Rick Mitarotonda

Guitarist for Goose.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Lessnett's Podcast. My
guest today is Rick Matera Tanda a Goose. Rick, how
did it feel to play Madison Square Garden?

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Thanks? Thanks for having me, Bob. Felt surreal for sure.
I mean, I grew up in Connecticut and that's you know,
that's it, you know, bears a lot of weight in
our world in many ways. So yeah, it was. It
was a wild experience. You know. It's just really grateful
that we were able to do it.

Speaker 1 (00:40):
And any difference other than you know, the Gravitas location,
Was there any different thing in the show or the
fact that there were fifteen thousand people.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
There in terms of our show? Yeah, we what we did.
I mean, there's there's so much, you know, like like
you said, the gravity toss of the whole thing. There's
there's so much uh lore and history and every so
many respects that you know, I think we obviously we're

(01:13):
readily aware of all that, and UH just did our
best to to you know, to bring the heat, I guess,
to uh to do to do what we do, try
to show up and be present.

Speaker 1 (01:24):
You know. So you're from Wilton, Connecticut, Yeah, I'm from Fairfield,
which is right now exactly. So you grew up in Wilton.
What did your parents do for a living?

Speaker 2 (01:41):
They both worked in insurance. I think when I was
born my mom stopped working in insurance. My dad kept
kept working in insurance reinsurance and you know, kind of
worked his way up in that industry.

Speaker 1 (01:55):
And did he work in the city or you know,
Wilton Westport?

Speaker 2 (01:59):
Uh? He was worked mostly in Stanford as far as
I can recall. I think he was bouncing around a
different companies, mostly in Stanford.

Speaker 1 (02:06):
And how many kids in the family.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
It's me and I have a sister. He's ten years
older than me.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
And what's she up to.

Speaker 2 (02:15):
She's a teacher. She's got three little boys, and she
lives she lives in Richfield a couple times.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
Okay, Ridgefield Playhouse. So you're growing up. Was there music
in the house? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (02:28):
My dad was from Long Island and so you know,
there's like a lot of Billy Joel and he was
into smooth jazz there, you know, some jazz guitar players,
but kind of like you know, like Larry Coriel. He
liked a lot, so it was kind of random stuff.
He liked Springsteen, he liked Delvert McClinton a lot, which

(02:49):
you know sometimes we gave him a hard time about that.

Speaker 1 (02:53):
But why a hard time about Delvert McClinton.

Speaker 2 (02:59):
It kind of just be came a joke, No, no
shade to Delbert whatsoever, but it just it just became
this this stick where my mom and I would would
bust his chops about his his Delbert obsession.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
Sandy Beach is good song there by DOUBLET mcclinn. So
did you listen to his music and like his music
or did you quickly get your own music?

Speaker 2 (03:23):
Billie Joel took from a from a young age. You know,
I I started really uh loving some of those songs
when I would ride in his car and stuff. But
I think, you know, my sister listened to Dave Matthews
a lot when I was when I was, you know,
a very young kid, and that that took even more
took a minute. I didn't like it. It didn't speak to
me at first when I was really young, but at

(03:46):
you know, at a certain point that one, that one
really kind of took hold.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
And when did you start playing an instrument? Uh?

Speaker 2 (03:55):
Sixth grade was the they rented a guitar for the
first time for me, and I took a couple lessons.
So yeah, I was probably eleven or twelve.

Speaker 1 (04:05):
So what was the motivation for them to rent a
guitar for you?

Speaker 2 (04:09):
I had been asking for a while. I had a
music had just a like a crazy effect on me
as a kid. Any anything I listened to. I mean
I remember like it was the you know, the CD era,
so I got like the space dram sound. It really
didn't matter it was I had a discman, I'd walk
around and with my little headphones and listen to whatever
CD I could get my hands on, and things just

(04:32):
had like a they just made me feel like a
like a crazy person, you know, had had a profound effect.
So I was always drawn to it. I was always,
you know, pretty intensely moved by it. And then seeing older,
older brothers and and things like that of friends of
mine playing guitar. There's you know a few experiences like that, right.

(04:53):
I saw someone playing you know, smells like teen spirit
on a guitar, and I was like, whoa, yeah that
I want to do that.

Speaker 1 (05:01):
So they rented the guitar. What were lessons like.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
Those? First? The first couple lessons, I don't even remember, honestly,
I started studying with a guy named Bob Ricchio in
in Wilton, and uh, it was a kind of a
slow start in the beginning. I you know, I liked
to play music that I you know, liked in that
you know, like recordings of some great songs and pretend

(05:26):
like I was playing it like I knew what I
was doing, and I really didn't. And I also started
writing kind of right away before I had any discipline
with practicing or anything like that. I started if I
learned a chord or something, I just started making up songs.
That was. That was kind of something that happened right
out of the gate. But the discipline to start actually

(05:47):
studying music and working on and practicing took took a
little bit for me, didn't. It didn't happen right away.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
Well, starting writing songs, was it something like you'd been
writing before, non musical stuff? Poet three short stories? Where
did the genesis come from?

Speaker 2 (06:06):
You know? When I was when I was really young,
I would I would, you know, make up little little
like really silly little things and be like, hey, you
want to hear my song. It's going to be some
silly little thing, but really not not much of that.
I wasn't writing a ton of poetry prior to that
that I recall at least stuff to remember some of
these things sometimes. But I think when I when I started,

(06:28):
you know, when I got a guitar and started really
getting into music, it just it all kind of happened
at once around that Around that time, you know, the
music kind of came first, and then I was like, well,
I'm just going to write lyrics for this and write songs.
So I wrote little songs about you know, bullies at school,
whatever whatever it was, and quickly got into recording with whatever,

(06:50):
you know, whatever kind of recording apparatus I could get
my hands on at the time, which you know, I
could started with like a little cassette recorder thing, which
was awesome.

Speaker 1 (06:58):
Okay, if you're writing a bullies at school, were you
bullied at school?

Speaker 2 (07:04):
Uh? Not not particularly, but I just like, I mean,
sometimes sometimes I get there. There's there's definitely certain situations
where I, uh, you know, I caught a caught a
hard time. But it was also like, when I think
back to that was kind of an observational thing too,
just like seeing seeing people going through their own stuff,

(07:24):
but then like taking it out on other people that
I don't know. I just the first song I kind
of remember writing was about that.

Speaker 1 (07:33):
And how did you fit in in school?

Speaker 2 (07:38):
I went through like different phases. There's a bunch I
think a good number of years I was pretty quiet.
It kind of like phase in and out of different
zones and then sometimes you know, it kind of had
this pattern of like I'd go into a new school
and you know, kind of had like the slate would
be clean, and I would I'd be really quiet and

(07:58):
kind of keep to myself and really shy. I was
pretty like, I was pretty shy. I've always been pretty
shy and like socially anxious. But then you know, by
the end of my time out of school, i'd have,
you know, a group of friends and a little micro
community kind of thing, and it changed forms a bunch.
But yeah, you know, when I was really young, I

(08:20):
was I was less shy, and then I think when
I hit middle school is when I started getting really
shy and awkward and anxious.

Speaker 1 (08:27):
So did you do well in school? Did you participate
in activity sports?

Speaker 2 (08:35):
I played sports up into up until high school, and uh,
and I had a really good time doing it. I
played baseball the most, the longest, I would say, But yeah,
by the time I got to high school was it
was kind of like I saw that the the demands
that you know, playing sports in high school had, and

(08:57):
by that time I was already way too set on
pursuing music and I wanted to kind of do everything
I could do in that regard. So yeah, I kind
of made the conscious decisions to not to stop playing sports.
By by high school school I was, I was, I
was like, all right, it wasn't great. Definitely wasn't That

(09:17):
didn't come super easily to me. Some some subjects were
easier than others. But it wasn't like a it wasn't
a total mess, but you know, it wasn't great.

Speaker 1 (09:26):
So you're taking lessons. What is your teacher teaching you?
And are you practicing?

Speaker 2 (09:34):
And the beginning is kind of the route of, you know,
the the typical rudimentary stuff. You know, he showed me,
like a chili pepper song and he kind of showing
showing songs and licks and stuff like that, and chords.
He was he was a good teacher in that way,
and he taught a lot of people, a lot of
kids in in the town. There and uh, I you

(09:55):
know it, like I said, it took me a while
before I started gaining gaining any discipline or getting serious
about it or you know, showing real progress in that regard.
I was always taken with it, but you know, it
was more in the writing, in the creative, creative side.
And then at a certain point, Uh, that started to
shift throughout middle school, I would say, And and I

(10:17):
think by the you know, there was there was a
turning point with him where he started to realize that
I was I was really I was taking it seriously
and pursuing it. And when he saw that I was
starting to make strides, he started pushing me more and
more into jazz and started teaching me jazz. That was
That was kind of where that journey started in a
lot of ways.

Speaker 1 (10:36):
I would say, So, did he teach you how to
read music? Can you read music today?

Speaker 2 (10:44):
Not proficiently? He did? You know? That was something that
he taught and we're worked on and you know, I
went to I went to music school, so it was
it was part of that, but I kind of just
got by with it. It was never it was never
something that was that I became, you know, very very
competent with.

Speaker 1 (11:02):
So he got you into jazz. What kind of jazz.

Speaker 2 (11:09):
He you know, he just started throwing standards at me
and and teaching, you know, showing me how to get
through the chord changes and and uh and stuff like that.
There wasn't I didn't really get a knack for playing
through changes until I did a summer program at Berkeley. Well,
some summer I was in high school. I did like
a I don't know if that was the one week

(11:31):
guitar thing or the five week program. I forget what
it was, but they you know, I went and did
this ensemble and they put five hundred miles high. It
was the Chickeria tune in front of me, and and
I was still I still really didn't know what I
was doing. At that point. I could, I could solo,
you know over a modal thing. But you know, the

(11:52):
first quarter was E minor, and you know, the head
came around. I learned the head and played the head,
and then solo came around. Everyone look to me and
they're like, all right, you know, go and I was
like E minor cool, got it and started selling over
E minor. The second chord is G minor, which is
like a total total change, and uh, you know, I
kept selling an E minor and sounded like a total dufist.

(12:13):
So that was like the wake up of what that
is was really all about. And uh that that was
like the turning point there for me, which was like,
it was a really cool moment for me in my
musical journey, I guess because I just took that tune
and sat down and learned the chord scales for every
every change and learned it in each position. And then

(12:35):
you know, that was that was kind of the the
impetus and in the moment catalyst for learning that type
of thing, which was a cool experience.

Speaker 1 (12:44):
Okay, let's go back. You start writing songs. Most people
start writing songs think their initial songs are fantastic and
want to play them for people. Later they realized they sucked,
but at first they think they're great. Welling through your mind.

Speaker 2 (13:01):
You know, I think back to that period so often,
especially now, the freedom I had at that age that
I think everyone has at that age in one way
or another, and I imagine that you know, it varies
quite a bit. I you know, can't can't under undervalue

(13:23):
or or you know, I can't stress enough how how
incredible was to have parents that were really supportive and
and you know kind of we're there for it, whatever
it was. But uh, yeah I didn't. I don't. I
wasn't thinking about if they were good or not. And
I wasn't trying to I wasn't trying to go out

(13:44):
and play play them at gigs. I wasn't trying to
play them for people or like trying to do anything
with them. The the discovery of them, like figuring out
of learning some chords and finding a new chord progression
that I hadn't I don't know, just discovering this the
sound of a new chord progression and then writing a
song and then recording a song. That's really all I
wanted to do, was like write these songs and record them.

(14:06):
And that thing was just like the most thrilling process.
That was the most thrilling thing I could possibly do
with my time at that time. And yeah, there there wasn't.
I really wasn't thinking about playing gigs or or or
doing anything with it. It. Eventually, I you know, got
a band together, I got a got my best friend

(14:29):
to start playing bass, and and we you know, found
another guy who we were friends with at school and
he was playing drums. We had a trio and by
eighth grade we recorded like an album in my in
my basement with a little cork twelve track you know,
you just burn you bounce everything down into a CD
and I you know, uh copied a bunch of CDs

(14:50):
and sold him around school and that was like it
was it was this just the purity of the whole
thing was just I you know, I think back to
it all the time. It was kind of doesn't get
better than that.

Speaker 1 (15:02):
You know.

Speaker 2 (15:02):
We'd get have like band practice once a week after school,
come home and eat popcorn chicken and go down to
the basement and just you know, whack it around. And
it was it was like that's it still feels like
that's what it's all about, you know. But uh, yeah,
that you know, it wasn't uh. I think the only
show we really ever played was the Talent Show in

(15:24):
eighth grade, which I was you know, that was the
first time I'd really performed. I think the Talent Show
in eighth grade. You know, we had we had made
this this this album had like fifteen tracks on it
and sold around school and had never played out anywhere,
but never played live or anything like that, and uh,

(15:44):
you know, it was this. It was this like the
night the day of the thing, Everyone's like you nervous.
I was like, no, I feel totally fine. And then
I just like threw up everywhere. So I guess that
was the the maiden voyage of learning what what performance
anxiety does to my nervous system. But yeah, it was
It was a it was a funny experience.

Speaker 1 (16:05):
Okay, you say about recording to cassette, did you have
a four track poored a studio? When you're talking about cassette,
how sophisticated was it?

