.png)
The Hook with Johni & Jess
Hosted by Jess and Johni, The Hook features candid conversations with musicians, artists, entertainers, and creatives of all kinds. We go beyond the surface to explore the real stories behind the art — the first spark, the turning point, the doubt, the obsession, and the moments that changed everything.
Just like a hook in a song stays with you, every creative has something that grabbed hold and shaped who they became.
This isn’t just about what artists create.
It’s about why they couldn’t stop.
🎙 Interviews
🎸 Live performances
🎣 Real stories behind the craft
Once you’re in, you’re in.
The Hook with Johni & Jess
Building the Sound of REIN with Jordan Rein
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
What happens when three incredibly talented musicians share a studio, trust each other completely, and set out to make the best music they possibly can? You get JORDAN REIN.
In this episode of The Hook with Johni & Jess, Jordan Rein, Peter Wellman, and Maddox Bruce join us for an unforgettable conversation about the evolution of their Richmond-based power trio, their collaborative creative process, and the friendships that fuel their music.
The band shares how they came together, why performing as a trio pushes each of them to new creative heights, and how every member leaves their fingerprint on the music. Jordan reflects on receiving his first guitar as a surprise Christmas gift, Peter talks about unexpectedly becoming a drummer before performing at the Grand Ole Opry with his high school show choir, and Maddox shares how playing bass during the pandemic and performing in church shaped his musical journey.
We also dive into Jordan Rein's ambitious new concept album, 65432, a deeply personal project exploring the five stages of grief through music, accompanied by an upcoming short film. Jordan opens up about the healing process behind the record, while Peter and Maddox discuss how emotionally invested they became in bringing the songs to life.
Along the way, the conversation takes plenty of unexpected turns—from Jordan's experience performing at the legendary Whisky A Go Go alongside rock icons, to touring with musicians like Oliver Anthony and Joey Davis, the future of authentic rock music in the age of AI, Jordan's lifelong fascination with sharks, and the hilarious true story of building the world's fastest flying lawnmower.
The episode also features three tracks from Jordan Rein, a live performance of The Star-Spangled Banner at Carmax Park and an always entertaining speed round, making this a must-listen for music lovers, creatives, and anyone who appreciates the stories behind passionate artists.
Featuring: Jordan Rein (vocals/guitar), Peter Wellman (drums, keys, multi-instrumentalist), and Maddox Bruce (bass).
Follow Jordan Rein on Social Media
IG ww.instagram.com/rein.rocks
TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@rein.rocks
River City Consulting is the the official website agency for The Hook podcast.
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Thank you for listening to The Hook with Johni & Jess.
This is where we talk to musicians, artists, creators, and visionaries about the moment they got hooked—and the journey that followed.
Learn more about our guests, watch episode highlights, and explore more stories at:
https://www.johniandjess.com
Follow The Hook on Facebook for new episodes, behind-the-scenes moments, and upcoming guest announcements:
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61588050877252
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, share it with someone who inspires you, and leave a review. Your support helps us continue telling the stories behind the hook.
The Hook with Johni & Jess — where passion begins with a moment.
Today's guest is a musician, songwriter, gear tinkerer, and self-described explorer of whatever sounds can be created with the tools and experiences around him.
SPEAKER_06He's the driving force behind Rain, a power trio focused on pushing musical boundaries and making the best music possible with the instruments they have in their hands and the stories they have to tell. Jordan Rain launches raw alternative rock and vibrant pop songwriting into cinematic orbit. The power trio consists of Peter Wellman, Maddox Bruce, and Jordan Rain. They collide technical arrangements with catchy melodies in a haze of analog and digital artifacts.
SPEAKER_05Whether he's diving into the creative process behind a new album, experimenting with gear, talking improv comedy, debating sharks, or explaining the mystery of evil Christmas shoes. You never quite know where the conversation is going, but you know it's gonna be interesting.
SPEAKER_06Jordan Rain, Peter Wellman, and Maddox Bruce. You're on the hut.
SPEAKER_05Alright, Jordan, we want to start off with you introducing your band.
SPEAKER_07Oh yeah, absolutely. So this is the Jordan Rain trio. I'm Jordan Rain. And we have Maddox Bruce who plays bass.
SPEAKER_00Bass player, a little Montreal instrumentalist, but yeah, bass for this band.
SPEAKER_07And we have Peter Wellman who is on drums and also plays many other things.
SPEAKER_08What's up?
SPEAKER_05Many other things.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and that the team is bigger than this, but this is like the this is the street team, essentially. This is the original project, and these are the core cylinders of what makes the original band tick.
SPEAKER_06You call rain a power trio. What does that format allow you to do creatively that larger bands don't?
SPEAKER_07It is the best thing ever. Like we played in this project. We played with five people, we played with four people. I've done stuff by myself before with duos, but trio, we basically all occupy a certain space, and I want them to answer too, because it's a different perspective for each of us. But as a front man and guitarist, it makes me have to play my ass off, and I have no excuses. I don't get to rest, and neither do they really, but it basically means we all have to try as hard as we can all the time, which is great, and it pushes our creative boundaries, especially me.
SPEAKER_08Yeah.
SPEAKER_07A lot. So yeah.
SPEAKER_08I think we all love to overplay, and this is one of the few situations where it's actually warranted and helps the final product.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, totally. That's like such a good question because that's been such like the catalyst for why this band like continues to be exciting and to continues to evolve. Like this is the next frontier. It's like all three of us singing. And Jordan said something one time that like has stuck in my brain. He said, like, it's like riding a unicycle and solving a Rubik's Cube at the same time, like all three of us playing instruments and singing at the same time. And we're playing really difficult music, and we're all doing it together in time all at once. It's just like so fun and different, and not what anybody else is doing right now.
SPEAKER_07So and it's relatively new, too, to this year. Like we've we played mostly with four and five people up until now. And then at the beginning of the year, just we just kind of realized that we just get a better performance when we're getting by by the skin of our teeth, you know.
SPEAKER_08So yeah, it's more improv y. We're trying to make this record that's like very produced come out right with three people and feel full and feel as energetic. So you have to try new things all the time.
SPEAKER_05Describe the music for somebody that hasn't heard you guys before and the vibe.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it it's definitely it started off as exploring guitar heroism because I'm into my heroes of like Eddie and Jimmy, and it and you know, if you look into the guitar heroes behind all those guitar heroes are equally talented bands of drumming and bassist. I can't think of any like guitar hero that has like an absolute stinker band that plays with. So that's why the trio works so well because it's also like the drum hero and the bass hero and like vocal heroes. So it's just that's how I describe it. But we make like alt rock essentially, and I'm trained on many four-hour sets, some five-hour sets, some longer of popular songs from every decade ever. So the songs are sort of reminiscent of what has worked with that stuff, I guess, and what excites me. But definitely at the core of it is complicated music that tricks the listener to not think that it is, you know. It there's layers to the onion, if that makes sense.
SPEAKER_00It's like kind of Y2K in foreign because that's like all of our childhood, but it's also like every single era of bringing in the 80s, the 90s, the 70s, like all of these heroes from every single part bringing all of that music and kind of bringing it forth into this new thing that has never existed before.
SPEAKER_07So this year we've definitely been leaning more into uh our influences, like of our generation. And so that looks like some glitch aesthetic stuff and like just different, just trying different stuff that isn't legacy informed, you know, because I've been really informed by my heroes, and this year it's more been like, okay, so now I've taken what I need to get out of that. What can we do that is unique to us and our experiences, you know?
SPEAKER_05That's beautiful. So you feel like you took everything you could, and now you're just figuring your own with that sort of almost in your DNA now.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it's our own horn now, which is really cool. So that's why this band has been really, really fun. And we've only done, I think, maybe four shows in this configuration, but immediately was very apparent how special it is to do it this way. So yeah.
SPEAKER_08I'm in a lot of projects where I have to try to be something else to fit it, like session work, where you're kind of making the same recipe over and over again with slightly different tweaks that are just not what you would naturally do. But this is like probably the most the project I have to think the least about when it comes to doing what I want to do and making it my own.
SPEAKER_07That's so important for a band too. We talk about this all the time. Like my name's on this project, but I do not want it to be just me. You know, I don't like making music by myself. I don't. I like making music with other people. So it's so important to me that these guys are as fingerprinted into this, you know. So it just makes it that much more special.
SPEAKER_06So well, I know I've seen you playing with the Joey Davis band. I'm in your stage presence, and it it's a lot of fun. So I haven't had the chance to see you guys together. So as soon as you have one coming up, which we'll talk about later, we're gonna come see you. I can't wait.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely.
SPEAKER_06So speaking of which, how did you guys meet? What brought y'all together as a band?
