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 A California Son Grows Up in the California Sun
By Vinny Smith
Listen in on any conversation about country music in Los Angeles and there is one name that will inevitably pop up every time: Dave Gleason. Well-respected, not just in L.A. but throughout California for his guitar-playing prowess, there is hardly a stage in this state he hasn’t played. He is a third generation singer-songwriter-musician who has just released his fourth CD, Turn and Fade.
Dave and I recently sat down for some Mexican food at Latigo Kid, located right next door to the legendary Canyon Club in Agoura Hills, CA to chat about music and his long career in the business.
VINNY SMITH—Like myself, you grew up in Northern California?
DAVE GLEASON—I was born in Milwaukee but we moved to Concord in the Bay Area in 1973. When we moved there it was a town of maybe 18,000 people and plenty of huge walnut orchards where I could ride my BMX bike around. My dad was a musician and there were probably 20 really good old honky tonks that he used to play in in that area and now they’re literally all gone.
VS—I remember, there were so many great places. It’s really sad they’re not there anymore.
DG—Times change, of course. I don’t know where they all went but there used to be some great places in Benecia and Vallejo was one of the hotbeds. That’s where my dad got most of his work. I always bring this up when I’m speaking about country music, everywhere back in the seventies had a lot more of these kind of places but Northern California was such a hot spot—nothing can rival Austin, Texas at this point, but there were that many places from Sacramento down to San Jose—there had to be a hundred venues that were constantly functioning. One of the only ones I know that’s still open is in the town of Clayton, a place called the Clayton Club.
VS—It seems like around here a lot of the dance club-type places are hard for new or different or dare I say, more traditional country bands to get into. A lot of time I see the same bands in there month after month.
 DG—There are a few places where their crowd focuses more on the dance thing and you have to be able to pull out some Marty Robbins or some Brooks & Dunn. The Cinema Bar or the Grand Old Echo-style bands, which I’m definitely a part of that whole crowd, it’s pretty tough for us to get accepted into the dance club kind of scene, even though I’ve played there a bunch but it’s only been playing lead guitar for people. It’s a different world, you have to be able to call out these dances and lead the crowd through it.
VS—Do you find there is a separation between those two groups of country musicians?
DG—It’s almost like the venues keep it separate because if I’m in either environment it seems like there’s a cross-pollination of people from both camps and they all seem to just mainly dig the music and if they can dance, great, and if not they’re just kind of happy to find some camaraderie in it. It’s tough to go into a dance club and say you want to play original music. It probably won’t go so well for you. It’s been said that some people are too country for some of the country venues.
VS—What brought you down to L.A. after all those years in the Bay Area?
DG—Literally just, the venues vanished. There are still bands doing country and roots stuff up there but it seemed like we had a good five year run or so where there were a bunch of places that wanted to book it. There were a bunch of bands that were excited by the music and there seemed to be all this momentum and then for some reason it just disappeared one day. Some of the venues all closed simultaneously and it was kind of like no one really knew where to go anymore so for me to keep working I had to move.
VS—I figure you probably had a good foothold down here anyway.
DG—Yeah, I’ve been coming down here for years and I had to keep coming down here more and more but I kept meeting more people, more great players, great singer/songwriters in bands and I met with a continuously supportive scene here so I just had to get out of the Bay Area. There was just nothing up there for me. It was almost like I had to leave the area and now when I go back up there I can kind of play better venues.
VS—It seems like you go up there quite often to play.
 DG—I go up every six to eight weeks. For a while I kind of backed off from going up there. I have a Northern California line-up and I have two different line-ups down here. I finally found a northern California group that I really enjoy playing with. They live in Sacramento, The Golden Cadillacs. They’re younger than me, late twenties. They’re great players, great pedal steel player, great guitar player. As soon as I hooked up with those guys and they started backing me on shows, going up there sounded a lot more fun than it had for a while.
VS—I didn’t realize The Golden Cadillacs were already going, I thought they were a new band you put together like the Wasted Days band.
DG—They are a functioning unit and a great band. Their guitar player is also in Hellbound Glory. It seems like California is like a tight-knit little community of us and a great little circle of friends and players. That’s the great thing about this kind of music; we all know each other and support each other. We all look forward to seeing each other’s shows and playing together. I’m lucky enough that so many people let me jump up and sit in with them. It’s a fun thing to be a part of. Being on stage and playing is a great way to participate in the community of it. It was harder to achieve up north, but down here I find it everywhere. That’s why in my groups I always have kind of an open, revolving door for friends who want to come and sit in.
VS—And you’ve been able to make a living in music rather than have the proverbial “day job?”
DG—Yes, but it’s a hard thing to keep a balance of, it’s like I’m juggling 10 apples or something. It takes a lot of work, I drive around a lot and do a lot of shows and play lead guitar for a lot of folks. That’s just kind of what it takes.
VS—If you had an ideal career would it be more playing or recording or songwriting? It sounds like you’re really more into the performing aspect than anything else.
DG—I think it’s such an important part of maintaining those other two sides of it you mentioned because I love the songwriting thing, I love getting into the studio and doing stuff. It’s almost like to be playing live and participating in the real world keeps the spark going. It’s almost necessary. It’s something that you get addicted to. My friend Chuck Prophet told me several years ago, “Be careful, Dave, you’ll get addicted to 200 dates a year and next thing you know you’ll be sitting at home trying to watch TV and you just can’t, you’ll be out bugging all your friends to let you sit in and play guitar.” He was 100% correct.
VS—Have you done a lot of touring around the country?
DG—I haven’t done a whole lot of touring. I’ve done runs up the East Coast, been to Austin and Nashville quite a few times. Been through Arizona and up through Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Utah and things like that. I’ve never put out a record, jumped in a van with a band and hit the road. I don’t have a booking agent so just kind of booking that yourself and trying to come up with guarantees and all that to make the whole thing work, it’s so difficult. I’ll have to see. But gas is so expensive, financially it almost kind of makes sense to hire a band in a certain city and fly out to them.
VS—You probably have friends in a lot of cities. I’m sure if you wanted to go to Dallas or something, you could get people you already know there to come out and play with you.
DG—I’m sure it would be pretty easy to hone in on someone wherever I might want to go.
VS—What kind of music did you listen to growing up? Did you always listen to country or country rock?
 DG—That was always with me because of the records my dad had around the house which were pretty much anything with cool guitar on it. My dad was a guitar player so we of course had a bunch of Ventures albums and Buck Owens albums. The records I really remember hearing repeatedly that really started making sense to me were the first few Rodney Crowell records on Warner Bros. and maybe the first few Emmylou Harris records. And I was always aware of Gram Parsons because I would see his songwriting credit on some of those Emmylou records. There was just something about the great mix of the rock. You could hear Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis influences, mixed in with Buck Owens and Bakersfield stuff and Hank Williams and the Louvin Brothers. Then you had Albert Lee and James Burton completely ripping their guitars to shreds all over all those tunes. I just thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever heard. For some reason I liked the aggressive rock approach. It just had a youthful sound to it that really grabbed me. There is just so much great stuff with country music, people just have no idea.
VS—There really is and it drives me crazy when people say they hate country music. I think it’s ridiculous to just dismiss it. I always ask them if they’re talking about the stuff on regular radio, because that’s not real country. There’s a lot better stuff out there, especially the old country.