Speaker 2 (16:15):
The cassette thing was very unsophisticated. It wasn't even a
four track, and I barely remember that it was pretty
it was fairly short lived. That was like that was
in the early early stages. And I honestly don't even
know what that thing was and where it came from.
I just remember sitting in my bedroom and it just
had like a built in microphone and it was I
think you could I don't even know if you could,

(16:35):
if if you could layer anything, it might have just
been like a one done kind of situation. But I
remember I would, like, you know, play and sing and record,
and then have had a buddy who was like kind
of starting to learn drums. It was like early early,
the first things. And he he didn't have a drum set,
but he was taking drum lessons and he had a
practice pad, so he would come over and he would

(16:56):
just like whack on the pack practice pad and I
would learn it. So that was that was kind of
the the first thing, which is you know, pretty short lived.

Speaker 1 (17:03):
So then did you graduate you're talking about you made
this album? What equipment did you make the album on?

Speaker 2 (17:11):
By that time that was probably a couple of years later.
I had this this COREK twelve track, which then I
was I was you know, I spent a lot of
time with that thing. I was able to you know,
had twelve tracks. And then you know we had I
had a few a handful of microphones enough to make

(17:32):
up a drum set and track you know like bass,
d I guitar maybe I threw a mic in the
guitar amp on or do I don't even remember, and
then uh, you know, a vocal mic and and you
know a few mics for the drum set. So that
was all going to the cork and then I would
overdub vocals just to uh, you know, but I was

(17:54):
a horrible singer. But I had no awareness I did,
you know. I was just doing it, having a great time.
But this singing thing was was never never there, never easy,
never was I was not a natural singer by any stretch.

Speaker 1 (18:08):
Okay, you pick up the guitar in middle school, are
you the outlier? Or is everybody playing instruments?

Speaker 2 (18:17):
Uh? Not necessarily, I wouldn't say either. There's like it
somewhat of my minority. For sure. Everyone wasn't playing instruments,
but you know, there was like you kind of knew
everyone who was. There's a handful of people that were
doing it, and everyone had their own kind of thing
that they were doing or working on or into. So

(18:38):
there weren't that many, but everyone was kind of aware
of everyone that was that was checking it out.

Speaker 1 (18:46):
And when you started writing songs recording, who did you
want to be?

Speaker 2 (18:52):
That's a good question, you know, Like in middle school,
I mean, Dave Matthews was kind of this like this, uh,
this touchstone throughout a lot of through really always so
that that was always, you know, a big inspiration his
whole world. But when I was in middle school, I had.

(19:12):
I had this this DVD called Under the Radar. It
was a Dispatch DVD, and it was it was kind
of this, uh, kind of scrappy DVD of them like
on the road and just doing things, going out of
the studio, playing shows, to talking about their come up
and Napster and that whole that whole thing. And I was,
I was obsessed with that band at that time. So

(19:34):
like I would say, in those early years of you know,
whould I want to be, it was Dispatch.

Speaker 1 (19:38):
Okay, you got the two other members. You're in the basement.
Are you a dictator saying I write all the songs,
I want it this way, I want it that way.
And they were just basically I don't want to see
your servants going along with you. What did it look like?

Speaker 2 (19:56):
Uh, I don't remember it being like that, And I said, certainly,
I hope it wasn't like that. I think, uh, they
were were we were kind of just you know, doing it.
I was I was writing the songs and you know,
had had the ideas and was like, all right, let's
try this, let's try this. And it didn't feel like
there was I don't remember there being like they're they

(20:20):
were I think from what I recall, Uh, they were
just down down to go for the ride, you know,
and and you know they weren't they weren't writing songs.
It was either so it was kind of like a
all right, yeah, here's this is the song, let's do
it wasn't really didn't. I don't know. I think we

(20:41):
were too young for it to be any kind of
ego battles.

Speaker 1 (20:43):
I feel like, okay, so you finished the fifteen song,
should make the CD. I assume you just burned the
CDs on your own burner.

Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah, that the core trail track had it had like
a CD you could you could bounce it down to
a CD right on the thing and then just go
make copies in the computer.

Speaker 1 (21:07):
Okay, so how many did you sell it? At? What price?

Speaker 2 (21:13):
I think I don't remember what we were selling for,
maybe like ten bucks, but I think we made like
somewhere between five hundred and seven hundred bucks something like that.
It got a little it got a little conflated because
the other two guys also crocheteded winter beanie hats, so
we were selling those two. So you know that they

(21:36):
were you know when we when when we weren't practicing
and stuff. They were just crocheting hats and they had
a little hat business called head Bandits. So we were
we were kind of little little entrepreneurs, I guess, running around.
But yeah, I think the album we made five hundred
and seven hundred bucks something like that, which was pretty
solid enough to buy like a new base amp.

Speaker 1 (21:55):
Oh yeah, absolutely, really solid. You know, you got a
couple of friends give you ten dollars, but how did
you convince the other seventy odd people to get it ten?

Speaker 2 (22:05):
I think people were being nice, like teachers were buying them,
and you know, people were people were being nice. But
I guess it was a lot of kids at school.
I don't know, I don't I don't totally remember. There
there are some friends who are helping us help like
helping us burn them and like helping us sell them
and stuff. It was, you know, it's, uh, it's like
one of those things when you're when you're young. You know,

(22:27):
you got a little a little pack and everyone's kind
of like getting in on the like we're doing it
kind of energy. You know.

Speaker 1 (22:34):
Well where people buying it, listening to it, they say,
oh I want to hear you play such and such.

Speaker 2 (22:40):
I don't know. I don't know. I mean I listened
back to it, and there's there's a lot of creative
freedom there. This is my own perspective. I guess there's
there's a lot of freedom in it and in the
songs and stuff, and a lot of decisions that were
made that I would never make now because they were
coming from a place of having no no like theoretical
understanding of of music and you know what, how like

(23:03):
what kind of chord progressions are normal and things like that,
which ended up making way more interesting choices, you know,
because it's it was just kind of throwing things at
the wall and chasing your ear and wound up being
some some things that just you know are just very
like kind of like wild card, wild card choices. But

(23:27):
the vocals, like I said, were just like brutal. So
I don't know if people listen to it or not.
Can So how did you go?

Speaker 1 (23:36):
You know, you had stage fright, but how did your
performance of the talent show go over?

Speaker 2 (23:43):
You know, I don't really know, Uh, I don't really know.
I think there was there was something to be said
for the just the fact that we were right that
a bunch of songs were being written. It was like
it was like there was like a body of original music,
So I guess there was. There was like that. I
remember that energy being kind of a thing, you know

(24:06):
because like the other other bands were probably better than us,
and you know, in the grade or whatever, but they
were playing covers, but like they're saying way better and
they're they're probably tighter and they played better or whatever
it was, but you know, they're they're being just a
lot of ideas, a lot of original songs happening. Uh
felt like an energy, But I don't I don't think.

(24:27):
I don't know if we were good or not, or
if people thought we were good. I have no idea.

Speaker 1 (24:32):
Okay, so you had a band, you were selling CDs,
you talk about these cover bands. How many bands were
in the school? I mean, was this this thing where
you were one of ten or one of two.

Speaker 2 (24:43):
Like maybe one of four, one of four or five
something like that. There's like some rockers, you know, some
hard some hard metal kind of guys, and then uh,
you know some it was like another classic rock kind
of outfit and things like that.

Speaker 1 (24:59):
Okay, little school, Ine go to high school. Then what happens.

Speaker 2 (25:05):
The first year of high school. It was kind of
it was kind of like back to what I was
saying before, I was didn't really have a crew anymore.
It was it was it was like low men on
the Totem Pole I had. I had a girlfriend, and
I had like a really serious relationship, Like we spent
a lot of time together and we went in really
deep for for how young we were. And so I

(25:29):
spent a lot of time doing that and kind of
didn't hang out with friends that much at all, and
was writing and recording a lot. But more so, the
band wasn't really playing anymore. I think the drummer just
didn't want to do it anymore. He stopped paying drums.
He was like he was actually amazing skier. He was
kind of pursuing that more and just wasn't interested in
playing drums anymore. So we kind of stopped doing the

(25:50):
band thing. But I continued to record a lot of
music and I kept I was writing more than ever
my first year of high school, and I had another
buddy who played drums and keys, and he would come
over and we would record stuff together. He'd play drums
and keys, I'd played guitar bass and sing something on it,
and so I was doing a lot of that, and

(26:11):
then the summer summer after first year of high school,
I started smoking weed and I got really into that,
really really into that, and the it kind of propelled
it was it was a major turning point in the
journey because I got deeper and deeper into that was
that was, you know, strangely when I really started studying music,

(26:33):
starting studying theory and improvisational music in particular, but I
stopped writing. I think, what is something about the way
that impacted my brain and how things were, you know,
there was there was still a lot of momentum and
forward movement in from a musical standpoint, but the writing
like halted in its tracks pretty much, which is you know,

(26:56):
somewhat of a regret looking back kind of, you know,
I can't help but be curious what would have happened
if I had stayed on the trajectory it was on
prior to that. But you know, nevertheless, I had a
great time in high school for the most part. You know,
it was those early years I was pretty sensitive and
emotional and you know whatever. But as as the years

(27:17):
went on, it was, you know, I had a lot
of fun. You know, in high school it was kind
of it was kind of like, you know, all you
could ask for, and you know, I didn't realize it.
I mean we was just having a great time at
the time going through things. You know, I had anxiety
and stuff too, but I guess it was mostly relative
to my perspective post high school that I that was.

(27:39):
That was when I really realized how great of a
time it was in so many respects. But yeah, it
was you know, studying the like with the guitar teacher,
he was pushing jazz more and I was studying that,
and that was kind of the time I got into
you know, the Dead and Fish and things of that.

(27:59):
You know, different types of jam bands. I'm Friese McGee
and MO and all these all these different bands and
learning that stuff. Getting into that world. Uh, playing along
with those bands was kind of the moments where it
was just like a release. It was just so much
fun and it was kind of like I'd spend time
studying jazz and trying to decode that language and then

(28:20):
let my hair down and play along with with, you know,
the jam bands in my room after school kind of thing.

Speaker 1 (28:29):
So what happened with the girlfriend? How long did that last?
How did you meet her and how did it end?

Speaker 2 (28:37):
We we were in school together and my sister actually
started babysitting for them. There was a yeah, we were
kind of just in the same in same community, and
I just had a huge crush on her. And then
we started spending a bunch of time together and you know,
went went full like young love mode. And then I

(29:01):
don't know, you know, when that summer after freshman year
of high school, I started smoking a bunch of weed
and we kind of just, I don't know, it's like
we just we kind of went separate ways in a way,
and uh, you know, it's tough to remember how those
things unfold, but you know, they's like when you go

(29:26):
that that deep as a young kid, you have like
no idea, you have no idea what like what you're doing,
and you just kind of like the fall, you know,
neck deep into the young love thing and it's just
it's like consuming and then the there's there's you know,
strange things that come out of it when you don't
have balance. I guess that maybe that's that's part of

(29:47):
the thing, is I don't, you know, struggle with balance
when when there's something I'm you know, really uh drawn to.
I guess you know it's like, oh, make the analogy
of like getting getting a bag of Dorito's and dumping
out the entire bag of Dorito's on your lap. It's

(30:08):
a weird analogy, but that's that's kind of how we've
come to refer to that that type of energy instead
of you know, the lack of being able to pace
yourself or or maintain some kind of balance in the
context of entering into or being drawn, you know, engaging
with something that you're drawn to in in an intense way.

(30:31):
It could be you know, analogy. You know, it's it's
presented itself in all types of different situations. Relationships, a band,
you know anything.

Speaker 1 (30:41):
Okay, you're the type of guy who always has a girlfriend.
You had a girlfriend who were a freshman. You have
a girlfriend when you were sophomore junior? How did that
play out?

Speaker 2 (30:52):
No? No, I was I was way too uh stoned
and shy to talk to girls for at least for
the next couple of years I had. I ended up
having another girlfriend, and like when I was a senior,
but for the bulk of high school, I was I
was too stoned and shy talk to girls.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
And who turned you on to dope.

Speaker 2 (31:14):
I don't know e every you know, everyone was kind
of doing it, and I just it, uh it it
fired up like the you know, learning music, playing music,
listening to music on on weed. It was just I was,
I was. I was just taken with it, you know,

(31:36):
but yeah, it was it was just around. It was
kind of as part of the culture where where we were,
as I imagine it was in most places.

Speaker 1 (31:43):
And this was something your parents were aware of, unaware of,
cool with, not cool with.

Speaker 2 (31:50):
They're they're pretty sharp, they're pretty aware. And at first
they were, you know, my mom was mortified, but then
as time went on, they you know, my house ended
up being the house that everyone would convene at. Like
we hung out at my house the most. You know,
if there was a party going around going on somewhere

(32:10):
in town, we we'd go there. But if there wasn't, we'd,
like the default thing was was hanging out of my house.
And you know, they they allowed. It wasn't like a
like a weird thing. You know, sometimes it gets kind
of weird when that's when that's the vibe. But they
knew what we were doing and they were cool with
it as long as everyone was making good decisions and

(32:31):
there I think their philosophy was like, we'd rather them
here safe and uh learning how to make good decisions
while partying. Then you know this it being this this
crazy forbidden thing and then making making much worse mistakes.

Speaker 1 (32:47):
You know, so we're in this story. Do you go
to the Brookley summer program? Uh?

Speaker 2 (32:54):
You know, I don't remember what when that started. That
might I might have gone to the first one, like
at the freshman year after high school, or it could
have been after sophomore year. I'm not sure, but I
think I think one summer I did the guitar It
was just a week I did the guitar thing. There
was another a guitar uh program, like a one week
guitar camp kind of thing I did maybe uh maybe

(33:17):
a year prior. So I think it was like one
summer I did this one guitar camp somewhere in Connecticut,
and then I did a one week thing at Berkeley.
And then I think the following summer, I just I
was getting more and more serious and and uh about it,
and I did the five week program. Uh the following summer,
I think, and yeah, I was you know, I I

(33:39):
was very very lucky that my parents were able to
and willing to set me up in those programs and
and you know, that's like, that's the privilege I was.
It was, it was, it was privileged to be able
to learn music at that age.

