Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
We're live and local back here on eleven ten KFAB.
We are Nebraska's news, weather, and traffic station. And it
is truly an honor to be joined by my next
guest getting ready to celebrate three eleven Night with Union
Omaha on Thursday at Werner Park. It is Nick Hexham,
the lead man, frontman, lead singer of Omaha's Finest Nick,
(00:21):
thanks so much for being a part of our show today.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Thank you, and it's an honor for me too. KFAB
was just such a ubiquitous part of life in Omaha
for me growing up. So this is cool.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
Well, I gotta tell you, Nick, you guys have been
in a band. I hope this doesn't sound too weird,
but you guys have been in a band as long as
I've been alive. And I was grown up in the
southeast Iowa flipping through radio stations and I heard your
cover of the Cures Love song, and I was like,
what is this sound? I couldn't figure out what was
(00:57):
going on. It wasn't until several years later that I
realized that this really cool and unique band was from
the Midwest. They're from Omaha, Nebraska. I'd still have a
hard time. I talked about three eleven all the time
to people that I know. My parents, you know, I
introduced them to three eleven And it's hard to describe
what you guys sound is. How do you best describe
(01:18):
what three eleven sound is?
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Well, I was just your comment. I love it. Thinking
about when I first heard reggae music in general, I'm like,
what is going on here? This is different? But of
course reggae is. The Cure cover that you mentioned was
us doing The Cure in a reggae style, which came
at the request of Adam Sandler because he was like,
I want to have a bunch of eighties covers done
(01:40):
to sound similar to your song Ambert for my movie
fifty First Dates. I was like, great idea, and it
turned out to be a number one hit for us.
But how I describe our sound in general is anything
we like we put in our music. I mean, if
you go back to our very first single called do
You Write, it was basically like mixing rock and Latin
(02:04):
like salsa music. And of course we've had a lot
of hip hop in our music. There's jazz, there's heavy metal,
for there's punk. I mean, there's everything we like. We
put it in and I think that was kind of
part of I was, like, you know, growing up in
Omaha in the middle of the country, we're also in
(02:25):
the middle of a bunch of styles and we can
just pick anyone we want and put it in. And
I think we just had always had attitude of just
saying yes an exploration.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Speaking with Nick Hexham here embrity songer with you on
eleventon Kfab three eleven is I really do think that
three eleven, along with maybe Bud Crawford, a couple of
the finest exports that Omaha has had to offer. And
I think one of the reasons why it's so awesome
is you guys have really been the same band as
(02:55):
far as your lineup has been concerned for well over
thirty years. Have you been able to have that continuity
when it's so rare in bands to see no lineup changes?
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Yeah, I mean, and today happens to follow on fall
on our thirty five year anniversary of our first show
that was at SoCal Hall in Omaha, which I believe
is now called the Admiral. But yeah, we stumbled on
something really special and we know it that we know
that we're better together than we could be separately. So
we keep an attitude of gratitude about just knowing we're
(03:28):
really lucky to get to do this and that we
stumbled on the right lineup when we started out. So
just keep it going, and you've got to be ready
to not get your way sometimes when you're in a
musical marriage, and we just stay positive.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
I got to tell you one thing that I've been
kind of interested in over the last couple of years.
I just moved to Omaha a couple of summers ago,
and one of the first things that I wanted to
do was try to get implemented in the sports teams
here because it's such an easy way to get connected
with the community, to meet people. And I was kind
of floored when I learned that Nick Hexham of three
(04:07):
eleven was going to be a part of the ownership
group shortly after I had moved to Omaha, and that
made me extremely excited, Like, Wow, there's really a big
investment not just from this community, but also from people
who are from Omaha to want to see this succeed.
What's your relationship to the game of soccer in this
club and what you're a part of right now here
in Omaha.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
So I played a little soccer when I was very young,
but then mostly in Nebraska. It was mostly like you know,
sand lot football and stuff. But now having three daughters
and soccer is just you know, the fastest growing sport
at major sport by mar and three daughters at all.
