Speaker 1: Bring these mics up, and we've got Cody Pope and
Byron g here with us in the studio.
Speaker 2: Hey guys, Hey, good morning man, thanks so much for
having us.
Speaker 1: Yeah, welcome back, welcome back, and uh hop if you
weren't waiting outside too long. It's a little little chilly today.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, it was perfect timing.
Speaker 1: He had Adju Justice Camra here. Get you guys in
the shot. Of course we are on Facebook and YouTube
and all that stuff.
Speaker 3: There we go, there we go.
Speaker 1: How have you guys been? What's what's going on? Have
you been releasing new music or what have you been
up to?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So in October, we just released our sophomore full
length album, Giant Steps in Gates City Excellent. Yeah, so
that's been We did a big release show for that
and it's been pretty wild ride since then.
Speaker 1: Where did you Where'd you do the release show?
Speaker 2: So we did it in our hometown in Nashaua. We
like rented a hall and put together this whole experience.
We had a caterer come in and like cater the
event and had a photo booth and had a bunch
of the artists from hell Hound open up the night.
It was really cool.
Speaker 1: Nice, nice. Yeah, you guys must know. Do you know
Mike McDowell the Healer? Did you run into him on.
Speaker 2: This We literally just shook hands and met as we
were heading out as we were coming in.
Speaker 4: Yea.
Speaker 2: Looking forward to chopping it up with him more.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's doing some he's doing some great stuff. And
you must know Eleanor and Andre from So.
Speaker 2: I actually just met them super recently as well. Yeah,
like maybe a week ago or so. I just got
to go to New Hampshire Underground and hang out with
them for a bit. They're awesome people.
Speaker 1: Oh, excellent, excellent. I don't think they've done like a
full hip hop show. I mean obviously six Minds combined yeah,
performs there, but yeah they should do uh you should
do something with them, like do a big hip hop show.
Speaker 2: Yea, that's what we're hoping to do something. We're hoping
the dates wul Ligne in that we can make something
happen soon.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I really like their space. I think that it's really
conducive to fostering a positive like live music and arts scene,
and they offer resources and spaces for people that I
think are really valuable. So right I'm looking forward to
seeing what they're capable of doing with that. I think
that's gonna be awesome.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, well, I'm dying to hear you guys. You
always perform when you come on the show, which is wonderful.
And now the real test, of course, is always making
sure that what have you got? What do you what
do you call that? Byron?
Speaker 3: This is the Roland SP four O four m K.
Speaker 1: Two Okay, and what does that do for the For
the uninitiated.
Speaker 3: It does a little bit of everything.
Speaker 5: It's a sampler so you could create like full songs
on here.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I use it mainly for our.
Speaker 5: Live shows and stuff like that, so I can load
up heads and I can manipulate the sound.
Speaker 3: Yeah, kind of live as we're going.
Speaker 1: So okay.
Speaker 5: You never really get the same experience twice with these
types of machines.
Speaker 1: Right right. Yeah, for those listening live, if you're wondering
how these guys are going to perform live, that's what
let's see. If let's see if we can hear that.
And I'm not hearing anything yet, but I think I
know why. Oh there we go, easy.
Speaker 3: Hello.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is always the that's always the moment, right
when you guys come on. It's like, let's let's hope
this last. This works.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 1: The first time you came on, we did the Yeah,
we did the flash drive option the very first time
in the old station and.
Speaker 2: That was our first album together too.
Speaker 1: Oh that's right, yeah yeah. How many times have you
guys been?
Speaker 2: Is this this is our third time? Now? No, it's
not your fourth. No, I think you've been up here before. Well,
we had done stuff up in Laconia. Oh okay, maybe
that's we did local outbreak up in Laconi.
Speaker 1: That's why I'm thinking that, Yeah, both of us.
Speaker 3: Time.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, because we did our first album was Meet
Me and Gates City, so we played some of those songs,
and then the next time was we released an EP
called Pound of Wait No Renaissance Park. I think it
was the Park. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you guys have released a lot of it's hard.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been a while.
Speaker 1: Well, do you want to perform something or sure?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 1: All right?
Speaker 2: You have No Sugar added A good way to warm up.
This is the uh. This was the first single that
we released from the new album. Okay, it's the second track.
It's called no Sugar added. Okay, check check, I've been
in a daze. Mine's amazing a blaze. I've been catching
fight us since before the twelfth grade. I had this
design yet, but couldn't get out my way. Now I'm
doubled the age, still rewonded, the days I can't believe
with all love done, I'm still looking back bin clean
it up, because still remember the cooking crack, the drink
that had for the needle. Never quite took it back.
Some days I still find that I'm quite shook. In fact,
the light keeps going out. Maybe that's a soign for me.
I have accepted that one day will be time for
me someone's revenge. I suppose that it's fine with me.
Nothing in life off didn't happen with the time and
sweet all I can do work to build a good now.
When then stay in the sun to makeup of days
that shrouded in dens. I am the howling man standing
upon the howling winds, night of the hunt of the preacher,
upon the prout again, not perfect, not even close to
all right. Can't remember the last time I slept all night,
eyes wide open, but I need another hour. I just
fell asleep already. Time for the shower. No sugar, no sugar.