DG—I remember back in the 80’s and 90’s, so many friends of mine and some other folks would start side country bands; the lyrics would be stupid, no one could play because they were all like these punk rock guys and I’d ask them why they were doing it and they would say “because the country shit is the easiest shit to play, it’s hilarious.” I’d say, “You’ve got to be kidding me, have you ever heard Eldon Shamblin? Jimmy Bryant? Speedy West? Those guys aren’t fucking around." At least we seemed to have moved past that era. I can remember a lot of bands around and unfortunately drawing a lot of people because it was just, “so funny.” A lot of folks don’t realize how intricate it is. It’s not easy.
VS—I’ve talked to a lot of rock guys and I find it interesting when they say they appreciate it because there’s a certain difficulty in playing it and they just can’t quite get it.
DG—There’s a phrasing and a subtle toughness to a lot of it. It’s almost like you have to believe it more than your ability. I’ve never had a guitar lesson in my life, I honestly barely even know what I’m doing but one thing I will say for myself is I can mimic that sound and pull it out. There’s a place I can get to and pull it out that no one showed me how to do. It was like I tried to learn the emotion rather than sit down with an instructional tape.
VS--When did you start playing guitar?
DG—When I was a kid I was a drummer, I actually didn’t start playing guitar until I was in my late teens.
VS—I’m not a musician, but I’ve always wondered how one decides to go with a certain type of guitar. For example, I have never seen you play anything but a Fender Telecaster. Why that over, say, a Gibson Les Paul or something like that?
 DG—That’s a good question because I know a lot of people who own two of every guitar, I’ve tried to play them all, I love Stratocasters and I love Les Paul’s and pretty much any guitar, but a Telecaster is the only one that really feels comfortable to me, it just seems to fit exactly how I move and play. It just seems like certain players and their styles can really pick up on certain kinds of guitars. Jimmy Page is always great on a Tele—I think he’s playing a Tele on the first Led Zeppelin record and most of Led Zeppelin II but as soon as he got into the Les Paul thing, the records started sounding different and you could tell that he really got comfortable. And I only play Martin acoustics, that’s the other thing. There’s just something about them that make sense to me and I have no idea why.
VS—Have you ever tried to play pedal steel?
DG—I’ve goofed around with it a tiny bit but playing pedal steel is a lifelong, full body and mind and soul commitment and the people that I know that play it are some of my favorite people in the world. I wish I could play it but it’s like playing lead guitar, rhythm guitar, slide guitar and piano while driving a stick shift all at the same time.
VS—Being a non-musician it would seem to me that it would not be a big step to go from lead guitar to pedal steel, but the more people I talk to, it sounds like it actually is.
DG—One thing that’s always overlooked on playing pedal steel is like on a guitar you have frets on the neck and pretty much wherever you land your fingers in those frets, it’s going to be in tune but on a pedal steel, there are no frets so whenever those guys are landing on a chord that might sound easy you’ve got to have that bar right in the sweet spot. If you’re a centimeter off or you’re slightly crooked, your guitar is going to sound out of tune. It’s precision, it’s rocket science, it’s amazing. I envy those guys and I don’t know how in the heck they do it.
VS—Do you read music.
DG—No.
VS—Some of the greatest players I’ve ever heard don’t read music.
DG—Some of the greatest players can. Chet Atkins probably could; Jerry Reed, I really doubt. Jerry Reed is my favorite. I don’t know of anybody who is more underrated.
 VS—Who’s on your bucket list in terms of people you want to meet in the music business?
DG—I would love to talk with Linda Ronstadt. I love her early 70’s country/rock records. Her Heart Like a Wheel record is one of my favorite country/rock records of all time. Porter Wagoner is one I would have loved to have met, I just love that guy’s records. I love that he was an artist who had a career that spanned 40 years or so and a good 38 years of it are just consistently great records. For years, I was always pushing his records on people. You know who else I’d love to meet is, Marty Stuart.
VS—I can’t believe you mentioned him because he is absolutely one of my favorite artists. Not only is he a phenomenal musician but he has such an appreciation of country music history and I don't think he gets enough credit.
DG—I would just really like to have that guy as a friend.
VS—What’s on your radar screen as far as what you would like to accomplish in music?
DG—I don’t really have an exact set goal for myself but the person I always look back on because I like where his career is at, I really like him personally, he has been very cool to me, he always puts on a great show and can pretty much draw a good number of people everywhere he goes is the great Dave Alvin.
VS—Definitely!
DG—I was lucky enough to open some shows with him last year. I very closely watched how he related to folks when he would show up for a sound check, how he would do a sound check, how he would walk in and pretty much get the sound he wanted in about 10 minutes. Then the way he would show up to the show and deal with the band, deal with himself, deal with everybody who wanted to talk to him then go out there and completely blow the place apart for like three hours. I just took a lot from how he paced his show and how he would roll to the next one and do the same thing. There should be a documentary on one of his tours and how he handles the whole thing. It’s the most graceful, well-handled situation I’ve ever seen. It’s just fantastic. He’d make everybody feel like you were his buddy. It’s a very special quality to have and I’ve taken a lot of influence from that. I would love to be just like that, to react to the world just like that.
 VS—I think you’ve made great headway toward that because I’ve never heard a bad thing associated with your name. That’s probably one of the reasons you keep working, along with being good at what you do.
DG—That’s a very important part of it, definitely so.
VS—I see you post a lot on Facebook what you’re listening to at the moment which I think is cool because helps people like me discover new music.
DG—That’s one of my favorite things about Facebook. I often post what I’m listening to and it’s not to brag about how cool it is what I’m listening to but just to reach out and see if anyone else is hip to those Jerry Reed—Chet Atkins records from 1971 & ’72 or whatever.
VS— It sounds like you have an extensive record collection.
DG—I also have a huge collection of 78’s and 45’s and my wife also has a huge collection. George Jones, Porter Wagoner and Conway Twitty comprise about two feet of it. I’ve spent so many years collecting all these records and I’ve really gotten into the Bakersfield side of it, the Nashville side of it, the Texas side of it, the Oregon/Washington side of it. It’s just a fun journey to take.
VS—Do you remember what the first album you bought was?
DG—The first two records I bought were The Eagles Greatest Hits and Linda Ronstadt’s, Heart Like a Wheel.
VS—My first two were Monkees records.
DG—I did an interview recently with my buddy David Wilson from Dim Lights, Thick Smoke and he brought up that listening to my stuff always reminds him of the Mike Nesmith Monkees and the Nesmith First National Band stuff. That’s some very overlooked great country rock music, any of those Nesmith tracks on those Monkees records are so happening.
VS—Try and get that stuff in a record shop these days.
DG—Thank God we have Amoeba Records, those Amoeba stores are just amazing. I worked at the one in Berkeley for 12 years and the last half of my stretch there was as the LP pricer. It was a lot of fun. The guys who own Amoeba are stand up individuals and they really create and support a music community within those stores. Especially the Hollywood store, it’s just the place to be whether you’re an actor, a writer, music enthusiast, desperate musician or established musician.
VS—I’m always amazed at the kind of country stuff I find in there because you don’t think you’re going to find much in a place like Hollywood.
