Zig At The Gig podcast

Interview with Anne Richmond Boston of Swimming Pool Q's.

Anne was born in Louisville, Kentucky. She was a member of the church choir, took violin and ballet lessons all through elementary school. Her father was transferred to Winter Haven, Florida, for one year (where violin and ballet stopped) and then moved the family to Atlanta, Georgia. She was accepted into the high school chorus and was chosen to sing in a special chorus performing Leonard Bernstein’s “Chichester Psalms.” Vocal harmonies were something she came to naturally. Perfoming “Going to the Chapel” with a band in the high school talent show was her first experience of being onstage behind a mic.

She really dug it. It was about this time that the music of Janis Joplin, Grace Slick, Sandy Denny, Linda Ronstadt, Tammy Wynette, Dolly Parton, Melba Montgomery, Aretha Franklin, Judy Collins, and The Supremes took up residence in her being. She became friends with local Atlanta phenoms Thermos Greenwood (original rock band) and was invited along with a chorus of people to sing on the song “Chocolate City” for their album Pinhead Teddy. Anne was invited to become a member of the newly formed band The Swimming Pool Q’s in 1978 and sang on their recordings The Deep End, The Swimming Pool Q’s, and Blue Tomorrow. They continue to perform today. As a graphic designer, Anne created much of the early Swimming Pool Q’s promotional material, supervised photo sessions, and designed single and album cover packaging.

Leaving the Q’s in 1987, Anne and her then-husband recorded The Big House of Time which was released on DB Records in 1990. It contained many originals and several cover songs, including “When You Dance” by Neil Young and “Darling Be Home Soon” by John Sebastian. T

he follow up was I Should Be Happy. Anne’s has had the pleasure of singing either live with, or on recordings by:  Drive-By Truckers, Widespread Panic, Thermos Greenwood, Terry Adams (NRBQ), The Brains, Johnny Jenkins, Marti Jones, Syd Straw, Laurie Sargent, Julie Adams, Kelly Hogan

Interview with Ryan Sollee of The Builders and the Butchers.

The band has had over 100,000 monthly listeners on Spotify for years now.  Several of their videos have millions of views on You Tube - including “Bringin’ Home the Rain” with 19 million views.  They are well known for their energized live performances and have dedicated fans that travel long distances to see them play.   “As our lives become more digital, people are sharing physical spaces less and less.  The creation and performance of live music is an ever crucial, consistent, and communal space. In these spaces people can share the sounds, sights and smells of what its like to be moved in unison and feel connection,” says Sollee. With glowing album and show reviews coming from Pitchfork and The Wall Street Journal, among others, their brand of folk-rock is best served live. Audiences can look forward to lively performances, where fourth wall is broken and the audience is able to participate in call and response sing-a-longs. Sometimes the band will hand out instruments for fans to play, and they’ll even get down off stage to perform right on the floor. “The songs for No Tomorrow were written with our cultural changes and challenges in mind.  The overarching message is that we can find hope in each other and still lead lives full of joy and creativity even when systems and leaders fail us.  We believe we have much more that unites us, than divides us and that music is one of the best ways to create a connected shared experience for people.  Live rock and roll is a church for the non-religious and religious alike. Stephen Thompson, NPR Music “The Builders and the Butchers make records the way the bards used to pass on stories. They’re poetic and captivating, and do to songwriting what Clint Eastwood does to movies,” and this [new record] follows the same, narrative-driven path.” - Consequence of Sound

badmanrecordingco.com

thebuildersandthebutchers.com

https://www.facebook.com/thebuildersandthebutchers/

https://www.instagram.com/thebuildersandthebutchers/

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=the+builders+and+the+butchers

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=badman+recording+co. Album buy link: https://badmanrecordingco.com/products/the-builders-and-the-butchers-no- tomorrow-pre-order-1

Brendan Canty is a musician, drummer, composer, producer and filmmaker. Brendan has played the bands Fugazi, Rites Of Spring, Happy Go Licky. Brendan currently plays in The Messthetics who recently released an album called Deface the Currency . 

Deface the Currency is the second collaboration between The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis. It captures the sound of what the forge of 150 shows in a year can do to a band. They have become a unit designed to destroy on stage. This record is expansive, ambitious, and spontaneous.

Get the Vinyl with link below:

https://store.ververecords.com/products/the-messthetics-james-brandon-lewis-deface-the-currency-milky-clear-lp?srsltid=AfmBOooC8C2oyn3IfvcVhF2qzPO4lKFhqlSbqU6aSsOZJdLTqeBBLoqg

The Messthetics's Info: 

Bandcamp:

deface-the-currency

https://www.themessthetics.com/

The Story of The Fugazi Basket Ball Hoop Show! Mickey Lynch on Zig At The Gig!

Mickey Lynch is a musician , Zine Editor ( Threatening Society), and he runs a music label called Uranium Rush!

Link for Upside Down Punks: The Strange but True Story of That Fugazi Basketball Hoop Show: https://microcosmpublishing.com/catalog/zines/67421?srsltid=AfmBOorSBwcIxkMAd1leBDDVNajsiSp_cxttXBcjPW6fVLUKBSxNfokA

Link for Threatening Society

https://threateningsociety.com

Interview with Ben Vaughn !