I just need water, meant the league. I can pat it.
Speaker 3: No sugar added, no sugar added.
Speaker 2: Somewhere between happening and apocalypse, now anxiety and alarms again.
Hope my horrible waves could never harm a friend. Some
men crossed me again, never saw him again, even the
he the Nord demon can fall from a sin who
called it again? I'm not sovvag to them. Drowning in
my own flood, I hardly can swim. Then I stopped
too late? How could I be so selfish do the
stupidest thing, But know that I'm not helpless? Bad patterns, habits.
I need to learn to break. I'm mad scattered this matter.
If I need to learn to shake, we'll extinguish over
light the match to burn the lake, every roll of
the dice, the one determined faith, slipping into the void
for just a few hours to win my best to
not flip. I got no new flower. My dreamscape is
the place that I do scout in search of advances, like
how I could bet the US power? Not perfect, not
even close to all right. Can't remember the last time
I slept all night. I was wide open, but I
need another hour. I just fell asleep already time for
the shower. No sugar added, no sugar added. I just
need water. Mentally, I get padded, no sugar added, no
sugar added, somewhere between being happy and mad.
Speaker 4: And I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1: Thank you Cody Pope and Ryron g here whatever live
in studio on this Saturday morning.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I couldn't hear everybody at first. I was like,
oh crap, what's going on.
Speaker 1: You made it work.
Speaker 2: You made it work volumes of magical thing.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, Now tell us about you know, for people
who are not familiar, So because you refer to it
Hellhound Publishing, what is that exactly? For people who don't know.
Speaker 2: So, Hellhound Publishing is a record label that I founded
in twenty eighteen and that Byron now co owns with me,
and so that is essentially our creative house where we
not only do we distribute and produce all of our music,
but we've been fortunate to sign and release music for
some artists that we're really close with as well. Okay,
we do music, we do some books, and we do podcasts.
Those are really like our big things right now.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, and yeah, you've talked about that on the show.
Before has that kind of has that kind of grown
in terms of who you're working with, Like you have
more artists that you're that you're working with or I don't.
I don't remember who we because I think the I
think the first time you talked about it on the show,
you had just kind of started that, or you had
started working together on that.
Speaker 2: I think, Yeah, I think what when we came on
and put out Meet Me in Gate City he had
only released a few records at that point, and now
with Giant Steps in Gate City, it's our fifteenth release
on the record label.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, Yeah, okay, okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel very fortunate to say that after all
this time. But yeah, it's been quite the wild ride.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no kidding, uh wow.
Speaker 3: So who now?
Speaker 1: Who else are you working with currently? Who are you
releasing music for?
Speaker 2: So our roster that's active right now consists of mostly producers,
but so they go out and perform a lot of
instrumental shows and we have instrumental albums out for them
as well. Yeah, so we represent even though who is
originally from Nashua but is now based out of the
Worcester area, he has like this very like Ethereal Lo
Fi kind of sound. But then because he comes from
like a boom back background, there's like a really cool
blend of like an almost ambient boombap kind of sound.
We represent an artist named Trip Seat who's based out
of Boston, Massachusetts area. He has a very electronic heavy sound.
I like to compare him to like an Aphex Twin
or a fat Boy Slim something along like very like
high energy, like party music. We also represent eight Biza
as well. I know you know Biza. He has obviously
been a long time contributor to the label and to
my music as well, and so he's always yeah, he's
always been a big part of the equation as well,
and that is that's really the core of like artists
that we have releases coming out for. But for twenty five,
where we're hoping to kind of expand the palette a
little more. We've kind of changed the way that we
operate as a label a bit, and we've also like
we've moved our headquarters. We had been in the same
place for over ten years. Wow, so now we just
moved into a new place and that's really evolved how
we can operate as a label and a lot of
capacities so we may not have as many releases coming
out in twenty five, but we fortunately have like really
big plans and a lot more resources to apply to
them now, which is exciting.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, yeah.
Speaker 3: Very good.
Speaker 1: Now, why why the when you when you talk about
the changes in terms of how you do things? Is
that is that something that does that come from kind
of learning as you go or or does some of
it I'm curious if some of it has to do
to with you know, the music business is constantly changing,
and you know now and I don't think we've ever
really talked about this aspect before, but now AI is
kind of really changing things. And yeah, I mean, does
does that play a role?
Speaker 2: I would say, And you might have a different experience
to speak to it. For me, as like a label owner,
I always sought to be the person that I thought
I would have wanted to have around as an artist.
But I learned that I wasn't being the person that
the artist needed, and that those are two separate things
where you could want more than you actually need, and
so not everybody's wants parallel, And so I had to
learn how to manage the artists better on the release
side of things because with some of the early releases
we put out on the label, we were very we
were very involved in the record in terms of like
being in weekly meetings, trying to make plans, and some
of the artists we were literally tracking all their music
in our free time and doing the artwork for I've
done the artwork for most of the releases on the
label a lot of so we were like super involved,
which feels good. But I think what we learned is
that artists need to kind of finish the idea on
their own m m and then kind of like be like,
you know, we were trying to build things out of
scratch with an artist, and really the artist has to
kind of have that idea and figure out what they
would do even if we weren't in the picture, and
if they were going to do that anyways, that's where
we can be of the most service to them. Okay,
But as artists, we have certain expectations for ourselves, and
so it's not fair to apply those expectations to everybody unilaterally.
