Summary

Back in 2011, we chatted with Aaron Beavers of Shurman. Surprising everyone, they reunited in August 2025 for a number of tour dates.

Sloane kicks things off with a warm welcome to Aaron from the band Shurman, and it's all about that sweet, sweet vibe of creativity in music. Right from the get-go, they dive into the heart of the matter, how music festivals bring artists together, not just for the love of the music, but for the chance to reconnect with old friends and share new tunes. Erin reflects on the joys of making music with pals, highlighting how it’s less about the cash and more about the camaraderie and experiences. They chat about Shurman's latest holiday record, which started as a tongue-in-cheek joke during a scorching Texas summer but turned into a surprisingly successful project. The convo flows from the essence of their musical journey in Austin to the quirky tales of life on the road, making it clear that for these musicians, it’s all about keeping it real and staying connected to their roots.

Links

• REMINDER: IGNORE ALL LINKS OR EVENTS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE FROM 2011
• Shurman
• You will probably enjoy this conversation from 2015 with Aaron Lee Tasjan
• Toss a few in our Tip Jar!

Show Notes

Diving into the vibrant world of music and creativity, the latest episode of Country Fried Rock brings listeners a delightful chat with Aaron from the band Shurman. The conversation flows like a sweet melody, starting with a nostalgic recount of a recent rendezvous in Nashville, where the duo reminisces about the electric atmosphere of outdoor shows and the camaraderie that music festivals foster. Aaron expresses the joy of jamming with old friends, highlighting the essence of music not just as a profession but as a cherished connection among musicians who rarely get to meet. The discussion unfolds into a nuanced exploration of the challenges faced by artists, particularly the struggle for exposure in an industry that often prioritizes profit over passion. Aaron shares candid insights about the realities of touring life, the financial hurdles, and the sheer joy of performing despite the odds.

As the episode progresses, the conversation takes a fun twist as Aaron reveals the story behind their latest holiday record, which unexpectedly became a hit. What started as a playful idea during a scorching Texas summer evolved into a project that not only showcases Shurman's musical prowess but also weaves in a sense of humor and irony about creating Christmas songs in the heat. The banter between the hosts and Aaron adds a laid-back vibe, making it feel like a friendly hangout rather than a formal interview. The narrative delves deeper into the roots of their music style, with Aaron sharing anecdotes about his punk rock beginnings and the evolution of their sound, blending country, rock, and soulful influences. This episode is not just a glimpse into Shurman’s journey but a heartfelt celebration of friendship, creativity, and the joy of making music.

Listeners will leave with a sense of connection to the artists and a greater appreciation for the stories that shape the songs they love. With a sprinkle of humor and a whole lot of heart, this episode paints a vivid picture of the music scene and the bonds it creates, inviting everyone to tune in and enjoy the ride.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Country Fried Rock

04:24 The Birth of a Band

09:48 The Journey of Musical Discovery

20:54 The Journey to Austin: Musical Authenticity and Personal Growth

22:22 The Influence of Austin's Music Scene

Takeaways

• In the heart of Nashville, the vibe of music festivals is all about reconnecting with old friends and sharing creative energy, rather than just chasing the big bucks.
• Aaron from Shurman passionately shares that music is deeply rooted in friendships, and collaborating with old pals is the ultimate creative high.
• The unpredictable journey of creating a Christmas album during a scorching Texas summer led to unexpected musical success, showcasing the magic of spontaneity.
• The rich musical history of Austin has given Aaron a sense of authenticity and confidence that fuels the band's creativity and growth.
• Aaron reflects on how his songwriting has evolved, highlighting the transformative nature of music and how past experiences shape current expressions.
• The camaraderie and support among musicians in Austin creates an inviting atmosphere where creativity flourishes, contrasting sharply with the competitive nature of larger cities.