DG—They run the whole business very smart, they have people working the sections who know exactly what they’re doing, know exactly what to carry, know exactly what to price things at and they know exactly what’s garbage.
 VS—You released your record Midnight, California on vinyl. How did that go and are you planning to do more of that?
DG—An old buddy of mine in San Francisco had started a record label and he just chose a handful of his friends bands that he liked records of and asked if he could press it up in vinyl. I wasn’t something I planned on but it was a real honor. It’s a very expensive thing to do, I wish I could do it all the time. You can press up a thousand CD’s for about a dollar apiece but records cost five or six dollars apiece.
VS—Did you get a lot of feedback about the vinyl?
DG—Oh yeah. I often get asked whenever I put out a new record out if it’s coming out on vinyl.
VS—Without some sort of record label, for the most part, your record career is in your hands, you have control of the marketing and distribution. How do you approach those things and do you approach each record differently?
DG—The first three that I did I was lucky enough to have the Yep Roc/Red Eye folks as a distributor. Yep Roc is one of the major roots music labels and they had this kind of distribution line called Red Eye Distribution. My first three records were through Red Eye which kind of puts you in the fold with Yep Roc when they release things. After I did my third record, they kind of cleaned house and pretty much got rid of the distribution. Luckily, this distributor in Portland, Oregon called Burnside Distribution, who seems to have taken on most of the Roots and Country bands, picked up my first three records and is doing the new one as well. This one I put out myself, the first three were put out by some friends in the Bay Area.
VS—It must be nice, though, to have a certain degree of control over your own destiny.
DG—You definitely can see an immediate result. The recording costs for my last record were literally paid for out of my merch kit selling my other stuff. I would sure like the exposure that a record label or a booking agency could provide. A lot of the really good roots music festivals that happen all around the country, a guy like me can’t just send them an email and tell them I’d like to come and play. Those gigs pretty much all come though booking agencies unless you have a good friend who can slip you in through the back door or something. That would be my only complaint. I’ve gotten to this level where I can put out a decent record, I can sell records, I can put on a good show and I still feel like I’ve got something to offer the world.
 VS—And you’re still having fun with it overall.
DG—Luckily it’s really fun for me.
VS—What is one of your favorite memories from your career?
DG—One of the things I used to do in the Bay Area was DJ country records in some of the clubs. One night, I think it was at a Big Sandy show, I was playing some of those old instrumentals from Merle Haggard’s band, The Strangers, and this young guy dressed in a very nice 60’s-era suit, very unassuming, slicked back hair, glasses, walks up to me in the DJ booth and says, “Hey, I just want to thank you for playing my daddy’s records.” I was like, “Your daddy’s records? What’s your name?” He said it was Mike Nichols, son of Roy Nichols, Merle’s old Tele player. I had a great talk with him. I couldn’t believe it.
VS—Have you ever thought about what else would you want to do if you didn’t play music?
DG—No.
VS—You’re the first person that’s said no.
DG—It’s a tough question but I really have no idea. I’ve almost designed myself for this path and geared myself up for it for so long. There’s nothing else I can do, so like it or not, this is it.
dave-gleason.com/
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Hard Country from the High Country:
A Conversation with Colorado's Railbenders
By Vinny Smith
I spend a lot of time searching for music online which is where I discovered the Denver-based Railbenders. I can't remember what I was searching for at the time but somehow a song called Whiskey Rain found it's way onto my computer screen. I played the 30 second sample and immediately fell head over heels for it. I dug around some more and found there were three Railbenders albums available. I sampled two or three more songs then purchased everything. I was not sorry for my impulsiveness. Every song on every album was great. I had nothing but Railbenders on my iPod for weeks. I found it quite disturbing, though, that my iPod was one of the few places these guys were getting played. With the Railbenders firmly in mind I decided to launch an internet radio station so I could play not only them but many other great bands and artists that don't get much mainstream airplay. So, in large part, I have the Railbenders to thank for the existence of HonkyTonkJunkie.com. I expressed my thank you on April 12, 2008 when I launched the station on Live365 with—let's say it all together now—Whiskey Rain.
Recently I got the chance to see their fantastic show as they came through Los Angeles for only the second time ever. For this show local pedal steel player, Jordan Shapiro, sat in for their set and I was later told that he also appears on the new Railbenders album due out soon. While chatting with frontman, Jim Dalton, and bass player, Tyson Murray, what became apparent very quickly was that as serious as the Railbenders are about their music they are first and foremost proud family men who prefer to call their own shots from the beautiful state of Colorado.
Vinny Smith—What is it about Denver?
Jim Dalton—Denver is where I met my wife. We were both from small towns in Colorado. We both moved to Denver and that’s where we met so that’s basically why we’re based there – because of family.
VS—It’s a beautiful place; I’ve been there a few times and my Dad is from Durango so I have a little Colorado connection.
JD—I love Durango; it’s a great town.
VS—Is music your main gig?
JD—We all have jobs or gigs that allow us to do this. Like for example I have a real estate appraisal business so I do the 9 to 5 thing; Tyson is in the bar business; Graham (Haworth, drums) has a job as a fish salesman but he can work from the road with a laptop and a phone. Tony (Nascar, guitar) has been with a company for about 22 years. He makes prosthetic hands and he can pretty much tour at any time. Luckily all of our other jobs are very flexible and allow us to tour and do music. We’re trying to make this a full time thing but we’re not there yet.
VS—Is that the next level you're shooting for?
JD—We love doing it. We’ve stayed together for eight years and haven’t killed each other yet. If there was a way we could just do music full time and not do the other stuff we will do it but it’s very hard to do that as an independent band.
VS—So are you interested in getting into a major label situation then or do you want to have the control of being able to do your own thing? Or maybe somewhere in the middle?
JD—At this point we’re happy just doing our own thing and being independent, however, if somebody came along and offered us a nice record deal and it looked like we could keep creative control then obviously we would do that. But I don’t think we’re every label’s cup of tea especially in the country world. We’re kind of in between a mainstream country act and the more independent alternative stuff. We’ve been literally told by people at big labels that we just don’t fit in the mainstream and that’s fine by us.
VS—How do you guys go about distributing since you’re independent? Can you get it into the record stores?
JD—No, not really. We don’t have brick and mortar distribution, but the way we get on iTunes is through CDbaby. They’re all independent, they do a great job so we end up just doing a digital distribution I guess you could say. Unfortunately a lot of record stores are going by the wayside. So I don’t know how that’s going to go.
VS—I know you’ve played in Texas, have you played in Nashville?
JD—Yes.
VS—How does your music go over in those places?
JD—You know, the cool thing about Nashville is that there is the music that you hear on the radio which is the contemporary, pop, mainstream stuff but there’s this scene in all the honky tonks that still play the traditional music and that’s where we play—right on Broadway in the honky tonks. We had a wonderful response from the folks there.
VS—That’s where I would go and hang out when I lived there.
JD—Yeah, Roberts?
VS—Exactly.
JD—We played Roberts. We’ve also had correspondence from the owner of the Full Moon Saloon across the street. He actually used to work as the cook at Roberts, he emails us regularly and plays Whiskey Rain and all that stuff in his bar. In fact, he’s got a Railbenders poster in his bar hanging up on the wall next to Kris Kristofferson and all these guys. It's great, it’s in a bar in on Broadway in Nashville. It’s very rewarding to hear that kind of stuff.