Every every artist requires a specific kind of like catered
to means of getting their thing done, and if we
love the art enough, we're going to work on how
to be that to each artist and still maintain the
integrity of what we're trying to do personally.
Speaker 1: That makes sense because everyone's process is different. Yeah. Yeah,
Now what about AI in terms of like like releasing music,
do you have to? Does it get complicated now? With UH?
I mean it's it's incredible what's going on, Like I
I see uh, you know, like major labels are suing
AI companies and there's all that. There's all this mess
like do you have to does it become a consideration
when releasing music? Like is there an AI sample or
something in here? Is there something that is going to
cause us a problem down the road? And are there
headaches that come with that?
Speaker 5: So it's I think personally there's there's good and there's bad.
For for the sample based producers that like to dig
in you know, old records of like old crates of
records and things like that, which I am one of them,
it makes it a little bit harder to kind of
chop and and when it comes to release time, if
you have samples on your beats, you kind of it's
it's different now, It's definitely AI is picking up on
a lot of that stuff. Doesn't mean that there's a
place for it, because there definitely still is and a
lot of uh, you know Snoop and are releasing. I mean,
it's probably a little bit different because they have the
actual stems from the artists, but there's different avenues where
you could go for that type of stuff now.
Speaker 3: But on the other side of things, I've been.
Speaker 5: Using AI to generate uh chord progressions and and different
sounds and stuff like that.
Speaker 3: And i've you know you cant Byron?
Speaker 1: Can you pull that, Michael a little bit? Just yeah,
so just I noticed it was just dropping out. Yeah,
it is better. That's better. Yeah, thank you, it's just it.
It starts to g sorry about that, to make sure
we can hear you. I'm sorry. Good, Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: On the other other side of things, I've been using
AI to generate melodies and chords and picking my keys
and and blending and mashing a bunch of like AI
generated stuff and basically using them as my samples as
of late, chopping it up that way and doing it
that way. It's all like you're you're the creator, so
there's no royalties or there's no copyright infringement cases that
you run into. Oking it that way and it's different.
There's a million different possibilities. And I'm the type of
guy it's like, as we evolve, as you know, producers
and just musicians, if you're not using all of the
elements that are at your hands.
Speaker 3: These days, you're gonna fall behind.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: So there's good and there's bad. It's just all about
how you look at it.
Speaker 3: I think.
Speaker 1: Yeah, adaptability is so important absolutely, and yeah, adapting to technologies. Yeah,
we I was talking to somebody about that in terms
of doing a like a radio show, you know, like
there was a time when a radio show would just
be on the radio, but we've had to adapt to
you know now you know podcasting and streaming and all
of that, and and if you don't if you don't
do that, yeah, if you don't adapt, you fall behind.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Like I would never like take someone's voice right and
and have them say specifically Eric's like I wouldn't use
AI or anything like that. Yeah, But in terms of
like creating, I'm definitely messing around with AI.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it comes to creating melodies and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: Sure, sure, So.
Speaker 2: I think the thing that's important with AI, and that's
why I'm glad you spoke on it because you have
more experience with it. I don't, but I just from
like a outside looking in perspective kind of thing, I
feel like there's a lot of fear around AI taking
on creative tasks and things of that nature. And I
think the ultimate responsibility or obligation is that like, if
we don't determine how AI is going to be used,
other things are going to determine that for us. And
so it's like, rather than being afraid of AI and
being so against it, figure out how to implement it
into your life in the ways that it that you want.
You know, it's like, yeah, my conversations with most people
is that it's like you want AI to take care
of menial tasks and things that are time consuming and
take away from you like living your most life right,
So it's like if we sit back and wait for
AI to become what it is, it's going to take
the things we love instead. Because nobody like stepped in
and said like no, I want to do this part,
like do this task for me instead, And I don't
have any experience using it, So that's why it's like
hard for me to really like put my foot down
one way or another. But I just feel like we
have to kind of like we are the users of AI,
so we have to dictate what purpose it's going to
serve to us before it becomes consequential.
Speaker 1: Yeah, got to be proactive with it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure.
Speaker 5: I think like for independent artists, it definitely can be
like an attribute to you because as an independent artist,
you have to you have to wear so many hats, right,
whether it's creating artwork or whether it's you know, coming
up with videos or whatever, and AI can be a
huge help for that stuff if you're not specifically like
a drawing artist, to make up your own art work
whatever it is, right, Yeah, definitely use AI to help
you out on that side of things too.
Speaker 2: And even just like like task stuff, I would think
more so you know, like as somebody who makes artwork,
it's like I like, I like that side of things.
But I'm sure even as like maybe an engineer or
like a radio show producer, there's certain like engineering things
where it's like I wish this, I wish my mixerer
just always set to these levels, or I wish my
fader just always went to this thing, or I wish
my preset always went you know, these are kind of
the initial These are things that like AI could probably
do for us, is like set these kind of prerequisite
things so that when we go to use our creative tools,
they're like in the right settings or whatever.