SPEAKER_00That's a really good question. Because you know, all of these musician things, it's like know a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy, and that's how all of these connections happen and these like little tendrils. For me, it was like I knew Pete through another band, and I got into that band through knowing another one of their mutual friends. And it was just like after a period of like two years of like getting to know this person and getting to know this person, I met these guys, and then it was like immediately like click, like this is just supposed to be this way, like just immediate connection and like musicianship, and won't look back. Like, this is awesome. I love these guys more than anything. I'm so grateful that this happened.
SPEAKER_07Peter and I have the longest story in the band we go back to, besides my twin brother and really great friend from second grade that also plays with us occasionally when we need to have more Calvary. But for the original project, Peter and I met. I was 16. We met in high school in a non-profit band, which most bands start nonprofit, but this one intended to never be profitable. And we'd play a bunch of benefit concerts. So we we met through that in high school and it was organized called Yesterday and Tomorrow. Yeah. And then we just kind of for some reason he went off to college and I was in high school and we didn't really connect until just a few years ago. And then it made so much sense. He started playing bass in the band, and then played keys in the band. Still do sometimes. Yeah. And then he got behind the kit and he went to school for drumming. And I think we share the most maybe inspiration with you behind the kit. And then we reconnected, and it was like, and then he moved in. And then our living room, we threw the couch out, threw the TV out, threw three keyboards and a drum set in, and that's where we rehearse and record music. And nice.
SPEAKER_06You basically turned it into a total studio. It's a complete studio.
SPEAKER_08It's the first room you walk into, you know exactly what we're about.
SPEAKER_06I love that. That's great. And Maddox, you just kind of came in with Peter then.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, totally. So I I live like super close with them, which is super convenient because they live like in Oregon Hill, and I live in Randolph, so it's like not even a five-minute drive. And they live together. So it's like just communing in the mothership, making music every single week.
SPEAKER_06You guys are so mellow, living together, playing together, touring together, because you guys tour with other people too. I can understand y'all have known each other for so many years. I'm sure you know every one of your but is it okay? Yeah, yeah. You guys are what I see.
SPEAKER_07We we communicate a lot. We overcommunicate. We just kind of keep it open. I mean, it's it's just a healthy relationship stuff. Like, yeah. I mean, especially on tour, like we're driving home and we're getting home at 5 a.m. together. I mean, if there's any time for you to freak out on your friend, yeah, that's the time to freak out on your friend. So we've been learning through all that, and we're doing a really good job. And I'm grateful to be sharing a roof and a studio. And there's definitely moments where I gotta, for me, like I gotta put the brakes on because I'll come down and be like, I have this idea. I want to do it. He's so smart and he's an engineer that I just I have ideas all the time.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, and if you start talking about it, I'm gonna think about how to do it. Yeah, but if it's like 12 things, yeah, it's gonna be overwhelming.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07It's a great, great relationship. And we were just working on another song the other day, and and the way that we work in the studio together is insane for me to watch just watch from the third person view, because we just are very connected and we're just we just move really quickly and we make the right choices. And if we're tired, we communicate that. So there's no like nothing gets wasted when we're working on stuff.
SPEAKER_05So it's called a well-oiled machine. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Same with Maddox, too. Like, that's why the trio works so well. And when you add more people, it gets more complicated, becomes a bigger thing, the steer, and like it takes you know, it doesn't, it's not as agile, but this is a really good group of guys, and we are emotionally intelligent men. That helps a lot.
SPEAKER_00No drama.
SPEAKER_07There's no drama.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I was gonna say, like, what you guys were talking about, like coming home on tour together and communication. I think that speaks to something bigger of like working together as a band, is like bands that stay together and you know spend as much time together as we do. You have to really like each other and you have to know how to communicate with each other. And you know, the great bands, the ones that are legendary and you know, just the bands that we look up to are the people that are really truly friends and really get along with each other. So have that next level above like communication and chemistry.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. I come from like improv theater background, which is like very radical acceptance and safety and trust in creating something like that. So I try to approach my creative relationships to be the same. Because I I think it's amazing what you can do in improv comedy just with strangers if you set the right boundaries and go into it. So to have like two guys that we can keep building every single week, it couldn't happen. You couldn't build something so big if you don't trust each other the way that we've kind of invested in each other.
SPEAKER_06So, Jordan, you played the legendary whiskey of go-go. What was that like?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, so that was a cool experience. I got sponsored by the Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp to go and I played the whiskey. I fronted a band with Ricky Rocket from Poison, was my drummer, which was super cool. And I also played with John Five from Montley Crew and Richard Fortas from Consent Roses, Jennifer Batten, who played with Michael Jackson on most of his world tours, Spike Edney with Queen. The list goes on and on. The Trans Siberian Orchestra guitarist, Joel Hoekstra, Gary Hoey. There's more. I have chills. A lot of star power. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05What was that like for you? I mean, was that did you are you just always cool as hell, or were you a little geeking out on that?
SPEAKER_07I definitely felt like I meant to be there and took some deep breaths and felt like it was definitely like a part of my journey. Although it was crazy. Like one time we got picked up from the hotel, and I was like, you know, there's a bunch of campers who pay to be there. And then I was in a unique situation because I was like chosen to go there because they saw my talent. They just wanted to see what would happen. And there was one moment I remember that we were going from the hotel in Hollywood, and I needed to get to those the rehearsal space. So I hopped in, like, you know, an Uber X with all these famous people, and it was just all of them and only me. And I'm just like the back of the car, like, oh my God. It's just crazy. Like, there's moments for sure. I'm like, oh man, is this my life? We're really doing this right now. But it was a great experience, and the biggest thing I got was like the validation. A lot of them really saw me, which felt really nice. Like they really saw me, and a few pulled me aside was like, You gotta keep going. Cause I was I was young, I was 22 or 23, and still growing as a musician. And I keep up with some of them. And for them to be like, you have a good voice, you know, you have something unique, good voice on the guitar. I was playing a lot of guitar then and singing less, but it was really cool and to front the whiskey. And I like doing things that scare me, and that definitely scared me, like playing the whiskey in front of, and it was like a sold-out crowd, too. And I didn't really know the song, it was like a poison song. I didn't really know the poison song that well either because I wasn't supposed to sing and play. It was a great experience.
SPEAKER_06And how old were you again when you did that?
SPEAKER_07I was 23.
SPEAKER_06Okay.
SPEAKER_07I missed my college finals for that. Oh yeah, you think it's I missed my I miss my I missed my finals and part of my graduation for that, which was pretty awesome.
SPEAKER_06I think they understood.
SPEAKER_07It was cool.
SPEAKER_06Well, and how old were you? I want to ask each and every one of y'all, how old were you when you first started playing?
SPEAKER_07And I was like 14 or 15. And I got a guitar for Christmas that I didn't ask for because my it was a Jaegermeister guitar because my grandfather was a liquor broker. Oh, and he had I love the story, but it just it was promo. So like he would just get swag, and the swag was a guitar and not a nice guitar, just a regular guitar, bring it into my guitar lessons, and I guess they assumed that a 14-year-old had a drinking problem or something, but I I still have that guitar, and yeah, that's how I started. And then I just fell in love with it. I saw Van Halen in 2015 and it blew my mind, and then I found myself staying up instead of playing video games at 2 a.m., I was like playing guitar and I'd wake up with it in my lap and stuff like that. So that's what got me here. So yeah, that's my story.
SPEAKER_06And what about you, Peter? How old were you? What got you ready to go?
SPEAKER_08When I was like five, we got a piano in the house as a piece of furniture. It was really bad. But I started hearing stuff on TV and like trying to figure it out on the piano, and then I got put into lessons when I was six and took lessons for like 18 years. And then throughout that, I started picking up other instruments like bass and drums and guitar. Dr. I really didn't pick up by choice. It was like because in high school in the show choir band, they needed a drummer, and they had just fired the professional drummer who I like really looked up to. And I had two weeks to figure it out before we played the Grand Old Opry in Nashville. Wait, and you didn't play before then? No. What the heck? I didn't know this. That's crazy. So that's how I started drumming. But I ended up getting some scholarships for lessons in college with Robert Jospe at UVA, and that was huge for me. Played with the jazz ensemble with John Dearth, and so here we are.
SPEAKER_05Okay, hold on. So, okay. My daughter was on all the whatever choruses in high school. Nobody was playing at Grand Old Opry though. How did your show choir have that opportunity?
SPEAKER_08There was something in the water at Clover Hill, and the show choir was just way bigger than it had any business being. But we were really good. We had a great band with some local professionals. We pretty much toured the whole East Coast. We went to Florida, we went to New York, went to the Midwest like six times on these charter buses. I was missing all kinds of tests and doing homework on the buses and mango jewel pods, man.