Speaker 1 (33:54):
You know, Okay, you went on the five week programs?
What was that like? Were the students competitive? Were they
is good or better? Was it kind of like summer
camp where music was a part of it, but a
lot of it was living in the dorm hanging out.
What was the experience like.

Speaker 2 (34:13):
The five week I mean, because the one week guitar
camp things were, those were I had a good time
at those. Those those kind of just they didn't. The
five week was was tough. I remember that being a
turning point. It wasn't as much of a communal kind of, hey,

(34:34):
everyone's here to learn how to jam kind of thing
it was. It was it was more intense. It was
more like college. Honestly, you know, you set up in
a dorm and the people doing that program were just
way more serious and the vast majority of them were
way better than me. And that was I think my

(34:55):
first brush. I remember very vividly having a conversation with
my with my dad out in the street one night,
maybe halfway through that thing where I was, I was
kind of homesick and like just getting my ass kicked.
It was it was the I mean, the talent there,
the talent pool. It was the classic thing of like,
you know, I was very comfortable. I wouldn't. I wasn't.

(35:17):
I wasn't even a big fish in my little pond.

Speaker 1 (35:19):
You know.

Speaker 2 (35:20):
It wasn't even like that. It wasn't I wasn't good
enough to even have that be the vibe. But I
was comfortable in my little pond.

Speaker 1 (35:28):
You know.

Speaker 2 (35:28):
I had my own connection, my own experience with it
in my own little pond. And then I went there
and it was the first time I had the experience
of being totally decalibrated from that and kind of lost
in the soup of all these immensely talented but really
really competitive energies, you know. So yeah, I remember my

(35:54):
dad kind of My dad had an amazing ability to
to help people talk to talk to people and see
where they're at, and uh just like say the right thing.
He always knew how to how to do that, and uh, yeah,
I remember that night. That was so the five week
thing definitely stands out as a point of my first

(36:15):
brush with with that environment of losing feeling like I
was losing my own connection to music and why I
do it.

Speaker 1 (36:22):
Okay, you're in high school, you're smoking dough, you're playing
along to record, you stop writing songs. At what point
do you start having bands again in high school?

Speaker 2 (36:36):
So throughout Yeah, there was like different things that happened
throughout high school. You know, I the guitar teachers started
setting me up with some some other kids who were
playing jazz, so I was kind of starting to play
with them a little bit. There was another project that
I played in. These these two guys were writing this
a bunch of they were really into dream theater and

(36:57):
they were writing this. One was like a classical trained uh,
piano player, pianist, and uh the other one was the drummer,
the same guy I was. I was kind of recording
songs with in uh, you know, earlier in high school,
and they were they were super into like progressive I
don't know, metal, progressive metal, hard rock, kind of kind

(37:18):
of dream theater kind of stuff. So they were writing
writing stuff like that, and Uh, I I was, you know,
I was in a band with them, and uh, we
would we were playing Teen Centers a bunch and and
doing that that kind of thing, and it was nice.
You know, I had had like a creative I had
creative input, I had a voice in that band. But

(37:38):
that was also, you know, one of the first early
experiences I had of being not the not the driving
force behind a project or you know, not like the
main main writer or something like that in a project,
just kind of like would come in and have ideas,
but mostly was the guitar player, you know. And it was, uh,

(38:02):
it was a great experience. We we learned a lot
together and and uh had a lot of fun like
playing playing these uh these teen Centers. It was a
very different scene than the people that I was, the
friends that I had, and the you know, the parties
I was going to and stuff like that. It was
it was a very different, very different world. And uh,
you know, I'd often like we'd have these gigs on

(38:25):
the weekend at teen Centers and there'd be like a
party that everyone else, all my friends were going to,
and I'd try to get some of them to come
to the Team Center with me, and They're like, nah,
we're gonna go to the party. I was like, all right,
so I'd go, I'd hang out with them for a
few hours and then roll into the Teen Center and
it was it was There was a lot of funny
experiences there. But yeah, I mean the music was they

(38:45):
The stuff they were writing kind of kind of kicked
my ass and in some different ways too, you know,
I was like dose they were it was like soloing
over some chord progression in fifteen and stuff like like
learning that was you know, they were pushing me to
do stuff like that, which was which was really cool
at that age. At the same time I was learning,
I was just learning a lot about music and studying,

(39:06):
studying jazz and stuff like that, and this they were nerd.
They were like kind of the nerdy metal guys, doing
weird number stuff, a lot of a lot of strange,
odd time stuff, and that was that was a that
was a really good learning experience in that way.

Speaker 1 (39:31):
So you graduate from high school, then what.

Speaker 2 (39:35):
Uh, graduate from high school and I got into Berkeley.
So I went to Berkeley. But yeah, yeah, so I
started Berkeley pretty much, you know, right after right after
high school.

Speaker 1 (39:47):
And how long did that last? I did?

Speaker 2 (39:50):
Uh? I think I did three years and then a band,
a band came together. Uh, there was there was a
guy throughout the college years, there was a guy that
I knew about. He was older, you know, like I said,
it's kind of small town. You you kind of know
all the people who are doing it older than you

(40:14):
and your your contemporaries. And I had known about him
from playing into different bands that he was in, and
also just people he was. He wrote a lot of
songs throughout high school and in college and stuff. And
you know, some friends of mine knew about and like
would send me recordings of songs he wrote or different
things like that. I was, I was readily aware. And

(40:34):
then I think it was the summer. It was either
the summer going into my last year of high school
or the summer after my last year of high school.
Ran into him at a party which was coincidentally at
Trevor's house, the bass player for Goose. Now, there was
a party at Trevor's house and this guy's his name's

(40:56):
Matt Campbell. And he rolled into this party and and uh,
I was, you know, I was pretty lit up. I was.
I was kind of a remote and I saw him.
I was like, you, like, I know you. I know,
you, you know, play and write and stuff like where's where's
your where's your gear? Let's get your gear, Let's play
right now. So he his parents' house was down the road,
and we drove and got his gear and came back

(41:18):
and that was the first time that we'd really connected
and really hung out. I don't really remember playing that night,
but I do remember the next day he came back
to get his gear and we played that afternoon, and
that was that was really the first time, like we
really connected and played music together, and it was it
was pretty impactful. So then throughout the years I was
in college and stuff, he was in college. Uh he graduated,

(41:39):
you know a year a few years prior to me.
Every summer we kind of would link up one way
or another and play, play gig or something or you know,
different little projects whatever it was. And then, uh, there
was this one summer after my second year of college,
I want to say where I was like, all right,

(41:59):
I just I gotta I gotta start, I gotta get
a band together, I gotta start doing something. So I
kind of went around and uh found a couple of
random guys at school. Who are I mean, there's so
many good players there was. It was insane, but I
found a couple of guys and started just booking gigs
at bars in Connecticut on the weekends this one summer

(42:19):
and also just like throwing parties at my house and
playing there. So we kind of got this little band
together this one summer and it was a it was
a really fun summer. And Matt had graduated from college
and got an internship at Red Light and he was
thinking about, you know, entering the music industry in that way,
and he didn't. He didn't get too far in that.

(42:44):
He was like, I don't. I don't think he was
there very long before he realized that it wasn't for him,
and he, you know, at that he had he'd been
playing with us that summer. We had some like really
great experiences the first time we started writing together. We
wrote a couple of songs that summer that we still
play now. And you know, it was like that fall

(43:08):
that he was like, I'm not doing the red Light thing.
Let's start a band, and I was like, Yeah, let's cool,
let's do it. And so I think it was that
that following, you know, the top of that next year,
I dropped out of school and we just started working
working on this band, and it was so that band
ended up being like it lasting for a year and

(43:29):
a half and it was extremely formative experience for all
of us. It laid the groundwork for what what the
band is now for sure, But it was also the
timing was kind of kind of wild in terms of
like universe karma type stuff. I got sick. I got

(43:50):
really sick kind of right when that band was starting.
Like I crashed like right before, right right around that time,
and that had a pretty big impact on I mean
everything for me, but the trajectory of that band for sure.

Speaker 1 (44:04):
So would your parents say when you dropped out of Berkeley?

Speaker 2 (44:08):
I was just my mom at that point, and I think,
you know, my dad passed away when it was my
first week of college. I was eighteen, So well.

Speaker 1 (44:20):
Let's stop there for a second. Had he been sick
or what were the circumstances.

Speaker 2 (44:26):
Yeah, So when I was, yeah, my senior year of
high school, like two thousand and two thousand and nine,
my grandfather, who was my dad's dad, who I was
really really close with growing up, died. And then a
couple of months later, my uncle, who my mom's brother,

(44:46):
who I was really really close with who had lived
with us throughout when I was in high school. He
kind of he kind of moved in. He was in
a rough spot in his life and moved in with us,
and we became really really close. He died a couple
months after my grandfather, and then right after he died,
my dad got sick cancer and he was sick for

(45:08):
five or six months and then died in September of
two thousand and nine. And that was like, it was
like my uh, you know, first week of at Berkeley.

Speaker 1 (45:18):
God, you cope with that? How do you cope with that? Today?

Speaker 2 (45:22):
Still trying to figure it out? Honestly, it's uh. I
after the first two it was like my first brush
with death, and you know, I was, I was grieving,
and it was it was strange. It was, you know,
I was trying to learn how to make sense with
sense of you know that these people that I was

(45:42):
really close to in my you know, current consciousness in
my life were no longer here, you know, it was
it was it was just a very strange experience when
my dad died. I I mean when he got sick,
I was in denial. I was running from him. I
was party a lot. I was having a really great
time with my friends in school and everything and couldn't

(46:05):
really show up to that at all. I wasn't conscious
of it. But you know, in my you know, eighteen
year old invincible, There's no way my like my dad's
I'm invincible. My dad's definitely invincible. There's not no way
nothing you know, bad would happen to him. He'll figure
it out. He figures everything out. He just he was like,
he was a really really special guy, and he loved

(46:30):
me a lot, you know, kind of to a fault maybe,
and and had a really like I like I said before,
kind of had a pretty amazing ability to to see people,
talk to people, say the right thing, do the right thing,
and just had a lot of a lot of charisma
and a lot of people were drawn to him and he, uh,
you know, he solved a lot of my problems throughout

(46:52):
the my my early life. You know, if something was
was I was, there was something I was struggling with,
you know, he would make it better, and it was
coming out of love and stuff. But when when he died,
it was I was not really prepared for it, and
I could just shut down. I like went into full

(47:12):
full shock. I don't really remember much, you know that
my memory from like my first year of college was
pretty shoddy, and uh yeah, I don't know. I just
you know, all of a sudden had like really really
bad anxiety issues. I was having panic attacks multiple times
per week and a couple after a couple of years
of that, my body just kind of shut down, you know,

(47:34):
for a long for many years, was trying to figure
out like what it was, what's the problem. It was
like mono, you know, Epstein bar lime disease, kind of
that kind of world. But no one, know, none of
the doctors I was seeing could really put their finger
on it. It was just, you know, one of those situations.
So I've been on been on that journey ever since, honestly.

Speaker 1 (47:52):
So how did you get past that?

Speaker 2 (47:55):
The physicals thing? Yeah, you know, I've I've become ah,
I haven't you know. There there's there were periods where
it got a little better. You know, it was really
rough for a while, and then there's there's a few
things that I discovered that kind of moved the needle
and got me to a place where I could go

(48:16):
back to school, and and uh, you know, there's a
wild where a while where I couldn't hold a job.
I was you know, I couldn't get through like a shift.
I just didn't have enough energy. But they, you know,
I some there's a couple of things I discovered that
that helped enough for me to go back to school
and start the band and you know, kind of be

(48:36):
getting by and then you know, it's there's it's it's
up and down. You know, things if stress gets too
high or you know, certain things change and things you
can kind of like heads south again. But I've it's
it's something that I've I've just never stopped trying to
figure out and and learn about.

Speaker 1 (48:57):
So you say you discovered some things that helped you,
what were those.

Speaker 2 (49:01):
At that time? It was I her Veda helped me
a lot. Actually, I was living in Colorado at the time.
It was like kind of right when right around the time,
right before maybe this band started. We started playing bars
and stuff in Connecticut, but I, you know, I'd moved
to Fort Collins, Colorado with the girls. So the band

(49:22):
I was talking about before that, I started with Matt.
You know that we went our separate ways. That that
band dissolved, and shortly after that I started seeing I
started seeing this girl and she was moving out to
Colorado to go study massage therapy, and I had nothing
going on. I didn't know what I was doing with
my life. I was kind of down and out, pretty sick,

(49:44):
had dropped out of school to do this band band
fell through, had put all my eggs in that basket,
and I really didn't know what to do with myself
after that point. And she was moving out there, and
I was like, is it cool if I come, you know?
So I went and moved out there, and it was
kind of the thing I needed. I needed to get
out of my home here and gain some new perspective

(50:05):
on on on everything, I guess. And while I was
out there, I was walking around Fort Collins one day
and there were these uh Hark Harry Krishna guys playing
playing music, chanting, singing with a little circle in in
the downtown area there. They were, you know, based in Denver.