VS—And in Texas it’s the same way?
JD—Yes. There’s this guy down there that says anytime we want to play there, he’ll put a show together. It’s been great.
VS—Have you ever been overseas in this band?
JD—No, not yet.
VS—Is that something you guys are interested in doing eventually?
JD—We almost did a European tour. We had a guy there that was putting together a tour for us but it fell apart for various reasons so we didn’t go but yes, we would like to get over to Europe.
VS—I think you guys would go over great there. I have a lot of listeners from Europe, they just love that kind of stuff.
JD—Johnny Hickman from Cracker just got back from Europe and he said, “You know, the entire time I was out there I thought that the Railbenders should be touring in Europe because they really love the American sound, especially the traditional country stuff and the rockabilly and Americana.”
VS—Yeah, they love it.
JD—I’d like to go. That would be a wonderful experience for us. I’ve never been to Europe.
 VS—You’re married. Do you have kids too?
JD—Yes, two young boys.
VS—Are they into music at all?
JD—Oh yeah.
VS—Are you teaching them guitar?
JD—Yeah we’ve got guitars around and we have a piano that we make them play. My littlest guy, he’s always picking up a guitar and playing. They have fun, they like the music. My son Jack says he’s going to be the drummer for the Railbenders when he grows up.
VS—That’s cool, how old are they?
JD—He’s six and my other guy just turned ten.
VS—That’s cool to have them want to follow in your footsteps.
JD—I expose them to everything because I grew up on a wide variety of stuff. I always tell them to be open to all music because there are good songs in every genre. They listen to AC/DC…like Jack, he thinks it’s only cool if it’s "old school." He's like, “Is that old school?” I’ll say no and he’s like, “Well I’m not going to listen to it.” And I’ll go, “Remember that thing about being open to all kinds of music?” He’s very into Led Zepplin, AC/DC, Johnny Cash—he loves Johnny Cash and he loves Waylon Jennings. His favorite song is Only Daddy That’ll Walk the Line. He loves the Ramones. It’s pretty cool. So he’s exposed because that’s all we do is music around the house. He knows a lot of music. It’s kind of funny, he gets around the adults and they’ll ask him questions. They’re like, “Okay what’s this song?” and they give him a lyric and he’ll nail it. It’s hilarious.
VS—That’s great, that must really make you feel good.
JD—Absolutely.
VS—(to Tyson) Do you have kids too?
Tyson Murray—Yes, I have a 17-year-old son.
VS—So is he musical as well?
TM—Yes, he plays drums but he’s not open to different kinds of music at all, he likes death metal, black metal, that kind of thing and nothing else, absolutely nothing else. He hates our band but he thinks it’s cool that we do it. He won’t listen to it unless he’s forced to come by his mom every once in a while. He’s a good kid, though. I’m impressed at how good at the drums he is. We bought a drum kit maybe six or seven months ago or something and man he’s all over it. He’s really good at it, he’s a natural, he’s going to be a very good drummer if he sticks with it which I think will; he loves it. He’s got a little band, I’ve gotten them a couple of gigs in Denver at some different places and stuff and he loves it, he lives for it. It’s pretty cool.
VS—Do you guys have other family that plays music?
JD—I grew up listening to my uncle who was a singer/songwriter/artist, his name was Terry Dalton and he’s the one who got me into music. He played at all of our family gatherings. He taught me my first chords on guitar, he’s a legend. In fact we cover one of his songs on our record, Showdown, it’s called Holdout In Time. He wrote that song about my dad. I guess I was lucky enough to have somebody like that to learn from and listen to when I was a kid growing up. He exposed me to all the old seventies country stuff. That’s where most of my influence comes from is my dad and my uncle. They had all that stuff on vinyl, a lot of the good, classic country stuff. I know his dad was the same way. His dad brought him up on that stuff too. Was your dad musical, Tyson?
TM—No. My dad played a little guitar but I’m pretty much the only person in my family that’s musically inclined. My dad was a huge music lover, though, and he had several hundred albums that I still have and am storing for him. So I was brought up listening to music all the time and I played when I was a kid and stuff but nobody else in my family was musically inclined.
JD—Graham’s dad was in The Kingston Trio. He toured with his dad as a young kid. His dad took him to Japan and all around the world when he was in The Kingston Trio. He’s not with them anymore. His name was Bob Haworth. Graham’s actually been playing a long time. And Tony, I don’t know if he has a musical family or not.
 VS—You guys have some new stuff coming out pretty soon.
JD—We have a live album out now and we’re trying to get our new record out in 2009.
VS—Any final thoughts? Is there anything you want to say to your fans?
JD—I would just say please try to come out if we’re in your town and thanks for listening.
TM—I would encourage people to keep trying to find independent music whether it’s smaller label stuff or no label stuff. There is a ton of great independent music out there. In fact probably most of the better stuff that you can find—it’s harder to find but it’s all independent—and if you find something that you like on iTunes or on Rhapsody or whatever, they have that link where you can see what else people are listening to and I find a lot of stuff just listening to things like that. Be open minded I guess you could say and try and listen to independent music because it’s a great thing and there’s a ton of it and a lot of it’s really good.
VS—That’s a lot of what I play. I cruise MySpace and, for example, I’ll go to your page and see that you’re friends with other bands so then I’ll contact them and get some of their stuff and so on.
JD—Awesome. Yeah, we have to all help each other out and support each other because it’s tough being an independent band. It’s not a lucrative business by any means.
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Southern (California) Born, Southern Bred
By Vinny Smith
I first started HonkyTonkJunkie.com with the goal of searching out and playing the music of the best unknown and independent artists I could find. My iPod was jam-packed with it and I wanted to share it with as many people that would listen. As time went on, though, I was getting anxious to see some of these great bands live. Problem was, I live in Los Angeles, not exactly a hotbed for kick-ass honky tonk music—or so I thought. I was cruising the tour dates section of the website for one of my favorite bands, Eleven Hundred Springs out of Dallas, and found they were doing a mini-tour of the west that included a Sunday afternoon show for something called the Brunch Americana at a place called Safari Sams in Hollywood. I was beyond excited; a band the caliber of Eleven Hundred Springs was going to finally play in my town.
They did not disappoint; they were fantastic as were the two local bands on the bill, West of Texas and The Last Americans. A few weeks later I saw that another one of my favorite bands, The Railbenders from Denver were doing the Brunch Americana with perennial Texas favorite, Jesse Dayton and local talent, Mike Stinson and David Serby. By this time Safari Sams had closed down and the show had moved to a new venue, this one in downtown L.A. I wasn’t happy about making trek downtown but my need to see this show trumped my need to avoid downtown. I was not sorry. Not only was the new venue, The Redwood Bar & Grill, an awesome little pirate/nautical-themed bar with excellent food, but it was one of, if not the best shows I’ve ever seen.
