Matt Connarton Unleashed: Questing Beast

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (01:26):
Quoting mid Nights my eliptical.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
So you have no idea the teps.

Speaker 3 (01:33):
To which we'll go and what we'll face.

Speaker 4 (01:37):
A guden scored a people of us, but a gatherin
bild You go spend life notes just seeing that trees come,
lad said to herself to save a lad well the
sash final, so see your home in John, recluding the

(02:07):
when the read.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
How so you marry your dad?

Speaker 4 (02:26):
You talk to talk corruption too hot and hot the
wider finally correct.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
At school.

Speaker 4 (02:41):
Ray now father slace.

Speaker 3 (02:47):
Where it's glass carries out to chase.

Speaker 4 (03:06):
How Jo.

Speaker 5 (03:10):
You're going to.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
John h That is the Comets Tale. The band is

(04:05):
Questing Beast and we have Jane and Shane with us
from Questing Beast. By the way, so I love that track.
The Comet's Tail definitely gets the blood pumping. And as
I like to say, if that didn't get your blood
pumping on a Saturday morning, check your pulsey, you might
be dead. But good stuff, good stuff.

Speaker 3 (04:24):
Yeah, yeah, no, it's a fun, fun intro song.

Speaker 5 (04:28):
Gets our blood pumping pretty much every time we play.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
Yeah do you play that to open the show?

Speaker 3 (04:32):
Or yeah? Generally speak you do?

Speaker 1 (04:33):
Oh yeah, okay, very good. Now, when we had you
on the last time, so how long ago it becomes
a blur to me.

Speaker 3 (04:40):
Yeah it was.

Speaker 1 (04:40):
I mean it wasn't a year ago, right, or.

Speaker 3 (04:42):
No, it would have been right before the Halloween show, right,
so October ish?

Speaker 1 (04:48):
Not that long. Yeah, yeah, not crazy.

Speaker 3 (04:50):
Long ago, but long enough that it feels relatively significant.

Speaker 5 (04:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:53):
Yeah, So what's been going on since the last time
we had John? I know, I know you've got a
big show coming up tomorrow for those listening live of
course at Terminus Underground.

Speaker 3 (05:04):
Yeah, absolutely sure. So yeah, yeah, so we're getting back
into playing, playing out again. You know, last time we
were here, we're talking about how we kind of went
into hibernation for the winter. We totally did that. It
was great and we're out better than ever, ready to
start playing more gigs again.

Speaker 1 (05:23):
Excellent And what what what so what were you doing
during that hibernation period? I mean, were you did you
take a break from the band, or were you writing
and recording or what was what was going on?

Speaker 3 (05:33):
We're doing a lot of writing and also we're planning
for our upcoming first ever tour that one April twenty fifth.
We're basically going on a quick week long run down
to Baltimore and back up.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
Congratulations on that.

Speaker 5 (05:51):
That's awesome, thanks, Yeah, very cool, exciting.

Speaker 3 (05:54):
Yeah, it's been great.

Speaker 5 (05:56):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (05:56):
Our buddy who's playing bass for us now at dan
se Lance. He helped us book all out of these
gigs and he's also stepping into the live role of
playing bass for us, which is awesome and because those
are some pretty big shoes to fill, you know, the
guy that we had record for us, Chase Brian's absolute monster.
So for Dan to come in and be able to

(06:17):
pick it up has been really great.

Speaker 1 (06:19):
Yeah. Is uh the track that we just heard which
is from what's the name of the album again, because
you guys have a whole u birth that's right, That's right?
Is that so that's what the previous Spass player right
or or is it?

Speaker 3 (06:34):
Yes?

Speaker 5 (06:35):
Yeah, all the recordings were done with Chase Bryant.

Speaker 1 (06:40):
Okay, yea Bryant okay, and then he so he so
he recorded with you, but was not in a position
to like, was he ever was he ever officially in
the band?

Speaker 3 (06:49):
Or was he just is basically a hired gun? Yeah,
I mean he lives, he lives in la He plays
in a war war Bringer I've.

Speaker 5 (06:58):
Heard of Warring Yeah, yeah, he's a he's a busy guy.
He's not just in that he's playing with a few
other bands. I don't know. I we follow him on
social media, like he's on tour with Warbringer right now.

Speaker 3 (07:12):
I think everybody's got like eight other projects out there. Yeah,
my favorite of which being Father Daddy Blues Band.

Speaker 1 (07:21):
Oh no kidding?

Speaker 3 (07:22):
Yeah?

Speaker 5 (07:22):
Cool?

Speaker 1 (07:23):
Cool? How did you How did you come to work
with him him being as busy as he is. How
did that come about?

Speaker 3 (07:29):
We were essentially just kind of racking our brains, like
trying to find somebody local, and we got sick of
doing it, and we're like, I bet we could find
somebody else for money. And I was like, this guy
is a perfect example of what I want the bass
playing to sound like. And so I just hit him
up on Instagram and we started talking. Yeah, and he
had me send him the demos and he was a
fan of the demos, and uh yeah, we were able

(07:51):
to work something out.

Speaker 1 (07:53):
When when you first contacted him, was I kind of like, uh, well,
I don't I don't know. I don't know if he's
if he's gonna have time or being tested, but I'm
going to give it a shot and then it works.

Speaker 3 (08:03):
Out or oh yeah, absolutely total shot in the dark.
Yeah yeah, I mean I don't expect anything of to
come from anything, especially like you know, just messaging people
on Instagram, you know what I mean. It's like, yeah,
you just throwing stuff out into the ether and hoping
you get something back.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
Yeah, yep. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:19):
And so for it to come back around, it's nice.
You know, every once in a while it does.

Speaker 1 (08:23):
You never know. It's it's always worth a try because
you never know. And it worked out phenomenally well.

Speaker 3 (08:27):
So yeah, basic playing came out awesome. He reported his
parts in like two days, no kidding, Oh yeah, incredible.

Speaker 1 (08:34):
So awesome.