(50:27):
They were they were like, they were young, young people
and most of them had went to you know, went
to jazz school coincidentally and and then got into got
into that thing. So they were they were like good musicians.
This guy, this guy was playing the murdanga a drum
and he was really good. And then there's another guy
playing the harmonium and had had this beautiful voice, and

(50:47):
so I kind of became friends with them. They they
came up before Collins once a week and I would
just go to the go to the gatherings and you know,
they you would sing, chant, meditate, eat, they'd bring food,
you food for free, and there was just discussions about
spirituality and different things like that, and and uh, it
was awesome, you know, we I got really into it,

(51:11):
just just that that experience hanging out with them and
learning all these wild stories about you know, Vedic like that,
all the Vedic stories. There's all these crazy characters and
monsters and dragons and and you know, the gods are
you know, the whole thing was it was very colorful
and and uh it's kind of this illustrious world of

(51:35):
spirituality and and uh, you know they were they were
great people, and I'd met someone who was you know,
the kind of At one point told them I was
struggling with my health and stuff, and they they referred
me to someone in their community that was a aravadic
aveda practitioner, and I started learning about learning about that

(51:57):
that whole thing, and that was that was kind of
a starting point of of just getting some basis on
you know, what what my what type of body I have,
and what type of foods are going to you know,
be nourishing or not make me feel you know, really
sick kind of thing. So that was that was the
beginning of that journey.

Speaker 1 (52:18):
I guess, So what does this therapist say about all this?

Speaker 2 (52:22):
The therapist which which therapists?

Speaker 1 (52:25):
Have you been to therapy about all this? You went
through all these crises?

Speaker 2 (52:29):
Yeah? Yeah, man, I've done I've done a lot of strange,
strange things. There's different types of therapists. I talked to
some you know, the traditional talk therapy used in you know,
for the most part, I don't In those years, I
never really I wasn't consistent with with with anything like that.

(52:51):
And I think that the times that I did try
that it was maybe it just was it wasn't the
right fit, you know. But regardless, I I felt like, uh,
talk therapy wasn't going deep enough for me. I knew,
I knew it wasn't because the issue wasn't in my
in my mind, it was in my body, you know,
like the the the feeling or the experience of that

(53:15):
loss relative to what my life had been prior to that,
and my you know, like relationship to the world and
and and things like that, and just kind of just
not feeling safe in the world after all of that
was it was not something that was in my mind.
It was it was totally in my body, and the
talk therapy just wasn't like I in my mind. I

(53:36):
kind of got the whole thing I was. I was
I was almost I was too much in my mind
and had just like the connection between that and my
life and my body. It just had been like kind
of severed. So that just wasn't any time I tried
something like that, it just it just wasn't working for me.
It wasn't moving the needle at all. So yeah, you know,

(53:57):
I once I exhausted all the all the conventional medicine
types of things like you know, infectious disease doctors and
all kinds of weird specialists and everyone. You know, there
was like blood work stuff that was off and things
that were you know, clearly an issue, but no one
really knew why. You know. Then I started getting into

(54:18):
the alternative stuff and exploring that way. It was you know,
out of largely out of desperation. But then you know,
on the note of the talk therapy thing, it was
at the same time there was you know, born out
of all that was kind of this pretty intense like
needing to know, needing to try to find answers about

(54:40):
what's going on here because that whole experience was so
strange for me, and there was so many it's hard,
it's you know, it sounds pretty pretty strange to say,
but around that whole experience there was so much crazy
synchronicity and you know, like I was, it's a yeah,
really hard to explain, but so many experiences of there

(55:00):
being wild signs and just things like that that just
felt like there was no way that you know, it
just took me completely out of my frame of what
life was prior to that, and it kind of sent
me on a path of pretty you know, ravenously seeking

(55:22):
answers about what's going on here.

Speaker 1 (55:27):
Okay, the nature of being in a band, they are
multiple people, things are planned in advance. Sometimes in excess
of a yeared advance, planning goes down. Is there any
voice in the back of your head, well, maybe my
health won't be good enough to do this I might
not be up to it. Is that a factor current day? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (55:52):
Current, No, at this point, I've I've it's it's not
that extreme. You know, I've gained enough ground, so it's
it's not like that. It's not that kind of thing.
You know, I'm still seeking, I'm still looking for you know,
looking for means to to move move the needle more

(56:15):
and more. But you know, functionally, it's it's not I
don't crash out like I used to as much. And uh,
you know, it's it's not the same kind of struggle
that it was, but it is. I mean, it's for sure,
very challenging lifestyle to to be in with that kind
of underlying. Yeah, I don't want to say I don't.

(56:41):
I don't. I don't want to say weakness, but you know,
it's it's with that that backdrop of a thing going on.
It's it's definitely not an easy thing to continue healing
while traveling around and you know, very high stress performance situations,
all kinds of things like that. It's you know, it's
it's tricky to navigate, but you know, throughout it's it's

(57:03):
been many years of us you know, on the road. Now,
I guess and Uh, in the earlier years, there is
a lot more challenge to it. And I think as
time has gone on and I've I've learned more things
about things that can help and support on a physical level,
whatever it may be, it's gotten easier.

Speaker 1 (57:24):
Okay. Would one say that your physical issues are behind
you or you just know how to manage them now?

Speaker 2 (57:36):
Maybe maybe somewhere in between. You know, I certainly hope
the worst, you know, I think the worst of it
is behind me. But there's it's you know, I feel
like the truth is out there. There's there's uh, there's
still ways to that I could be moving the needle.
It's really the simple stuff. It's, you know, but just

(57:57):
just kind of there's there's so much that we don't
learn learn about about, you know, how to what the
things that actually support us in that way. And I've
tried a lot of weird, weird alternative things, and you know,
some of them were helpful, some of them I learned
things from. But for the most part, it's really it's

(58:18):
really like the simple stuff that I rely on the
most and and have been the most impactful. But yeah,
I mean I'm still as as much as I can.
It's continuing to study and learn about things like that,
things in that world, and it's it's such a it's
a crazy space. I mean, there's like there's so much
noise in that world, just like any any any space

(58:40):
these days. But you know, it's just more and more
so many different ideas about things, totally contradictory ideas about things.
And so I'm just trying to you know, I try
to keep an open mind and keep learning and and uh,
you know, trying to get stronger all the time.

Speaker 1 (58:57):
So what's your relationship status today? I'm single and is
there a significant other in the picture or not now?

Speaker 2 (59:06):
Not right now? Now?

Speaker 1 (59:08):
To what degree is that a result of the so
called rock and roll lifestyle?

Speaker 2 (59:17):
You know, yeah, I'd say it's it's definitely a result
of that. You know, I think it's a result of
a number of things. You know, in part probably it
feels like the the the health journey, and you know,
it's it's not just the health thing. It's it's like,
you know, the the degree to which I'm I'm able

(59:39):
to be present with myself and with with everything. It's
like that that feels like a factor. But it's also
you know, the the like the the drive for for music,
you know, the rock star lifestyle. It feels like more
so a personal thing than that, more so just you know,

(01:00:01):
being being my own biggest enemy, maybe from a from
a lifestyle standpoint, and in terms of just like the
hunger to to keep working and keep trying to move
forward in both in any way possible, like the you know,
creatively or or with like the well being thing, all

(01:00:24):
of that. It's it's uh that it doesn't. It's a challenge.
What's what's left? There's not much leftover. I guess that's
what I'm getting at from that.

Speaker 1 (01:00:33):
Okay, you're driven in terms of relationships. On one level,
you have this success that draws women to you. On
another level, it draws women to you and they're attracted
to something that might really not be you. What has
your experience been.

Speaker 2 (01:00:55):
That's a tough one to to comment on.

Speaker 1 (01:00:59):
It.

Speaker 2 (01:00:59):
Does it they really? Uh, you know, it doesn't. It
doesn't feel like there's uh, you know that we're we're
you know, we have to we're not we're not swimming
in uh, I'm not swimming in that kind of attention.
It doesn't feel like, you know, there's there's there's some
of it but it's it's really not uh you know,
we're not the Beatles. It's I haven't had a ton

(01:01:25):
of that experience, like when we're on the road and stuff.
It's I'm kind of in a bubble. I'm not I'm
not meeting a lot of people honestly in that way.
And uh, yeah, it has it hasn't been a super
present thing. When when the band first started doing really well,
I I was I was in a relationship and I
had fallen I had fallen for her really hard, and

(01:01:46):
uh it was, uh, you know, it was kind of
when that happens, at least in my experience, it's there's
there's zero hesitation. You you kind of just like see
red and it's just kind of like there's no it's
tunnel vision kind of. And that was that was the situation.
I started seeing her in twenty nineteen and right when

(01:02:09):
the band really started, like you know, when the moment
happened kind of, So it was it was a crazy
that was a crazy turn of life. It was a
it was a really really intense change of momentum from
where where I was coming from what I was used to,
you know, in both ways, like the band kind of

(01:02:30):
all of a sudden, you know, starting to pop and
then and then that that relationship on a personal level,
it was it was just like this like roller coaster
and it it kicked my ass, honestly, but yeah, that
was that. I kind of thought that that was that
was the one. And then as as the years went by,

(01:02:51):
and you know, a lot happened throughout the pandemic and
you know, things going on her family and things I
was going through. You know, my health kind of got
really really rough again throughout that period from the stress
and I don't know other factors that were introduced into
I don't I don't know what it was, but for
whatever reason, I kind of crashed again pretty bad. In

(01:03:12):
twenty twenty one, kind of when it hit came to
a head, and yeah, we just you know the nature
of our relationship changed a lot, and we were kind
of coping with every everything that was happening. Her father
had passed away, and so I was I was with
her through that, and you know, the things she was

(01:03:34):
she was trying to work through with her, you know,
in her in the context of her family and her
own life and things. We had this like very supportive friendship,
but the romantic part of our relationship kind of just
went away, and that took a toll over time and
to the point, you know, eventually we just you know,

(01:03:55):
decided to to go our separate ways. You know, we're
don't touch and she's she's amazing. But yeah, just you know,
it was it was a tough thing to navigate.

Speaker 1 (01:04:15):
Okay, what you're telling the story. The relationship ran its
own course on traditional relationship issues. It wasn't a factor
of your profession and dedication or was it.

Speaker 2 (01:04:28):
I don't think that was the That wasn't the reason
for it. It was it was a factor. It poses
a lot of challenge, for sure, but I don't I
don't think that was you know, I can't point the
finger at that, like that's why, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:04:44):
Okay, So at this point in time, how many gigs
a year does Gooset do?

Speaker 2 (01:04:50):
Uh? You know, probably around eighty It feels like more
than that.

Speaker 1 (01:04:55):
How did you establish that number is more too much
or you need more the other the rest of the
time to do something? How do you come up with
that number?

Speaker 2 (01:05:05):
I think it's something we're you know, constantly trying to
trying to figure out the world we're in. It is
that the customary thing is perpetual touring, which you know,
I've kind of talked about this a good amount in
different different things, but it's, you know, the observationally typical

(01:05:29):
artists bands, you know, the typical thing is, you know,
you you make a record, you put the record out,
you tour for like a year, two years usually, and
then you kind of go dark and go back in
and work on the next thing and until you're ready
to make the next statement and you have that time
to to be you know, two go into like creative

(01:05:54):
fertility mode, you know. And that's been something I've I've
I've kind of wrestled with, I suppose because you know,
some people are able to write on the road, and
I'm not one of them. It's when there's a lot
going on, there's a lot of momentum and all this
stuff over like overstimulation. It kind of it quiets all

(01:06:15):
the the the voices from which I you know, rely
on or try to tap into for making songs and
stuff like that. They're they're they're quiet, they're they're subtle,
you know, and it takes a lot of work and
a lot of patience and a lot of stillness too.
To hear hear anything from from that from that place

(01:06:38):
for me, So that's been something I've wrestled with and
I think we're still kind of constantly talking about it
and and trying to figure out what the right balance
is to to keep keep the momentum and keep the
ball moving forward and keep playing shows. And because it's
it is this that is like a self propelling thing.
It's it's and I love it. Like when we get

(01:07:00):
off we get to the end of a tour and
where you know, everything's feeling great and like the crew,
like the vibe with every it's a big family, it's
a big tribe, and you know, there's there's so much,
so much amazing, so many amazing things that come with
that and from that. So it's it's it's pretty frequent

(01:07:20):
that at the end of a tour it's like, man,
I don't want to stop, Let's keep going. You know,
it feels so great. But then at the same time,
there's this other other side, this other voice that's like, dude,
you need to stop for like three years. We need
to just hang out in the woods and stare at
trees and and be quiet and see what you know,
just like be present in a way that I haven't

(01:07:41):
in a very long time, you know. So you know,
it's a balance thing.

Speaker 1 (01:07:46):
Well, I understand taking a break to recharge and to
be inspired, but going back to the concept of an album,
is a new release you talk about traditional cycle, but
we no longer live in a traditional era. Is a
new album necessary?

Speaker 2 (01:08:06):
It's a good question. It's a good question. Maybe not.
I don't know, I uh, but whether it is or not,
I want to make them, you know, I just I
love it. That's that's kind of you know, from from
day one in the basement, that's like that was the
thing that excited me the most, and telling telling stories
in that format, So you know, yeah, it's it's it's

(01:08:30):
definitely valid, especially in the in the world that we
primarily exist in. It's you know, the question of its
relevance is is very valid because we you know, for
the most part, are it seems like most of the
people who you know, uh, come to the shows and stuff,
are are just interested in that. Primarily they just want
to come to the shows and listen to the shows

(01:08:51):
and and do that. But regardless, I guess I don't.
I just love I love making albums, and I want
to make a lot of.

