the that's where we thrive the most because they're intimate, they're intense, they're way way more intense. And so, like, we just played for a crowd of four, you know, four thousand for three nights in a row the other night, or you know, a couple weekends ago, and that's a rare instance of four thousand people being completely into it. Usually when you play a big show like that, it's kind of uh, I don't know, very odd.

SPEAKER_03 16:53

But even then, there's a there's a disconnect between a large crowd like that and uh between that and being in a club that has just a few hundred people that are really packed in and really feeding off of each other's energy.

SPEAKER_02 17:06

Generally, we end up playing like for those smaller club shows, we'll just play like a mix of our of whatever we're feeling like playing, whatever works for the set, not really like leaning into the storyline as much.

SPEAKER_01 17:18

If someone hears Proto Man for the very first time, what is the song that you wish they hear first and why? It's hard, that's a hard one.

SPEAKER_02 17:29

For different reasons. Like, if you want somebody to go like a the rock and jam that everybody likes a lot, Light of the Night's the one. Um everybody seems to love that song, uh, which is super grateful for it.

SPEAKER_03 17:42

Yeah, that's the one I that's the one I always send people to.

SPEAKER_02 17:45

Yeah, like there's all kinds of stuff on the new album, though. Like, literally, the whole new album is like we go to that one, go to that one, go to that one. Like, keep quiet, rad from act two. Act one, will of one would be the way to go, or the stand is fun. Hope rides alone explains the story.

SPEAKER_01 18:01

What's in your bucket list? What are you hoping that you can do for the future? Money.

SPEAKER_03 18:07

Yeah, I get it. There's money in the bucket.

SPEAKER_02 18:10

We we've but we've loved to play Japan. Yeah. We have to have people buy our things from Japan, though. So if anybody knows anything about Japan and or how to get us into Japan or get people to listen to us in Japan so that we can tour there.

SPEAKER_03 18:24

I mean, yeah, we we go to other Europe, Australia, and we can get around everywhere.

SPEAKER_02 18:33

So there's all kinds of things.

SPEAKER_03 18:35

I mean I mean, I want to make a Broadway play of this thing.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

Yes, that's the there's all the things, anything you can think of, we want to do it. It's just do we have the money to do it? Or the backing, the funding, any kind of like that. Like we need to do it, make a video game, we need to make a series of animated movies or live action movies, and the expertise.

SPEAKER_03 18:52

We don't have the expertise. Yeah, we have no expertise. We're pretty good at audio. Yeah, yeah. We're not great at everything else. Yeah, yeah, we're all audio engineers from here, so yeah, yeah, I get that.

SPEAKER_01 19:04

Join the crowd. That's me too.

SPEAKER_03 19:06

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

If anybody out there does animation, get in touch with us. We've got all kinds of things we want. Animation would be great. A lot of great things come from that.

SPEAKER_00 19:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:16

So what's coming up next? You just mentioned several different things without giving too much away. What can your fans and the listeners expect from you in the future?

SPEAKER_03 19:26

We've got the June, the June, June 18th through 20th. We're doing the Nashville release show, like the big celebrated release show for the new record. An album a day, you know, three albums over three days, like we did two weeks ago. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:40

This one would be a bit more of a production.

SPEAKER_03 19:43

Yeah, yeah, because we'll be in our home turf and have more time.

SPEAKER_02 19:45

But that's already sold out, so yeah, but it's sold out another week.

SPEAKER_03 19:48

It's sold out so fast. So it's also marathon music works. Yeah. Um Marathon was about 170, 1800, so that'll be that'll be the biggest shows we've ever done in Nashville, literally. And then three days of it.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

Let's look in the future right now. Fifteen, twenty years from now, someone's looking back on the proto-man. What are you hoping that they say your music gave to them? Hope.

SPEAKER_03 20:15

Yeah, I also really I really love people that come up to us and give us something that they've done. Art or music or uh, you know uh yeah, inspiration. Yeah, that and they say your band caused me to want to produce something of my own. That's always really cool. Yeah. I hope we're spawning a lot of, you know, people making their art.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

Other really weird bands?

SPEAKER_03 20:43

Other really weird bands, yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:44

Yeah, now speaking of fans, what is the most meaningful thing a fan has said to you? Oh, there's so many.

SPEAKER_02 20:52

And they're all very like a bunch of them. They're very personal.

SPEAKER_03 20:55

Yeah, a lot of it's usually I think that one is is not one particular, but when someone talks about, oh, you know, I'll listen to you with my family member who's now not with me anymore. Then I listen to this and think of that, and you know, if that the I don't know what you call that. That there's a term for that. It's has to do with memories. I can't think I'm I'm losing the words, but those are always appreciated, you know, when those are happening.