Mentioned in this Episode

• Shurman
• Blues Traveler
• Mother Truckers
• Blue Shop
• Stonehoney
• Whiskey Town
• Vanguard
• Sustain
• Universal Republic

Recommended If You Like

Country Fried Rock, podcast episode, musician interviews, creative inspiration, Nashville music scene, Shurman band, Americana music, Texas music, music festivals, songwriting process, holiday music, music collaboration, indie music, country rock, live performances, recording studio, acoustic music, music industry insights, musical influences, music promotion

Transcript

Speaker A

00:00:00.800 - 00:00:10.080

Welcome to Country Fried Rock, where we talk with musicians to find out what inspires their creativity. Country Fried Rock Music Uncovered Hey, Sloan.

Speaker B

00:00:10.080 - 00:00:12.080

How you doing? This is Erin from the band Sherman.

Speaker A

00:00:12.320 - 00:00:16.320

Hey, Erin. Thanks a bunch for being with us. I'm so glad I got to meet you in Nashville this year.

Speaker B

00:00:16.720 - 00:00:21.120

What a fun time that was. Wasn't that great? Amh great. I just had such a blast.

Speaker A

00:00:21.520 - 00:00:27.520

Perfect weather, perfect time. Country Fried rock out in Nashville. A little outdoor show of you solo.

Speaker B

00:00:27.880 - 00:00:38.360

Yeah, you know, it was kind of a laugh that popped in with some old friends, and I never turned down, if I can make music with old friends, that's kind of as good as it gets, you know?

Speaker A

00:00:38.680 - 00:00:41.800

You know, that is exactly what music festivals are all about.

Speaker B

00:00:42.120 - 00:01:37.170

You know, it really is, because you're, you know, half a lot of those times the bands that are playing are doing it in order to get exposure. You know, they're not doing it so for the huge payday. And so you're kind of just going, well, okay, I'm eating the show. I'm handling the expenses.

I'm doing this. I'm taking care of himself, which as musicians, have a hard time doing, in case you haven't heard.

Yeah, but, you know, those kind of conversations, you get to meet with all your old friends who are touring all over the country as well, and you don't get to see them except for maybe south by southwest and the AMAs and all the clients and CMJ and, you know, a couple times a year, you'll all get together and you're lucky enough, there's instruments around and everybody gets to play some songs and, you know, not only catch up on what everybody's girlfriends, wives, kids, brothers, sisters, moms and dads are doing, but also, you know, get to catch up musically on whatever it's got coming down, you know, the creative pipeline as far as what's their new song or what's they're excited about and a lot of times, you know, what bands we're kind of all listening to.

Speaker A

00:01:37.170 - 00:01:47.610

You know, it's funny that you say that, because that's actually how I found you. We did an interview a while back with Josh and Teal from the Mother Truckers, and that's how I found Sherman.

Speaker B

00:01:48.010 - 00:02:20.130

Oh, yeah, we love Josh and Teal. They're both. They both make appearances not on the same song, but in separate songs.

Our holiday record that we have, Little Sherman, the holiday album. Oh, cool. She'll sing the song. I always wanted to do a duet with her, so I wrote a song to do with my drummer and bass player, Mike.

And then I also always wanted to have an instrumental, just like full on, you know, guitar, rock, you know, instrumental. And never be able to do that. When you're friends with someone like Josh Z, those kind of things seem a little bit more possible.

Speaker A

00:02:21.650 - 00:02:25.970

So wait, I know that you have other things in the work for 2012. You have a holiday record out too?

Speaker B

00:02:26.330 - 00:04:03.200

Yeah, we just released it last week as a matter of fact. It's been incredibly successful. I mean we've had. It's the most record we've ever sold online of any album we've done.

It's basically we did after we finished our last studio record.

It was kind of as a joke, our bass player said, you know, it was the middle or, you know, end of July, middle of August, when we were wrapping up the new studio record and we were experiencing what was the hottest summer that Texas had ever had and the history of keeping track of temperature. And we had almost like 100 plus days and we just built our new studio and we didn't quite.