Ben Vaughn is a south New Jersey–born musician, songwriter, composer, producer, and radio host basd in Los Angeles. He hosts the weekly syndicated radio show The Many Moods of Ben Vaughn and performs regularly in the U.S. and Europe. Vaughn is known for producing artists such as Ween, Arthur Alexander, and Charlie Feathers, and for collaborations with Alan Vega and Alex Chilton. As the leader of The Ben Vaughn Combo and through his solo albums—including the cult classic Rambler ’65, recorded entirely in his car—he has built a devoted following in his native Philadelphia and beyond. His songs have also been recorded by artists including Marshall Crenshaw, The Morells, and Deer Tick. For more information on Ben, visit

benvaughn.org

Straight From The Hat

Ben He’s had a career filled with twists and turns as a performer, songwriter, composer for film and TV, and record producer. For Ben Vaughn, the best part of the journey has been the colorful characters he’s encountered along the way. His friend Laura Pochodylo, who works for Sun Records in Nashville, wrote the names of those characters down and placed them in a hat. Each episode, she’ll select several names at random and let Ben relive the stories—no pre-planning, no filter—just telling it like it was, straight from the hat. https://www.straightfromthehat.com

Interview with  Steve Wynn of the Dream Syndicate.

Steve Wynn is a singer, musician and songwriter. He led the band the Dream Syndicate from 1981 to 1989 in Los Angeles, afterward began a solo career, and then reformed the Dream Syndicate in 2001

Steve's info : (links to Medicine Show release )

https://www.stevewynn.net/dream_syndicate_medicine_show.php.

Steve's Bio:

Steve Wynn was born in Santa Monica, California in 1960 and got his first guitar (a nylon-string acoustic) when he was nine, shortly after which he wrote his first song "Sing My Blues". He formed his first band "The Light Bulbs" that same year and the band made the circuit of parties and school functions; the band's oldest member was ten years old. By the time he was 13, Wynn had played in bands with such colorful names as Purple Passion and Sudden Death Overtime, alternating between his own early originals and songs by Neil Young, The Rolling Stones and The Who.

In the years that followed, Wynn found himself sidetracked by a strong desire to become a sportswriter. Abandoning his electric guitar for a notepad, pen and typewriter Wynn found himself on the other side of the interview, speaking to football, basketball and baseball players and dreaming of one day seeing his name on the masthead of Sports Illustrated.

During his high school years, Wynn entertained notions of becoming a sportswriter but the excitement and immediacy of the punk rock explosion of 1977 brought him back into the world of songwriting and performing. He found himself writing and playing guitar for UC Davis (near Sacramento) New Wave pioneers "Suspects", a band for whom Wynn wrote over 100 songs, none of which he has performed since. A move back to Los Angeles with Suspects lead singer Kendra Smith was the first step towards the formation of The Dream Syndicate, the band with whom Wynn would gain national and eventually international acclaim.

The Dream Syndicate played together for the first time in December 1981 and within three weeks had recorded its self-titled first EP. The record was released in April 1982 and followed six months later by the band's debut album "The Days of Wine and Roses", an album which fans and critics alike still consider one of the best and most important rock albums of all time. Those early years are represented here by "When You Smile" and "That's What You Always Say," songs which have been covered, respectively, by Concrete Blonde and Luna. The band was almost immediately signed by A&M Records for whom it recorded the landmark "Medicine Show" (the title song opens this compilation), a record that was recently named one of the 40 best rock albums of all time by the London Guardian and whose songs have been covered by REM and The Black Crowes among many others.

Several years of worldwide touring (including several trips to Europe and Japan and Australia) followed before the band broke up at the end of 1988. Wynn has said "As proud as I was of The Dream Syndicate, our music and our accomplishments I felt we had reached our peak and everything that followed would have been a disappointment. I wanted to be a band that broke up while we were still doing our best work."

In 1990 Wynn came back with his first solo offering "Kerosene Man," an album of incredible diversity that showed Wynn's enormous growth as a songwriter and record-maker. The songs "Carolyn" and "Tears Won't Help" were among the most-played songs that year on Modern Rock radio stations and his video for "Carolyn" was in regular rotation on MTV for six weeks. The follow-up "Dazzling Display" was Wynn's most elaborate production to date, a dizzying synthesis of the best rock music of the previous 30 years featuring the talents of, among others, REM's Peter Buck, Concrete Blonde's Johnette Napolitano and members of The Bangles, The Turtles and the touring bands of Lou Reed and Tracy Chapman.

A four-day writing vacation in Richmond, Virginia with the House of Freaks' Bryan Harvey turned into the side-project supergroup Gutterball who released two albums, garnered overwhelming press response and built a frenetic cult following; the Black Crowes took the band out as its opening act even before the first Gutterball record was released. Not one to stand still, Wynn followed the success of Gutterball with the more introspective "Fluorescent", an album whose single "Carelessly" picked up heavy radio play throughout the US and Europe.