SPEAKER_05Oh my god. You guys really are my son's age. Like it was I I would find those rappers everywhere. I'm like, with the mango pods.
SPEAKER_08That was before jewel pods.
SPEAKER_05Oh, yeah. That was like anybody. Then they banned all flavors because that was the problem.
SPEAKER_07I didn't know that story. That's amazing. That's crazy. That's probably the most insane thing I've ever done in music.
SPEAKER_05So you're you've got that, and then Jordan, you have the whiskey at go-go. Like those are huge at your age to have already experienced. You can handle anything after that.
SPEAKER_08You would think that.
SPEAKER_05Madison Square Garden, here you come. I don't know.
SPEAKER_08I still get nervous all the time.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it depends on the situation for sure. Yeah. But it is nice to skydive as frequently as you can. Yeah. That way it becomes less scary when something new happens.
SPEAKER_06Whenever I've seen you guys on stage, I don't see any fear whatsoever. I told you, you all have excellent stage presence. It's amazing. It's a lot of fun. Thank you. Thank you. All right, Maddox, you're up. How old? What got you there?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So I had the serious fortune of like COVID happened exactly when I started to pick up the bass. So like I did music all throughout middle school, high school. I'm originally a trombone player, but I picked up the bass. I cut my teeth in church. So like I was playing in church every single week, and it was COVID. So I would just go home and practice for like 12 hours every single day. It was like looking up to all of the greats and learning about the bass guitar and learning about like Jack O and learning about jazz and all this stuff. How I really cut my teeth, it was church, but it was also funnily enough, the same thing that Pete did was show choir in high school, playing to like thousands of people. For me, that was playing trombone, but I learned like what it is to be a really good band and what it is to have energy and what it is to like perform in front of a bunch of people. And that's when I was like, okay, this is it. Like, this is exactly what I need to do. For me, it was a little combination of everything, like through playing music in high school and just like becoming obsessed with it and taking it apart and looking at all the pieces and like really absorbing all that I possibly could. So yeah, that's it for me.
SPEAKER_06You know, this is a great advertisement for keeping music in schools. All right. You mentioned your twin brother. So what does he play? Does he sing? Is he a rocker like you?
SPEAKER_07He plays drums. He started around the same time that I did, and we just we played last weekend with him. When we do cover gigs, and especially when we're pushing three to four hours, we go past the trio and we bring the full band, which is a five-piece band, just because I need to rest a little bit, you know. And like we all need to rest a little bit. And that's not like you can't overplay for four hours like that. We could. We do that sometimes too, but it's just nice to have everyone. It's more relaxing and it's more of like a fun thing to bring them, you know. It's just nice to have everybody around. And my dad runs sound for us too, and my mom helps book some of these gigs as well. So it's a family it's a family affair. Yeah, shout out Parker. He's a lot of the reason why I feel like I grew is just having someone to jam with is awesome. It's one thing to play along to YouTube and play with old records, but it's another thing to be able to actually jam with somebody in a room. To have someone built in like that to do that definitely helps a ton.
SPEAKER_06And maybe that's why you like working with someone and playing with someone as opposed to doing music by yourself. Because I never pretty much grew up doing it.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I've never had to do it alone, you know, which is really nice, which is a great, yeah, it's a blessing.
SPEAKER_08So I love to do it by myself personally. But it is a whole different animal with another person.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Yeah. Peter's got a project. Peter Wallman, you look it up. He does everything from the conception to release. He does every single thing. And that's incredible.
SPEAKER_05Are all of you in the same boat with having families, you guys, that are supportive of this? Yeah. Yeah. No mother that's totally freaked out. No.
SPEAKER_08I thank God I quit my I quit my robot engineering job to do music full time last year. I mean, at first my dad was like, what? Because he's an engineer and his dad was an engineer, and his dad's dad was an engineer. So it's like, what are you doing? But then it they came around, you know, it made sense to my mom. It makes sense to him. In some ways, you're doing more engineering now. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I was just about to say it's like applying all of these skills that you have towards something that you really, really, really love.
SPEAKER_05So already helped us with our equipment today. I know. Bought a mic? You're excited.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, for me, my my mom, like since I was a little, little kid, sang in church. So, like, since I was a baby, I was hearing music all the time around me. And then, like, once I was, she saw that I had an interest in music and was like, you should play with us at church. And she brought me into that. And like I said, that's how I cut my teeth, was doing that every single week and learning songs and all that stuff. Also, my older brother played music all in high school. My little brother is an amazing drummer. And it's like so cool. We're like best friends. It's so cool to see him like flourish and do the same things that I'm doing now. And like he's going on the same path that I was doing, and he's like playing in bands and all this stuff. It's it's really cool. Really cool to be surrounded by so many supportive people that love what I do and understand why music is so important to me.
SPEAKER_06Well, your brother's lucky because you kind of paved a path and can really guide him too. Because I'm sure all three of you have made little mistakes here and there along the way. So that's kind of cool.
SPEAKER_00Totally. In a lot of ways, I feel like these guys are my like older brothers that are like they're experienced and they're a few years older than I am. So they're like bringing me through this landscape that I don't really I don't really know. So they're like tour guide.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, totally, totally, totally.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. As a musician, it's like you want to play with people that are, you know, better than you, that are pulling you up, and I feel that every single time that I play with them.
SPEAKER_07So I feel the same thing with you two guys, too.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. That's awesome.
SPEAKER_06All right, well, let's talk about the new album.
SPEAKER_07Yes, yes. This is a big, it's a big topic, but it's gonna be it needs to be smaller every day, I feel like, for me. But this is a long time in the making. Stems from some not fun experiences, and it was a big project to do, and it's I think 14 songs or something like that. And we started it, it was after doing so just so much cover gigs, and I feel like my the original music just wasn't getting the love it deserved. I knew what it could do, I knew the potential in it, and the beginning of 2024, no, the end of the beginning of 2025, we all went in the studio and just sent it. And we are just like Vexine, we are with Shocker Records, which is amazing, and they gave us the most amazing studio and Tom Preston, who engineered this whole thing. It was amazing to work in that capacity. But it was a challenge for me to get out of my own way, to get all these experiences out of my head, out of my spirit, and into the music and bring other people into it. It was a huge challenge. I'm glad that we're on the other side because you can tell that it was thought about a lot. And now we're able to revisit these songs and we're able to recontextualize them in a new light and a new spirit. So yeah, the album's called 6x432. It's about grief, and there's songs about denial and anger and bargaining and acceptance. Today we're gonna play we're playing three unreleased songs that are even past the album. Except for one. That's still gonna be finished in that project, and there's also a short there's gonna be a short film with the two. It's such a big freaking project. But we're doing a short film with Tilta Advertising Agency. They're sponsoring a five episode. So we're gonna do all five Stages of Grief with five songs in a script that I wrote last year. So yeah, I get to act a bit too, because I do acting as well.
SPEAKER_06Like all three of you just enormously talented. It's beautiful.
SPEAKER_07We love what we do a lot.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I'm excited for that to get out. And the songs are are released like 65432 came out. That one is on the album. That's bargaining, fantasy is anger, that's out now, and thinking of you is denial.
SPEAKER_08So and we're all intensely emotionally invested in this album, too. Like from our own experiences. It's been cathartic in some way for for all of us.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it's it's been therapy for everybody.
SPEAKER_02All the things they went to the gold.
SPEAKER_07Well, I don't know what the album cover is gonna be for the album, but for 65432, we have this distorted clock that we found, and like six five four three two are those stages of grief counting down. And this one's bargaining, which I think is extremely important to the process because it's the most complicated and it's a time where you can really relapse into other moments. And I feel like I spent the most time in bargaining. So we definitely wanted to articulate that. And so having like a distorted clock would seem like the most obvious. Yeah, like the Salvador Dolly melting clock thing. And that was just we just shot that in the backyard really quickly. Now, the actual album cover, we don't know what it's gonna be yet. It's probably gonna come from on set for the short film, I would imagine.
SPEAKER_06I can't wait. Now, the short film are we gonna be able to is it gonna get released and I sure hope it does.
SPEAKER_07If I survive till the end, yeah. No, it's gonna be released, and I would love to put it in uh film festivals because there's like different episodes, but really it's meant to be. I got this ta this is the only tattoo I had. I got it like six years ago. It was like a promise that I would like tell the story the way I want to. This has nothing to do with it anymore, but it's just as like sigil to remind me that this is a piece of art that I want to put out in the world. It's definitely been a long game. It's definitely been a long game, but I'm excited for more and more.