SPEAKER_01 21:20

How do people find you?

SPEAKER_02 21:22

Um, do you mean how should they look for us? Yeah. Uh Protoman.com is a good way to get to us. Uh that kind of leads everywhere. We're on all the streaming things, just Protomen, Act Free, The City Made Us the new album. And then we're on YouTube. You can find us on that. It's pretty much anywhere you can find us, we're out there. So just search our name.

SPEAKER_01 21:43

Here's the part I call between the beats. We do quick questions, no right or wrong answers, just something for the fun of it. Oh, I can say I can make it wrong.

SPEAKER_00 21:54

Don't do challenge.

SPEAKER_01 21:56

What is the first album you ever owned? Album. Like owned or Bought with your own money. Yeah, that's it. Bought with your own money. You owned it. Oh, bought with your own money. I think I know mine.

SPEAKER_02 22:07

Allapalooza.

SPEAKER_03 22:08

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 22:11

No, use your illusion.

SPEAKER_03 22:13

What?

SPEAKER_02 22:14

November Rain.

SPEAKER_03 22:16

That's one. Yeah, that's one. Yeah. It might have been it might have been Thriller. That's pretty good. When it was new? No, no, no. Like a cassette, you know, bought it from you know, Camelot or Yeah, that's pretty cool. Like the I don't know. Maybe uh I know the first album that I ever possessed was the Alan Jackson record with Ched Hoochie on it.

SPEAKER_02 22:40

That'll do it.

SPEAKER_03 22:41

That was like that was like an uncle, and uncle was like, Here, kid, this is what you need to be listening to. And I got a boom box for Christmas, one of those like CD boom boxes where the speakers pop off and you can move them a solid three-peed away. You should still have it. Man, I'll still have it. The first one I bought was I had a uh my birthday, and I was given a cassette player in like $20. Like that was the birthday, and I went down the road and bought Beastie Boys License the Ill. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:09

That's what I was about to say. Is the all the first thing that I probably ever had was a copied version of that album-owned cassette that my cousin from Memphis gave me or my brother, and that ended up with it.

SPEAKER_01 23:23

What's your favorite proto-man to play live? I don't like any of them.

SPEAKER_03 23:30

They're all tortured.

SPEAKER_01 23:31

No.

SPEAKER_03 23:32

Uh man. So we've just started, like, literally at the Magfest thing that we played a couple of weeks ago. It was the first time we had played most of Act Three live. So I think my new favorite is Light's Last Stand. It's sort of at the end of Act Three. It was horrifying to try and pull off live. It's a lot of moving parts. Uh there's a saxophone solo. I broke my knee during it. You broke your knee during it, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:57

My ankle.

SPEAKER_03 23:58

But it's it is now my favorite.

SPEAKER_01 24:00

What's your favorite tour city? Oh, tour city? That's impossible.

SPEAKER_02 24:04

Like New York's always incredible.

SPEAKER_03 24:06

Chicago Chicago's incredible.

SPEAKER_02 24:10

LA is incredible. London is incredible.

SPEAKER_03 24:12

Major ones are. But you know, the ones that are memorable in the on the old days is like you know, like Richmond. Or like North Carolina. British Columbia.

SPEAKER_02 24:21

Spring Springfield, North Carolina. What was the where's what's or Springfield, Missouri? No, North Carolina. Greenville. Greenville, North Carolina.

SPEAKER_03 24:28

That was a long time ago. Those are now those places don't exist anymore that we used to go play.

SPEAKER_02 24:33

Like the whole towns don't exist.

SPEAKER_03 24:34

Yeah. Yeah. But there's like some surprising, like small, weird towns that you wouldn't think that are pretty.

SPEAKER_02 24:41

Vancouver is always the wildest for some reason.

SPEAKER_03 24:43

Yeah, Vancouver's, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:45

No, yeah, I can't. There's no there's no favorite. It's there's just so many ghosts.

SPEAKER_01 24:49

Yeah. What's the strangest thing this ever happened to you on two? Oh, if also impossible. One that just stands out in your mind that you probably will never forget.

SPEAKER_03 25:05

We did push our uh RV up the Continental Divide.

SPEAKER_02 25:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:10

Uh a few years ago. And that that was that was the day, and then then the tow truck driver showed up and had to drag us up it illegally. That was a fun day. He didn't know it was illegal. Yeah. He didn't know we were all hiding in the RV. Oh, that was that was a different time. Oh, he knew that one. That was another one where he didn't know.

SPEAKER_02 25:28

That's is a good story. Every time a tow truck shows up and they're like, Well, you're not supposed to be have people in the back, so we you just have to get out on the side of the road. Or you just hide. And then as you're riding down the interstate in the tow truck and everybody's sticking their heads up over the dashboard.