 I decided I needed to meet the person who was putting such great shows together, if only just to shake his hand and say thank you. I went up and introduced myself to him, a man known as Hillbilly DJ Jeff W. and he instantly made me feel as if we had known each other for years. I mentioned that I would love to sit down and talk about what he does and how he does it. He said that sounded great so we agreed to meet for lunch later that week in this great place in Long Beach called the Pike Bar & Grill, owned by former Social Distortion drummer, Christopher Reece. It was a perfect setting to talk about music as the jukebox in the background played everything from Hank Williams and Willie Nelson to The Cars and oddly, Social Distortion.
I thought I was somewhat of a musical savant but I have to say my knowledge suffers greatly compared to Jeff’s. He rattled off names of artists I had only vaguely heard of, if at all. I was horribly embarrassed to even call myself a honky tonk junkie after that. But that’s a good thing because as soon as we finished with our four-hour lunch, I went home and researched and purchased music by every artist he mentioned. And that’s what Hillbilly DJ Jeff W’s passion, dedication and knowledge will do for you. Attend any one of his shows and not only will you have the time of your life, for a low, low cost--generally $5-$10--but you just may discover something cool you never knew about.
VS--People always ask me how I got into this kind of music since I’m from the San Francisco Bay Area but what they don’t realize is it’s actually quite rural around there; my town was known for its dairies and poultry farms. So my question to you is the same: How did you get into this kind of music?
HDJJW—People don’t realize how “southern” California is and I don’t mean Southern California but actually how much of the South and the Midwest like Oklahoma and Missouri is in Southern California. I was born here in Long Beach but my whole family is from Lubbock, Texas. So even though I was out here, I was still going back to Lubbock to see relatives for summers and stuff like that so I still had the same upbringing and environment that I would if I were in Texas. It was the same lingo, the same vocabulary. It wasn’t like, “Hey, we’re in California so all of a sudden we’re surfers.” I was born in ’67 and I remember as a kid, my grandfather had on the record player, anything from Jim Reeves and Buck Owens and Hank Thompson to Elvis and Patsy Cline so it was always in the background. Looking back, I should have known at 9 or 10 how it was going to turn out. And my dad’s side was always Waylon Jennings and Johnny Cash. That’s what was there. Then in high school in the 80’s I started listening to The Blasters and The Stray Cats and bands like Robert Gordon which you just go, “I like this stuff, it’s different,” not knowing how close it actually was to what you grew up on. You look back on it now and you can see how you went from the Blasters to this to this to this. As a kid, though, you go, “Oh it’s not that crazy country crap my grandfather listened to, it’s original.” Then you realize it’s not.
VS—It’s like when I first heard Social Distortion, for instance, you could totally hear the country and rockabilly influence.
HDJJW —Chances are if there is anybody in a band that you thought was badass and doing something different, they weren’t listening to punk rock, they were listening to country, 50’s rock, folk, and blues. If you went through their record collection, you’d be blown away. Everything goes back to either blues or country.
David Serby & Jeff
VS—What is your goal with these Brunch Americana shows?
HDJJW — I want to have a place that’s in southern California that does good music. There are tons of places once you get east of the Rockies but in California it’s non-existent. I remember back in the 90’s a lot of the stuff I’m trying to do was a lot more accessible—you could go to more places, you had more of these little small honky tonk places around then over the years more of those places have closed up, gone away, shut down or changed format because they think people don’t want to listen to it or hear it any more and the funny thing is when I started doing this stuff at Safari Sams—someone needed to do it. I saw these bars closing up and stuff dying and bands weren’t playing in Southern California and you’d ask them why and they’d say, “No place to play.” So you’re missing the Dale Watson’s and the Wayne Hancock’s—they’d just skip it. They’d hit the bay area—they’d go around us—they’d go to Norco but they wouldn’t play the city. Places would either not book the show or they made them be done by 10 o’clock at night because they have some dance club coming in afterwards. So these guys would say screw it, we’re not going to do it. But slowly you start getting the word out there and people are like, “There’s a place around here doing this? Okay, get me in touch with him.”
VS—I know, I’ve been here five years and it’s taken me all that time to find this stuff. All I knew were some of the big dance clubs and a little Mexican place in Burbank. Then recently I found your shows and the Cinema Bar in Culver City which is actually right near my house.
HDJJW —That’s funny.
VS— So you’re trying to get more of that down here?
HDJJW —I’d like to get more of it—it’s always kind of been here—it’s just like getting the word out because it’s like you said, people don’t know. There are still people that want to hear it and still want to do it and I’m never going to be a good musician so I might as well have some place where good musicians can play.
VS—So you play, then?
HDJJW —Very badly
VS—What do you play?
HDJJW —Guitar—very badly
VS—How long have you been playing?
HDJJW —Three years now. I mean I’ll sit there in the bedroom by myself and play and the crowd is awful. There’s no shouts for encore going on, believe me.
VS—Tell me about your DJ work.
HDJJW —The first place I started DJ'ing at was the Foothill in Signal Hill—I DJ’d there the last two years they were open.
VS—With this type of music?
HDJJW —Yes, it was primarily a little more rockabilly but for every nine or so rockabilly songs I’d drop a Buck Owens song in or a Hank Williams song or Hank Penny or something even crazier. People would sit there and look at you and go, “What’s this? I like it but I don’t know what it is.” So I did that until that place closed down then I did occasional shows at a few different places but then I just kind of quit DJ'ing because it seemed like all they wanted to hear was more rock ‘n roll-type stuff and I thought no one wanted to hear the whole country aspect anymore. Then I got contacted by Steve Zepeda, who used to book at the Foothill who I was friends with, he said he was starting Safari Sams up with Sam, he asked if I wanted to DJ a Blasters show and I said okay so I went back to DJ'ing there for about a year doing Big Sandy and the Fly-rite Boys shows or whoever was coming through town. Then they started doing this brunch thing on Sundays but they just couldn’t find the right person to run it so they kind of asked me to take a crack at it. I kind of fine-tuned it a little more toward what I wanted to have rather than like a coffee house, acoustic, folky kind of thing. I said let’s get a sound guy in here and let’s make it more of a night show during the day because if we don’t treat it like a night show people aren’t going to be serious about it and they won’t show up because they think it’s more like a rehearsal. But once you all of a sudden have a regular night gig but it’s during the day, people show up, people want to show up. Anybody over 35 years old who has got to work and has a wife and a kid. You can go out, have some fun, get home early and still get up and go to work the next day.
VS—That’s pretty much the category I fall into.
HDJJW —I’m going to get shirts made up that say, “Sunday Brunch, it’s the new Saturday night.” I’ve actually had people say they stayed in and went to bed early on a Saturday night so they could get up and come down on Sunday. But it works out great because most bands, if they’re coming through town they play Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night. They usually don’t go home until Sunday night or Monday anyway so they have that one down day, what do they do? I’m like, “I’ll tell you what, I’ll pay you, get you some food and some drinks, come over and play in the afternoon." Most bands think that’s fantastic. I mean I’ve had bands who want to make the Sunday thing a focal point of their tour. They’ll book mine and then pick up dates around it whereas it used to be an afterthought. Now bands will say, “We’re going to be out there, can we secure your Sunday?” like three, four months in advance then they’ll pick up night gigs in the area. Okay. Works for me.
VS—So you are paying these bands to play, they’re not just doing it because they want to build up a fan base in the area or anything?