SPEAKER_05Do you have any ties or connection with uh comfort zone camp? That's definitely an organization to link up with this project. It's a camp that was started here actually, and it's now in all over the world, but it's for children who have suddenly lost a parent or a sibling, and they go to this camp for three days and they have counselors and they kind of all work through their grief, but they also have camp. You know, they have fun, they're kids. Kids are so resilient. Um, but it's really more than anything an opportunity for them to not feel alone because it is so unusual for a kid to have that circumstances, and sometimes you just feel like an alien. So then it's all these kids that are going through and and everybody they do healing circles and they talk about the stages of grief. So I don't know if there's a way to connect in there and maybe have your music kind of be helpful or central in their cause, but I'll yeah, I'll get you some. Please, that's beautiful info.
SPEAKER_07You know, this has been therapy for me. I'm very much healed at this point. If the art can help other people, that's very important, and I really hope it gets to do that. And it will it will do that.
SPEAKER_06Did each of you write a song on the album? Did you kind of write together, or is this mostly your writing?
SPEAKER_07It's mostly my writing, but there I talk about the garden a lot. Because we play so much together, I hear these guys in my head when I think about music anyway. It's like I can't really imagine. Like whenever they make choices, I'm like, yes, that's what I was thinking, because of course that's what I was thinking, because this is the this is the group that makes it happen. But yeah, these these are all songs I've I've written over the past over half decade, and they have slowly morphed into different things. And there's one song that Peter and I co-wrote that was an amazing part of the uh it was one of the most amazing things that I've been able to do. I've never because I never co-wrote anything with anybody. I was in other bands, but for like my project, we were jamming and he wrote this beautiful verse of this song and like gave it back to me. And then it was almost like we were sending letters, and then I I wrote the chorus and sent it back to him, and then we were sitting down and thinking about this bridge, and then it like happened, and it was like so it it's such a cool it's called a song called Empathize, but it's only album.
SPEAKER_08I've never sung higher notes before. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I mean we might even have we might even have to play that one, I don't know, because well, we'll talk about that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you talked about it, now you gotta play it.
SPEAKER_07It's a really it's a really cool song, and it's like a duet. It's very much kind of like a duet, which is really cool. And you don't really see like two tenor male voices doing like a duet like that. So it's cool that we were able to share this feeling together and turn it into something really beautiful very quickly, too, which is cool.
SPEAKER_06I'm so excited. I can't wait.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Alright, well, actually, what track for first-time listeners would you suggest they listen to first?
SPEAKER_07I would start and go through the stages of grief that are out right now. I would go Thinking of You first, and then Fantasy, and then 65432, and that's a good cliffhanger for the rest of the album, honestly, because that song is crazy. So I would I would listen to them in that order, cue them up, and you will understand.
SPEAKER_06But this morning I just listened to all of them and I had no idea they all come together in a story, and that is I've been sitting here getting chills because of that. So that's amazing.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I'm really proud with how the records came out. Peter played drums, keys, and bass, and I played guitar and did all the singing and bull and harmony, so it's they're very special for that reason because it sounds like a lot of people. Really, there's a lot of agreement inside of the choices being made, which is cool. It's kind of alien in that way.
SPEAKER_02I'm feeling all these things with you. I'm feeling six, five, four, three, two. I'm feeling all these things, but honestly, I think that you're the one.
SPEAKER_08I've done some I've done base and keys at the same time on tour. I'm so glad to give it to this guy. He is amazing.
SPEAKER_00Thank you.
SPEAKER_05You might have started to lose hair. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And we got new songs today that we're playing that Maddox is such an important part of this that every song going forward is just the three of us, and we save a lot of time. We'll save a lot of time that way.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. We were talking about the garden earlier, and it's like in this garden, there's all these seeds. And all these seeds are ideas that every one of us have, and it's like they sprout and they take a new shape, and it's in this garden's creative place that we all have together, but it's sprouted so many things, like of my own songs and my own songwriting, and my own drive to become my own artist, like I've always wanted to be.
SPEAKER_07So yeah, their original music is so different, but also like we're all kind of getting high on our own supply. Like it's it's shared, it's shared in a way. Like if you listen, like it's very different, but you can hear that there's a connection, even though it's like a different concept, you know. So that's really cool to hear.
SPEAKER_06Well, now that we're talking about gardens, this question actually goes right into play. So we read that you built the world's fastest line long ago. First of all, I mean, does it actually fly and just story then? What?
SPEAKER_05Okay, just tell us everything.
SPEAKER_07I'm gonna try to tell the story so quick because this could be a whole podcast episode. So the person who owns NU Air Studios, Michael Congden. He got his wealth from recording Chris Brown there. I think he's Grammy nominated and also like multi-platinum. So, like, that's awesome. So he decided he had the side quest to start a satirical show called Watching Grass Grow, which about grass, and which is hilarious. And I was unfortunate enough to joke about wanting to make the world's fastest flying lawnmower, and because I thought it'd be an easy world record to beat, because they make these RC ones. It's just like a plane shaped like a lawnmower that I saw at the air show when I was six. So random. And I thought, oh, just strap rockets to that, and then I got myself again as plaque that I can, you know, then I got something to talk about at party. So I s I made that joke, and he said, Alright, we'll see you in a few months. Like we're doing it. And I was like, okay. And I was 21 and was like, holy shit, here we go. And I go on Google, and apparently it's not as easy as it looks. Like, you cannot just build one of these. Like, it's not you don't just you don't can't just buy one, you can't just build one, but on page like four or five at Google, which is like a lot deeper than I've ever all good things happen. I'm a pretty yeah, I'm a pretty curious person, but once you get on the few pages at Google, I mean it gets weird back there. Yeah, but I found I found a kit in Germany. I forget what Flying Lawn Mower is in German, but that's what it was called, and then I ordered it, it got held up in customs, and they had to push the shoot date back twice. And it was like a six-figure budget. It was a huge production. I tried to go to Hobby Lobby and Hobbytown USA to get sponsors, and they were like, hell no, we're not we don't want anything to do with this. It eventually arrived, like two weeks before and I'm still in college, like I have like shit to do, and two weeks before the shoot, it came in and it was only the shape of the wing, so everything else has to be fabricated. So planes are just a bunch of it's like a frame. And I opened up the schematics, it's all in German. It's like DASIST, you know, I don't know. I didn't take that much German. And then it was all in metric, too. So it was all metric measurements, so all the dowels needed to build stuff they don't really have. So it was a pain in the butt. And I pulled an all-nighter doing it at a friend's shop, and I showed up on set with this just frame of a wing, and they were like, That's the flying lama. I'm like, This is what I got. And we did it at Independence Golf Course, and they rented out the golf course to shoot. And the next morning we woke up, my friend Pete Renga, who's a big part of this project too. What's up, Pete? He produces and executive produces a lot of this stuff. But anyway, he showed up because I was like, I need help. And we it ended up we used a lot of foam, we wrapped it in saran wrap and spray painted to chrome, so it looked like it was metal, even though it wasn't. And then I got the biggest legal rocket model rocket engines you could find, which you read, and you're not supposed to be anywhere near those things when they go off. But I had like a beginner 20-foot cord, too. We had to be close to this very scary thing, and I had three of them too. Like it's like the kind of thing where you have like mission control. Like, it's like you go to actual like specific launch places for these sorts of things, and it goes like some of them go to space, like it's crazy. But anyway, we put these on these lawnmower, trying to trying to go as quick as I can. And the producer's like, or someone with insurance is is asking me which way it's gonna fly. I'm like, there's no controls, it's just a rocket like strapped to trash. Like it's like it's it's basically there's no way of telling which way it's gonna go. So I actually had this pretty smart idea to like put eyelet hooks and put it on fishing line because there's a goal post, and so we just put it on like a rail, and yeah, we were going down to the wire, and we only had maybe an hour of daylight left on set, and it was a whole scary thing because I wasn't even sure if I had enough voltage to start these engines to, so and I wasn't gonna try it because I only had a few, so it's like uh we're gonna push the button, it's either gonna go or it's not gonna go. And it went and it went, it flew fast, big thing flying fast. The fire department was there, there was like three red cameras on cranes, it was a huge production. And then after I didn't get paid a cent for this, and then which I was doing more work than arguably everybody on set that day, to be honest. And then the footage got corrupted, apparent allegedly. What? And so there's really no proof that this happened, but I do keep pieces of it.
SPEAKER_08He's he said he has it though.
SPEAKER_07He did, yeah. Recently I was told they didn't want to edit it down because I think it didn't get picked up by Amazon the way they wanted it to, so it was really expensive to still edit. He told me recently that they do have the footage. I you know which part I want.
SPEAKER_03Right, yeah, right.
SPEAKER_07There's like only one part that I really care about. So yeah, maybe that'll happen in the future. I should go pull his leg about that.
SPEAKER_06This might pull his leg. Yeah. Yeah. And we want a picture. Do you have any pictures of it?