Speaker 5: Yeah, like everything else, as long as you put the
time behind to learn the things you know, and you
can manipulate anything in your favor. Yeah, you know, as
long as you put the time in and the effort
to figure it out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, Yeah, No, I agree, Well said you guys
want to play on other.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what do you think? Maybe gratitude?
Speaker 1: Sure, if you're just joining us. We have Cody Pope
and Byron g here with us live in studio.
Speaker 3: Let me get that. Uh, there we go. I gotta
find this joint.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Some days I wake up and I wish I had it.
I hate that I'm sad, but my love once feel
so glad that he's a lead trip And don't know
why I'm so mad. Man got a lot to be
He's greatful for even when I'm down, bad man. Some
days i' wake up and I wish I had it.
I hate that I'm sad, but my love Monk feels
so glad, easily dripping.
Speaker 1: I don't know why I'm so mad man.
Speaker 2: You've got a lot to be grateful for. Even when
I'm down, bad man, waked up in my brain already
feeling dark, get the couch, already chase a spot, contemplat
and in my sick or unhealthy. It's this depression of
calma for unwealthy enough cleverity to know that I'm the
end of me, the one destroying me, the one should
be defending me. Got to take time enough to know
you can't make time, So make mind feel with the
things that shape live. What you heard on the great
vine might not taste right, so you don't gotta make wine.
You'll still make life. Plant that seed that gonna bandy
your family with the real money tree, life's optical standard fees.
And still days I'm fighting to get prop it. But
that's the vibe when no mean my trooper, when the
fight come at the door, you can't be true. You
missed that chance. Well, some days I wake up and
I wish I had it. I hate that I'm sad,
but my loved once feel so glad. Then he's the
lead tripping don't know vibe. I'm so mad man, got
a lot to be here, grateful for even when I'm down,
bad man. Some days I wake up and I wish
I had it. I hate that I'm sad, but my
loved ones feel so glad that he's the lead tripping.
Don't know why I'm so mad, man, you got a
lot to be grateful for, even when I'm down, bad man.
Speaker 1: Some days I wake up, I wake up. Mmm, good stuff, guys,
good stuff.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: If you're just joining us, we have Cody Pope and
Byron g here with us live in studio, and uh yeah,
I love that track and it's it's very relatable. I
I have those.
Speaker 2: Days, right, That's the thing, you know, I feel like
most of us do. And yeah, when we're in those moments,
you kind of feel like you're the only person and
it's like, man, how is like the world really like
crashing down on me? But when you realize how many
people in your life have made it to that next day,
it's like, all right, let me let me just try
and like breathe for a minute, yeah, and stop thinking
about what's weighing on me and like figure out what's
like lifting me instead.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, no, I like that a lot, you know.
I I'm pretty public about it. I struggle with depression,
and so I can I can relate to that, you know.
I hear those lyrics and it's like, yeah, yeah, I
get it.
Speaker 3: I get it.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 1: Are you so the new album it just came out.
Speaker 2: It came out in October.
Speaker 1: Came out in October, so pretty recent. Yeah, are you?
Are you already working on the next one? It seems
like you guys are pretty prolific. You put out a
lot of music.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So we have a lot of stuff in the
vault right now, and we definitely have some releases planned
for next year, but we're gonna honestly spend a lot
of time with this record. We've been working on visuals
for it. So we do these seminars called Inside the Music.
We do them at Nashville Public Library, and oh yeah.
We take songs from our records and kind of break
down the lyrics and the stories and the Ryan patterns,
the references, and he'll break down the stems of how
the song was composed. And we put one together for
Giant Steps, and we didn't get to do it in
time for the release. So that's gonna be one of
the things that we do this spring is Return of
the library seminar, and so we really just want to
give people time to take this record in. It's eighteen songs, yeah,
and we have a documentary coming out for it on Monday,
which really covers like from when we did meet Me
in Gates City till where we're at now. And so
there was like a lot of like obstacles along the
way of getting the album out, and so because it
took us so long to get here, we're really hoping
that we can afford to take time with this record
over next year because there's a lot to take in.
You know, it's eighteen songs. It's a very like in
depth personal record. It's the essentially like the follow up
to you know, the first record that we did Meet
Me in Gates City was shortly after we met as people,
you know, and like we met, and within a year
and some change we had a full length album out
and had been playing all over the region and running
this label together, and so so much has happened in
that time and we've learned a lot. We've both gone
through so much in our personal lives, and so the
album is really a document of so much of that
that it's hard to like move on to the next
thing already interesting where like we have like we have
an EP that we had already recorded. I have a
actually I have a project with Biza that we're hoping
to put out next year.
Speaker 1: Oh cool.
Speaker 2: I have a live band record that him that he's
helped me engineer that we've been working on for a
couple of years. We worked with some great artists from Maine.
So we have stuff that we're hoping to put out
next year. Yeah, but it just is, Ah, everything's kind
of happening on a feeling now where we did so
much stuff on setting deadlines that we thought fit within
our marketplace, and our audience has really shown us that
we can dictate our own marketplace and the best way
to do that is to not compromise the integrity of
these records. And so we're really hoping and frankly, you know,
just to be like honest about it. The record is
doing very well in regards to reception. People that hear
it loved the record. People have been buying the CDs,
which is great. The show was fantastic, But in terms
of like the typical benchmarks that you're trying to reach
in audience growth and stuff like that, we're just not
there yet. Yeah, We're we're a long ways away from
being where we're at comfortably in growing our audience, and
so it seems like it would be detrimental of us
to move on from this record too fast when there's
so much substance there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that makes sense.