Speaker 5 (08:34):
Yeah, kids, you never know.

Speaker 1 (08:36):
You throw it out there, you don't know what's going
to happen. Yeah, exactly, absolutely, So, So what was that
a matter of just kind of sending the tracks back
and forth.

Speaker 3 (08:46):
And essentially yeah, I mean, dudes were pro so, I
mean he pretty much had everything under his fingers by
the time he came out here, which is convenient because
we only had like, you know, eighteen hours between when
he came out here and played with us for the
first time and when he needed to get the studio.

Speaker 5 (09:00):
Okay, wow, yeah it was it was a good time.

Speaker 1 (09:03):
Yeah. Yeah, no, that's fantastic. That's fantastic. So the so
the new what's his name again, the new new bass.

Speaker 3 (09:11):
Player or the current bass player, Dan Selan. He plays
in Ice Giant, he plays in a Nihilist Monday, he
plays in Perennial Quest. Yeah, he plays in other bands too.
There's a bunch of them.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
I've heard of Ice Giant.

Speaker 3 (09:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (09:27):
So he's so well, so he's also a busy guy.
But yeah, but geographically he's available.

Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (09:33):
And the nice thing is he seems to be I
don't know if this is just like a point of pride,
but he seems to be really enjoying conquering the music
and learning the parts, you know what I mean. He's
like posting himself working through some of it on his
Instagram story and stuff like that, And it made me
feel pretty pretty awesome. Yeah, just because you know, we

(09:58):
play the music all the time. For somebody else to
try it out and get fulfillment out of trying to
learn it made me like I was like, yeah.

Speaker 1 (10:04):
Yeah, well that yeah, I mean, that's that's tremendous validation, right,
I mean, you know, Obviously, you get the validation if
you play it for other people, if you play it
live and people react positively to it, you know, that's
that's fantastic, right. But to also get that validation of
somebody wants to learn the songs and really commits, you know,
commits to learning them. I mean, that's that's fantastic. That's

(10:26):
that's great. How long has he been in the band?

Speaker 3 (10:30):
Now?

Speaker 1 (10:31):
The band?

Speaker 3 (10:31):
He just played his first gig with us on Saturday,
So I think we've done We've done like three practices
with him or something.

Speaker 1 (10:37):
Oh, so he's very new.

Speaker 3 (10:39):
Yeah, okay, it's a pretty new development as far as
our live show goes and everything.

Speaker 1 (10:45):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (10:45):
Yeah, but we were talking to him for a while
because of the whole tour situation and everything, but so
like it was going to happen eventually. But yeah, I
don't know, he's he's really been doing a great job,
I think.

Speaker 1 (10:56):
Yeah, yeah, excellent. Now for the tour, are you is
there another band or other bands that you've teamed up
with for the tour or you know, because there's different
ways to approach it, right you know.

Speaker 3 (11:07):
Yeah, so our main tour mates are a band called
Moon Tomb from Rhode Island moved to Moon Tom.

Speaker 1 (11:14):
Yeah, that's a cool name.

Speaker 4 (11:14):
I like that.

Speaker 3 (11:15):
Yeah, they're cool guys. We picked them because they're such
pals that, you know, we couldn't we couldn't have thought
of like a better three dudes to go out on
the road with nice and so we hit them up
and they were super open to it and everything. And
there's I think a total of like twenty something different
local bands. Because one of the shows is a is
a festival. Oh really, Yeah, the New York show is

(11:38):
a it's the Long Island Doom Festival, Okay at mister Berry's,
which so that kind of ups those numbers of a bunch.
But so we're super excited to go out and beat
a bunch of these bands. And yeah, some of these
cool shows are going to be in some really cool
places too, so yeah, it would be a good time.

Speaker 1 (11:56):
How many dates are you playing?

Speaker 3 (11:57):
Seven dates in eight days?

Speaker 1 (12:00):
Okay?

Speaker 3 (12:00):
Okay, So we get a nice day off in the middle.
We might go to Hershey Park, hit some roller coasters.

Speaker 1 (12:05):
Who nice. You should, Yes, you definitely should.

Speaker 3 (12:08):
We've been talking about it.

Speaker 5 (12:09):
I'm feeling up to it. I don't know, I haven't
been to a theme parking a long time.

Speaker 1 (12:12):
Yeah, I haven't either.

Speaker 3 (12:14):
When I was a kid, we went to Hershey Park
for like the eighth grade d C trip and the
park itself was closed down, but I always wanted to
go and hit those roller coasters. But I did get
a five pound chocolate bar while I was there.

Speaker 1 (12:25):
Yeah, five pound chocolate bar. Oo. That sounds like a
lot of it was a lot of work. It's a
lot of chocolate. But the roller coasters. I love roller coasters.

Speaker 3 (12:33):
Yeah, it's my favorite type of ride. Yeah, like the
stuff those ones that are like just like the big
post where you sit on you know what I mean,
and it goes like all the way up. I'm not
a fan of that type of stuff, but I get
any roller coaster.

Speaker 1 (12:45):
Oh yeah, me too, Me too. When I was a kid,
I remember being terrified of going on one that went
upside down until I did it, and it happened so
quick that you know, you don't even know you're upside
after you what I mean? But yeah, yeah, no, I
love I love roller coasters. Yeah, so you should definitely
do that. And are you are you playing the same
set every night as far as you know or your

(13:07):
time is going to kind of vary where you have
to kind of work with it.

Speaker 3 (13:11):
Some of the shows are four band bills and some
of them are five band bills, so we'll be able
to get an extra song or two on the shorter bills. Yeah,
but I mean we've only got the one record. Yeah,
we're not unveiling any of that new material until the
time is right. Pretty much will be songs from the
first record in various orders.

Speaker 1 (13:32):
Okay, yeah, yeah, well you have so you do have
new material you're working on.