In 1994, Wynn moved to New York City. He harnessed the excitement and energy of his new home in his record "Melting in the Dark". The two albums that followed,"Sweetness and Light" and "My Midnight", found Wynn settling into the sound that would define the next phase of his solo career.

In 2001, Steve went to Tucson and recorded the double album "Here Come the Miracles" which was released to overwhelming critical acclaim. The album was seen as a stunning comeback and appeared on many year-end critics' surveys along with winning Best Alternative Rock Album by the American Federation of Independent Music. The album was followed by "Static Transmission" and "...tick...tick...tick", both also recorded in Tucson with his new backing unit "The Miracle 3" and which were viewed as part of a "Desert Trilogy" that is seen by many as the best work of his career.

But Wynn has never been one to settle into an easy or predictable groove. Since the last of the desert trilogy he has recorded "Cast Iron Soul", a new Danny & Dusty album with Green On Red's Dan Stuart, joined forces with his wife and drummer Linda Pitmon and legendary Spanish producer Paco Loco to concoct the twisted pop side project "Smack Dab", and collaborated with the Walkabouts' Chris Eckman in Slovenia on the lush and lavish "Crossing Dragon Bridge", a record that made up a tandem of new releases in 2008 with "The Baseball Project", a baseball song cycle collaboration with Pitmon and also Scott McCaughey and Peter Buck of REM and the Minus 5.

In the midst of such a prolific recording career, Wynn has still found time to average over 100 shows a year all over the world. He has found himself as welcome in Rome, Oslo, Athens, Brussels, London and Madrid as he has in Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco, Chicago and Boston. And for the devoted fans he has made in these and many other cities, his extensive discography of music reflects the consensus among fans: that Steve Wynn is one of the most adventurous, accomplished and exciting songwriters of the last few decades. If all of this is still news to you, just put on this cd and get ready to join the legions of people who have enjoyed Wynn's dazzling display of songs over the last 25 years.

Interview with : Nick Hexum of 311

Nick Hexum is a singer, rapper, songwriter and guitarist who is the frontman for the alternative rock band 311 and The Nick Hexum Quintet.

Tickets for Nick Hexum and Water Tower Band at Grog Shop CLE OH Mar -31-26 : https://grogshop.gs/tm-event/nick-hexum-with-water-tower/

Nick's Info :

https://www.nickhexum.com

https://311.com

Interview with singer songwriter Robert Deeble.

Born in 1966 in Long Beach, California, Robert cut his teeth as a songwriter in the gritty

Robert Deeble - Bio

depression and struggle but with “a redemptive hope that brought glimmers of light (Performer

Robert's info: 

Interview with Jerid O'Connell of The Rousers.

The Rousers were formed in 1977 in New York CIty by Jeff Buckland (vocals), Bill Dickson (rhythm guitar), John Hannah (bass), Tom Milmore (lead guitar) and Jerid O'Connell (drums). They auditioned at CBGB, where they were noticed by famed Max's Kansas City booker Peter Crowley. The Rousers genial "Rhythm and Twang" sound soon earned them a following, and the band performed all around the New York area, Washington D.C., Philadelphia and Boston.

The Rousers released a single in 1981 on Jimboco Records of "Party Boy" and "Don't Let the Band Stop Playing" produced by MC5 legend Wayne Kramer. (An early limited edition included a red FlexiDisc of "Christmas Party".)

In 1982 Sal Capozucca and Brett Wilder respectively took over on drums and bass. This lineup continued until 1984. Jeff Buckland left music and went on to a successful career in animation. The other members went on to various other bands (Bill and Brett joined The Backbones, Tom and Sal to Syntax Error, Treasure Head, etc.) and continued to play and record in the New York area.

Around 1986, the Praise Jockeys were formed with Bill, Brett, Tom and Sal. The band featured a heavier, riff happy sound. Their "Look at My Face" CD was released in 2021.

Bill, Tom and Sal next formed The Mockingbirds with keyboard player Chris Pondish. The Mockingbirds released the CD "Broken Times" in 2021. That band transformed into The Shambles (Bill, Tom, Sal and Rob Noname). Brett continued to play in several bands, including The Vacant Lot.

Around 1995 The Rousers began playing as a quartet with Bill on vocals and guitar, Brett on bass, Tom on guitar and Sal on drums. This lineup recorded several songs at Purple Light Studio in Brooklyn which was released as "All the King's Men" in 2021.

Brett left to pursue his musical muse, sometimes rejoining The Rousers, but mainly going his own way. The Rousers continued with Bill now on bass and vocals. Henry Kandel was added on saxophone from about 2000-2002. After that, the Rousers recorded and performed as a trio. The band released a CD ("Playing the Rock and Roll For You") in 2012, and an EP in 2018 ("Kickin'"). Drummer Sal Capozucca died of Covid May 13,2020.

Pick up a copy for The 1979 Sire Session here :

https://www.leftfordeadrecords.com/

1979-sire-session

Interview with Smitti Supab of Captain Buckles

After years of incubating, Captain Buckles has found its own trademark sound steeped in

Captain Buckles Info:

www.amazon.com/music/player/artists/B0D9WR9Y79/captain-buckles captainbucklesband.bandcamp.com