Speaker 3: We also went to a legit studio this time around too.
Speaker 6: Oh.
Speaker 5: Before we were it was all in house, like doing
all the engineering, mixing, mastering, all that stuff. This time,
due to you know, time and our mental capacities with
work and stuff like that, it just.
Speaker 3: Wasn't gonna come out the way we wanted it to.
Speaker 5: So they made the decision to bring in Mertz, who
Cody had previously worked with who's uh engineered down at
the Bridge in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and he was kind of
like the third member of the team to help us
put this one together. Yeah, and he absolutely crushed it,
blew it out the like hit it right out the park.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5: Like, the synergy between the three of us was fantastic.
Every time we were down in his studio, we recorded
the whole thing down there, and he was like a
huge part of this record. So sonically, it's definitely like
our best sounding record too.
Speaker 2: Okay, it really it allowed us to be like it
allowed us to operate as a duo as artists. Where
doing Meet Me in Gate City, even though we were
a duo, he had to be the Rick Rubin and
like run the boards and make sure that I was
doing what I needed to do. And and so this
time was like we both just got to be the
artists and have our vision be brought to life. And
so I'm glad that you brought that up because i
do think that that also like played a big part
in making.
Speaker 3: This That's what it was the Upbraide sonically for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a huge and and that's and it's a poster,
you know, it's like this is part of a greater story.
And so you know, from meet Me and Gate City,
it was a lot of getting to know us, getting
to know how to operate with each other, and us
getting to know who our audience was. Now because this
music was quite a bit different than my solo music
and now with Giant Steps, it's exactly that, like we
were willing to challenge ourselves, we were willing to challenge
the listeners, we were willing to challenge the status quo.
We were willing to step outside of all of our
comfort zones and just make a record that we felt
was like a strong body of work and I'm happy
to like stand on that for a long time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, was that a difficult decision to to because you
had done the previous tracks? Yes, and how Yeah, Yeah.
Speaker 2: We tried. We tried. Frankly, like we we took a
couple different attempts at doing so we were gonna do
EP three before the new album we had so that
we did Pound of Flesh, then we did Renaissance Park
and we have one more that we already have written,
and so we went to record that and we just
we just weren't feeling it. There was just something. And
that's when I think he started to realize he was
getting burnt from the engineering, the mixing, the mastering, all
that stuff.
Speaker 5: And it was juggling family with work and yeah, at
the studio till two am and then waking up and
going to work and doing the same thing.
Speaker 3: And it's a lot. It was a lot, and we
have been doing that for like three years straight.
Speaker 2: So it was like, yeah, you don't get that same
off filming, right right, Yeah, Yeah, you don't get that
same fulfillment when it feels like work all the time.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and that's what it was definitely becoming the field
it was it was starting to feel like work and
that's the complete opposite artist, right right.
Speaker 2: But it was also like a blessing in disguise because
the songs for EP. Three, while we love them, by
the time we kind of figured out that we wanted
to like go back into the studio setting, the songs
wouldn't have worked for the time period that they would
have been done. You know, there was just a sonic
appeal to having them in like the springtime. They just
have that kind of energy. And we didn't start recording
until the beginning of summer, so by the time we
were done, it was gonna be late summer fall, and
we would have just been putting out songs just to
put something out and just to keep up with the joneses.
And instead we have this body of work that just
like everything made sense, and it was like it just
really reminded us of like we can't always dictate the timelines.
We just have to make the art, and the art
is going to tell us not to be like you know,
but like the art is really going to set the
terms of like what we can do. Like, nothing we
say matters until we have a body of work in
our hands, and then we can, you know, get to
the starting line.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. By the way,
you mentioned so you do you've done most of the
artwork for the arts of released through hew Lound. Yeah,
is there is there any kind of like, do you
have a specific style that you apply to The reason
I'm curious is in the past, it probably isn't really
a thing anymore, but I just remember, like back in
the nineties or in the two thousands, like No Limit Records,
you know, there was a very specific style pixel.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm curious if if, like, do you have a
specific style that you try to use.
Speaker 2: Or I don't. The only thing I guess I would
really say about my style is that I am in
I'm not like a traditionally trained graphic designer. I don't
have any sort of like art background or anything. I
learned how to use photoshop purely because I wanted to
be a guy starting a record label, and so the
root of my like artistic style is very photo heavy.
So I love when somebody can either give me a
photo or give me a reference or something, and that
is typically like my canvas and I can like creatively
build from there, Okay, and like I'm I'm learning how
to do other stuff. But I would say that through
the fifteen releases that we've put out that I've done
covers for, they're very like photo centric, where it's about
a certain like character or a certain idea and then
I'll just kind of design around that idea.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Robert, Yeah, he's the one who basically took all
the pictures of us, yeah for the for the last
ep in this album. Oh okay, Yeah, he was just
the the artistry in him, like he was literally laying
down almost like head in traffic to get that perfect angle.