Speaker 3 (13:36):
Oh yeah, oh yes, oh yeah, we pretty much. We
took so between when we finished writing the first record
and when we finished recording it, which was about I
don't know, maybe nine month period, we were just working
on really hammering those songs down, and so we didn't
write anything during that time. Yeah, so it was kind
of like this big there's like a big rush of

(13:56):
like creativity when we you know, played the final note
in the studio and we went home and we're like,
what do we do now? Yeah, we've been working pretty
hard and I'm really excited about the new stuff.

Speaker 1 (14:09):
Excellent. Is it in the same vein?

Speaker 4 (14:11):
Is it?

Speaker 3 (14:13):
Yeah?

Speaker 5 (14:14):
It's definitely similar style for sure, But I think we
delved even farther into each kind of individual element that
we're bringing to it, So it's kind of, you know,
even more thematic, even more, we spend even more time

(14:36):
paying attention to the different you know, flares and genres
and influences, you know what I mean. So there's a
lot of variety, Like there's a lot of variety in
the first record, but what we're working on is kind
of expanding upon each little bit of that variety, I think,
and so each song kind of feels pretty unique, but

(14:58):
also there's a pretty substantial common thread between all of it,
which is something on the first record too. So yeah,
it's been pretty cool. Uh, we're not we're kind of
throwing caution to the wind for a few things, and
we're just kind of trying whatever we want to do.
There's some pretty funny ideas that we've just totally ran with.

(15:21):
So yeah, it's like it's like our sound two point zero.

Speaker 1 (15:26):
Okay, okay, cool.

Speaker 3 (15:28):
Yeah, it's basically it's a huge expansion on the first record.
I think it's it's basically everything we did, but we
went in every direction a little bit further. Yeah, and uh, yeah,
it's I don't know, it's exciting.

Speaker 1 (15:42):
Is it thematically similar in terms of lyrics or.

Speaker 3 (15:45):
We're not done the lyrics yet, so it's.

Speaker 1 (15:47):
Okay, So the music comes first, right yeah.

Speaker 3 (15:50):
Yeah, So I mean we kind of have like a
storyline and then we build the music off of the storyline, okay,
and then the lyrics are kind of like the very
final thread.

Speaker 1 (16:00):
Okay, I think.

Speaker 3 (16:00):
So it's like that's like really the last eyes to
dot in the tease to cross or you know, Okay, lyrics.

Speaker 1 (16:07):
Okay, okay, cool, cool. Obviously we talked about it the
last time you were here. But does birth have a
is there a story to it?

Speaker 3 (16:16):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (16:17):
Or a particular theme? Well, I know there's a theme,
but I couldn't remember how how defined the actual story
was or if it was kind of more just a
loose concept.

Speaker 3 (16:27):
So it's it's kind of both actually, right, So it's
very defined to us, like we know the storyline as
like this very defined thing, but we purposefully at this
point like like the lyrics are kind of esoteric, right,
because like you can go really far in the direction
of like wanting to write a good story, but after
a certain point you're taking away from like the quality

(16:50):
of the song, right, Like we don't need a billion
details about like a guy's armor as he's coming up
over the crest of the hill, you know what I mean.
Like you just filled up half of your verse describing
this and so like, and what I wanted to do,
or what we wanted to do, is kind of have
it be a more like personalized thing, right where anybody

(17:11):
can go in and like read the lyrics and try
and derive like what the legitimate story is. But it's
more important, I think, from my perspective, for people to
be able to derive their own meaning from it, Okay, Right, So,
like I would really like to, at one point or
another figure out how to do a comic book to
like tell the legitimate story like straight up, you know.

Speaker 1 (17:31):
What I mean.

Speaker 3 (17:33):
But yeah, I also don't want to like go to
people who have maybe derived their own meaning from the
songs and be like, you're wrong. This is what it means,
you know what I mean, Because it's like that's kind
of a slap in the face, and like I wouldn't.
I feel like, you're whatever your meaning is is totally legitimate, which.

Speaker 1 (17:52):
Is how it's supposed to be, right with music or
with any kind of art. Really, it's what you We
might have talked I've talked about this with a few
peop belond the show. We might have talked about this before,
but I know that I've experienced that where it's kind
of like, you know, a song means something to you,
and then you read an interview with the person who
wrote the lyrics and they talk about what it means

(18:14):
and you kind of go, oh, that's different than what
it meant to me, And then there's that weirdness of oh,
now I kind of feel differently about it, you know
what I mean?

Speaker 5 (18:24):
Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, I think for our music specifically, Yeah,
I think that would be a pretty funny instance because
it's so specific. So you know, there's so much left
to interpretation in the lyrics that if and when, you know,
inevitably we do have a concrete representation of what the

(18:47):
whole story is. You know, We've said it before. This
was part one of a concept of a few albums
that we're planning on releasing.

Speaker 3 (19:00):
Essentially want to make a trilogy.

Speaker 5 (19:01):
Yeah, we want to make a trilogy, and so you
know we're working on installment two of that. So it's
expanding upon this storytelling universe, you know what I mean?
So it would be pretty funny for us to just
drop all that information and have people, you know, kind
of learn what it is. I think I'm gonna speak

(19:23):
a little bit on lyrically. For the first album, there's
some very literal world building. So the song we just
listened to, there's some very literal you know, pre you know,
description of what's going on, some exposition, Yeah, exposition exactly,

(19:45):
and it's not really up for interpretation when you sit
down and read it, you know what I mean. It
basically tells you you know, what's going to happen, yeah,
and then you know all the other things beyond that,
when we're singing about emotions and you know, things happening,
it's it's all pretty up for interpretation. And I think
we want to make music that is true to what

(20:08):
we're trying to do story wise, and then also is
up for interpretation and receivable to someone who knows nothing
about the story as much as possible. And I think
we've tried to dive into that even more so. Okay,
on our current writing lyrically anyway.

Speaker 1 (20:26):
Yeah, No, that's very cool. I look forward to, uh,
you know when eventually, I mean, you probably at this
point do you have any kind of an eta on
when when you might start recording the next.