Speaker 1 (01:08:59):
Them, hope. So if you have to split it, to
what degree are you in percentage wise into live performance,
into what degree are you into making records.

Speaker 2 (01:09:10):
Like my own? You know what? Am I right?

Speaker 1 (01:09:12):
Your own inner tuning for decision.

Speaker 2 (01:09:16):
That's that's that's tough to put numbers too, you know,
I from I from being really honest like I I
I love making albums, probably more than playing shows. But
that's that's uh. At the same time, when I think
about what we're doing playing shows and our and our
crew and moving, you know, and making improvements upon that

(01:09:38):
and moving, you know, working on that, it's I I do.
I love it just as much and and you know,
on another hand, so it's really tough to say, but
you know, I guess the cool thing is that both
both can both can happen, and both will continue to happen,
you know.

Speaker 1 (01:09:56):
Okay, making a record, there's writing the song as in
recording the songs. A lot of people are very into
the process of being in the studio or wherever you
do it, your bedroom, your basement, and getting it down
with the facts and layering, et cetera. Where does the
interest lie with you more in the actual writing of

(01:10:18):
the songs or getting them down in recording form.

Speaker 2 (01:10:24):
They feel it feels kind of like a an equal
They're separate parts of the process. You know, they exist
in a different space for sure, but i'd say they
you know, I love that entire process as one thing

(01:10:45):
so much, so they don't. You know, they are separate
parts of the process. But you know, at the same time,
it's it's it is one, it is one thing, one process.
So I you know, I think I guess I love
them both equally, and you know, there's there's sometimes they're
not separate. Sometimes it's you know, sometimes the best if

(01:11:06):
I'm stuck on something like from a just a writing phase,
I'll just start, you know. Sometimes the way out of
that is is working on a demo for it and
just starting starting recording it and throwing ideas and decisions
at it in that way. And then sometimes that can
kind of like creak, you know, look at like get
the wheels moving on on finishing an idea. Although I

(01:11:29):
will say finishing things is not my strong point. I'm
a lot better at starting ideas than finishing them.

Speaker 1 (01:11:34):
Okay, we live in an arrow now more than ever.
One person can do it all themselves. To what degree
is the songwriting and the recording collaborative with your band members.

Speaker 2 (01:11:50):
The songwriting varies. There's there's I guess, different buckets you
could say of of how the how the writing gets done,
uh for us, And you know, I think the philosophy
of the band is like anyone anyone can write, anyone
can bringing things to the table, and you know, everyone

(01:12:10):
has brought ideas and things to the table the recording,
you know, finding parts and also you know, there's also
a different thing between the difference between the writing and
then maybe you know, someone will write a song, I'll
write a song and bring it to the band and
then it's still a whole process of arranging it and
finding parts and that whole thing. And that's that's kind

(01:12:31):
of tied in this, you know, the same same, same,
but different in terms of recording, you know, finding the arrangement,
finding and sometimes we you know, we'll play as you know,
we go and to record a song that we've been
playing live for a while and feel a desire to
completely change it and we do or not, you know,
or we like we're still excited by the way we
play it and it still feels good. So we decide

(01:12:52):
to try to just record it the way we play
it live. It all depends on how we feel about it,
and and you know, what we feel most ect I
did buy, I guess you could say, But yeah, I
mean the process of arranging it, inevitably, that's gotta be.
That's it's always interactive, finding parts and finding you know,

(01:13:13):
what feels most alive, because sometimes you can have an
idea about how something should be, like what kind of
groove it should have or what kind of feel, and
you know what the arrangement should be, and then you
bring it in the room and it doesn't feel as
alive as you thought it would. So then you have
to go and explore and see see what you know,
what feels the most alive and what plays the most
to the strengths of the people in the band.

Speaker 1 (01:13:34):
You know, so your band has changed members multiple times,
you're a steady factor. Does that make you the de
facto leader?

Speaker 2 (01:13:50):
I mean, I don't know if I don't know if
that would be the criteria for that, but I think
I guess, I guess it's. You know, it's it's kind
of just the same thing as like the old days
it was. It was kind of like, you know, no
I wanted to start, wanted to be in a band,
wanted to play in a band, wanted to write songs
and play them with a band. It's and no one was.

(01:14:14):
No one was like handing out that opportunity. So it
was kind of like, well, I'll just do it. I'll
just start it, you know, and and and do it
that way. And it's kind of I guess always just
kind of been that way. So, you know, I think
there's there's a lot of qualities and that I see
other great leaders in in our world, you know, band

(01:14:37):
leaders and stuff have that I don't feel like I'm
I'm not you know, on that level with the with
in certain respects, and so you know, there's I think
there's I don't know, it's tough to tough to compare,
tough to tough to look at that type of thing.
But yeah, you know, I think just due to the
nature of of like, hey, here's this idea, let's do it,

(01:15:00):
and that that being you know, applied many times over,
I guess kind of has resulted in, uh, you know,
how how how things roll in our camp?

Speaker 1 (01:15:10):
Well, how jarring or inspiring is it to change band members.

Speaker 2 (01:15:18):
Depends I you know, like you said, it's we've it's
happened a lot. You know, it was. It was not
an easy process for us. You know, it took a
lot of work and a lot of experimenting and a
lot of you know, different iterations to try to find
the right formula and and and uh you know the

(01:15:42):
thing the things that will just work for us, and
you know, it's a yeah, it's been a serious process.
There's there's a lot of uh, there's like this this air,
this can this this conjecture that in in like the
jam band world that you know, Goose was this uh,
this like test tube thing, like an industry plant and

(01:16:02):
that like you know, it was like a you know,
the the boy band of the jam band world or
something where like some some guy like put it all
together and it's it's a it's a funny it's a
funny thing too funny perception that has evolved out of
that in the context of like what a crazy rocky

(01:16:22):
road it was in reality and how imperfect and how
much failure there was getting to this point in those
early years, like yeah, we went we went through we
tried a lot of different things, went through a bunch
of different members. Some of them it was, you know,
incredibly amicable, and it was just kind of like, hey,
you know, I don't this is really work anymore, and

(01:16:44):
they're like cool. I was thinking the same thing. We're
like cool, let's be friends and and like go our
separate ways. And then other times it was like, hey,
this isn't working anymore, and it was you know, people
were really hurt by it, and and it was it
was a really difficult thing to navigate, and you know,
it's yeah, it's both just it's just like relationships in

(01:17:04):
any in any circumstance, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:17:08):
You reference, you know, conceptions of the world, the jam
band world calling you a boy band, etc. A. Isn't
that just jealousy? And where do you think that blowback
is coming from? What is that about?

Speaker 2 (01:17:26):
I don't know, you know, there's there's some aspects of
it I would say that are that are kind of obvious.
There's there's kind of like it's just part of the
nature of maybe the jam band scene is there's this
kind of tribalism and you know, sports teams kind of
mentality where like, you know, my jam band is better
than your jam band kind of thing. So you know,

(01:17:47):
part of that's just just part of the scene has
been for a long time, and you know, is what
it is. It's nothing ultimately, you know, it's it's nothing
that's worth losing sleepover. And then you know, sometimes I
did it does I'm like whoa, Like why? You know?
How did it? How did this? How did this happen?
Like how did it get this crazy? You know? So,

(01:18:09):
I you know, on some on some levels, there's there's
some obvious stuff where there's there's answers to that, and
then other times where I'm like, I don't know this
whole things strange, you know, because when when we were
coming up, when it was first happening, there wasn't you know,
there wasn't much of that. But uh, and then you know,
part of the thing is just like if something gets
gets bigger, then it's no longer cool to think it's cool,

(01:18:33):
you know.

Speaker 1 (01:18:34):
So how big can it get? If you're talking on
the roots of the Jambn scene, the Grateful did maybe
the Alman Brothers, that was a completely different era. Time
has flown by when they started calling at the Jambn scene.
Blues Traveler had a hit on MTV Run Around, but
since that time there's a scene. But even Fish one

(01:18:58):
of the at this point the stall warts of the scene,
they don't cross out of the jam band world. Ay,
do you have a desire to cross and what would
it take to reach more people?

Speaker 2 (01:19:14):
Mm? Yeah, you know, I think Trey has talked about
that when you know, when they were around, there was
no quote unquote jam band scene, which you know I'm
saying that saying using that term. You know, it's yeah,
it's it's a strange thing.

Speaker 1 (01:19:31):
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:19:33):
What I think is cool about that scene is, you know,
it was maybe never more never more so the case
than in the nineties. There was just like the hord
Tor kind of kind of world. Everyone had their own
sound and their own voice, and and it was a
it was a very colorful like community you know of music.

(01:19:56):
And you know that's that's still the case. There's there's
still so many cool things going and on now and
create really really amazing bands and people with different sounds
and different combinations of influences. You know. I guess to
your question, I my philosophy about that is if you

(01:20:17):
can have ideas about that kind of thing, and uh
be like, oh, I want to I want to be
different in this way. I want to you know, not
be this or be I want to be this. And
it's it's that being heady about it like that rarely
in my experience, results in anything worthwhile. It rarely works,

(01:20:38):
you know. I think I've always had this feeling that like,
you kind of have what you have, you can work
on it, you can get better, you can you can
you know, pull your thread as much as you want
to get deeper and deeper into your process, which is
what everyone should do. It's the you know, that's the
best thing you can do. But at the same time,
it's your you. You have to honor and you have

(01:20:59):
to be real about, like what you are really drawn to,
what you really get off on, and what you're really
inspired by. In my case that you know, I kind
of what we're talking about before, in high school and stuff.
I was, you know, fully immersed in that you know,
quote unquote jampan world, which I admittedly don't I don't

(01:21:20):
think that's the uh the most you know, illustrious term,
but you know whatever, the improvisational rock world, the jam
band world, whatever you want to call it. I was.
I loved it. I was totally immersed in it. Where
I grew up, that was what everyone was doing. Everyone
was going to the shows. And you know, even even
like the really cool kids, the cool popular kids were

(01:21:40):
going to those shows. Everyone. It was just it was
a thing. And so that was where I was coming from,
and I was. I loved it. I was. I was
completely taken with it. And then you know, as I
got out of college and those those years, and I
was kind of entered into a very different I wasn't
partying at all. I was pretty sick. It was kind
of in a very different emotional place. I started getting

(01:22:02):
into really different music, and a lot more modern music,
because I prior to that point I really wasn't in
tune at all with with like the current indie world
or even you know, pop or anything like that. I
had no idea. I was listening to more Otis Redding

(01:22:23):
and West Montgomery and Nina Simone. Had no idea about
Fleet Foxes or Bony Bear, but those those bands. When
I kind of discovered that music, it like took over
my my situation. I was so inspired and so enamored
with that music. It started with the Fleet Foxes. I

(01:22:44):
was like that I was just fully immersed in that
world for for years and my throughout my twenties. It
was you know, those first two records and that that
EP the sunshint Ep. It was like those It was
such an immersive thing, which I that's what I you know,
I love that so much. It was it was like
this timeless yet kind of like this medieval medieval world

(01:23:05):
and the artwork and their aesthetic and and the music,
it all, it all worked so well together, and it
all created such a specific feeling and world that I
just like didn't want to leave. And that led to,
you know, discovering other other things. So at that point
in my life that that type of music and and

(01:23:26):
different artists doing things in real time now became became
like my main point of inspiration and in a lot
of ways, and I think you know that that to
me kind of became the somewhat of a novel idea.
You know, I wanted to hear I wanted to hear

(01:23:49):
Fleet Foxes, you know, go on a really cool twenty
minute improvisation after they're really cool songs, you know, and uh,
that didn't really exist to my awareness, So that kind
of became this this idea of like, you know, well,
I'm I'm very taken and drawn to these these these

(01:24:10):
this world and you know, other other approaches to songwriting
and production and stuff like that, and uh, you know,
maybe marrying that with with my roots and in the
improvisational rock world and jazz and stuff like that. It,
you know, it it felt like a h there was
there were things to threads to pull, there things to

(01:24:30):
explore there.

Speaker 1 (01:24:31):
You know, I've never met an artist who didn't want
to reach more people, have a larger audience. So you
talk about your personal musical journey by the same token,
you want more people to listen to music, right.

Speaker 2 (01:24:54):
Yeah, yeah, like you said, I don't, I don't you
know who doesn't want that? I mean there there's there's
the part I think a lot of probably a lot
of artists I maybe maybe have a similar thing of
of there's there's some kind of point of wrestling with
that where you know everyone wants that because I guess
it's just a natural thing to want. But then you know,

(01:25:17):
as the more it happens, the more you do it,
the more you realize like the things that come with
it and how those things can be struggle. And you know,
for me, I still I still believe in that I
feel like though, I feel like it's worthwhile, you know,
trying to get trying to get bigger and working working

(01:25:38):
to you know, to reach more people there. You know,
it's it's easy. You can easily view that maybe the
impulse is to view that as as a self serving
kind of endeavor, which I'm sure you know, inevitably on
a lot of levels it is. But at the same time,
there's a I've always seen something beautifull about it, and

(01:26:01):
you know, have seen, like I know, the way that
I know the impact that bands who have been very
big and have done big, amazing things have had on me,
and how inspiring that's been to me. And I've seen
how it's the space that's occupied in other people's lives
and how you know, it has the ability to help

(01:26:22):
people get through, you know, things that they're experiencing and
things that they're struggling with and provide some kind of
light in their lives. And you know, so I think
that that you know, became that became a mission for
me at a certain point after after the things I
had experienced and stuff. It kind of amplified that, it

(01:26:43):
reframed and amplified that as you know, going from being
stone in high school watching Fish DVDs being like that
looks awesome. I definitely want to do that too, you know,
really kind of getting to this place where I was
really struggling with my existence and trying to make sense

(01:27:09):
out of that, and you know, all the things that
had happened and the things I had lost and the life,
the life, that lifestyle and experiences that I had lost.