Speaker 3: Yeah. He's one of a kind.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's actually based here in Manchester. But his name
is Robert Bates, ok and you can so you can
find his Robert Bates Photography and on Instagram he goes
by Domino Sonata. But he's also like a very he's
a very into cinema, like local cinema and film and
film history and stuff like that too.
Speaker 5: So you could totally feel it when you're like when
you see his photos. Really he's incredible man, And I think,
what did Nick did meet me in Gate City?
Speaker 3: So okay, Nix is girlfriend.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So we have a lot of like close people
in our network that shoot photos and then I just
like am fortunate enough to take those and manipulate them.
Speaker 1: Oh that's cool? Yeah, yeah, very cool. Uh you guys
want to play another one?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: What do we go?
Speaker 1: Dying to hear more?
Speaker 2: Here?
Speaker 1: If you're just showing us we have Cody Pope and
Byron g here with us alive in studio.
Speaker 2: And to exit more. Yeah, it's a fun one, all right,
you're watching at home, you can snap with us elevated
to the gallows like a miles in France. Life be
hitting differently do Miles of dance might have a thousand
yards stare of of a mile and trance life can
be so short you're running miles and pants don't care
for people but a smile, because why not? This life
the only one that I know that I got all
This Third eyed Jazz got me feeling like cyclops every
year for a little closer they'm feeling like my pops,
frustrated with my nation. Probably for different reasons of posing
opinions on opposition committing treason. I'm from where you got
to embrace multiple seasons. One day it's spring, one day
you take in the leaves and still jump hurdles. What
I got these long legs for? Ramp up my protein?
Would I eat all these eggs for? I grew up
between exit one and exit for, But even as a youth,
I knew I had to exit more.
Speaker 3: A little short one.
Speaker 1: That is a short one.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 5: Yeah, there's a lot of those little kind of like
interlows between each a lot of the tracks on this one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, No, I like it though. One day it's spring,
next day you're taking the leaves. Then that is true.
That is our weather tends to go. Yes, yes, we
have Cody Pope and Byron's here with us alive in
studio and uh sounding great. Are you guys playing out Lutrey?
Are you doing a lot of live shows the days?
Speaker 2: So it was. I would say this was probably our
slowest year we did. We did a run in March
when we put out Renaissance Park. We were real lucky.
We got to go out with Ari the Rugged Man
for a night. We did some nights in Vermont. Yeah,
came here. You're with the first on that whole that
was the well, that's the show that's okay, going back
to before we were on air, that's we were here
for Renaissance Park and that was the show that the
computer crashed, yes, because we played let It Grow for
the first time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's that's part.
Speaker 3: Of that run. And that same night we had a
The Rugged Man at.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, okay wow.
Speaker 2: But after that run of shows, it was pretty quiet
for the most part. We did something, you know, something
here or there.
Speaker 3: A lot of life stuff was going on.
Speaker 2: Yea, yeah, we we started working on well, so we
started EP three basically in like so, Renaissance Park came
out in March, and by like the end of April,
we were already jumping into EP three and then by
like the end of May we realized everything just like
wasn't working. And by the end of June we were
already down at the Bridge working on the new album. Okay,
So it was just one of those things that like
and then we spent so much time doing the album
and we didn't want to. We knew what we wanted
to do for the release show, and we knew if
we did too many shows beforehand that that would kind
of like spoil or saturate it. So once we started
working on the album, we made like a very like
conscious effort to be like, look, we're gonna not perform
until this show. We want people to really like, this
is the next time they experience us is going to
be hearing these songs in a room that we booked
with our sound are lighting, our caterers that we brought,
like just like a show the way that we think
it makes the most sense. Yeah, and and like, I
think it was one of the best decisions we made
because the event turned out like really memorable.
Speaker 1: Excellent, excellent. By the way, what was our a the
rugged man? Like he seems like an intense dude.
Speaker 2: Like, yeah, he's very intense. Yeah, we we didn't get
to meet him. I've opened I think I've opened for
him like three or four times, and I've literally never
met him. So oh really yeah, that's just how rappers
are though.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he I I heard I heard an interesting story
about him. Do you guys know Kate ever?
Speaker 2: So I don't know him personally, but I feel like
we the name sounds familiar and I'm pretty sure we
played a show like years and years ago in the past,
if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, he he opened for U.
Speaker 2: I bet you that was probably the I bet you
I might have been on that show too. Okay, maybe
that's where I know him from.
Speaker 1: Yeah he he He told me an interesting story which
I won't I won't repeat.
Speaker 5: But I would never want to be as loud as
a live sound engineer artist.
Speaker 3: Man. I felt bad for that guy that night.
Speaker 1: Really, why did the engineer take some verbal Yeah.
Speaker 3: And it's yeah, yeah he did.
Speaker 5: And uh, you know, I mean if you're an art
like a has been around for you know, over two decades.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's like there's a there's a level of expectations.
Speaker 5: You got it if you're gonna you know, oh yeah, yeah,
do anything with him, which is you know, he earned that.
Speaker 1: So if you guys ever seen the meltdown he had
with Tim Poole on his podcast.
Speaker 2: That sounds wild.