Speaker 3 (20:37):
One, or yeah, I don't know, like a year or
I don't know, one hundred years somewhere between those two.

Speaker 1 (20:45):
Somewhere somewhere between one and a hundred.

Speaker 3 (20:49):
Yeah, I mean, I wish I could have that crystal ball.
But you never know what's going to happen, you know.
I mean, we it took forever to get the first one,
and I think we've got a more streamlined process at
this point, but you know, anything could happen.

Speaker 1 (21:01):
So so, but you both talked about a trilogy. Does
that mean that you've already got the you've got the
whole story mapped out already, or.

Speaker 3 (21:10):
Like big story points that we want to hit mapped out. Yeah,
But I mean it's it's cool to leave like certain
things open, right because like, for example, on the first record,
we had finished the record, I just did air quotes
for anybody listening, yea, and we had like six songs,
and I was like, nah, it doesn't feel right, you know,

(21:31):
And so I was like, we got to write two
more songs, and we ended up doing Beneath Red Leaves
and Titans Grip, which have ended up being two of
the most popular questioning beat songs at this point, and
nobody else wanted to write them. But I was like, look,
the story, we can add some more details into the story,

(21:52):
and these riffs rule. I don't see why anybody could
be opposed to it. And then everybody was mad when
we were recording them, and so it came out awesome.

Speaker 5 (22:01):
Mostly me, I was mostly angry in doing it. I
don't know why. I was just like, all right, well
you want some more guitar, you're gonna get it. Yeah,
And it came out wicked good.

Speaker 1 (22:15):
So you were able to channel that anger. Yeah, Yeah,
it feels.

Speaker 5 (22:19):
It feels really epic. Titan Script is actually our current
most stream song on Spotify. We passed like four thousand
streams today, I think, which is cool.

Speaker 1 (22:28):
Congratulations.

Speaker 5 (22:29):
Yeah, that's great, interesting metric, but.

Speaker 1 (22:33):
But not it matters though. Those metrics do matter. No,
that's very cool, very cool. Do you have anything that
you play currently that's not on this first album when
you play live or no.

Speaker 3 (22:45):
No, we've talked about doing some covers and stuff, which
is now a lot more of possibility that we've got
Dan in the live setup because we were just playing
to like recorded bass tracks before, you know, from the record,
and so comunities for that are kind of more available now,
So I mean I'd be down to explore that kind
of stuff for sure, But for the most part, were

(23:06):
just playing stuff from the record and trying to promote
that we've got a ton of vinyl that we need
to get rid of. So what do you mean, oh,
just like vinyl records.

Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (23:15):
Yeah, we're trying to play the songs that are on
the on the record for people to try and entice
them into buying it.

Speaker 1 (23:23):
Yeah, I got you.

Speaker 5 (23:24):
I got many copies that we have.

Speaker 2 (23:28):
You could be.

Speaker 5 (23:31):
So we have less of them.

Speaker 1 (23:36):
Was that hard playing with bass tracks live? Was that challenging?

Speaker 3 (23:41):
I mean the process of like setting up the Ableton
session and everything was and that's why I had Bane
do it. And uh but uh yeah, I mean once
it's all been set up, it's not that bad. You know,
our drummer is kind of a machine, okay, so having
him played to a metronome, it's pretty easy. As far
as getting everybody else locked in.

Speaker 1 (24:03):
It wasn't It wasn't weird for him, or maybe or
maybe it was, but he adapted them.

Speaker 3 (24:07):
He adapted pretty well, I don't think that there was
like a huge problem for him. You know, each each
song has kind of its own counting and everything. I
think that was the only like learning curve.

Speaker 5 (24:16):
Okay, Yeah, he's he kind of takes most things in stride,
if I'm going to be honest. We threw a lot
at him.

Speaker 1 (24:24):
Really.

Speaker 5 (24:25):
Yeah, We're like, hey, you gotta do this, this and this.

Speaker 3 (24:27):
And he's got a hard job.

Speaker 5 (24:29):
Yeah, he's got one of the hardest jobs in the
house for sure. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (24:33):
He's back there singing too, Oh he is. Okay, yeah,
backup vocals there.

Speaker 1 (24:39):
That always impresses me. You know, drummers who can sing
while they play, you know, because drums is the most
you know, you're using all four of your loombs. It's
the most physical. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (24:47):
And he's doing like harmonies, like the chorus harmonies on
like Pip and stuff. Oh yeah, dude, he's He's crazy.

Speaker 5 (24:53):
Watching him do it too. I Mean there's a there's
one part I think it's in the second course at
Titans Grip where I'm looking at him when we're in practice,
I'll just be looking at him. He's leaned over, you know,
to the mic to try to sing and the arms
are going, and he's playing so much complex stuff on
the drums and he's just keeping his head here yeah,

(25:13):
and nailing the note too, and then he just finishes
and looks at the rest of us, like pretty much
every time. Then he knows, well, we'll look at him
and just give him an affirming nod of yeah, that
was on. And he just always goes, you know, some
iteration of like, you know, lips out like you know, heck, yeah.

Speaker 1 (25:33):
Very cool.

Speaker 5 (25:33):
Yeah, he's the man.

Speaker 1 (25:35):
Oh, by the way, you're getting some love in the
chat room here, Bradley Hurley says, can't say enough great
things about this band. I'm a huge fan of this band.

Speaker 5 (25:42):
And Jane Oh shouts out Bradley, what's up.

Speaker 1 (25:47):
Very nice, thank you for chiming in there, Bradley, excellent,
thank you.

Speaker 5 (25:49):
Bradley.

Speaker 1 (25:50):
Yeah, yeah, oh, we were talking. We had an interesting
conversation off air two about lyrics, circling back to lyrics
for a moment because you know, I was commenting how
it's it's nice when I you know, I don't mind
making radio edits for our guests, but it's nice when
I don't have to and I never have to make
any radio edits for requesting Beast, which is nice.