SPEAKER_07Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_06Alright, you gotta send that to him. But the whole time you're telling this story, I'm thinking David Bowie and ground control.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. It could be turned into something. But yeah, that was a crazy and that's how I really found my love for producing in a broad sense. Like, I think it's cool just to have a creative idea. And just be like, it has to happen. It doesn't have to happen in any specific way, but it's like it definitely has to happen in some sort of way. So I really like doing that.
SPEAKER_05So do you have one brewing?
SPEAKER_07Like another?
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Well, definitely the short film will take a lot of producing. Yeah, but no other lawnmowers in the future. Nothing that flies in the future for now.
SPEAKER_05Was it intended to actually be able to cut a lawn?
SPEAKER_07No.
SPEAKER_05Okay.
SPEAKER_07No, there was never gonna be any steel on this show. No blades. No.
SPEAKER_06No blades. It's funny how things just kind of like build and build, and all of a sudden now you're doing a flying lawnmower just from a grass show, right?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, just because you made a joke in a room in the wrong room at the wrong time.
SPEAKER_05That thing's gotta come back full circle. Like you couldn't have had to have gone through all that for nothing to happen. Like somehow, someway, that thing's coming back full circle.
SPEAKER_07We can make a music video out of it. We can have a, since it's so long ago, we can have a time travel arc. See, I'm thinking producery now. I'm like, okay, so what do we have? We have this old footage of me, and then we have what we have now, so we might as well do it. Some sort of crazy time travel arc.
SPEAKER_02So good.
SPEAKER_07People are like, how'd you do that? It's like, well, we did this five years ago and waited and sort of a back to the future vibe. Yeah. You just make the right choices to make you look like a genius, I guess. It's just coming in like, holy shit. So yeah, that's the flying lawnmower story. I forgot I put that in there.
SPEAKER_05Tell us about you might not have. I did a deep dive. Tell us about the connection with Oliver Anthony.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, so this is a Peter question because he's been touring with him for a while and I got roped in recently, which I'm so grateful for. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08It's one of the main reasons I quit my job because Joey was doing maintenance at the office I worked at for engineering. So we jammed for years, and then Joey got picked up by Oliver and called me right when Richmond popped off and said, Do you want to come out on the road? I had just moved in with a friend to try to make a band work. It ended up not working out, but at the time I couldn't go on the road. I just felt shitty to move in with this guy, then suddenly leave for a world tour. But once that band stopped working out, I decided it was time to kind of take matters into my own hands and do what I actually want to do, which is music. So I gave him a call back and I was like, Are you still need a bass player? And he said, We actually we do. Actually, no, I started on Keys with him, but that became bass down the line. And then last year we went to Australia and Europe and all over the West Coast. Crazy experience.
SPEAKER_06I got the pleasure to see you guys play with Oliver Anthony. It's such a good show. And with Joey, Joey's presence, too. Yes, he's amazing. One of my favorite people to watch on stage. And just favorite people.
SPEAKER_05Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_07It's great to see how it actually happens. Sold-out theaters and tour buses. And I mean, that's dreams for this project in the future. So it's really cool to figure it out now. It'll seem like a with the trios, it will seem like a piece of cake, honestly, compared to that huge production. So it's it's been really cool to learn.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, you cut your teeth with Oliver Anthony, and you guys will be able to just coast. Hopefully.
SPEAKER_08My role in that project has been growing, so I'm seeing all the nitty-gritty of setting up a stage that has 32 microphones, or like mixing that show that was recorded with 32 microphones, and it gets put on Spotify, and that's how it happens.
SPEAKER_07It's been great. Just playing with Joey in that project. I'm I'm mostly there. I'm there to play with Joey, but also to help set things up with Pete and be part of the sound crew. It's it's cool to do and learn about how we might do things differently if we had to do it or what their great ideas are. It's like, okay, we have to that makes so much sense to do this on tour, you know. That's hard work, not easy. It's a big production. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06And he lets you guys shine on stage. He definitely does.
SPEAKER_07Shout out Joey. If you're listening to this, thank you for the opportunity. And he all he lets us be us in his band, which is so cool.
SPEAKER_05I'm curious, you guys are seeing that level and like right up close with it. Have you prepared yourselves for how to kind of stay grounded if that's where you end up? It seems like that's where a lot of bands go off the rails.
SPEAKER_08Yeah. I've had so many opportunities to become ungrounded by this, especially like being sleep-deprived and in a different city every day in Europe. It's like you can completely depersonalize sometimes. Coming back from Europe was kind of rough, kind of remembering who I was in the place that I lived and called home. But I came back, and so I know I can.
SPEAKER_07It's definitely like routine suicide tour, is so it's that's the challenge. For grounded, I don't know. I I see the artist way over there, and I think I I think we talked about that that book. And we all have read that book, all of us. And that was one of the first things I did when I kind of wanted to start a new chapter with the band, is I gifted everybody that and that book is all about trusting the process and understanding that everything you create is an extension of God, whatever God you believe in or don't believe in. And I think that allows that if we were playing the Grammys tomorrow, we'd be able to buckle up and do it. You know, if we were playing on the moon tomorrow, we would be able to buckle up and be like, this is it's gonna be okay.
SPEAKER_06That book is there because of you, by the way. I came straight to Jess when you told me about it. I'm like, I gotta get this book, The Artist's Way. And she goes, Bitch, I have that book. We brought it right to the studio. It's because of you.
SPEAKER_07Nice. It's a great book. It's such a big part of me. When when I was going through all these difficult moments, it got me through. It was my Bible for sure. And it's the reason why the album and this band exist. I don't know where I'd be without the guidance of that.
SPEAKER_05Have you discovered The Prophet yet?
SPEAKER_07What do you mean?
SPEAKER_05The book, The Prophet.
SPEAKER_07Mm-mm.
SPEAKER_05Okay, I'm giving you that. I would normally never recommend it to anyone under 40, but you you you'll tear it up.
SPEAKER_02Cool. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Um, it's it'll be good for all of you guys. It's it's really it's about a prophet coming to a small town and all of the villagers gathering to ask questions of life. And so every chapter is his answer. And so there's one on grief that is well, joy and sorrow and death and marriage and children, and it's just these beautiful, like poetic answers that are so jaw-droppingly deep that and they they give you perspective, I think, in a similar way. So if you're able to absorb that, because I could barely get through that, you'll tear up the profit. I have one, I'll give it to you today. Cool.
SPEAKER_07I'd love, I would love to read it.
SPEAKER_00That looks awesome. I'm all in on this stuff. Like, I read every single day, and like this is this is the stuff.
SPEAKER_07So Maddox is secretly 300 years old.
SPEAKER_05Well, all of all of you are. All of you are. You are very old souls. Yeah. That's gonna save you when you guys blow up. It's just gonna, I really think it's gonna save you from going crazy and being able to keep it going.
SPEAKER_06Do you think audiences are craving something different from artists right now?
SPEAKER_00That's a really good question.
SPEAKER_07Oh man. I think so. I think really great songs and people that are really, really playing their butts off. It's always worked.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And there's less of it nowadays. Not saying it isn't out there, but I think yeah.
SPEAKER_08Yeah. On one hand, I think the pendulum of like overproduced to underproduced has always kind of been a thing where you know people really love bubblegum pop for a little bit and then they want like grunge again. Then like I go to the barber shop and they're playing AI music, and I don't know like what people want, or if people even care if it's played by people. So I'm kind of split.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. I think the live aspect of this band is something that will that I'm not like the improvisational, like we have these songs and but we play them different every time, the way we transition into things. And so I I think human music, the stock will be going up as AI music becomes more accessible, personally. I do agree.
SPEAKER_00This is so silly, but I saw this clip of Joe Rogan talking about how rock music is dead and how like there's no great rock bands left. And and I I g understand that sentiment because it's like there there isn't like like ACDC, that was a revolution, and like when Van Halen in the 80s, when that came on the scene, that was like that was the music to listen to. But it's very much still alive and well. Like this is living proof of that. It's like these having actual amps on stage, power trio singing with our voices, it's not super overproduced, it's our actual performances and musicianship, like that is irreplaceable. And that's something that I really, really truly at the deepest level think that there's a market for. Like people recognize that and say, There's something different about that, there's something special there.
SPEAKER_07So yeah, especially leaning into our like nostalgic influences. I think that especially is I see the audience and just the market going towards that, which is cool to see. Like, I see a lot of other projects exploring that too right now, which is very affirming because we've been thinking about this for a little while. So that's cool.
SPEAKER_05Well, and the younger, like teens and down, they're full rebelling on AI. Like they are not about it, and they're pissed, and they're I think it's coming back full circle with them, and they're gonna be the thing that saves us. I agree.