Three play on teams. Two of them are on club teams,
(04:48):
which is very competitive, and we travel around a lot,
so I really came to understand the game and also
you know, practice with my kids and go a lot
of their games. So then when this opportunity came up
to be part of a professional soccer team in Omaha,
I jumped at it. And it's been a lot of
(05:10):
fun and what a thrill to be there at the
final game last year when they won the whole thing
and be up on the winners podium because I am
a minority owner on the team and I'm just really
looking forward to coming there and seeing a game and
dropping The first ever three eleven co branded sports jersey
is the one that we're putting out this week.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Yeah, we're speaking with Nick Hexham, lead singer of three
to eleven, and Nick is going to be in town
Thursday night at Werner Park as part of the three
to eleven night at Union Omaha. The Union Omaha match,
They've been nothing but successful. The new jersey is unbelievable.
You're going to actually do performance and we'll get to
that in a second. You mentioned your daughters really interested
(05:52):
in soccer. You like, I think people probably are like, well,
Nick's a rockstar. I mean, how does he get kind
of into the athletic I don't know if anybody's seen
you recently, but you're kind of jacked. I mean, like
fitness is a big deal for you. So how do
you best describe your relationship with sport, athleticism fitness, because
I mean, you look twenty years younger than I think
(06:14):
you are, and I've seen you do interviews where you're
talking more about fitness than you are your music.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
Sometimes. Yeah, you know, I guess I am a little
bit of an outlier of how much I like to
exercise for being a musician. But I just realized early
on that it was working on my physical state would
help my mental state, and that if I got a
(06:42):
really vigorous run in or lifted some weights that I
felt good, and then any challenges emotionally that I was
going to face for the rest of the day became
a lot easier, and then you know, I just keep
finding ways to kind of tweak my workouts intencityval training.
I play basketball, I play soccer, I lift weights, I
(07:06):
run marathons, you know the works. I just like to
mix it up a lot, and we bring weights on
the road with us. We have like a dressing room
gem set up and it's it's just part of what
I do. But it all started with sort of a
mental health thing and now I just kind of became
known for it.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
Nick Hex, I'm joining us lead singer three eleven Emory
Songer with you on eleven ten kfab. Let's talk about
the kit, the shirt, the jersey that you in three
eleven kind of was a part of designing. This thing
is a work of art and it's available. You can
buy this thing and pre order it. And I can't
imagine anybody who cares about this soccer club not having
(07:48):
one of these. Can you tell people, I know we're
on the radio, but can you tell people kind of
the inspiration and what this looks like because it is
so uniquely Omaha, but it also has a lot of
three eleven elements in it.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Yeah, so honestly, I'm not the guy in three eleven
usually who's very involved in designing merch, but this one
I did design the original sketch, which for people that
don't know, there's this kind of raise called vapor Wave,
which is kind of like almost like an eighties look
(08:22):
with the really bright colors and kind of trippy with
like the stars in there and stuff like that. But
it's it's got an Omaha skyline, and my first sketch
of the Omaha sky Line was really bad, so we
had to go and find the actual you know skyline
with you know, the Leads Museum and all these different
(08:43):
different things, so we had to revise it a lot.