Speaker 1: Oh it's great. Yeah yeah, if you go on YouTube
and just hide in Tim pool all right, the recommend
I'm sure it comes right.
Speaker 3: Oh, I gotta check that out.
Speaker 1: Yeah he got He had a little angry with Tim Poole.
It's just like, I'm not that guy. You don't want
to go there with me. I can't even do an
impression of it. It's it's really really good. I'm really
angry with it. Was awesome, It's fantastic.
Speaker 2: I can just like picture that in my head.
Speaker 3: Yes, it's really good.
Speaker 1: Now who else?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 1: Is there any is there anyone else coming up in
the short term who you're releasing through uh?
Speaker 2: In sometime this spring we are hoping to release so
eight Biza. Yeah, yeah, really yeah. Business just dropped a
Merry Christmas beat tape which is on all streaming pladcams,
so everybody should go listen to that. But when we
initially obviously Bizza has always been a part of our movement,
but when we like made a formal offer to be like, hey,
we want to have a record of yours come out
on the label, he put out what what I to
consider like his magnum opus is an album he did
a few years ago. It's called Bobby's boombapp recitle. Okay,
it's like his producer composition album and he basically hired
and picked and curated all of the vocal features on
the record and produced it and put them all together.
And it's a phenomenal album. It just has acrobatic mister Lyft,
crime Apple, my favorite rapper, Cody Pope is on there.
Tons of people are on There's just Time and lep
who don't even really perform anymore. So it's probably one
of the last recordings that they did. Yeah, there's just
these phenomenal verses on there. But much like a lot
of us as artists, because they didn't have a budget
behind him to do some grand release. He didn't have
money to do a physical release, you know, there wasn't
He was doing it all himself, you know, and he
puts so much into making it that it didn't even
get like a huge digital distribution. Okay, So one of
the things that we wanted to do first was give
that record like a really grand release, And over the
years we've been trying to like put a CD package
together that really like is special and put some video
content around it. So this spring really is hopefully going
to be the Bobby's boomback recital Spring, as well as
some more stuff from us.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Bus is incredible. Yeah, I haven't interviewed him and
a real I gotta get him on the show.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's always got stuff going on.
Speaker 6: Man.
Speaker 3: I went into the studio.
Speaker 5: It was like two weeks ago and ran into bizit
there and what he was doing that night, I actually
got it. I had was like taking videos and stuff.
Just the way he manipulates samples and audio is like
no one's doing it like him. Yeah, he could literally
you can smack this wall and he'll make a full
beat out of it.
Speaker 3: Like, yes, he's on another level, and I hope.
Speaker 5: I think he'll get his flowers soon where everybody, you know,
I can see that he can just he's he's the
mad scientist for that's what I call it.
Speaker 3: He just can anything any sound.
Speaker 5: He's manipulating it in his way, and it's really incredible
to see when he's in his zone at the studio,
you know.
Speaker 2: Yea, Yeah, I hate to be biased because I'm obviously
like his friend, but I can't tell you enough, like
as a record label owner and obviously like Bizza is
an artist, So I'm not saying that he's not challenging
in his own right, but but Bizza is he's the
type of artist you want to work with as a
label owner because he's doing things that he was going
to do even if you weren't. Sorry, that's right. He's
doing things that he was gonna do even if you
weren't in the picture. And that's what you want, is
you want an art of You want an artist that's
motivated enough to do it themselves, so that when you
come in and partner with them, you're just adding fuel
to something that was already the If you just know
a great artist but they're not driven to do it
on their own, you're like pulling teeth sometimes because it's
like they clearly didn't want it if if you were,
if they weren't already doing it, you know. And so
with Bizzy, you almost have to chase him sometimes because
he's so motivated that he's he's dropping stuff constantly, and
you got to kind and so that's why it's like
we have a unique friendship and relationship with him because
it's like he was doing this before either of us anyways.
So it's like you got to give him room to
do his thing and let him breathe creatively. But we
just feel fortunate that like he still like wants to
partner with us and do stuff with us as well,
because we like to find those little gems every now
and then and be like, here's how we can help
bring that into the world.
Speaker 1: Right, right, Have you ever I mean obviously I don't
expect you to mention any names, but have you guys
ever run into a situation where you work with somebody
who maybe just doesn't.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, I guess for you know, not too many, fortunately,
but I would say we've had We've had one release
that didn't work out, and in total, we've maybe worked
with three artists that it just wasn't the right kind
of relationship. But fortunately, we only ever really were in
one situation where an artists record came out and it
just didn't really work out. And uh yeah, you know,
like those things are tough in the moment, and for
us being so early in the label, I think it
definitely felt like, oh, like what did we do wrong?
Like what you know, But as time went on, like
we realized like we did the best we could and
it just like everything's not going to always work out.
And I like to say that hell Hound is for anyone,
but Hellhound isn't for everyone, right, you know, Like we
are so open to what kind of music, what kind
of art, the kind of people we work with, Like
we really just we have a wide scope and a
love of art. Yeah, but we also have a certain
framework within which we like to do things, and we
have a certain aesthetic and a certain rawness and vulnerability
and honesty and work ethic, and that's not for everybody,
and so it's not you know, goes back to like
what I was saying earlier, is like we can't hold
other artists to the way that we do things. We
do what works best for us. And if there's other
people that we love their art, we just have to
kind of acclimate to what's going to work for them
to be the most genuine.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, exactly not And you could tell. You could
tell when.