SPEAKER_07I feel like every other graduation commencement ceremony had a boo AI moment.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I don't know if you saw, but it was just too many to even just went saw all those. There's so many. Especially now. I mean, it's things are gonna accelerate a lot next year. I won't get into the politics of it.
SPEAKER_00Woo!
SPEAKER_07I'm glad that we're a rock band right now, honestly. Like, thank goodness. Like, I feel I feel safe knowing that everything else will be accelerating because I know that this will they'll stay strong the way it is, you know.
SPEAKER_06So I feel like I see a lot of 70s revival bands coming, you know, wearing the bell bottoms and the music and very Led Zeppelin-y, you know.
SPEAKER_07So Yeah, every trend has like a harmonic that it comes back. But it's cool to see our generation getting old enough to like enter the industry and broadcast in the industry to show the things that we found important about our youth, you know. So that's really cool. That's that's that's new, you know. And then in 40 years, people will be reminiscing about Nintendo and stuff like that and be like, Kesha, like listen to this old got this old Kesha LP.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, like but rock and roll traditionally always survives and lives. Agreed.
SPEAKER_00Always good music doesn't go away. Like you hear all this music from the 70s and 80s, and that's still some of the most popular music ever. It's very interesting being the generation that we are because like that was super nostalgic for like my my parents' age, Van Halen and poison coming on the scene and all this stuff. But for me, like I've listened to all that stuff growing up too. It's like that is super, super nostalgic to me. That's some of the music that I hear I hold closest to my heart. It's like that's what I grew up listening to and what I loved.
SPEAKER_07And I was talking to Peter about this after we we kind of cranked out a demo the other day. And one thing I'm really grateful about this band is we really truly are trying to make the best music we possibly can by all means necessary.
SPEAKER_08Whatever knob is the better knob, we're like cranking.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, very grateful that we all understand that we're trying to make something timeless. If you know, we're doing everything we can to do that with what we have.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I can totally really Johnny and I talk about that all the time with the hook. It's so nice that we're both so invested. We both care so much, we'll both do anything to make whatever we need to do happen. And if we didn't have that equality with each other, it would if it was tipped over to one side, it would be hard. But when everybody's in at the same level, it's just makes everything better.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely.
SPEAKER_05I want to go back to your youth and learn a little bit about your shark obsession.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. It was my first obsession of many obsessions I've had, many phases of obsessions, and now it's this, which is cool because I didn't get a marine biology degree, so I can't make money. I've that boat, that ship has sailed, unfortunately, for now. But I could rattle off 200 species right now easily. Just to tell you how like mildly how the signs of mild autism I had back then, which I'm proud of that trait. I have a binder that's just I printed out, basically logged, indexed my own shark book of every species, and so much printer ink in 2008 was put towards that. And there's like a few sharks that look really bad because it was at the end of the cartridge and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_08The stripey shark.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and then it was die-cast NASCAR designs that I put from zero to 99. Like, it's funny how when I found out that I had signs of ASD, my mom was like, What? I'm like, I had a binder full of NASCARs from zero to 99 of every era.
SPEAKER_05I'm like, that's like how many of your friends' kids had that?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I know. Like, that's just absolutely crazy. I was like inventing my own Pokemon, and then it was just like so obvious looking. I used to line my matchbox cars end to end. I had like 600 something back then, and I would line them end to end. I was similar. Yeah. And then they're just like, this is what he does. But it's just what he does.
SPEAKER_08Oh, he's so organized.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. If only my calendar was like my matchbox.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07But yeah, I love sharks. I love shout out to the goblin shark, the wabbagong shark, the ratfish, which is actually a shark. Let's see, the frilled shark, shout out to the cookie cutter, basking shark, greenland shark, pygmy shark, oceanic white-tip shark, black tip reef shark. I have so many sharks.
SPEAKER_04Have you ever rapped? Because I feel like you could do a rap shark. About sharks.
SPEAKER_07I don't rap, but if the game is rapping about sharks, then I'm put me in, coach. Overqualified for sure.
SPEAKER_06Well, I was gonna actually ask you a great white hammerhead or whale shark, but I think we were way past that.
SPEAKER_03For the basic shark people.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, that's right. About the niche. But yeah, look up the ghost shark. Ghost sharks are really cool. Goblin sharks are really amazing. The deep sea ones are really interesting, and especially the prehistoric ones are very cool. The ones that have survived extinction events that are still around today are very interesting to me.
SPEAKER_06Alright, I got a fun question for you. If you discovered a new shark species, what would you name it?
SPEAKER_07Holy smokes. It depends what it looks like, I think, because a lot of them it's based off of like their characteristics, you know.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_07If it was what Peter just showed me, it'd be the it'd definitely be the mustache shark to me.
SPEAKER_05I think so. That's so good. I have a shark story.
SPEAKER_07Really?
SPEAKER_05But it's one that would really be it amazes people, but it won't amaze you because you know enough to know what was really going on. I was in the Cayman Islands snorkeling, and I was following this sea turtle for I don't even, I like got lost. It was hours of following this one sea turtle, and I could tell because of where his shell was broke, and I could hear like classical music as I watched him. Like his movements made me.
SPEAKER_07The turtle was probably stressed.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_05She's on to me. I was way more back. So I was so lost that I didn't realize I had gone kind of past like the area that you're supposed to sort of swim. And then all of a sudden, I got fascinated by this crazy school of fish. It was like hundreds gathered all together. As I'm watching them, I'm realizing they're sort of all gathered around the opening of this cave. Are you sure you weren't tripping? No. And then I realized, although I do have friends that went scuba diving, tripping, and it's a wild series of events that yeah, I'm not that, I'm not that, no way. Anyway, so behind the fish in the depth of this cave, I do a head tilt, realizing that I am seeing a fin. And I'm like, oh shit. So I kind of like turned around and I looked at how far I had to go, and it was, I don't know, I'm not really good. It was like a football field, you know, and I'm like swimming really cool, trying to just get back, thinking the whole time there was a shark behind me.
SPEAKER_06Yeah.
SPEAKER_05But you know that if that was the situation, they're there because it's a nursing shark who probably just delivered and they're there to kind of collect whatever they can to eat, and that shark was definitely not one that would be coming after me. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And if you didn't panic, that's the worst thing you can do is like start splashing and freaking out.
SPEAKER_05Wait, so even with it being a nursing shark in that capacity.
SPEAKER_07Like a nurse shark, like that species. Yeah, those are pretty harmless, yeah. But you can still get bit.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_07So they still got teeth. But I don't I think they're pretty docile and they're like bottom dwellers, like their mouths are oriented down. And a cool fact about nurse sharks is they have like I forget how much PSI of pressure, but they can like just suck in crabs. They've measured it. I don't know. I don't remember like the actual numbers, statistics, but they have like an insane amount of force that they can just like suck things out. Like a vacuum cleaner.
SPEAKER_06Wow.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Well, sometimes. Yeah, let's go right here. All right. So we have to ask, what exactly are evil Christmas shoes?
SPEAKER_05Everybody had a reaction to that.
SPEAKER_08I've been waiting for this question. Yeah. Every time you say I have a question, I was like, here it is, here it is. Go for it. On light 98, 98.1. Our family would tune into that station for Christmas every year, just as your family did, I assume. And maybe maybe you'll be able to do that. Everybody in Richmond did. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06I actually worked there.
SPEAKER_08Oh my goodness. Yeah. Thanks for playing Christmas shoes. But yeah, this sh song Christmas Shoes, we've just heard it all our lives, and the older we got, we realized it's kind of a crazy song. I I don't I don't know how to talk about this.
SPEAKER_07It was always jarring to me sitting in the back of our SUV leaving mass or something during Christmas, and then Dominic the Donkey will play, and then Christmas Shoes will play about mom dying on Christmas Eve, and then Rudolph the Red Nose Ranger would come on right after that too.
SPEAKER_08It's so serious, and it's so like overproduced, like such a specific story. Yeah. You all heard that song?
SPEAKER_07No.
SPEAKER_05What? I'm getting like a weird flashback of one of my kids showing me something. Is there a video?
SPEAKER_07There's a music video. But it's not like a it's just like a normal music video. Okay, okay, it's not that whole. It's just a sad Christmas ballad that's as sad as you could possibly make us. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08And then it's like, here comes Santa Claus, and it's like, alright, cool, presents now. But we found a we found a way to turn any song into the most evil version of itself possible. There's an interval in music called the tritone, which they would call the devil's interval.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it used to get like punished by the church back in the day. You couldn't even play this note. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03No way.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_08So we found if you take the entire song, superimpose it on top of itself, and shift it up a tritone, everything about the song becomes evil sounding.