Speaker 3 (26:09):
Because we don't hit the swearing. Yeah, what's interesting about this.
I think that's a very like conscious decision on our
part because it's like, I don't know, you can throw
a ton of swears into a song if you want to. Yeah,
Like I don't know. Personally, it's like a very weak
creative decision. I mean there's so many words, you know that, like,
I don't know, choosing to swear for like edginess sake

(26:32):
is like kind of weak to me. And what's funny
is that I that idea kind of came from with
Corey uh, what's his name, Slipknot Corey Taylor, Yeah, because
he made that switch. And when I was like super
young and angsty, I remember being.

Speaker 1 (26:51):
Like that's lamp, You're not gonna swear anymore.

Speaker 3 (26:53):
And then I got older and I started like kind
of like, you know, listening to the slip Knot sort
of evolution, like the maturity and like the lyric writing
and stuff, and you know, I mean you go back
and listen to that first record and some of it's
like headbanger stuff, but yeah, a lot of it, like
I don't know, spit it out, Like I really want
to go and listen to that right now. Yeah, I don't.

Speaker 5 (27:13):
Yeah, good song, great song, pretty intense, Like I don't know.

Speaker 1 (27:19):
Sometimes one catches me off guard is when it's like,
you know, it's one thing if it's if it's metal,
certain kinds of metal or hip hop, but if you
hear you know, just a singer songwriter and they've got
like the S word just in there, it's like, you know,
because it's like, oh, you're a singer songwriter, but ooh
you're edgy.

Speaker 4 (27:36):
Right, you know.

Speaker 5 (27:39):
Variety is the spice.

Speaker 3 (27:41):
And that's not to say that I think as like
a blanket rule like swearing in songs bad or lazy,
you know what I mean. But I do think it's
a tool that like should be used at certain points.
Like like my buddy Joe plays in this band called
Dirt Byre and he's got this song called Fentanyl, and uh,

(28:04):
there's this really powerful part when he first comes in
to this one line he says, you keep fing around,
and I'm like, it's super powerful because of what he's
talking about, you know what I mean. Sure, But like
I don't know, a lot of times I'm like, it
doesn't have that same effect.

Speaker 1 (28:19):
Right right by the way, Jane, looks like you're getting
some familial love in the chat room. Mommy loves you, Jane. Yeh, Shelley,
that's your your mom. That's very nice, very nice.

Speaker 5 (28:32):
Thank you, mother.

Speaker 3 (28:34):
We love Shelley.

Speaker 5 (28:35):
Yeah, I love you too.

Speaker 1 (28:37):
No, that's great. Actually the subject came up to with
our first guest today, uh, waiting for Ze. We're on
and we're talking about it's a nice one when you
have supportive family members. Also, oh, I missed this comment earlier.
Kyle Gatto is in the chat room and says more
than Matt, what's good brother, Welcome Kyle. Yeah, I mean
it's it's Uh. I also think though too, it would

(28:59):
be weird because of the style and the genre of
the music that you do. Sure it would Actually it
would be strange word in there, you know.

Speaker 3 (29:08):
Yeah, I mean nobody's thinking of like I don't know,
mid century or like medieval times, and like you know,
everybody's running around with like swearing a whole bunch. I
don't know. It feels like it should be more like
regal and like hoity toity and you know, almost have
a bit of a curtsy just embedded in the lyrics.

Speaker 4 (29:29):
You know what.

Speaker 3 (29:30):
I feel like there's like a certain level of like,
I don't know, fanciful that it like needs.

Speaker 1 (29:39):
No, I know, I know what you mean. Although if
you watch like some some of the Monty Python movies
that are period pieces, it seems like there was a
lot of swearing back then. But absolutely, yeah, no, I
know what you mean.

Speaker 5 (29:50):
Though.

Speaker 1 (29:50):
Yeah, I think I think profanity would be very awkward
in your music. It would, you know, it would almost
be like, I don't know, there's I think that genre
it just it doesn't fit. But no, so I and
I think it's great that you're you're so conscientious about
the lyrics that you will you know, use you know,
there's so many words. Sure, you know the English language,

(30:12):
we have so many words, you know, So why not
be creative?

Speaker 3 (30:14):
Yeah exactly. I mean we spend so much time arguing
about like the sourus related opinions. Oh yeah, when we're
writing lyrics. So when we write lyrics, generally it's me,
our drummer and our vocalists all working together. Sometimes Jane's
into Jane generally helps more with like the melodic elements
of like the vocals and like the rhythmic elements of everything,

(30:38):
but as far as like the lyrics goes, it's like
the three of us generally kind of going back and
forth about what the best way to say, like what
we're trying to convey is yeah, and so it prevents
it from like being kind of like overbearing in like
one person's style, you know, and we get this kind
of cool average I think that works out really well
and represents the band as a whole. Yeah, pretty beautifully.

Speaker 1 (31:01):
Yeah, No, I think that's I think that's really cool.
I think we should play another track from the from
the album, and you did send me another one that
you wanted to highlight.

Speaker 3 (31:11):
I think Beneath Red Leaves, right, yes, Beneath Red Leaves fantastic.

Speaker 1 (31:15):
Yeah, we can. We can give that a spin, and
then at the end of the show we'll probably play
another one from the album. I have your I do
have because I do have the album pulled up and
I love love your music. I think it's really good. Absolutely,
So I check this out. This is called Beneath Red
Leaves and the band is questing beast.

Speaker 4 (32:33):
A Hound it back, it through is gone, I still
it attack, I see a pis a piece of bad
PA seek through back now.

Speaker 6 (32:48):
You seek to clime. If that said please about the hate,
it's pass called me a stall. We got crock work.

Speaker 4 (33:02):
Still stop with snort kill got.

Speaker 1 (33:05):
By so we got struck right the coming sail.

Speaker 6 (33:11):
We got thrunt sing fill the sky is things well,
can't my hide?

Speaker 5 (33:17):
We got broadwise.

Speaker 6 (33:30):
A fine let's all little seal snot get away, spike
swim heels, God brass corse his shield and my fall.