Speaker 5: You know the passion's not fully there right as well,
you know, and.
Speaker 3: It kind of sucks the air out of the room.
Speaker 5: So yeah, you kind of learn real quick when you
get into a couple of sessions with somebody and you know,
kind of the first or second day, we're like, it's
either going to be way too much work in us pushing, right,
and if they're not in that creative space or if
they're you know, not fully committed, then it's I'm we're
not going to push you to like get there, like
you gotta have that. Like it's just an artist in
general or musician or whatever like, Yeah, you gotta have
the passion or else it's not gonna work.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, exactly.
Speaker 3: We have time.
Speaker 2: You guys want to play one more or twist arm right?
Speaker 3: Do the last one?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess we should. So. This is the title
track from Giant Steps in Gate City, which is affectionately
called Giant Steps.
Speaker 1: Okay, Cody Pope and Byron g.
Speaker 2: My lace is tight enough for all my giant steps.
Now easy to get every day to say I'm the
best Now, life be like some big beautiful breast now
over a windy day when all the sun dresses out.
Even when stressed out, stop and taking another ahead of
this life and understand why you love it it. No
one can do what you do. That's why the gluff
won't fit. Keep working hard towards your dreams. You'll make
so much of it. These menver thongs take training more
than saying words. Sometimes you're on the path alone that's
evading herds. You lucky if your lifeline is exchanging verbs.
There was a time in my life I was exchanging hurt.
Went from thinking not be dead before the age of
thirty to making it with words and trying not to
be too worthy for every step back something to look
forward to. You've been working. Soon enough you'll be soreing too.
These giant steps come by learning how to evox. First,
life's a fight. You might want to learn how to evox.
First progress means getting up when you beat down. Dedicated
to the babies born.
Speaker 3: Damn.
Speaker 2: These giant steps come by learning how to walk. First,
life's to fight. You might want to learn how to box.
First progress means getting up when you beat down. Dedicated
to the babies born. I meet clowns all the time.
Most of them fade away. Not enough battery for all
the games they play. Learn how to center, stop, step
on your own side. Don't let these cat with this
people lead up your own time. You know you best,
so find a pass to the rest. Understand it takes time,
try your buy risk and tests. Had many people tell
me I was two heads strong, But when I do this,
all those people will be dead. Wrong people not wrong
for offer room ways to make the day, but everyone
God preferences how to make the stake. There will be
times when you know you got to walk alone. Let
the power of your actions be the message shown. Plenty
of thrones don't worry about what the king say. You
play lifelike shredding guitar like a way. How much can
you do before the end credits play? All depends on
how much you let get in the way. These giant
steps come by learning how to walk first life. To fight,
you might want to learn how to box first. Progress
means getting up when you beat damn. Dedicated to the
babies born feet damn. These giant steps come by learning
how to walk. First life. To fight, you might want
to learn how to box first. Progress means getting up
when you beat damn. Dedicated to the babies born feet damn. Preach.
Speaker 1: Well done, guys, Thank you man, well done.
Speaker 2: Well, Thank you having us.
Speaker 1: Cody Pope and Byron g here with us live in studiou.
What should our listeners know about where to find you
guys online to keep up with everything that you're doing.
Speaker 2: So everything in our universe can always be found at
hellhum Publishing dot com. We're really active on YouTube right now,
so we have a Hellhound Publishing YouTube channel. We would
love for people to go over there and hit the
all subscribe button. We're putting out music, we're putting out
behind the scenes videos. We had our documentary. It's going
to be out Monday.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I'm very very curious to see that.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Yeah. So it's my first like big video
editing project. It's like a forty minute documentary just about
our whole journey. Cool.
Speaker 3: I saw it yesterday for the first time.
Speaker 4: Really.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's blown away. Yeah, oh very cool. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So yeah everything Hellhound Publishing dot com, Hellhound Publishing on YouTube,
if you're on social media, I'm at Cody Pope hc
across everything. He's at BG six ZH three across everything,
and at Hellhoun Publishing of course too. But hell Hound
till we're underground.
Speaker 4: All right, I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1: Anything we didn't talk about that, you want to make
sure our listeners know about anything we didn't mention. You
guys always got to like going on side. Well, I
make sure we didn't leave anything out.
Speaker 2: No, So we're, like I we mentioned earlier, we're and
this is our kind of weekend wrap. But for us,
this was the first thing we have going on. So
thank you so much for having us. Yeah, Tomorrow night, Sunday,
we're going to be at the shaf Skiine for rap night.
It's gonna be our last show of the year, kind
of a holiday wrap up show, and then Monday is
the premiere of the documentary. And other than that, I
would just say that our new album, Giant Steps in
Gate City is available anywhere that you listen to music.
Please take an opportunity to listen to it. That's all
we could ask is for people to just take the
time to listen to it. It's eighteen songs and if
you don't like it, hopefully you'll have a better day after.
I think you will.
Speaker 1: Very good, very good guys. Thank you so much.