HDJJW —Oh yeah. If it’s a headlining band coming through, you get what you pay for. I’ve done shows where it’s been a lower end budget—some bands will do it for hanging around, some bands won’t. Most bands—they’re professional musicians, they’re good, they need to get paid. You can only pay people so much beer and food but the way things are anymore, people need money, they’ve got families and bills. I try and take care of all the guys that come through and play, monetarily and with food and drink.
Jeff with The Derailers
VS—You’ve booked some pretty heavy-hitters like Eleven Hundred Springs, Dale Watson, The Derailers and Wayne Hancock, I imagine that gets to be expensive.
HDJJW —Well yeah, but a band like Eleven Hundred Springs, they’re professional musicians and they’re worth every cent they’re paid. I’d say almost all the bands I’ve booked are worth every cent and I wouldn’t have booked them if I didn’t think they were good.
VS—So you’re mostly out-of-pocket on this then?
HDJJW —Most of the time, yeah.
VS--Is this your main gig or do you have another job as well?
HDJJW —I actually have three jobs including this. I work at a ticket broker and I have some properties that I manage. This job I started out doing for shits and giggles but it’s a full time job. It’s the one I like the most but I get the least back on. Most of the time I’m thrilled if I’ve got gas money and a bar tab.
VS—Are you looking to get to the point where this is your only full time job?
HDJJW —If I could make a living financially with what I love doing, it would be perfect.
VS—Aside from some of the more well-known acts, how do you hear about or discover the high-caliber, lesser-known or up-and-coming acts?
HDJJW —A lot of it is word of mouth but I love music so I’m always out there searching for stuff. I jump from site to site to site. I can usually tell three chords in whether it’s something I’ll like. If it starts off with a heavy telecaster twang or something, it’s perfect. I shouldn’t have to listen to five songs to convince me to book someone.
VS—Do you have a wish list of people that you want to book?
HDJJW —There are quite a few guys I’d like to hit up, a lot of guys from Austin. I’d like to get Hot Club of Cowtown back. I’ve had them on a night show at Safari Sam’s before. I’d love to get BR549. I’d love to get Miss Leslie and Her Juke-Jointers. But I love the local bands too. If I didn’t have them I wouldn’t have a show.
VS—The local bands are damn good too.
HDJJW —Southern California has got so much talent that nobody’s ever heard of. It’s a shame because there are the guys like Dave Gleason, Mike Stinson and David Serby who are really, really good and once people hear them they’re like “Oh my God!” Northern California too. You’ve got bands like 77 El Deora, The B-Stars and Johnny Dilks that are unbelievable.
Mike Stinson, Jeff, Dave Gleason
VS—What do you do to get the word out about the shows?
HDJJW —I do it to the best of my ability. The days are gone from putting flyers out and passing them around. It’s all electronic now, email, MySpace, mass media. I might make up flyers to put around the club to promote the next show, but you can reach far more people through MySpace than hanging around someone else’s show handing out flyers when people are leaving. It’s a waste of money. I’d rather put it toward paying the bands.
VS—Do you plan to keep putting on these shows for a while?
HDJJW —Oh yeah. And that was the thing when Safari Sam’s closed down, it was like do I stop? Do I have it in me to reorganize and go shop my wares to someplace else? At the same time I was trying to keep bands in the loop—and I have a job, so I thought about it a lot. I lost two weeks worth of shows. Then Christian Frizzell and Joe Walters from the Redwood Bar & Grill said they would like to have me do it there.
VS—So the Redwood contacted you?
HDJJW —They hit me up so I went up and checked it out, checked out the food. It was a perfect fit so we just swung everything over to there.
VS—Any final words?
 HDJJW —My ideal thing is to have people just show up. If you don’t know who the bands are but you’ve liked other shows I’ve done, it’s worth it to show up. I’ve had people who I never thought would come to a show because it’s not their type of music show up and be blown away.
For more information go to:
www.myspace.com/samsbrunchfoodmusic
theredwoodbar.com
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From Jersey to Texas:
One Man's Steel Odyssey
By Vinny Smith
I am not a musician, only a fan – a junkie, actually, with a pedal steel guitar addiction. In 1995 I wanted to hear the sweet sounds of ringing, twanging steel guitar live and in person every single night and that just wasn’t going to happen in the San Francisco suburb I lived in at the time. Nashville was where I decided I had to be, so off I went. I even bought my own steel – I was that addicted. I convinced myself I would learn to play and form a killer band. Well I never even came close to figuring it out, but man did it look awesome set up in my living room. At least it did until I loaned it to someone who never returned it. But alas, my steel dreams were not to be. Instead I settled for living vicariously through the dozens of steel players I met while I lived there. The urges eventually faded a bit but lately they have been coming back strong. I tried to get into a twelve-step program but I only got as far as a two-step.
It seems fitting, then, that my first interview for this website is with Danny Crelin, a New Jersey-born pedal steel player with Dallas, Texas-based band Eleven Hundred Springs. I recently had the great pleasure to sit down with him before their show at Safari Sam’s in Hollywood. We talked about everything from hockey to mob movies to heavy metal music but mostly about the steel guitar and related topics. What shone through the most, though, was his genuine love for the steel. He has a healthy respect for the instrument and for those who play it and is constantly striving to learn more. If you ask me, it has paid off. Shortly after Danny and I finished up he and the band went out and rocked the house.
Vinny Smith - New Jersey isn’t exactly known as a breeding ground for pedal steel players so let’s start with an obvious question. How does someone from New Jersey end up playing steel guitar?
Danny Crelin - I was in a country band playing regular guitar and we were lacking another instrument very badly so a friend of mine gave me a lap steel to kind of mess around with and it just kind of went from there. I got my first pedal steel shipped to me and I was basically playing it out within a month. It was just a little student model that had a lot of twang and it just progressed from one steel to another. I just had a knack for it somehow. I don’t understand that myself.
VS - And you just kind of got pulled toward Texas?
DC - As I got more and more involved with the steel and felt more confident with my playing and all that, I moved to Richmond, Virginia and kind of built up some more and got a little better at playing and more competent. At one point Stonewall Jackson came to town and I got to back him on stage for a couple shows. I just kind of got that bug that I wanted to do something more. Then Dale Watson came to Richmond. I was sitting right in front, right between him and Ricky Davis who was playing steel for him at the time. So I’m sitting there going left to right, right to left, watching both of them and I was like, "Man this is what I want to do, this is how my life’s going to go, I want to do this." And you know what? If I would have been scared to deal with it and said, “Man I don’t know if I should,” I’d be kicking myself in the butt the rest of my life. I just packed up and left for Texas. And that’s pretty much how I roll. I swore on my life that I would never say that I’m afraid to do something or not want to do it because I’m unsure about the future. You could be working on a 9 to5 day job and have no idea if you’re going to get fired the next morning. You can either choose to be miserable or be happy. I choose the latter.
VS - How did you hook up with Eleven Hundred Springs?
DC - I was playing with Jamie Richards at the White Elephant in Fort Worth and Eleven Hundred was playing at Billy Bob’s the same night. Jordan (EHS’s fiddle player) was at the White Elephant having a beer. We had been in touch on MySpace because I had played with Johnny Lee at one point and he’s a big Johnny Lee fan. So he shouted out my name and I just went over and we formally introduced ourselves. A month later I got an email from the band on MySpace saying they needed me for a couple gigs if I was available. I was off that weekend so I went and after the first night they offered me the job so I jumped at it.
