The Jay Franze Show: Music - News | Reviews | Interviews

A forgotten Indianapolis sound helped shape the blues, and Christopher Wise is determined to prove it with receipts. We sit down with the Indiana blues recording artist to talk about Knaptown Blues, his deep dive into the music of Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell, and why recording close to home can feel just as alive as cutting tracks in Memphis or Mississippi. If you’ve ever wondered how much a room, a neighborhood, or a l...

Sun Studio has a reputation that borders on myth, but Coyle Girelli breaks down what the “magic” actually feels like when you’re alone in the room with a guitar, a vocal mic, and the original RCA microphones. We talk about recording in Memphis through Sun Records, why a room mic can tell the whole story, and how hearing the space itself can change the way you understand sound, performance, and even songwriting.

A “made it overnight” story can still take decades to understand. We talk with Texas folk rock and Americana artist Ezra Vancil about the twists that shaped his career: early bands with a drummer-driven groove, a development deal that arrived fast and fell apart even faster, and years of chasing the next break without ever getting the album release he thought would change everything.

Ezra doesn’t dodge the ...

Cincinnati is full of rooms where a band can level up fast, but only if you know where to look. We talk with hard rock artist Mark Frye from Asayda about the Cincinnati live music scene as a real map of neighborhoods, venues, and crowds, and why the city feels like a “big small town” for musicians. From Bogarts to Annie’s Music Center to Ludlow Garage and Riverbend, we compare what each space rewards, what it cost...

A debut single is never just a song. It’s ten years of drafts, late-night voice memos, and learning how to trust your own taste long enough to hit release.

We sit down with Tennessee pop rock recording artist Ivy Leighton to unpack the real work behind her first official drop, “Good Girl,” out September 1st, 2026. Ivy shares the moment she got serious about songwriting at 14, the mix of influences that shap...

Three songs. That’s the window most concert photographers get to capture an entire night of energy, emotion, and chaos and somehow deliver photos that look like they belong on a tour poster. We sit down with Ohio concert photographer Tom Rentz to talk about what really creates a signature look in live music photography, from tight portrait framing to the decisions you make before you ever lift the camera.

Tom breaks do...

A heavy song doesn’t start as a finished riff and a perfect hook. It starts as a feeling, a voice memo, a half-built demo, and a band willing to tear it down and rebuild it until it finally hits. We sit down with Ohio rock band Archer’s Gate for a deep, practical talk about collaboration, vocal harmonies, and the real behind-the-scenes work that turns an idea into a release you can blast in the car.

We get specif...

A great heavy band does two jobs at once: it punches you in the chest with sound, then pulls you closer with truth. Jay Franze sits down with Ohio recording artist Matthew Fritsch, vocalist for Life After This, to talk about the moments that shaped his approach to modern metal and hard rock, starting with the impact of Papa Roach. We get into what “stage energy” really means, how crowds become one unit, and why the most...

One scoop of vanilla ice cream after dinner sounds harmless until it turns into a band tradition, and it’s the perfect opener for a conversation that quickly gets real about what a working musician’s life actually looks like. We’re joined by Les Janssen, a New York bassist with deep roots in rock, a love for great feel, and the kind of touring experience that forces you to think about everything from stage sound t...

You can hear it in Trey Calloway’s voice: the grind is still there, but something has shifted. The work feels more focused, the circle is tighter, and the next steps look a lot more like a real Nashville plan than a hopeful guess. Jay Franze sits down with Trey to talk through the behind-the-scenes moves that actually change a country artist’s trajectory: signing with manager Jerry Hines, learning how to lead with confi...

Streaming promised unlimited music, but it also trained us to treat songs like disposable wallpaper. We sit down with Harmony Records founder and CEO David Chatfield to talk about what that shift costs artists and listeners, and why he thinks the next wave is about bringing music back to being an experience you choose, not noise that happens to you. 

David walks us through building a record label from the ground up, fro...

A band that adopts a highway, cleans it with fans, then goes straight back to building a tightly synced live show is the kind of story we can’t stop talking about. I’m joined by Rex Larkman, drummer for Tropidelic, for a conversation that moves from Cleveland pride to the real mechanics of modern touring, with plenty of laughs and hard-earned lessons in between. 

We get into the Cleveland music scene and how...

One email, a few MIDI files, and a shared obsession with atmosphere can turn into a finished single that sounds huge. We sit down with Ohio singer-songwriter Kate Stanton to talk about “Rise,” a track inspired by the Greek idea of mania, the kind of love that looks a lot like limerence and fixation. Kate walks us through how the song came together, from early synth sketches to deep vocal layering, and why making music t...

Empty seats can cancel a tour faster than bad reviews, yet rock touring is still printing money. We start with a rapid-fire rundown of newly announced rock and metal tours and quickly end up doing what real fans do: clicking past the headline to check official artist sites, compare dates, and figure out whether these runs are truly “fall tours” or just a handful of shows with a catchy label.

From there, we dig in...

You can learn signal flow in a classroom, but you only learn touring when the bus doors close and the clock never stops. We sit down with Jerry Hines, a Tennessee-based tour manager turned artist manager, to unpack the behind-the-scenes reality of building a career in live music production and artist development. Jerry shares how a single phone call in 2004 launched him from side jobs into the deep end as a monitor engineer, then i...

Rock mythology is fun, but what does a real working career look like after the posters come down? We’re joined by guitarist Paul Sidoti for a wide-ranging conversation that starts with the exact moment KISS flipped a switch in his five-year-old brain and stretches all the way to the day he can email his heroes and actually get a reply. Along the way, Paul shares what those early influences gave him: the drive to learn parts b...

Nashville during CMA Fest is a choose-your-own-adventure where every decision has a cost: stand in a line, catch a set, make a meeting, or follow a last-minute invite that turns into the best story of the week. We take you with us from the “question of the day” energy to the real CMA Fest play-by-play, including what it’s like navigating Broadway crowds, building a schedule with the CMA Fest app, and still getting...

You can feel it when a band isn’t just playing songs, they’re building a world. Johnny from The Dreamboats joins us to explain how a modern rock and roll revival band takes 1950s and 1960s oldies covers and turns them into a full-throttle live performance people cannot stop filming. We talk about the real difference between touring Canada versus the United States, from endless drives between small markets to packed sche...

Three hours. That’s the kind of clock Nashville can put on a recording session, and it forces you to learn fast or get left behind. We sit down with country music recording artist Stephen Quinn to unpack what it really felt like to walk into a Nashville studio for the first time to cut “Get It Girl” with seasoned session musicians and a producer who actually cared about getting it right. If you’ve ever wonde...