Speaker 3 (33:38):
We s can't big on me the yack.

Speaker 4 (33:49):
M I woted time stumping it through the star.

Speaker 1 (33:54):
No, not that back, I.

Speaker 4 (33:58):
See me overs it a man sending me for us.

Speaker 6 (34:06):
Scars to you time you know, but that time saying
nothing he thanks gone dejai okaya, but I'm stand with
sures killed, don't but soul okay, comic si do not

(34:29):
forday final course commit our life.

Speaker 4 (34:33):
You bet to die? That okay?

Speaker 5 (35:30):
Right us? Okay?

Speaker 1 (36:00):
That is beneath Red Leaves. The band is Questing Bees
and that is from their album Birth That is so good.
And they're going to be playing if you are listening
live on Saturday, they're gonna be tomorrow night. They're going
to be Sunday night at Terminus Underground. What time does
that show start.

Speaker 3 (36:16):
So doors are at six o'clock. I believe we are
on at seven. We're opening up that show.

Speaker 1 (36:21):
Well, who else is on the show with you?

Speaker 4 (36:22):
Do?

Speaker 3 (36:22):
You know? Off Dog eight Dog and Sunset Electric?

Speaker 5 (36:26):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (36:26):
Nice, Yeah, we've had We've had both bands on the show.

Speaker 3 (36:29):
Oh cool.

Speaker 1 (36:29):
Dog eight Dog was with us a couple of weeks ago. Actually, yeah, nice,
really really cool. Oh yeah, they're they're amazing.

Speaker 3 (36:35):
Now.

Speaker 1 (36:36):
So a song like that, I mean, does that take
a while for that to come together?

Speaker 3 (36:41):
I mean in terms of just honestly, that was probably
one of the faster ones, was it. Yeah, So that
was one of the last two that we wrote, right,
the ones that we had mentioned before we started playing,
And I had had that rift, the main rift that
a button't it yeah, for a little bit. And Jane,
I think, had had that intro kind of written out

(37:02):
from something that we had messed around with during practice,
and so we essentially just like fused those two things together,
came up with the solo section, and I had a
little alternate version that became the outroka and yeah, we
knocked that thing out I think in.

Speaker 1 (37:19):
A day, no kidding.

Speaker 5 (37:20):
Yeah, solo section chords.

Speaker 3 (37:23):
The solo took forever to write.

Speaker 5 (37:24):
Yeah, for a long time. I would say the solo
section chords and the fast like thrashy part probably one
of my proudest moments. Also, so having an awesome guitar
solo on top of it too, And that was like
the cherry on top. That was like the last thing
for the song. That song, that song is super hard

(37:45):
to play live.

Speaker 3 (37:45):
Yeah, it's probably the hardest one on the record.

Speaker 5 (37:48):
Yeah, it's so fun.

Speaker 1 (37:50):
Yeah, Yeah, I'm fascinated by that because I you know,
I'm a musician. I used to play in some bands,
but I never played in anything that did anything that,
you know, with time changes and you know, demanding. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So,
so I'm very impressed. Yeah, that's uh, that's that's really good. Oh.
By the way, in the chat room, so Bradley Hurley

(38:12):
uh said to your mom. Uh, oh, you should know
your daughter has helped my recovery and life so much
for the better.

Speaker 5 (38:20):
Oh.

Speaker 1 (38:20):
So very nice. You're getting a lot of love in there.
That is awesome. That is awesome. And then so when
does the now? When does the tour start again? Uh?

Speaker 3 (38:31):
April twenty fifth is the first day of tor playing
Ralph's okay in rock, Yeah, that one is going to
be with uh so Moontomb obviously, Horror, Perennial Quest and
mercury Burns First.

Speaker 1 (38:48):
Oh okay, great, yeah, yeah, yeah we had mercury Burns
First on a couple of months ago, and we've had
Horror on too. So yeah, that's a that's that's really strong.
That's great. Now with the with the tour, will this
be your your first time traveling out of New England
with the band? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (39:02):
Oh yeah yeah. Well the furthest we've gone up to
this point is that we played out in Connecticut at
some point last year. Okay, but yeah, this will be
the furthest out we've gone in Maryland, I think in Baltimore.

Speaker 1 (39:15):
Okay, yeah, we're in Baltimore. What's what venue? Do you
do you remember?

Speaker 3 (39:19):
Yeah? We're playing the Depot okay in Baltimore.

Speaker 1 (39:21):
Okay, nice? Nice? And then do you have so who's
is it just the four of you now live now
that you have a live bass player, is it five
of us? There's five of you?

Speaker 3 (39:38):
Oh yeah, so we've got lead singer, two guitars, bass player, drummer.

Speaker 1 (39:43):
Okay, and then so so before you would play with
bass tracks. Did you always have a live drummer? Yeah, yeah,
you did always have a live drummer. Okay, all right,
that makes sense, So it was just a bass player
that you didn't have before.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
Officially, okay, it's a lot easier to get away with
not having a live bass this then a live drummer, same.

Speaker 1 (40:02):
A bass player. So that makes me sad. But but no,
I understand though, because bass players are hard to find.

Speaker 3 (40:09):
Something they really are. They're in such high demand, you
know what I mean. Like, I don't know if I
if I wanted to be a career musician, I definitely
would pick up, like, you know, like a higher gun
type guy. Bass or drums is like what you want
to do.

Speaker 1 (40:21):
Yeah, you know. Yeah. My theory about yeah, because drummers
are hard to find too, and in fact, we've seen
you know, Jenny knows this. We've had so many bands
on the show where the drummer specifically is in like
ten different projects. And uh, my theory about that is,
you know, when you're growing up and you first you
become interested interested in playing an instrument, and you have
the conversation with the parents, you know, I want to

(40:42):
play drums. They're going to try to talk you out
of that, oh for sure, because nobody wants live drums
and their you know, in their attic or whatever.

Speaker 3 (40:49):
No, especially if it's being played by somebody who doesn't
know how to do it right exactly.