SPEAKER_07Do you have it in your files still? I don't know. We could play a little tiny snippet just so you guys kind of get the gist. And while you do that, I'm gonna pull up real Christmas shoes. Oh my god, yeah! So you can have an A B. Yeah. I found my thing. So it ends like this.
SPEAKER_05If she does, like it's an idea that she might die.
SPEAKER_07Yes. Yes. That is what is implied by this song, exactly. The story is a kid, a kid that is in poverty trying to buy shoes for his mom because she likes them and wants her to have them before she dies on Christmas Day.
SPEAKER_03Dude! Okay.
SPEAKER_07So yeah, anything becomes as evil as possible.
SPEAKER_03That's crazy.
SPEAKER_07And they they do that a lot in like scary movies and stuff. If you have like a demon talk, they'll put that interval on it.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I like I recognize the sound for sure, but I had no idea what that ever was.
SPEAKER_07So we had a little fad last October during Halloween, just cranking out evil versions of the song.
SPEAKER_08We had a Halloween party with all our partners, and I set up the computer so that any music you played through it would become evil, and they did not like that at all. It gets really old.
SPEAKER_07It kind of makes your kind of makes your head yeah, it kind of makes your head spin after a while.
SPEAKER_06It's not natural.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. All the melody and harmony of the music is completely stripped away.
SPEAKER_08Like we're socially conditioned for that to be tension, and it never resolves or goes anywhere.
SPEAKER_07It just the tension just shifts around. Yeah. It's so funny. It's horrible. We love it. I feel like I got a hernia laughing so much at that. Like in October. Like we were laughing so hard.
SPEAKER_06You should make an album. Yeah, we should make them as well.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_06A new Halloween album.
SPEAKER_07We've thought about it. It's just so unlistenable.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_06Jake Brittany Spears songs. We've done it. No, you haven't.
SPEAKER_07We have. We did Toxic and uh we did Justin Bieber songs. We did Gongnum style.
SPEAKER_08We're like, oh, I have an idea. Michael Jackson. Jackson Briller. This one's really gonna suck. And then we go like, wow, that really sucks.
unknownOh my god.
SPEAKER_06I mean, only fantastic musicians can find a way to make music suck. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Okay. That's true.
unknownThat's true.
SPEAKER_00Well, we found the cheat code. We found the shortest possible thing that you could possibly do to make the music.
SPEAKER_07It's the quickest thing you do to make the worst piece of music you can ever make.
SPEAKER_01This is new. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07This is novel. No, I know. When it first happened, we were like, I think we just invented a new musical satire genre. I haven't seen it anywhere. It's probably because it's so just insufferable that it's just there's no way it can do well.
SPEAKER_06Everybody else was like, nah.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Watch, it'll be the next TikTok now.
SPEAKER_08Yeah. There's a few layers of irony that you have to cross before you get to understanding evil Christmas.
SPEAKER_03It's extremely evil Christmas shoes.
SPEAKER_07It's extremely funny if you're a musician, though, because they're just like, is that just tritone? Is that just a tuned up a triton? Like if people can tell like exactly what you did to make it that way, they're like, you guys, that's just so crazy.
SPEAKER_06My question is, and it's probably a stupid question, and we'll probably bleep it out, but can you guys actually play tritone?
SPEAKER_07Evil Christmas shoes? Yeah, I just like a song.
SPEAKER_06Can you do that? Because I know you said you used the computer or whatever to do it. Could you actually do a tritone?
SPEAKER_08Back in October, I could sing the melody of Christmas shoes and he could harmonize in the It takes a lot of practice because it's not something you ever have to do ever in real life.
SPEAKER_07It's not something it's to be avoided at all costs, usually.
SPEAKER_08And you never really you never really get there because like the way the computer does it, it makes the drums evil, it makes the reverb evil.
SPEAKER_07It's insane. Like I love the end of the song. There's a nice, like, pretty chord at the end of the song, and that's like you gotta play it. It's like and that and that's the gnarliest part of the song, right when it ends. There's an ending.
SPEAKER_03Oh my god.
SPEAKER_07It's terrible. So weird.
SPEAKER_06It's like we just saw his mom go. Yeah, yeah. And not quite sure where she went. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07She like fell into like a terrible, terrible dark hole or something.
SPEAKER_08Straight to hell.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Yeah. It's funny because you can hear like the intention of the music still that it's supposed to be this pretty ending, but it's so funny.
SPEAKER_06I'm serious. Watch. This is gonna be like the big TikTok thing.
SPEAKER_07Watch out for evil music. It's coming.
SPEAKER_05Have you guys heard of our speed round? That's where we're at next.
SPEAKER_07Ooh. No.
SPEAKER_05So you can each answer. Okay.
SPEAKER_06Vintage gear or brand new gear. Go ahead, Matt. Vintage. Vintage. Now why do you say it like that? Because it's expense.
SPEAKER_08It's expensive. Oh. It's so expensive. And often it's mostly because of how it looks or something's broken about it that's fun. Whereas all the you know, the new stuff is cheaper and great, but you might not feel the same while you're using it.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Vintage. My first amp, real amp, was a 71 Marshall, and just turning it on and smelling the cigarette smoke burn off was like mildew. Yeah, filling in the blanks of like its story is was enough to make me play it all the time.
SPEAKER_06So please tell me you still have the Jaeger guitar.
SPEAKER_07I sure do. I have Evan Williams guitar, Fireball, Firefly. You took a lot from the warehouse.
SPEAKER_06That'll be a killer man cave.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Hanging those on the wall. For real. That's chill.
SPEAKER_05Alright, we'll go in order, starting with you, Jordan, so we can get each of your answers. Ocean vacation or mountain getaway.
SPEAKER_07Mountain getaway. Ocean vacation.
SPEAKER_00Ocean vacation.
SPEAKER_05I would think you'd say ocean with the whole shark thing.
SPEAKER_08I thought I would too. He's scared. Yeah. Look at him.
SPEAKER_05Same thing. Recording studio or live.
SPEAKER_07Live. Live.
SPEAKER_05Live. Well, you guys are meant to be together, aren't you?
SPEAKER_07Yeah. I love a studio though. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Vintage Jaegermeister guitar or a custom dream guitar.
SPEAKER_07Custom dream guitar. Custom dream guitar for sure. Custom dream guitar. Not taking the Jaegermeister.
SPEAKER_00There's something about having a beautiful vintage instrument, but if it's like exactly to my spec and I can do it everywhere, any way I want.
SPEAKER_07That's my favorite thing, is making it just how I want it.
SPEAKER_06Tell us a little bit about I know we're in the speed round and you're gonna kill me.
SPEAKER_07I'll be so quick.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, tell us a little bit about your guitar.
SPEAKER_07This one I've been playing for seven years or something like that. You'll see, it's like super you can tell. I just love chasing the sound in my head. That's why I love Eddie, and that's why I love living with an engineer and someone who's smart about these things because we are constantly tweaking things to push the envelope. Whether it's the speakers or the cabinets in or the pedals or the guitar, everything's been thought about. Winding my own pickups. I'm all about that.
SPEAKER_00I would just like to comment that his custom guitar that he made is called Mako.
SPEAKER_07It is called Mako.
SPEAKER_08It had a tooth in it, but it was too dangerous.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it had a prehistoric Mako tooth in the headstock, and then I was thinking I just had too many visions of slicing Maddox's jugular on the stage.
SPEAKER_05Alright, in regard to your fondness for chicken nuggets, if everybody could just share their favorite Chick-fil-A sauce.
SPEAKER_07I like the Polynesian, is that what it's called? I like that one. Buttermilk ranch.
SPEAKER_00I'm a Chick-fil-A sauce guy. I will say though, Chick-fil-A's barbecue sauce is the worst barbecue sauce.
SPEAKER_03What is wrong with your barbecue sauce?
SPEAKER_05I thought you say you like everything else, and you can't nail the barbecue. It's so weird.
SPEAKER_00Literally, every single other one, I'm like, that's good. And anybody that knows me knows I'm a sauce guy. I put sauce on everything. Yeah, a barbecue sauce. I'm like, throw it away. Like, I don't even want it.
SPEAKER_05It's like it has poison in it. So weird. Chick-fil-A, get your shit together.
SPEAKER_07Obviously, never been to a cookout before, those guys.
SPEAKER_08Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Sad big.
SPEAKER_05All right. Funniest thing that has ever happened to you on stage.
SPEAKER_08I was out on stage for an Oliver Anthony show and Oliver came out in an inflatable chicken suit. And Joey came out in an inflatable chicken suit. I was not told about this. I didn't know we had inflatable chicken suits. So I thought I was on the good drugs. It just made the whole show for me. I love that. Do you have one, Maddox?