But it's a vapor Wave style that I designed, and
it's the first ever three eleven co branded.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Yeah, it's got three eleven and the eyes of the
Owl with Union Omaha, which is such a cool lie
and I mean it's entrancing. If you're going to get
noticed where in this thing, and people are not going
to think that this is a soccer jersey, this is
going to be something. This one of several things you'll
notice on Thursday when three eleven Night is happening at
(09:13):
Warner Park with Union Omaha and one of the I
think real chief reasons. A lot of people are going
to be interested in coming out because they get to
see Nick Hexum. What are you going to be doing
out there? I know that this is an important thing
for you to always come back to Omaha. You guys
always are super busy. You have a lot of shows,
but you're going to be here on Thursday night and
you're actually going to play some songs.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Right, Yes, I'm going to do a short acoustic set
after the game in a little side area that they
have too for me to sing some songs. And I'm
not going to divulge the exact set list, but I
will say that I just put out a couple solo
(09:54):
EPs of more Like Americana Music, and one of the
songs on there is a song called California, written by
the Midwest's own Chapel Roone and so Are, the CEO
of Union Omaha, was requesting that I play that song
because it's a story about moving from the Midwest to
(10:14):
California to pursue you know, stardom and so forth, but
really missing missing the Midwest. So it's a very cool
song to have covered and that's available on all streamings
if you're interested. Under my name Nick Nixon.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
So cool, Nick Hexum, lead singer of three to eleven. Okay,
just a couple of things for you. I'll make sure
to keep promoting the soccer match. But not every day
that you get to talk to somebody who is so
instrumental in such an interesting band. You have so many
different sounds, Like we talked about earlier, one song that
I am just hypnotized by is Beautiful Disaster, And there's
(10:50):
something about that guitar lick at the beginning of it
and how heavy it honestly sounds. It still has kind
of that reggae kind of Caribbean feel to it when
you into the midst of the song, but it really
that's a heavy riff. Where does some of the inspiration
come for that? Because yeah, I mean the reggae feel
is it known for like super awesome guitar parts all
the time. But I mean, you guys got some really
(11:11):
killer riffs in some of these big popular songs you've had.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Well, thank you. Yeah, I guess that just comes from
the spirit of combining any different styles that we wanted,
and for us, it just seemed obvious to put like
a really heavy rock riff and then to lighten it
up with a reggae style, and then reggae a lot
of time has like harmonized horn leads if you listen
(11:35):
to Scott and reggae, but we don't have a horn section.
So what I did is like a dual guitar lead
that's actually more reminiscent of like classic rock bands. I
think like Sinn Lizzie was one of the first bands
that really started like the harmonized guitar leads or iron
made in all these different kind of bands, But to
(11:56):
put that in reggae was pretty unique at the time.
So that's some of the kind of highlights of the
song Beautiful Disaster. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
I sometimes I'm just like sitting at my desk and
I'll just think to it and ain't like, I don't
know why, it just like it stays with me. Okay,
last thing for you, I could talk to you for hours.
I know you can't do that, but Nick, your catalog
is so vast and so deep. I had a hard
time telling my dad. He's also he's more of a
classic rock music lover, but he's just like, Okay, so
(12:23):
where do I start with three eleven catalog if I
want to get like a really good taste of what
this band sounds like, because you guys have made so
much music, what would be kind of an album or
a couple of songs that you would direct somebody to
like this is a true taste of what three eleven is.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
Well, I feel like you know this here marks thirty
year anniversary of the Blue Album, which was really it's
our self titled album, but we call it the Blue
Album because it had a blue cover, and that I
think is a pretty good place to start because it
the songs are fairly succinct, you know, short, punchy songs
(13:00):
that are great to play live, and has three of
our biggest hits between all Mixed Up, Down and Don't
Stay Home that are kind of staples of our live show.
But I love to hear that you're talking three eleven
with your dad because I get so many reports of
people turning their kids on the three eleven and I
just love intergenerational enjoyment of our band.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
Well, it's pretty easy when you sound so different from
song to song to be able to find some songs
that anybody with any musical tastes to be interested in
and that's what makes three eleven so unique. Also, they're
from Omaha Union Omaha Werner Park. Thursday night, it's three
eleven night. Nick Hexham, lead singer three eleven will be
there doing an acoustic set after the match. You can
(13:43):
see the incredible jersey that the guys are going to
have on, which was designed by Nick as well. Nick,
this has been an honor for me. I can't wait
to actually be at the match on Thursday. Hopefully I
get a chance to see you there. Congrats on all
the success and thanks so much for taking Omaha with
you all these years.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Right on him, We definitely do day hi and thanks
for having me today.