Speaker 1 (01:27:17):
In Let me put it this way. At this point,
whatever label we use, jam band, improvisational rock, it's a ghetto.
And if you're in it, you know who all the
acts are. Your act is a relatively new act that

(01:27:38):
has been very successful. Okay, that is not the case
with most acts. There's not a plethora of new acts
bubbling up. So Goose came along was very successful. Okay,
you could do what you're doing. I'm not talking in
terms of the music itself. I'm talking about a career arc.

(01:27:59):
You could do what you're doing, and thirty years from
now you could be Fish. You could do what you're doing.
Thirty years from now you can be Fleet Foxes. Those
are ultimately cult acts. They have an audience that keeps
them alive. Now, in reality, everybody's a cult act today,

(01:28:20):
even Taylor's with people are paying attention where they're not. Okay,
But as I say, it's not rocket science. You look
at your new album. These songs are lengthy, and you
could say, theoretically, you're an educated person literally musically educated,
could say, well, you know I could do a verse
chorus bridge thing, throwing a solo, and you know that

(01:28:46):
might have a chance of moving the needle further. What
do you think about that?

Speaker 2 (01:28:56):
So you're asking if if we're thinking about things those
in those.

Speaker 1 (01:29:01):
I'm being practical. Where you are right now is a
very good spot. But all of your predecessors that's as
far as they've gotten. Okay, you have other people in
that world we're using shorthand Jamban, let's just use that
who are jealous of your success. But the vast majority

(01:29:24):
of the public has no idea who you are, or
if they know who you are, wouldn't be able to
identify your music. So if you look at history, that's
the way it's going to be going forward. The difference
with your act is you are very successful in a
short period of time, which has not happened in this

(01:29:45):
world for a while. So the question arises is there
a broader audience for your music. Secondly, is there a
tweak such that it can be made? Listen, if we
used the progenitor here, the Grateful Dead, Okay, Anthem of
the Sun, those records, those were long improvisational records for

(01:30:10):
hardcore fans, only growing slowly. You get The Working Man's Dead,
American Beauty Quanti. It is a little bit of a
change in style, but a lot of people could understand it,
and the people who understood it became fans and carried
through many years after. You know, they ultimately were on

(01:30:30):
Arista and they had an MTV hit whatever. They knew
what the game was, and they made certain choices that
ultimately didn't compromise who they were, but it brought them
to a larger audience. They were not the only band
in that sphere. They're just the band that's most remembered,
that has the largest audience. Okay, you're a smart guy.

(01:30:54):
In the back of your mind, do you think about that? Hey,
you know, I'm here and it's pretty good to be here,
but could I be somewhere that would even be better?

Speaker 2 (01:31:07):
Yeah, when you put it like that, definitely, I don't know.
I don't think that in our case, I don't think
it equates to like, hey, let's write some you know, Uh,
there's I don't. I don't there's not a there's not
a moment of a contrived desire to write pop songs,

(01:31:28):
you know. I I think there's there's a lot of
pop music that excites me. Actually, there's you know, there's
certain yeah, there's certain pop music that I think is
awesome and and production and you know, as much as
I love a twenty minute jam, I there's sometimes I
love there's like three minute songs that are you know,

(01:31:48):
crushing on the radio that I think are amazing. So
part of that is it's a genuine you know, I
part of me wants to make more music like that.
Another part of me wants to get deeper and deeper
into the improvisational thing. So it's uh, you know, yeah,
I don't. I don't think. Uh, there's The thing I

(01:32:11):
want to do mostly is pull on new threads and
try to become more more of what we can be,
you know, like like how how much can we be?
You know? And when it comes to the to the
business of it and the the thing I know, I
never really you know, all of all the people that
I look up to have have paved their own path

(01:32:32):
and created their own worlds. And to me that I
think that's always seemed like the best case scenario is
just being existing in your own world pulling people in
that weren't aren't always you know, not like that. Aren't
just fish fans or just you know, other fans of
other things. That's that really excites me. You know the thing,

(01:32:54):
you know, the notion of someone hearing a song of
ours that has no bearing, no awareness, no experience with
improvisational music, there jam, the jam band scene, any anything
like that, and getting into it, coming to a show,
probably being pretty surprised with you know, there being music
happening for twenty minutes on end with no vocals or

(01:33:16):
anything like that. And you know, the notion of some
of those people that person discovering that they like that
approach to music and are are you know, are taken
by that, by the journey of that. That's really exciting
to me. And I think, and I hope that's already happening.

(01:33:37):
You know, obviously we've we've come up in in that scene,
in that world and for the most part, and you know,
some it's it's tough to tell. There's no way to know,
but it feels like it's somewhat split. You know. Some
of those some of those people like what we're doing.
Some of them, you know, pretty passionately don't like it seemingly,

(01:33:59):
which you know, there's nothing we can do about that,
but just keep trying to get better. But you know,
I think, yeah, I think that's a really exciting thing having, uh,
having people that exist that listen to completely different types
of music somehow stumble into our world and if they
like it and want to learn more about it, and

(01:34:20):
that's I think that's a really cool thing and that's
something worth striving for. It in my mind, is you know,
opening up, opening up more more past, and sometimes that
leads people to other improvisational music that other jam bands
and uh, and I think that's a really cool thing.
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:34:37):
So let's go back a chapter. Your father dies. You
say your mother didn't work outside the house after the
children were there. To what degree did that affect the
family and you financially?

Speaker 2 (01:34:54):
My dad worked really hard. I mean he was you know,
he came from lower middle class US and in Long Island,
didn't didn't come for much of anything, and uh, worked
worked really hard, worked his way up in the insurance
insurance companies in Connecticut, and you know it was a

(01:35:15):
was a like I was, like I was saying, kind
of a charismatic guy. People were drawn to him. People
really liked him, and I think that really helped him
in his career and you know, he he ended up
doing doing well. We weren't like, we weren't loaded, but
we were comfortable, and you know, there was there are
certain points in my life where it seemed like I
think things changed for my parents financially, like when when

(01:35:38):
they first when they first got a house in Wilton
when I was born, and they didn't pay much for
it at all. It was it was a you know,
the town I think was still there was still pretty rural,
kind of lower income, uh options for for for people
at that time there. And yeah, maybe I was in

(01:35:58):
middle school or something. I think he got a promotion
or something like that. And you know that I was
too young to like, I wasn't really aware of things
on that level at that point. But in retrospect, is
it is you know, we we we started going on
vacations and going you know, doing a trip to a
to a hotel in Mexico for a week, you know,

(01:36:19):
or they did. They did some work on the house
that you know, there was there's some things that I
think there are points where he started doing better and
making more money. And by the time he died, I
think my family, my mom was comfortable enough so that
we were able to she like, she's she's able, she's
she's able to live off of off of that, and

(01:36:43):
was able to, you know, support me enough in the
ways you know that that I needed. I lived, you know,
through a lot throughout my twenties when I wasn't doing
well and working on music and striving and trying to
make something of it. I was living in her, living
with her, you know. So yeah, we were it was
it was comfortable enough. We weren't we weren't rolling in it,

(01:37:05):
but we were. It was comfortable.

Speaker 1 (01:37:08):
So how did you get back from Colorado to the
East Coast.

Speaker 2 (01:37:14):
When I was out there? You know, it wasn't. I
wasn't out there for too long before I started getting
a fire under my ass again, and you know, I
wanted to start projects. There were a couple opportunities back
here that were popping up, and I started to just
the school thing felt like a big, big unfinished business,

(01:37:36):
big open end, and uh so, I, you know, I
wanted to I wanted to go back, and it felt
like the right thing to go finish what I what
I started there. And uh yeah, things, you know, different
things were popping up back east, not big opportunities, but enough.
It was the only I did have no opportunities then,
so it was the only thing. So after being out

(01:37:59):
there there for like six months or something like that,
things started popping up. So I started flying home for
a weekend here and there to go do a gig
or or do an opportunity and one of them. You know.
During that time, it started playing with Trevor again and
started you know, putting together what was the earliest formations
of this of this band. But it actually wasn't the

(01:38:23):
main thing I was focusing on at that point. But
as time went on, it it just it became it
became the main thing.

Speaker 1 (01:38:31):
So you went back to Berkeley. Did you finish at Berkeley?
Did you graduate?

Speaker 2 (01:38:35):
I did?

Speaker 1 (01:38:35):
Yeah, Okay, in the hindsight, you're growing up when you
go to Berkeley. There's a lot of changes there. But
was Berkeley advantageous for your musical career.

Speaker 2 (01:38:51):
Uh, yes, yes, And I mean for sure in the
way of learning, you know, I learned. I learned things there.
I studied I was exposed to. You know. That was
that was the more extreme, you know, like the kind
of the full uh the full capacity of that experience

(01:39:12):
of that I you know, talked about during the five
week of being lost in a sea of people way
way more talented than me and and uh, you know,
way better at being competitive at music than me, you know.
So uh it was, you know, I I did. I

(01:39:36):
did lose myself there kind of both times. The first
time I went it was I was coming out of
the experience of all that loss, So it was it's
kind of it's a pretty loaded thing. I can't really
be objective about that at all because I was just
like I was fried. I was in total shock and
had no idea of what like where I was at

(01:39:56):
and how how you know, how smoked I had gotten
by all that. But when I went back, when I
when I went back prior to that, I had I
had really found after the that previous band that I
started with Matt, after that band broke up, I really
started writing again because when I, you know, when I
when I moved out to Colorado, I was at I

(01:40:18):
was working at a taco place, and I was at
that point where I was really thinking about, you know,
can I stop pursuing music? Can I stop thinking about
this as like the thing that I need to do.
That was the closest I've ever come to thinking about
it in that way, because I was always just naive

(01:40:38):
about it. I was like, yeah, there's this is what
I'm doing. There's no there's no other way for me.
But that was the closest I had come to that.
I was working at this taco place and thinking about,
you know, about giving up, I guess, and you know,
giving up didn't look like I was never going to
stop playing and working on you know, writing and things

(01:40:58):
like that. But you know, the notion of not thinking
about it as the career, you know, That's that was
where I was at during that time. And I think
that that being at that point where I was no
longer trying to force something, I was no longer trying

(01:41:19):
to make something out of, you know, I was I
was kind of like at the end of my rope,
so to speak. You know, I was I was lost,
and and UH had had nothing going for me. And
that was when I started actually writing again because it
was it was for me, you know, it was it was,
it was honest, and and it was because I just
had to. It was like when you're left with nothing,

(01:41:41):
then all of a sudden, you get you start getting
the real stuff, you know, And that was what happened
for me. So, you know, for for a year or two,
maybe a little more, I was writing a lot and
a lot of this stuff that was you know, the
formation or the foundation for this band was written during
that time, and other things that I have never really

(01:42:04):
recorded or put out there. So there was there was
like that, and that thread was continuing to grow. It
was growing and growing. There was a lot of unfinished
ideas from that from that time that I still have
like strong feelings about and still intend to finish someday.
But yeah, when I went back to Berkeley, that that
that well dried up pretty quickly. You know. When I

(01:42:28):
first started, there was so many ideas and so many
things I was working on, and then within six months
to a year, that flow had kind of stopped, and
I was I was pretty deep in the course load.
I mean, it was also we uh, we were starting
this band. We recorded the first record, and I was,
I was working on that a lot. We went up
and did basics. We rented out a a cabin in

(01:42:54):
New Hampshire and just brought all our own gear, and
someone an engineer at a Look studio came and recorded with
us and and and helped produce, and you know, we
had we had basics and kind of sat on those
for a while. And then, uh, during that time when
I was in school, I was, I was, I didn't
even have a place up in Boston, so I was driving.

(01:43:14):
I was like commuting to Boston for a minute to
go to classes from Connecticut, which was crazy, and so
I was I was kind of on the weekends working
to working on overdubs, working on you know, editing and
you know doing d I Y finishing this record and
then uh, you know midweek was driving to Boston and uh,

(01:43:36):
crashing on people's couches. But if I had like, you know,
three days of classes in a row, and you know,
it was just too much to drive that many hours
back and forth every day. So that was. Yeah, it
was kind of kind of a crazy time, and the
creative flow got got pretty burnt up during then, and
it was the struggle to get it back.

Speaker 1 (01:44:02):
Okay, Berkeley is a music college. There are teachers. To
what degree do they squeeze the creativity out of you?

Speaker 2 (01:44:15):
Listen?

Speaker 1 (01:44:15):
I had this in my own college experience. They have rules,
they have the way you want to do it, which
is actually forcing you into a traw through a tunnel
that is against you. To what degree do you say, no,
that's not for me. I need to explore my own way,
which is not how they want me to do it.

Speaker 2 (01:44:36):
I think in my experience there was a there was
kind of a bit of a bunch of different things.
Some people really cared, and some people really nurtured, and
some people really engaged. Some people were just uh, you know,
I think you know, some people were incredible musicians that
you know, maybe their their career didn't go the way

(01:44:57):
they wanted it to, and they it's a really it's
a really great teaching gig. But they weren't they're not
like passionate about teaching a little bit of that thing
of like I'm just really good at this, Like I this,
you know, I worked hard and I'm I'm amazing at
what I do and if you can't do it, then
like I don't know that kind of just sucks for you.