VS - Good move; it’s a great band. Now as far as musical talent and ability goes, it tends to run in families. Do you have a musical family?
DC - Well my earliest memory is my grandfather had this old Kaye acoustic guitar. He’d set me on his lap and he’d start singing You Are My Sunshine and all these Hank Williams songs. He always had country music on the radio at the house. One of my grandmothers had this immense record collection and it had everything from big band to blues to Sinatra and a lot of classical but she also had Patsy Cline albums and Hank Williams. I would say those two were probably my biggest musical influences as far as in the family. Nobody else played an instrument; they were the only two that even remotely were into music as much as I was. My whole life’s been music ever since. I remember that acoustic guitar and I always wondered what happened to it. It’s just a weird thing; I have no idea where it went to. But yeah, my grandfather used to sing You Are My Sunshine all the time to me so now when Jordan does it in the middle of Orange Blossom Special on stage it’s kind of a special little thing for me to sit there and hear that.
VS - So you don’t have any brothers and sisters that play?
DC - No I’m an only child and I think a lot of people are probably thankful for that.
VS - Have you done a lot of recording in the past?
DC - You know, I really haven’t done a whole lot of recording as far as any major bands. I did a bunch of sessions in Richmond for various people. The biggest thing I’ve ever done was the Eleven Hundred CD. I just never got myself into a position to where I was close enough with a studio to be able to go and record and all the bands I played with were using mostly session guys. With us you get the real deal, which is cool. What you hear on the CD, you’ll get a little more amped up version live, but for the most part it’s pretty much what we do.
VS - Do you write songs?
DC - I’ll write lines down, just little hook lines that come up. I’ve got this whole box full of little sheets of paper and napkins and stuff where I just get something going through my head and if I’ve got a pen handy I’ll write it down and throw it in the box. Maybe one day I’ll just give it to Matt (Hillyer, lead singer and songwriter) and let him tear at it and put all these different papers together and figure something out of it so who knows?
VS - Lloyd Maines produced Eleven Hundred Springs' current album, Country Jam. Was the fact that he’s also known for being a great steel player intimidating?
DC - I’d say the most intimidating thing about that whole session was not the fact that he’s a great steel player, it was more of a time issue for me. I’m pretty frugal so when it comes down to it it’s like time wasted is money spent and I’m more concerned about that. I didn’t really want to dwell on a whole bunch of things and waste time. But Lloyd is what I’ll refer to as “the voice in my ears” and what I mean by that is that when I had the headphones on in the studio Lloyd would sit there and I’d run through a line and he would just kind of be like, “Why don’t we try it like this?” He’d be just talking me through stuff, he’d be like, “Try this lick here and see what it sounds like.” Lloyd was just awesome, he really builds your confidence up and he makes you feel like you’re doing the right thing, like you’re doing what you can do. He’s going to get more out of you, which he should. It was a real treat to get to work with him.
VS - Do you feel like you got any more or less attention due to you both being steel players?
DC - I was in there for two straight days and mostly in those two days Matt and I were the only two in there. He was doing lead guitar parts and then I’d go in and do the steel and then he’d work on some vocals. For the most part I feel like I got plenty of attention and I’ve gotten quite a few compliments from people who have heard the CD that said, man, it’s nice to hear the steel guitar out front in the mix.
VS - Is that something you think Lloyd brought to the table?
DC - Yeah, I think so. If I stunk on the CD then you wouldn’t be hearing the steel or Lloyd would have gone and back did it but it’s nice to know that 100% of the steel on that CD is me and that’s a great feeling.
VS - It’s nice to hear the steel get proper attention.
DC - It’s a great instrument, it really is. I almost feel blessed to be able to play it, because I hear a lot of guys say, “Man I tried playing that and I just could not do it.”
VS - I know, it’s got foot pedals and knee levers – all kinds of stuff.
DC - And it’s not like I’m saying I know everything about it because I don’t but I’m learning something new every day and I’m not afraid to try new licks on stage that’s for sure, I’ll do that in a heartbeat.
VS - At this point is music your main gig?
DC - Yeah, but I’ve also been helping out at Rains Steel Guitars which is a builder in Fort Worth. It’s owned by Gary Carpenter who’s played with Reba McEntire, Ray Price, you name it he’s played with them. He’s the go-to guy in Fort Worth for sessions and gigs. Gary’s been teaching me for the past two and a half months, how to build steel guitars. So not only do I get to play one at night, I get to build them during the day. It’s more of an apprentice deal so I don’t consider it a job. It’s another thing that I feel blessed about that I had somebody who picked me up and said, “Hey, you need to learn this.” So that’s what I’m doing. So now I get to hang out with him all day and while he’s fine tuning steels, he’s throwing off these licks that are just blowing my mind and I’ll sit there and listen to what he’s doing and then I’ll go home and just start playing. It’s really helped my playing out a lot just being with him.
VS - One of the steel players I knew when I lived in Nashville did the exact same thing; he worked for a steel guitar builder.
DC - It don’t hurt, you know. Plus we get a lot of big name steelers stop in when they come through town so I’ve gotten to meet a lot of my heroes.
 VS - That was the next thing I was going to bring up. You list Buddy Charlton as your mentor.
DC - Buddy Charlton played with Ernest Tubb in the sixties and seventies. He replaced Buddy Emmons which are pretty big shoes to fill. Buddy Charlton is probably one of the most proficient steel players I’ve ever heard. He lives in Fredricksburg, Virginia, about an hour and a half from Richmond. I had gotten to the point where I was pretty much teaching myself to play so I just got up one day and gave him a call, scheduled a lesson and then I spent the next year and a half, like maybe every other weekend driving up there and getting lessons. The lessons were supposed to run for 45 minutes but would always go over to almost two hours. He never charged me a dime more and he would just get excited that I was getting what he was teaching me. So I’ve got a box of tapes that I’m putting on CD’s right now so I can still go back and hear some stuff that I might have forgotten. When I told him I was thinking about moving to Texas he just started going, “Well, that’s where you need to be, you’re not doing anything around here. You gotta get off your butt and go while you can.” He really gave me the confidence to go and do it and thank God he did because I’m making a living playing guitar.
VS - So was that one of the biggest pieces of advice you got from him?
DC - Yeah, that and then he showed me how to do a palm harmonic where you can make a train sound. He goes, “You’ll need to learn this because if you ever get a gig with Hank Thompson you’re going to be playing that a lot.” When he said that it just kind of made me think that for him to make that statement, maybe he sees potential in me. I never got to play for Hank Thompson but I got to play with some pretty good people.
VS - Sounds like a great experience.
DC - He never got frustrated while he was teaching me which was cool. When I first started I had a guy in Jersey and no matter what I did, if I hit something wrong he would get mad and it just discouraged me. So like after four or five lessons I said, “I’m not doing this with you anymore,” so I just did it on my own. I bought all these instruction books, I listened to country twenty-four hours a day and then one day I was listening to the radio and some blues came on so I just started playing along with that and next thing you know I’m playing all different styles. I don’t limit myself to one box; I can go out there and play what I gotta play.