Speaker 1 (40:52):
Yeah, that's the worst. Yeah, drums or the tuba or
probably the two that your parents are going to try
to actively talk you out of, like, well, do you
really want to play that?

Speaker 3 (41:00):
Are you sure you want the violin?

Speaker 5 (41:02):
Right?

Speaker 6 (41:03):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (41:03):
Violin? Yeah, that one could be a problem too, but
uh yeah, so yeah, drums and uh, drums and and
drummers and bass players are usually the hardest to find.

Speaker 5 (41:13):
So you're bringing up some some childhood memories of me
setting up a secondhand drum set in my parents' basement.
Oh yeah, and since my mom is probably still watching,
I wonder if she remembers opening the door to the
basement and yelling down to me to please stop.

Speaker 1 (41:31):
Oh really?

Speaker 3 (41:34):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (41:36):
Oh man, did you did you continue to play drums
or my?

Speaker 3 (41:42):
Not?

Speaker 5 (41:42):
I I never really played drum set, so it's funny. Actually,
my trajectory is a musician. I started on piano and
then I started playing percussion in like middle school, middle
school band and stuff like that, and then I started
playing marching percussion in high school, so I played I
played like xylophone and stuff like that, like pit percussion

(42:06):
for marching band. And then also during concert season I
would play pit percussion, but during marching band season, I
would play snare drum. But I think I was when
I was a senior, I was marching snare, but I
marched some other things in parades too. But I picked
up guitar in high school at the same time. The
drumming didn't really come with me in any sense of
the word. After I graduated high school.

Speaker 1 (42:28):
Yeah. Yeah, Oh, by the way, your mom says in
the chat room, that's a lie. She's an eyes yelling
at you. I guess to stop.

Speaker 5 (42:36):
All right, Well, maybe you know, all right, maybe some
selective memory on one or both parties.

Speaker 3 (42:46):
I do.

Speaker 5 (42:47):
I do firmly, and I will have a firm stance
on the fact that it was not the preferred situation.

Speaker 1 (42:54):
Okay, understood, understood. Yeah, but that is an unusual trajectory though.
I think you're right in terms of because I feel
like I forget who we were talking about this with.
But I feel like most most people who play drums
who play other instruments as well, drum. They usually get
to drums at the end, you know, like they like
they start on guitar, bass or piano or whatever, and
then eventually they get to drums. But it sounds like you, well,

(43:16):
you started on piano, right, but then Yeah, but drums
was early.

Speaker 5 (43:19):
Yeah, drum drums were early. I think I started on
I think I started on piano when I was like seven. Yeah,
and I still play piano. I still, I still play
piano pretty regularly. But yeah, I think it's interesting. I
think I started picking up percussion in fifth grade. Maybe

(43:40):
I think I was eleven or twelve when I started
picking it up, so, you know, only another five years later,
and I kind of did things in stages. I left
a lot of piano behind as far as my main
focus once I kind of got into high school. My

(44:01):
mom will also agree with this. I stopped actually really
practicing for my lessons, so I would learn stuff that
I was playing. You know, I was in the school
jazz band and stuff like that, so I would practice
that stuff kind of. But I stopped taking formal piano
lessons when I was maybe fourteen. I don't blame her whatsoever.

(44:22):
She didn't want to support me doing it if I
wasn't actually going to practice any of the material, and
I had. Yeah, I was like, I don't want to
learn classical music, like I want to play cool stuff, right,
I want to play guitar now, you know.

Speaker 1 (44:38):
Yeah, not rebel, yeah, real rebel.

Speaker 5 (44:43):
It really only served to hold me back really, uh,
in the future. I'm fortunate enough that I was able
to like get back into everything kind of universally, you
know what I mean. I ended up playing drums. No,
it's not true. I did play drums in a band
when I was in college. We were not good really, yeah,
a little punk band, you know. But yeah, it served

(45:06):
me well as far as all the other things that
I did, yeah, you know, musically, but yeah, very interesting.
I'm back into piano pretty regularly now, you know. I
play guitar every week, okay, but no drumming.

Speaker 4 (45:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (45:18):
Yeah, they hate it when I get them a drum set,
that's true.

Speaker 3 (45:20):
Yeah, yeah it's bad.

Speaker 1 (45:25):
But actually starting on piano though, that's good because I've
heard a lot of Uh. I've heard so many music
teachers and instructors and even Berkeley professors say that ideally,
when when you're young and you're starting out getting into music.
That's the ideal place. Keyboard, any kind of keyboard is
the ideal place to start in terms of building blocks

(45:46):
for learning how to play music. Like that's like the
single best place to start is learning how to play
a keyboard.

Speaker 3 (45:53):
Yeah, I would agree with that. I mean yeah, because
it's just up and it's just up and down. There's
none of this like dumb sideways stuff where like you're
repeating the same exact note like on guitar. You know, there's, however,
many different places to play each note that's like in
the same exact octave. You know that. It's like, I
don't know, there's it's a lot more open to interpretation

(46:14):
than I think that playing like piano or something like
that is. And so it's really easy to see the
more linear nature of music in that way than trying
to like figure out a guitar fret board and be.

Speaker 1 (46:27):
Like exactly only and what's that right, right? Yeah, yeah, exactly.
And I guess there's research to these shows that are
really it's the fastest way to train your brain to
understand music and understand music theory and everything is just
learning on the keyboard. But which I didn't do, unfortunately,
I wish I had.

Speaker 3 (46:43):
But yeah, I mean it would even give you like
a really good rhythmic foundation if you wanted to switch
over to like drums or something like that. A lot
of people consider it to be a pretty percussive instrument itself.

Speaker 1 (46:53):
Right right, Yeah, exactly. Well that might explain your trajectory
there in the beginning.