(01:45:18):
And you know some people who were doing it because
it was it was a good job, and then you
know some people who were engaged and passionate about it,
but more entrenched in some rule set. You know. I
had that probably that that experienced most. I studied jazz
performance and classical composition and studying like, I wanted to

(01:45:39):
learn counterpoint. I wanted to learn what, you know, the wheels,
like what what made the wheels turn in classical music
on some levels, which is obviously an incredibly deep rabbit
hole and it's like a completely different world. But I
started getting into that, and uh, you know that that's
where the rule set is really in place. You know,
that's there's there's like that that's like that's that's there's

(01:46:04):
a lot of rules there. And I wasn't. I like,
got really bad grades in some of those classes because
I was, you know, breaking the rules. And I was like,
but like, this is you know, this is an idea,
this is this is my that is the four part
harmony thing that I wrote. He's like, yeah, but it's
just wrong, It's all right, And he was probably right
on some on some degree. You know, it wasn't Maybe
it wasn't that great, but you know, so there there's

(01:46:27):
a bit of that. But you know they're the thing.
The thing about all that I think the best the
best musicians, Well this you can't. You can't say that
because there's you know, West, here's West Montgomery who didn't,
as I understand it, didn't know anything about music theory
or anything like that. And was you know, wrote the
book on a whole a whole way of approach to

(01:46:48):
playing there. So you can't make these generalizations. But seemingly
a lot of people, you know that. The thing is,
like you you have to learn the rules so that
you break them. You know, when when you break them,
you you ah have a much deeper understanding of why
you're breaking them, you know. So yeah, no, one way.

Speaker 1 (01:47:12):
Okay, you talked about questioning your future in music in Colorado?
How many times have you contemplated giving up the music gig?
And when was the last time you did it.

Speaker 2 (01:47:28):
In a real way? That kind of feels like the
only time that that was the closest I've gotten to it.
And even then it wasn't It wasn't that, you know,
I didn't get too far down. It was like I
was like scratching at the idea of like, am I
gonna hang this up? This is crazy? You know, there's
got nothing going on. I'm down and out. I feel

(01:47:49):
like I feel like crap every day, Like I don't know,
I don't know. But you know, since then, it really
I was. I was too stubborn to go there for
the most part.

Speaker 1 (01:48:04):
Okay, so you finish up at Berkeley, you have a
band that is the beginnings of Goose. What is the
first point of positive reinforcement? Will you say, wait a second,
you know we're getting a good reaction. This might be something.

Speaker 2 (01:48:23):
It definitely wasn't for a while. I graduated. I finished
up school in twenty sixteen, and then in twenty seventeen
was when we got a booking agent and started just
you know that that helped because you know, sometimes bands
early in their time, someone in the band is like
has a knack for making connections like that and booking gigs,

(01:48:44):
and none of us had that. You know, it was
it was hard. We played bars locally here and stuff,
but like booking gigs and starting to build a little
thing like that, we just weren't get at it. So
when we got a booking agent. We were like, you know,
let's go hit, let's hit the wheels, and and uh,
just get us out there. We want to play, we
want to play a million gigs, we want to tour.

(01:49:05):
And he was, you know, he was, he was great,
he was he was like, you kind of don't want
to do that, and we were like, yeah, we do.
He's like, all right, if you say so. And he
threw us out there and we, uh. The tour. The
tour that year has been commonly referred to as the
Thrown to the Wolves tour because he was like, I'm
gonna throw you to the wolves, and we're like, let's go.
And he did, and we were thrown to the wolves

(01:49:26):
and we were like, oh, got it. Okay, we need
to we need to we need to rethink this whole thing.

Speaker 1 (01:49:33):
He threw you to the wolves. What did that look like?

Speaker 2 (01:49:36):
Uh, you know, touring in a in a in a
twelve passenger van with no a C in the South
in the middle of the summer, sleeping in our trailer
and Walmart parking lots and just playing terrible gig after
terrible gig, like hemorrhaging money, you know, the whole the

(01:50:00):
whole thing you know, and uh, not only that, but
the band dynamic at that point was was pretty it
was pretty bad. It was just like it wasn't we
weren't connected and we weren't doing it for the same
reasons everyone in the band. So we just had a
lot to learn at that point, and it was it
was necessary because of that, you know, just getting our

(01:50:23):
asses kicked like that, and Trevor, Trevor and I there
were many nights when we were out there just like
what how do people do this? What is like? This
is crazy? How to like where do we go? Like
how do what is? What is what is this? What
the what the fuck are we doing? And then you know,
we'll just to.

Speaker 1 (01:50:40):
Be clear, a lot of that, so you're playing for
little to know money to a fewer no people who
weren't interested anyway.

Speaker 2 (01:50:47):
Mm hmm, one hundred percent. Yeah, a lot of that.
You know, there's if we got if there was like
a you know, there was a some place in South
Carolina where we'd go and play on like the tiki tiaki,
like it was like a Helton resort or something like that.
We'd go and like play on the tiki porch. We'd
play like three or four sets and got five hundred bucks,

(01:51:09):
and we were like, this is this is a this
is great, you know, and we did not even give
us a room, but we got five hundred bucks and
covered gas for you know, however many shows. So yeah, no,
it was it was weird. There was there was very
there was to your question, your original question. There was
nothing in that time, you know, pointing towards any hope

(01:51:30):
or success there. But it didn't. It was like it was,
I guess in retrospect it was crazy, but like I
was that stubborn and they were like, no, we just
got to just keep going, keep trying. There's got to
be a way, you know. So you know, you know,
we made we made changes and things evolved, and uh,
you know kind of found found our way to a

(01:51:53):
better dynamic within the band at least, you know, like
a better one, a more functional one where we were
more connected and and uh, you know, when Peter joined
the band, he understood more of you know, he understood
what we were, what we were trying to do, and
he was coming from the same place like the he had.
He was coming from that that like you know, yeah,
I play music with my friends and my parents' basement

(01:52:15):
because that's because that's really fun and that's like what
we're trying to do, and it's just a it was
like a it was more of more of more of
that energy that of the original why you know what
I mean, why why you do it? Instead of like
some other energy of like I want to be on

(01:52:35):
stage in front of lots of people and like in
the industry and getting good looks and all the things
that come with that's it, you know, those things are
there's there's cool parts to all of that, but it's
I don't know, not it's not what what I'm in
it for, you know. And as time goes on and
just become less and less interested in that side of

(01:52:56):
things and just want to, you know, be more and
more connected to the core of of the why of
it all and uh okay experience.

Speaker 1 (01:53:06):
So they throw you into the Wolves, you reset when
you start to work again. What does it look like?

Speaker 2 (01:53:14):
Uh well, we never really stopped. It was kind of
like from that point for Forward is it was really
trial by fire. We there was no there was no
like there was one long tour which was a thrown
to the Wolf's tour, but at large we were playing
we were kind of doing a lot of Weekend Warrior
stuff and once we started, we we haven't really stopped.

Speaker 1 (01:53:33):
Okay, but you're playing original material to people who really
don't know who you are. How does that work?

Speaker 2 (01:53:44):
Well, you know, we we played covers too. Sometimes that helps,
you know, are doing an interpretation of a cover that
someone knows. And you know, in those days, it was
it was it was, you know, that thing could be helpful,
but I don't know, you know, if we got an
opening gig or something like some some of those were
some of those were helpful. You know. Really a turning

(01:54:05):
point was the beginning of twenty eighteen. That was in
my you know, for all intents and purposes, that was
the turning point in terms of us kind of getting
our getting our act together. Peter joined the band, and
he was he was kind of, you know, a driving
force in the band that he was in prior to that,
and him and I just started working together a lot.
And prior to that, I hadn't really had that like

(01:54:28):
someone on the front lines in that in that same
way you know, Trevor and I were working on things
all the time. But yeah, it did. Peter kind of
had this this like workhorse vibe and kind of day
to day which is like was you know, was making
sure all the recordings got the soundboard recordings, were We're

(01:54:52):
getting getting done, and he started getting into video. He
learned how to edit video and and really really quickly
and well so and him and I just were on
the same wavelength of like thinking about creating a world really,
you know, because it ties into like the branding and
all of that, but really it's that the branding is

(01:55:13):
in my mind, has always been just a vehicle to
create a feeling. And when he first joined the band,
we had already had this opportunity to go open for
this band, Stafford, who at that time was like on fire,
like really they were having this big moment crushing and
their tour was so intense and they were playing maybe

(01:55:35):
you know, it was like five hundred to fifteen hundred
cap venues, which felt and they were like full, all
of them were slammed, which was way bigger than anything
that we had done to that point, and it felt
the energy around it was so is so intense, and
we were opening for them. We opened them for them
for seven shows in January of twenty eighteen, right when
Peter joined the band, he barely played keyboards.

Speaker 1 (01:55:55):
It was.

Speaker 2 (01:55:57):
You know, very very trial by fire. But that experience
sort of set the tone for for for us and
it was kind of like, okay, we I think we
understand like what we need to do. That that kicked
us into gear in terms of building it just informing
the world that we wanted to start building. It was
an extremely valuable experience and we started doing that. You know,

(01:56:18):
we started working on the website and like, what is
what kind of feeling does the website have, you know
when you when you go on there, does it feel
like some kind of immersive thing? You know? And then
filling out our catalog and filling out you know, show recordings,
soundboard recordings for people to listen to, videos for people
to watch on YouTube, which ended up being really really
the thing that in you know, outside of the music

(01:56:41):
and all of the chemistry and all the things we
were working on in that regard the the building the
content world online was was really what it was. It
was just an extremely necessary thing for the way that
we got to the place that we got to. So yeah,

(01:57:03):
that was that was really that was really the thing.
And you know that that experience we got a taste
of that energy of like people coming to shows and
rapidly you know, and consuming and like looking for looking
for something to be you know, experienced or found on stage,
something unique and something you know, happening in real time

(01:57:24):
and and and real you know, and like later that
year there was a there was I think we got
our our first taste in our own respect of a
very very long winded answer your question, I apologize for that,
but our first taste of that in our own, you know,
respective world was a few months after that, we did

(01:57:46):
a tour out to Colorado and we played, uh, you know,
same same deal, status quo, ton of you know, shady
gigs that no one came to, no one cared about us,
but we had We had this one gig booked on
the way out to Colorado, and then two weeks later,
on the way back from Colorado in Covington, Kentucky, and

(01:58:08):
this one this one guy who had like there was
a crew of friends that lived there, but they're really
they lived in Cincinnati, but they went to shows in Covington,
Kentucky's right over the right over the river. And this
one guy listened to our saw we were on the
schedule this at this club, the Octave in Covington and
listened to it, like, found our album, listen to it,

(01:58:28):
liked it, spread it around to his friends. They all
listened to it. They learned some of the songs, and
you know, maybe there was ten twelve of these people,
of these kids that came to this show totally unexpectedly,
and you know, we just played expecting another you know,
shit gig on a Tuesday night in Covington, Kentucky where
no one was there, and here are these twelve kids

(01:58:50):
who like know the lyrics to some of our songs
and are just throwing there brings so much energy, like
they're having a great time, and it's just kind of
us in them. It was like this really intimate thing
and for us that was like that was amazing. So
we you know, fortunately, uh we like we were coming

(01:59:10):
back to the same place two weeks later, and they,
I guess the word spread. They they talked to more
people around town, the word spread more, and we came
back and there were like one hundred people there and
the energy was awesome and we you know, we threw
down and and it was it was kind of this like,
oh wow, one hundred people came to actually to kind
of to see us, and then I think three months

(01:59:33):
later there or four months later that year, we went
back in June and did two nights at that club
and it was sort of sold out, and we felt
like we were on top of the world doing two
nights of this this this little club, and it was
it was it was like our first taste of of
of that kind of thing at all, you know. And

(01:59:53):
then we kept touring and playing other places and we're
you know, in other areas for all intents and purposes,
went back to playing shit gigs for no one. But then,
you know, throughout that year in the early twenty nineteen,
gradually saw you know, we sold like sold one hundred
tickets in Buffalo, you know at the door, and like

(02:00:14):
that was a huge win for us. We were like, oh,
all right, great, another one, another place where people know
who we are and are coming like some people are
coming to a show. That was a big deal because
it wasn't there was no there was no label, there
was no like our music wasn't being consumed in that
way at all. It was it was all just our
only hope was the grassroots thing, you know, at least

(02:00:35):
as far as we were aware. So then you know,
gradually we got we got more some more festival stuff,
more opening gigs for you know, opening for other bands
like Pigeons playing ping pong and bands like that, and
you know, throughout twenty eight the latter end of eighteen

(02:00:55):
and into twenty twenty nineteen, first half of twenty nineteen,
they felt like the pressure, the pressure points were just
getting hit more and more. You know, we were just
in the flow with it and doing doing these things
and could feel could feel the needle moving a little bit,
but not not crazy substantial. After that, you know, the
experience in Covington and stuff, it was, you know, it

(02:01:18):
was a kind of us flow flow role for the
most part. And then you know that summer, the real
turning point was the Peach Peach Festival in twenty nineteen.
There was a lot of hype around the set. We
played the set, and you know, we kind of gotten
used to like playing these festival sets, which like back
in the day, you know, I had this like really
naive mentality around it, like, oh, we'll play this festival

(02:01:40):
set and like it's really things are going to really
change after that, like all of a sudden, people who
will know who we are, will come to shows and stuff,
and I got I had gotten so used to that
not being the case, you know, thinking that the needle
was going to move, and then it didn't. So we
played that gig and there was hype around and I
was like, oh, that's cool. A lot of people were there,
you know, it was pretty packed. And then we put
out the video from that set like really quickly after it,

(02:02:02):
as we kind of had gotten used to doing at
that point, and I didn't think that much like it was,
you know, it was a big moment. It felt like
a lot of hype. It was pretty stressed about it,
but then we just did it and I didn't think
too much of it, and it didn't realize, you know,
that was that was going to be as much of
a catalyst as it was, or as much of a
breaking point as it was. You know. The video kind

(02:02:24):
of started getting shared a lot online and and then
there was this sort of viral thing. I guess that
happened with like fish Twitter. Everyone was like doing meme,
like joking with sending all these memes around about goose jokes,
and people thought it was a joke but then ended
up going and checking out the band, So it kind
of just h it kind of just erupted by there.