One of the last things that we kind of dealt with when we were making the studio was the air conditioning and the how will we cool this thing off? Kind of a two story, like little mini house behind our drummer's house. It's just we call our little tree house. But it was 125 degrees in that studio.

You have to keep the AC off while we were tracking. So there was very much a sense of urgency. We've got to get this or I'm going to pass out.

And as a joke we kind of said the end, like we should make a Christmas record. You know, it's 100 and, you know, 104 degrees, you know, and we're writing songs about like it's snowing outside and all this kind of stuff.

And we were doing it totally tongue in cheek, right. We started like writing these songs, like good. This is a good song, you know.

And so we started recording it and sending some stuff around to our friends. Like kind of jokingly like John Popper from Blue Shop. Yeah, you know, everybody's from Roger Klein, the Peacemakers and Friends in Stone, Honey.

And we ended up thinking, why don't you guys come down and help us make this record. We're gonna just do some original, maybe a couple of choice little covers. Like we did a cover of a band.

I didn't know that the band did a Christmas song, but a fan sent it to us.

Speaker A

00:04:03.200 - 00:04:04.280

I didn't know that either.

Speaker B

00:04:04.520 - 00:04:24.740

Yeah, it's called it's a song called Christmas Must Be Tonight. They actually did a few different alternate takes of it off Kingdom Come record I think it was. And they sent us a copy of the.

Of the song and loved it and we wouldn't actually cut it. Caught the guys from Stonehoney to come in and do some harmony vocals and our. And and Phil from Stonehoney played guitar on it.

So yeah, it was really kind of a cool project.

Speaker A

00:04:24.980 - 00:04:33.380

When I first heard about the band Sherman, I was trying to spell it with an E. And you know we're based in the south and the war is not over yet here.

Speaker B

00:04:34.260 - 00:04:36.020

So I thought exactly why it's with you.

Speaker A

00:04:36.100 - 00:04:40.020

I thought, wow, that's really brave of a Texas band to name themselves Sherman.

Speaker B

00:04:40.020 - 00:06:24.120

Well, it's even crazy because I actually, you know, my high school years and my mother lives in Georgia and so yeah, to have General Sherman as part of your name after what he did in the Civil War, probably not the best marketing. And oddly enough, I mean that's how the name kind of how came about. I mean there's a couple different reasons.

It was like one of those things where the name clicks with me because for a few different reasons in my life I thought of it when I was younger aiming a band Sherman because my mother went to high school in Denison, Texas and their arch rival was the Sherman Bearcats.

And I always thought that would be really funny because at the time I was trying to put together punk bands and if you had a punk band, it didn't offend your parents or at least a really good name. So it was early on that was in junior high when I was putting their punk my skate punk dude. And it's funny enough, I don't remember.

I was talking to a friend of mine, Ben Peeler on the phone and he said we were talking about the super bowl was going on in Atlanta. And he said, you know what they need? They need Sherman to come back through there and melt all that ice. Is this kind of a joke? You know, I was like.

And it was like, you know what that's. And at the time I was. The band was called Blue Train, which is just a horrible name. And even a funnier story is like I basically living in Los.

I got offered a gig.

I was out at the bar and this guy who was like, yeah, I booked a whiskey at Go Go and I just moved to la and I was, you know, like starry eyed trying to put a ban together. I didn't even have a band. And I just said I have a Band I want to come play. There he goes. Great, man. He's like, how about next Friday night?

And he's like, what's the name of the band? And I was looking around the room and there was all these posts, like, all these rock posters everywhere in this bar that we were at.

And there was also this in the corner. It was that John Coltrane poster that said Blue Train on it. Blue Train. And I came to find out later that they were the guys.

Blue Train were the two guys for Baywatch. Wasn't really a really hip maybe.