SPEAKER_03 25:44

It's fantastic. We have lots of those stories.

SPEAKER_01 25:47

Um okay. If you were not musicians, what would you be doing today? I don't even know. It's been so long.

SPEAKER_03 25:56

I could be a mechanic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'd definitely be somebody's accountant.

SPEAKER_02 26:00

I'd make hot sauce.

SPEAKER_03 26:01

I would, I mean, I already am an accountant, but I would be even more an accountant. You could be getting paid for it. Yes, I would get paid to be to account the money.

SPEAKER_02 26:11

Yeah. I almost went to school to be a marine biologist. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 26:15

Oh, yeah. I went to school for history. Kind of no computer science and history kind of initially, and then we were at MTSU, and I was like, oh, I should uh do music stuff because I'm here and there's all this million dollars equipment. Oh and then I met these fellows there.

SPEAKER_02 26:32

I would probably be working on a dive boat in the Caribbean somewhere. That's pretty much it. I would fix the boat.

SPEAKER_03 26:37

I think I would I'd like to be a boat mechanic. There you go. I'd like to change the answer.

SPEAKER_02 26:42

When we go to when we go to the the Japan Caribbean? No, we're gonna go to the Caribbean. I'm gonna I'm gonna work on a dive boat. Okay, and you're gonna be the mechanic for the boat. Let's start a band while we're down there.

SPEAKER_03 26:51

Ah, you son of a man. Gotcha. Get him. Now every time I think I'm out.

SPEAKER_02 26:57

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

Dream Collaboration, alive or dead. Who would you like to work with? Oh, that's that's intense.

SPEAKER_03 27:06

We tried to work with Jim Steinman one time.

SPEAKER_02 27:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:08

He was not all about it.

SPEAKER_02 27:10

I'm gonna tell you, yeah, I'll tell you who we did try to work with on this album, and he kind of ghosted us, but we still love him, is Dennis DeYoung from Styx. We tried to get him to sing our Wiley part for this album, and we were talking to him for a bit and chit-chatting, and he ended up, I guess, just passing on it or something. So, but that would have been wonderful.

SPEAKER_03 27:30

Yeah, we said live or dead. It's like you know, you say obvious stuff like I don't know, Bowie and things like that, but it's also who's who's the underdog that would that would help us even more.

SPEAKER_02 27:40

What's his name? I can't I can't get to his name.

SPEAKER_03 27:42

Uh charades, do charades. Uh he has he has a hair. He has hair. What color?

SPEAKER_02 27:49

See, I don't want to. Art Garfunkel. Art Garfunkel's got it. No, I hate myself for not getting to his name right now. No.

SPEAKER_03 27:56

Uh he's Bob Roth. Is he still alive?

SPEAKER_02 28:00

No, no, he's very dead. Very dead. Died unfortunately in like 1986. Oh. And um something like that. And Randy Rhodes? No, no. Irishman. That's all you're gonna need. Oh, Phil Linett? Yeah, Phil Lynett.

SPEAKER_03 28:14

Oh, yeah. Phil Lynett would be unbelievable. He said Irishman are gathered there. You're an Irishman. Yeah, then you you almost charaded it out.

SPEAKER_01 28:22

Let's wrap this up with a nice message to your fans. What would you like to say to them? Thank you. That's really it.

SPEAKER_03 28:29

Just thank you. We um woke up a couple of days ago to the news that our newest record is charting on Billboard.

SPEAKER_01 28:39

Nice.

SPEAKER_03 28:39

In the bizarrely enough, in a couple of categories, but one of them is the is emerging artists, which is fantastic because we've been emerging for a long time. But I think I would say that thank thank you for being a friend. The sub thank you for being a friend. Thank you for uh continuing to support and ramping up your support with each new thing that we put out.

SPEAKER_02 29:03

And this, especially this album support has been unbelievable from our fans. Yeah. Just they've all gotten so into it, and it's been so wonderful, and we've we dragged them along on this journey of releasing a song per week, and they were all about it. Most of them were all about it. There were several that were just very crying the whole time. It was hilarious and sad for them, but it was something. So yeah, like the fact that they've stuck with us this long and really I don't know, it's huge. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 29:33

Yeah, that's awesome. Well, this has been fun. Great information, great conversation. I really appreciate you taking the time to join us today. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:41

Thank you for having us.

SPEAKER_01 29:42

Yeah, thank you for being a friend.

SPEAKER_03 29:44

Awesome. Perfect. Good. Great to meet you. Yeah, it's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 29:47

Yeah, it's been great. Thanks again. Thanks for joining us today. We hope you enjoyed the show. This has been a Tony Mantor Production. For more information, contact media at plateau music.com.