Speaker 5 (46:57):
With it definitely does. It's everything. It was an easy
you know bridge, it's everything. It's it's melody, harmony, uh,
you know, bassline me, you know what I mean. I
definitely because of that, I'd say my biggest strength in
this band would be composition, you know. It's it's interesting

(47:20):
my technique and my proficiency on the instrument on guitar
has had to develop. I mean, I've become an infinitely
better guitar player than I was when we first started
writing music in like twenty nineteen. My my actual playing
was just so behind every step of the way when

(47:41):
I was learning guitar. But my main skill is being
able to take I call it piano brain, you know,
whenever we're doing anything. I just I got the visual
piano in the sky okay, okay, And I kind of
have to translate from guitar to piano in my mind
and then back to guitar. It mixed communicating with him
them not great sometimes and and everybody else too. This

(48:04):
stuff going on in my brain is sometimes hard to explain.
But given the opportunity to put it down and then
explain it in terms of everyone's individual instrument and understanding,
I've been told I do a good job and it's
probably my biggest I would say it's probably my biggest
attribute and contribution other than like the technical side of things, okay,

(48:25):
as far as like tech actual technology, yeah, and setting
that stuff up. So yeah, you know, let me just
talk about myself for a bit.

Speaker 1 (48:35):
Now. That's uh no, that that's very interesting. And yeah,
I think everything you says you said, they're really bolsters
that idea that you know, learning on the keyboard is
the best way to start.

Speaker 5 (48:45):
Well, what about you?

Speaker 1 (48:46):
And by the way, if you're just joining us, we're
joined by a questing beast. Here in studio. We have
Jane and Shane here, and so I'm curious about your
trajectory now, Shane.

Speaker 3 (48:55):
So I had almost none of that. I always wanted
to play guitar when I was seven I got appetite
for this struction, and I would be listening to that
and be like, how are they making these sounds happen?
It was the first time I remember hearing like stereo
guitar parts and noticing that, like each guitar was doing
totally different things. And so that s more than like

(49:17):
even like you know, slashes soloing being you know, great
or whatever. It was the interaction between the guitars, like
the riffs, and the way that the playing the two
different things culminated in this one new thing that's ultimately
way better than the individual things on its own, always
really spoke to me. And so when I inevitably started
picking up guitar at like twelve years old, that I

(49:42):
started going towards rock and roll like immediately, and Jane
and I started writing music together when we were like fifteen. Yeah,
And it was funny because I had taken I had
a guitar teacher at the time who had kind of
like burnt me out on it because it was like
I didn't feel like I was really learning a lot
of stuff, and I felt like, you know, very stagnant.

(50:02):
So I stopped playing for a while, and then one
day I was like trying to figure out something that
I was hearing in my head. I was like, oh,
I wonder how you play that? And I didn't play
it right at all. I played a totally new thing,
and I was like, that's not the thing I was
looking for. But it's pretty cool on its own. And
I ended up talking to Jane at that point and

(50:24):
being like, hey, I came up with this thing, like
do you want to write the rest of it with me?
And yeah?

Speaker 1 (50:31):
And that was so that was really the beginning of sure, yeah,
of all this right.

Speaker 3 (50:35):
Oh yeah, wow, yeah a long time ago.

Speaker 5 (50:37):
Yeah, fifteen years later. Wow, it sounds a lot different
than it did when we were hanging out, just playing
through a couple tiny little combo am in his bedroom.

Speaker 1 (50:48):
Yeah, yeah, I can imagine, Yeah, I can imagine. Well
before we run out of time, so I want to
make sure we remind everybody about you know two things.
Of course, you know that you got the big show
tomorrow and at Terminus Underground in Nashua and then and
the tour. And also to where people can go online
to keep up with everything that you're doing.

Speaker 3 (51:08):
Yeah, absolutely, if you're on Instagram, you can find us
at Questing beasts. There's no punctuation or anything. We really
lucked out on that screen name there. We're also on Facebook.
Those are like the two primary social places that we're at.
We stream our music everywhere, and we've got the link
tree on the Instagram page and on the Facebook page,
so it's very easily accessible. We can find our music anywhere.

Speaker 1 (51:32):
And yeah, excellent, excellent. Yeah, so be a terminus tomorrow night.
And then the tour started. What was a start date
April fifth?

Speaker 3 (51:41):
Yeah, at Ralphs Rock Diner.

Speaker 1 (51:43):
Yeah, Yeah, congratulations on that. That's amazing.

Speaker 3 (51:46):
Thank you. Yeah, I know we're stoked for that.

Speaker 1 (51:47):
That's amazing. Jane and Shane, thank you both so much
for joining us.

Speaker 3 (51:52):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (51:52):
This has been wonderful. And what should we I'll let
you pick. Well, we'll play one more track from Birth
to close out the show. What should we? What should
we play?

Speaker 5 (52:00):
Uh?

Speaker 3 (52:00):
You want to do corruption? It's one of the heavier ones.
I'm trying to push it out there. It's the it's
like the only song that hasn't hit like a thousand
on Spotify yet.

Speaker 1 (52:08):
Oh no kidding.

Speaker 3 (52:09):
And also I'm trying to I want to do a
side project where I do death metal vocals. So if
you don't an death metal band and you need a vocalist,
you call me up.

Speaker 1 (52:17):
All right, all right, and let's see if we can
push some streams on. This track absolutely sounds great. This
is from the album is Birth and the band is
Question Beast.

Speaker 2 (52:27):
Thanks again, brought the stuff shot in my mind longest

(52:54):
myns Guy's boy Die.

Speaker 4 (52:58):
Train no vocal on I'm sorry, I say by Mentorian,
I have alread hurried now I'm selling.

Speaker 3 (53:13):
My start was taken.

Speaker 4 (53:15):
St shot.

Speaker 6 (53:20):
Around sound shut up, It's.

Speaker 5 (53:29):
I don't where.

Speaker 4 (53:32):
Good Boat Shad, Stone Don't Wait, Take.

Speaker 3 (53:39):
Back the Car Roads.

Speaker 1 (53:41):
First Boat Flash and Stone God Don't Wait.

Speaker 4 (53:47):
Take it Back Far Roads Rise