SPEAKER_00The only thing that's coming to mind right now is one time I started this set and like the first five minutes, like almost the entire first song, I was like, why am I not getting any sound? I check my amp and I check all my pedals and I check everything. I make sure my bass is turned up, every single thing that I can think of. I'm looking at the sound guy, I'm like, what is happening right now? Like, why don't you have sound? And he goes like this, like super frantically. He's pointing at my guitar, and I look down and I realize that my instrument isn't just straight up not plugged in. Literally, literally, you couldn't even possibly get anything. So that's probably my and me and the sound guy had a great laugh after that. No bass player for the first song on that set. That's funny. When doves cry all over again.
SPEAKER_07I was playing in Myrtle Beach one time during 4th of July, and we were playing and some fireworks went off, and then they set the dunes on fire behind us, which was pretty crazy.
SPEAKER_05Wow. I wonder if anyone got pictures of you playing with the dunes on fire before you realize they were on fire.
SPEAKER_07That'd be cool. The singer at the time, he went and got the uh fire extinguisher and we put it out. That was a pretty interesting.
SPEAKER_00We did play a super crazy gig recently, literally, like in the middle of a pool. An empty pool. Oh, yeah, that was fun. Like in a completely empty pool. There was like a stage set up in the deep end.
SPEAKER_07Under the diving board, basically.
SPEAKER_00It was crazy. Super hot, too. We had to schlep all that gear down there, but it's definitely the craziest gig we've ever played.
SPEAKER_05Alright, you guys are gonna have to really think about this one. If your music had a scent, what would that scent be?
SPEAKER_07Jasmine incense and leather. I was thinking lavender.
SPEAKER_00We have this like vintage power cable that is from like a really old amp, and it just smells like grandma's basement, mildew, and like just old. And there's something about it that's so like nostalgic and amazing. That's what I think our music's looking for.
SPEAKER_07If we could put that into a candle, all those things, honestly, that'd be it's yeah, yeah. Mix them all. Leather, lavender, jasmine.
SPEAKER_06For great answers.
SPEAKER_08Or like the rusting train tracks near our house. Yeah. There's something about that the grunginess.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_05I mean, if you can build a flying lawnmower, I'm pretty sure you can put a candle together that captures this. So maybe that's just a little side project.
SPEAKER_07Coming soon, sort of our new music shop. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06But anyway.
SPEAKER_07Hammerhead.
SPEAKER_06Well, okay. If sharks could talk, what would they complain about?
SPEAKER_07The human race. Overfishing, appoaching them for their fins, the reef decline, the plastics in the ocean and so bad. Lots of things they'd complain about.
SPEAKER_05What is one for each of you? What is one completely useless skill that you're weirdly proud of?
SPEAKER_07I could blow ring bubbles underwater.
SPEAKER_05Wait, what?
SPEAKER_07I could blow ring bubbles like a dolphin. Nowhere. Like rings. I can blow rings.
SPEAKER_06Well, that's kind of cool. Really cool.
SPEAKER_07That's pretty useless, but yeah, it's cool. We're going to the pool after this, I'll show you. I love make I love asking people to watch me do it.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_06Like I'm five years old. Oh my gosh. We want a video.
SPEAKER_07Just be sitting in the pool and be like, you want to wanna watch me watch me.
SPEAKER_00You want to watch me dive off the diving board? Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Dude, Peter, I know yours, man.
SPEAKER_08Oh, I can make my eyes go in different directions. Oh. Like this.
SPEAKER_07It's amazing.
SPEAKER_06That is amazing.
SPEAKER_07I've never seen that ever done before.
SPEAKER_06I know why you like it because it's almost like a fish.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Yeah. He goes ham, he lives hammerhead for a second.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, he does. Oh my god. Okay, what's your special trick? Okay.
SPEAKER_00As a bass player, you are only really supposed to, in air quotes, supposed to play like one note at a time. That's pretty bog standard stuff. My completely useless talent as a bass player is I can do the Eddie Van Halen like tapping stuff, and I play chords and I play all that stuff. Sometimes it's useful most of the time. Completely useless. So for all my bass player friends out there, you know that uh all the tapping stuff don't need that, but it's fun sometimes.
SPEAKER_07And the trio is true. That's why the trio works, because sometimes you'd be cooking.
SPEAKER_00So use it's like useless with an asterisk, and this band is what makes it useful in Eric WhatsApp. Yeah, okay.
SPEAKER_06Well, when you guys set up, you gotta show us what you're talking about.
SPEAKER_00I can do that.
SPEAKER_06Alright, what's your walk-up song if you're entering a boxing ring? There's only one.
SPEAKER_08Why is it Evil Christmas shoes? Evil Christmas shoes. Lock it in.
SPEAKER_06Okay. If your life were a movie, what would the title be? Or maybe if the band was a movie. Give us that much.
SPEAKER_08More than a feeling.
SPEAKER_07Oh, that's good.
SPEAKER_06I love that.
SPEAKER_02More than a feeling.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Lightning in a bottle. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00That's been like our motto since we first started as a band. It's like there's this something spark that is here. We just gotta let it out of the way.
SPEAKER_08I did do some like burning steel wool in a jar that turned out kind of cool for that.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, if you check out Peter's song Ember, like the artwork has got some cool pyrotechnics.
SPEAKER_05What conspiracy theory would your friends believe that you started?
SPEAKER_07I would believe that Maddox could do the birds aren't real. Yeah, totally. Birds are robos.
SPEAKER_00I'm the one, I'm the guy that's like unapologetically at every single party being like birds are not real. You cannot convince me otherwise. They're not. They're charging poles.
SPEAKER_03And charging.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's why they're on the power lines. That's why they're on the lines.
SPEAKER_05So you could I could I could follow you on that. I will you I would be your first convert.
SPEAKER_00You know, these sheeple, man, they just they just go with what everybody tells them that birds are biological beings, but it's not true. If you look into it, you really wake up, sheeple. Yeah, for real.
SPEAKER_06I'm rethinking my hummingbird love. Like, yeah, what are they?
SPEAKER_05Their wings are shaped.
SPEAKER_08They're the most robotic of them all.
SPEAKER_05You need to cut that shit off with the hummingbirds right now.
SPEAKER_07Those are straight from the CIA. Yeah. Or like owls. Owls are I saw a video of a bunch of birds flying, and owls are like silent. They can fly silently, which is crazy.
SPEAKER_00There's actually a whole movement on it, and this is not a joke. No. There's like a birds aren't real movement if you look it up on like Instagram. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05All right. Before we wrap, I definitely want you guys to shout out kind of right now we are in mid-June. So for the rest of 2026, what should people be looking out for from you guys?
SPEAKER_07Pretty much new music monthly. We are playing 804 Day on August 1st. What else do we have? We're doing a tiny porch thing coming soon.
SPEAKER_05Northside. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Yes. Yeah. Yeah, we're doing that. We're playing at the Hoffheimer. Play on the rooftop. We'll be playing on the rooftop. That's a cover set, but we're going to be playing an original set too this summer sometime. To be determined. There's a really cool DIY venue that's like, if you know, you know. And the rules you can't digitize it. And then we're playing Jam and Java and Vienna. And just check out the original music. If you're listening and you like what we do, just support, share stuff, and comment, follow along. Because we're going to be posting lots of videos and that's how it happens. The algorithm just right, you know.
SPEAKER_06And what about the movie?
SPEAKER_07Oh, the short film, yeah. That'll come out this fall. We're in pre-production right now, so probably do some sort of screening or something, and then it'll be in the film festival circuit next year.
SPEAKER_06So one thing we learned when we interviewed the producer for the movie Checked Out, you have to make sure you don't say what's premiere? Premier. Never use premiere.
SPEAKER_05Or you become ineligible for the small film submissions.
SPEAKER_06Because they want to do the premiere. If you've already had a premiere, then they've lost your job. Interesting. And he said that was the most important thing because he would have lost the ability. So always say private screening.
SPEAKER_07That is so thank you. Yes.
SPEAKER_00Very good.
SPEAKER_05Well, thank you for being so open and fun and educating us on fur. Awesome.
SPEAKER_03And sharks, guitars, and lawn mowers.
SPEAKER_06I've learned so much today. You guys are really fantastic.
SPEAKER_07Thank you for having us. This is an awesome.
SPEAKER_08Y'all are great hosts.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, you guys, yeah, absolutely. Great question. I wanted to say that too. Thank you. Let's get loud.
SPEAKER_08Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Another hour. I can't tell if I've ever been as confused and suddenly I'm turning stower. To everybody but you. I just can't help it when my heart starts beating. Like I could ever choose. I know the fantasy that you've been thinking. And I got nothing to lose. Put the floor of the night. And the hood of the lights to disguise. I'm just doing it again. And it's light.