(02:02:44):
And then by the by that fall, the fall tour
was was pretty much totally sold out all the little
clubs we had booked and stuff like that. People were
just buying tickets and then it kind of just kind
of just grew from there.

Speaker 1 (02:02:56):
So then COVID hits. So what do you do for COVID?

Speaker 2 (02:03:04):
We I mean, it was I feel that in a
lot of ways, you know, for us, it was it
was really helpful to to for things to slow down,
to stop at that time because the schedule we had
planned for that year was going to tear at least personally,
I don't know, it was gonna tear me up, like
it was. It was. It was crazy that summer. The

(02:03:25):
schedule we had plotted for that summer, it was shooting
around to three festivals every weekend all around the country.
It was just like, you know, you can't, you can't
do well in the under those circumstances. Especially, I mean
I for sure can't, and maybe other people can't, but
like that, I just not a recipe for for doing

(02:03:46):
your best work, you know, So we slowed down, well,
you know, the world slowed down. We because of the
momentum we had at that point, we just kind of
instinctively we didn't stop working, but the fact of you know,
the nature of just sleeping at home for the bulk
of that year and being in one place and going
for walks in the woods every day in conjunction with

(02:04:09):
the things we were working on. We finished a record
we were that was taking us forever to work on.
I was doing all the editing myself, and it was
I was just laboring over it way more than I
should have. And you know, that gave us the opportunity
to finally finish that thing, which was you know, important
for us. And you know, we were just cranking out videos,

(02:04:30):
live streams and working on that and trying to make
make those things interesting and and different. You know, there's
we did all these live streams in the spring of
that year and had gotten like a really good response
from a lot of them. The way we were doing them,
it felt kind of alive. We had people on on
like handicams and moving and it was kind of dynamic,

(02:04:51):
and it felt felt interesting, and you know, we put
a lot of energy into that and trying to make
those as cool as we could, and then summer rolled around,
and you know, our managers were like, all right, we're
gonna everyone's doing tours, virtual tours, and you know that
sounded really like boring to me. It was just kind

(02:05:11):
of like, we're we're all just gonna keep doing what
we're doing. Just just do more and more videos of
us playing kind of the same mute, same songs in
the same room over and over again. That you know,
what makes touring. You know, you're you're in different places,
playing to different people, so it it you know, it
doesn't get as it doesn't get as redundant because of that.
So it just felt like like a like a really

(02:05:31):
redundant thing. So that that kind of triggered us to
to think to try to think about it in a
different way and make it compelling and add some element
to it that was more interactive and uh and more engaging,
I guess, and and and more and more immersive. So we, uh,
you know, we did this bingo tour thing, which is
which is you know, turned the entire how many of

(02:05:54):
every many shows it was into a bingo game and
everyone had cards and it was it was we they functional.
We had our own TV channel for like two weeks,
which we really ran with. We had we built up
all different kinds of kinds of content. We had people
doing videos walking them through like whatever. If someone had
in our community here had a farm in the backyard,

(02:06:15):
you know, we did a video of them walking through
the farm. Or we did like yoga videos or or
cooking classes and all kinds of stuff. We were just
cranking content through this thing, and we were all just
in this area and being really creative and coming up
with ideas and having a lot of fun. And it
was a really really special time. So I think they're
doing all these things. It was a special like it

(02:06:36):
was a special time, a special opportunity, I guess because
the world had just you know, stopped, everyone had slowed down.
And you know, if that happened now, we probably would
use it as a opportunity. I mean maybe to do
the same I don't know, but but you know it
would it would be at a very different point because
it would be like, all right, I'm going to slow
down and like write, I'm going to write a lot.

(02:06:57):
And I think probably a lot of people did that,
but for where we were, it was like we were
we were in a place to be just turning and burning,
and we did and it ended up I guess, you know,
it reached a lot more people. Somehow, it just continued
to grow through all of that, and then we started
doing the drive in shows and doing doing whatever we could,
whatever was whatever people were doing, whatever was coming you know,

(02:07:18):
coming up, we were we just didn't stop working, and
you know it seemed to work.

Speaker 1 (02:07:24):
Okay, so now live gigs come back. What does the
landscape look like?

Speaker 2 (02:07:30):
It was pretty gradual, right, I mean the the I
mean it felt like we like shows were happening and
it was kind of like intense, and you know, there
was people are in pods or whatever, and and then
you know, COVID would kind of come back strong and
and things would kind of slow down and shut down again,
and but you know, fun functionally, for the most part,

(02:07:51):
we were riding that landscape. We just we we really
didn't stop and uh, it kind of just kept growing.
I guess, you know, the shows just kept getting bigger,
and uh, you know, in a lot of ways, it
was it was tough to it. It's a challenge, you know,
being on that kind of wave and keeping up with
it and meeting meeting the expectations that other people, that

(02:08:14):
everyone has and that you have on yourself in in
that type of opportunity. It's it's you know, it's not easy.
So you know, I think we throughout all of that.
It's just it continued to grow, and you know, there's
a huge the adaptation process to that from a production
standpoint was was a huge challenge as well. You know,

(02:08:34):
we we didn't we were like playing clubs. We didn't
know how to how to graduate into these bigger things,
and there was like a massive learning curve with that,
you know, big time crew and and how to how
to go into these bigger rooms and actually do it right.
And you know that's uh, we we did the best

(02:08:55):
we could. You know, we were we were just doing
our best through that that period. And also, like I
said earlier, you know, twenty twenty one, I crashed out again.
I was I was you know, I was hanging out
by a thread for a lot of that time. So
it was, you know, we were just we were doing
doing the best we could with what we had.

Speaker 1 (02:09:13):
You know, well, when did the numbers start to jump
in terms of you know, attendance.

Speaker 2 (02:09:20):
I mean early twenty twenty it was already like that
fall of twenty nineteen, that whole tour had kind of
sold out and we had done our our first show
to six hundred people that you know, that sold out
in Virginia, Richmond, I think, and Chicago kind of hit
a similar number, and that that felt huge to us.

(02:09:41):
You know, that was massive. And then you know, during
that time, during that fall, I remember, we put up
we had we had gotten we just started working with
our current agents and they they were like, we want
to put up two shows in New York, one in Brooklyn,
one Manhattan in January of twenty twenty. And they did

(02:10:05):
and they and we were like, well they were both
six hundred cap rooms and they were there was like
back to back rooms, back to back nights, and we
were like whoa, Like that seems way aggressive, but maybe
one of those, you know, but there's no but like
two that's no one, you know, it's gonna we're gonna
take a bath. It's not no one's gonna come, you know.
And they put them up and they both sold out

(02:10:28):
in like a second, and we thought there was The
initial reaction was like there's there's you know, there's must
be something wrong with the website. You know, but yeah,
so that they ended up cooking really hot, and you know,
I think the attendance was just kind of that once

(02:10:48):
that that fire starts, the buzz and all of that,
it kind of just it kind of just kept going.
You know that that spring, these all they all got
canceled because of COVID, but you know, I think we
had rooms rooms like thousand to fifteen hundred kind of
zone booked, and I think they were all sold out.
So it was kind of on that trajectory. And then

(02:11:08):
you know, by fall of twenty twenty, we started doing
those driving things and it was like, you know, selling
two thousand of these driving kind of show tickets and
things like that, and I don't know, the numbers of
it all just just kind of get gets fuzzy, but it,
you know, it's always an up and down kind of thing,
always till to this day. You know, there's there we
play some really big shows and then there's some places

(02:11:30):
where they're not as big, you know, but the yeah,
it was it was just a lot of growth for
years after that. I mean, the numbers kind of just
continued to grow.

Speaker 1 (02:11:44):
I guess, well, what point do your peers start to
embrace you you know, the famous people, you know what
I'm talking about.

Speaker 2 (02:11:55):
Sure, yeah, the more here heroes than peers. But but yeah,
I mean, I think twenty twenty two is really when
that there was like a huge turning point there. We
put out we put out another album that year, and
we played Radio City that summer and that was you know,

(02:12:15):
Trey came out and played with us, and so did
Josh Tillman, father John Misty, which you know, that was
a that was a wild combination, like to the point earlier,
you know, the merging of those two worlds was like
was one. I mean, it was just insane that that
that happened. I just still don't understand, you know, I
still like there's there's a certain degree of dissociation that

(02:12:37):
has to for me, that has to happen in order
to just like show up to those things. And when
that's it's like, Okay, this is happening. Cool, you know,
it doesn't feel real to me on some level, but
it's just it's happening, so you just will go do
it and try our best, you know, do our best.
But yeah, so that was I think that was that
was obviously a massive moment for us in so many
ways and the momentum at that time, I'm it was

(02:13:01):
it was just crazy. And you know, after that kind
of those things just kept kept happening. But that that
that year felt like the turning point as far as
that stuff is concerned.

Speaker 1 (02:13:12):
Okay, going forward other than more gigs anything special in
the pipeline.

Speaker 2 (02:13:22):
You know, I I think, uh, it's just you know,
building the building our own world feels that's like feels
like the most special thing to me. You know, I
I want to, like I said, I just I want
to keep writing a lot of music and putting out
as much music as I can and working on different
projects like that feels like the juice. That's the sauce

(02:13:43):
to me. And uh, you know, getting getting deeper into
into special events is feels really good and something that
we're excited to keep doing. And and the things that
that feel authentic and exciting and unique, you know that
that's that's those are the kinds of things that that

(02:14:04):
really fill up the well. You know, we're doing a
we started doing we did the first year of a
Destination festival in in Cabo last year, so we're you
know doing that again this year and is a really
special place and really special experience and you know kind
of uh, we kind of did this once before, but

(02:14:26):
it was a very last minute thing. This is kind
of the first time we've we've put ourselves in the
in the situation to be working on a lineup and
having people come to a thing and and and uh
kind of hosting in that way. And it's it's really fun,
and it feels really good, and it feels really good
to be you know, having having other artists there and

(02:14:47):
that that we that we love and and you know,
look up to and and uh love love just you know,
collaborating with and and and you know, getting to be
peers with. So you know, that's that's a pretty special thing.
Continue to work on that. Our our you know, our
event every December Goose Miss. We uh, you know, we

(02:15:10):
try to make that special every year and come up
with new ways to to think about that and approach
that and just like you know many other people in
our world have done. But you know, finding our own
our own ways into these things and our own our
own spin and you know, the way our our energy
can can bring it to some some different place. It's

(02:15:31):
it's it's a fun process. But yeah, mostly I just
want to keep writing music.

Speaker 1 (02:15:35):
So you got this destination vessel in Cabo, you played
Red Rocks, you played Madison Square Garden. How many tickets
can you sell in secondary markets Cleveland, Minneapolis? I mean
you tour in those places. How big are the poles?

Speaker 2 (02:15:53):
It varies, you know, even even within one city, it
varies depending on what time of year is, or what
the venue is or whatever it may be. You know,
there's certain spots where we're getting up where you can
do like the ten thousand maybe a little over, maybe
a little under kind of mark. And then there's some
spots where you know, we're like twenty five hundred to

(02:16:15):
five thousand zone. I'd say most places are are, you know,
in that like three to five thousand kind of zone.

Speaker 1 (02:16:22):
So personally, do you feel like you've arrived? You're still
pinching yourself.

Speaker 2 (02:16:30):
You know, if the whole thing is such a whirlwind
and it goes so fast, it moves like time when
all the tours and stuff, you know, you do three
tours a year and then the year's over, and the
time moves so fast. It still feels in a lot
of ways like like I'm just starting to like trying
to get caught up to that change of pace in life,

(02:16:54):
but at the same time, like it's been going on
for a while now and I think we have in
a lot of ways. Is like we we continue to
I think, catch up to it in different ways. But
I see I see so much, so much more, runway,
so much more. Like That's why when it's it's like
kind of what's next, it's like, I want to just
keep getting better out where we are, you know. It's

(02:17:18):
it's not thinking about the next the next biggest venue
or the next you know, most tickets we can sell.
It's just like I just want to continue to be
able to show up more and more to to where
we are and what we have, you know. That's that's
the thing that that feels relevant. I guess yeah, I

(02:17:39):
think it's a combination of both. It's like, you know,
I think hopefully we arrive more and more each each month,
you know, each day, but it still feels surreal for sure.
There's still like you know, playing the garden again. It
feels like, you know, because we're not we're not part

(02:17:59):
of the mainstream world in that way in so many ways.
You know, Uh, it doesn't, it doesn't. It feels like
it's like a like a you know, it's like some
cheat code or something. We're just like in our own
little universe. And and if I think about, you know,

(02:18:20):
comparing or competing with the broader thing, it's it's it's
just like, oh, thank god, we don't have to do
that because we're just in our own little universe over here.
You know.

Speaker 1 (02:18:29):
Well, speaking of showing up, you definitely showed up today.
I think we got a good understanding of you and
the band. Rick. I want to thank you so much
for taking this time to speak with my audience.

Speaker 2 (02:18:41):
Thank you, thank you for having me until next time.

Speaker 1 (02:18:45):
This is Bob left Sex