VS - So if you didn’t play music for a living, what would you do?
DC - Man… I have never even thought about that at all.
VS - Well that’s pretty cool in itself.
DC - Now I could tell you if I didn’t play music for a living I’d be building steel guitars but if you’d asked me that before the Rains job I would say I really have no idea because I’ve done so much in my life as far as employment.
 VS - So basically it would be just get a job and earn a living.
DC - It would just be find something and go with that part of my life and whatever happens happens, you know, that’s just the way I roll.
VS - Any family or kids?
DC - No. No kids. I’m single and loving life.
VS – Is there a family in your plans?
DC - I was married. But you know... things change.
VS - This seems like a pretty good life, traveling around playing music.
DC - Yeah it is. You get to meet a lot of neat people. That’s the whole thing too, being out here, we’re building up a fan base and it just gets bigger and bigger every time. People have been nothing but really cool and they dig the band, they dig the music.
VS - I saw on your MySpace page you have Slayer and some bands like that in there. Do you listen to that kind of stuff also?
DC - (Laughs) Yeah, yeah. When I was a teenager I saw Metallica at Lamour in Brooklyn, which is a nightclub. I used to see bands like Merciful Fate and Slayer because I just did not get the L.A. glam scene at all. I liked the more aggressive, faster drum beats. But I’m still a metal head, man; it never leaves your blood. When I was a teenager my parents got divorced and it got me through some tough times. It made me forget about that stuff.
VS - I think it had that effect on a lot of people.
DC - Lamour had a show once and the bill said it was Charlotte and the Harlots. As soon as the tickets went on sale I bought four of them because I just had a gut feeling. Sure enough me and my buddies get up to the show and Iron Maiden was warming up for their World Slavery tour – the one they did for their Live After Death CD. They were doing the warm up for that that night and there were only about 300 people in there. That club holds 4500 easy so we had our own personal Iron Maiden concert in a nightclub which was awesome. I’m also a huge (Swing bandleader) Louie Prima fan. Big Time. If there’s anyone in the world I could have met and had dinner with or talk to, it would have been him. I’d love to play steel behind a swing like that. That’s something I’ll put in the CD player and drive on down the road and just blast it. You just never get bored of hearing it. I like Sinatra and a lot of big band music. Definitely country, I mean take your pick. I’m a huge Burrito Brothers fan, Gram Parsons. Gram he’s another one I wish I could have met. And definitely Elvis.
VS - When you have free time how do you like to spend it?
DC - Well the funny part is I really don’t have a lot of free time. Between traveling with the band and working with Gary at the shop 12-14 hours a day, when I’m done with that I get home, shower and collapse, then get up and start it all again the next morning. So as far as free time, if I do have some, I’ll go out to shows - mostly in Fort Worth. I know a lot of people so I’ll get to go and hang out with the bands. Most recently I went to go see Jason Boland and got to hang out on their bus for a while and listened to their new CD that nobody had heard yet. I like those guys, man. And Dale Watson came up to Fort Worth before we left for California and I had dinner with that great bunch of guys.
VS - Dale’s a good guy. I met him a couple months back.
DC - Man I’ll tell you what, I call him the King of the Honky Tonks because in my eyes, that man has a great voice, he’s a fantastic guitar player and he’s got a great band. I first heard him back in the 90’s when I was living up in New Jersey. I probably will be a fan of his for the rest of my life.
VS - Same here. Let’s talk hockey a little bit. Do you have a favorite team?
DC - Yes I do. As a matter of fact since I moved to Texas I have two favorite teams. My first is the Pittsburgh Penguins. The Penguins were always my favorite team; there was just something about them. My new favorite team is the Dallas Stars because I’m right up the road from them. I’m going to go hit a few preseason games. I think they have a game with the Penguins coming up so I’m kind of psyched about that. I’ll be kind of neutral in that game but I’ll be screaming my head off. I just love hockey in general.
VS - So do you play hockey yourself?
DC - No, no we played street hockey when I was a kid. I really want to get out on the ice and skate around and just slap the puck at the net, have some fun and not get checked because I don’t know if my bones can handle it at this age. (Laughs)
VS - Yeah, I know that feeling. I know you like mob movies. What’s your favorite one?
DC - I would have to say – and this isn’t being cliché or anything but the first Godfather would be number one. Goodfellas is another. Joe Pesci was just a nut in that; he’s just psycho. Even though it’s about Vegas, Casino was a great mafia movie.
 VS - That’s a great one too.
DC - I went through a little obsession where I started looking for books on John Gotti and all that. I read Sammy the Bull’s biography and that got me wanting more. There’s not that much out there on Gotti; just those books that the prosecutors all did. But yeah, as far as mafia movies, Godfather, Goodfellas and Casino. Then of course you go back to the James Cagney days, the original Scarface, the new Scarface – just-pick ‘em. I don’t like stupid cliché mob movies though. It’s just that mob movies are cool.
VS - Do you have a favorite scene? Something maybe you quote from?
DC - Yeah. “Go get your shine box,” from Goodfellas. They’re at the bar and Billy Bats comes in, he’s like, “Hey Tommy, go get your shine box.” Jordan and I do that, we recite that scene constantly.
VS - I like one from A Bronx Tale.
DC - See, I forgot all about that movie, I haven’t seen that in years. You know you resemble De Niro, I’m sure you’ve heard that.
VS - Actually, people say I resemble Joe Pesci.
DC - Nah, you look like De Niro. I get I look like Junior Brown all the time.
VS - Yeah, you do. He comes to L.A. every so often.
DC - You should go up to him and say you look like Danny from Eleven Hundred Springs. (Laughs)
VS - If you were retired, what would you do?
DC - I would be living somewhere in Italy drinking vino and just enjoying the sun. I went there a few years ago with Rodney Hayden, spent a whole week in a bed and breakfast, played one show and the rest of the time I was swimming and sightseeing. Maybe California too, I don’t know. Sometime later this year I’m going to come back out here and just hang out for a week and just kind of go to places around here like the Chateau, check out John Belushi’s room if I could ever get in there. It’s just a lot of my heroes are dead now so it’s like I kind of want to get a piece of them. That’s the best way to do it; just go see where they hung out and what they did. I mean you walk out this street (Sunset Blvd.) and honestly, Belushi’s probably been up and down this street a thousand times looking for drugs or whatever and here I am standing on the same sidewalk that he’s been on. Now he’s not here and I am.
VS - So to wrap this up, what is the best part about being a member of Eleven Hundred Springs?
DC - Getting to hang out with four other souls that are really cool dudes. They’re not afraid to try stuff and play some ass-kickin’ music. Just being in a band of this caliber and seeing the reactions of people who’ve never heard us before. We’ve actually played in Dallas with a metal band on the same bill. They opened for us; that crowd stayed around and when they heard us they were just like – wow. Because we’re not like your average country band, we brush on all styles but we can also rock the mic. I’m very proud of being able to play with these guys. That was my life-changing experience the day they sent me that email and asked me to come out and play. It’s like fate’s right hand.
EDITORS NOTE: Since this interview took place, Danny has left Eleven Hundred Springs. He is now the pedal steel player for The Jason Allen Band.
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