Speaker A

00:06:24.840 - 00:06:31.080

Yeah, you're cool. When you started your first little skate punk band, were you writing your own stuff then or were y' all covering punk?

Speaker B

00:06:31.080 - 00:07:12.300

Oh, yeah, I was writing, like, kind of got into music through.

I had an English teacher who I always really loved music growing up, but I had an English teacher in, like, middle school who got me into all these poetry contests. Started getting really into that.

It was funny because I was a lost kind of punk kid trying to get into sports and, you know, awkward seventh grade taller guy in my class and doing poetry, you know, I kind of really thought about it. And then I entered a few of these contests and I won one of them.

And I actually got some where I was like, poetry's kind of hokey, but when the songwriting. Now, that's pretty cool, you know, that sounds a chickal. Like, I learned really quickly. Okay, this. All right, I get it. I get it.

The rest is a lot of truck stops and Florida line vans down the.

Speaker A

00:07:12.300 - 00:07:17.620

Road, you know, did you have some musical stylers or specific bands that you were trying to model yourself after?

Speaker B

00:07:17.940 - 00:07:48.400

You know, when I was first coming out, I was into punk rock. I think secretly I wanted to be like, a member of Van Halen, you know, I think everybody did in the early 80s.

And you're living like I lived up in, like, North Dallas.

I just remember a friend of mine's mom took us to go see Van Halen in concert, and I came out with, like, you know, four bandanas tied around my left leg, if that tells you anything. Mom, I think I want to get a sword for Christmas. She's like, a sword? What are you going to do with the sword? I was like, I don't know.

Dave Lee Roth throws one around, looks pretty cool. Seems to get a lot of chicks.

Speaker A

00:07:49.280 - 00:07:51.680

Women will throw their underwear on stage at me, mom, if I do this.

Speaker B

00:07:51.680 - 00:08:08.140

Exactly right, you know, does something. I can't figure it out. I figured out that the results are positive results, but I can't figure out why the sword is doing this.

I didn't get it until I saw, you know, Sami remains the same. Then full circle. Hey, this is Aaron from Sherman on Country Fried rock.

Speaker A

00:08:08.620 - 00:08:14.060

As you were first forming those bands, what kind of music were y' all working on and how did that move to where you are now?

Speaker B

00:08:14.460 - 00:10:56.360

I'd say it was a lot more folk and a lot more country. We had like a stand up bass player at the time and so I was like an air force brat as a young kid.

So I kind of traveled around a lot and my family just in general, you know, Winnebagos and trailers and pop up trailers. And their idea of having a good weekend was going on camp for three days.

And so, you know, the camaraderie of being on the road, it was just something that always just really, really, really, really came, you know, for me. Something I've always loved. Still to this day, I really. It's one of my favorite parts about, you know, being a musician.

But you know, I did a lot of traveling kind of growing up and I think it kind of set me on a path of, you know, wanting to make music. But when I went, right before I moved to Hawaii, I guess there's this long winded circular story here.

I. I had a bunch of friends that were going to be moving out to Hawaii. They were all kind of saving our money.

And what I was actually doing, I was working on them mountain as like a lift off in the summer, you know, like, I just like kind of bailed out of college at Arizona State and I was like, what am I gonna do? I'll go up to Colorado mountains, you know, it's snowing and I've always wanted to do that. So I got a job doing that.

I met a bunch of these crazy, you know, mean guys who are all like kind of getting in this new sport called snowboarding. And everybody was like, you know, it was like a really cool time to be there. A bunch of us had this kooky plan that went to snowman.

So we were gonna save up all the money we made at the resort and, and go to Hawaii. And at the time, my dad was a polyhouse.

I flew for free and said, oh, this will be, you know, I can still come home for Christmas and live there for a while. I ended up going out there for a few years and I only went out with like a few, a handful of records.

And one of those records was the Uncle Tupelo record, you know, the one with the date on it, 1992, whatever. And I just Was over the