Speaker 1: W M N H rips the domos.
Speaker 2: Ramdella ringdy.
Speaker 3: You don't even last of mine?
Speaker 2: Run Don Brudo, Randol made a bar by run Don Rudolf, Santa,
do make it to town.
Speaker 1: Santa Maga her in town.
Speaker 2: Na can take the freeway down.
Speaker 4: Run Don Rudolf, being an Americal Right, okay, yeah, saying
Santa to bo a child, what have you been longing for?
Speaker 2: None of my for Christmas is a rocking ball lectric guitar.
Not away when brudoh, w isn't I gonna shoot the star? Run,
Don Rudolf said, do.
Speaker 1: I get to child sat up?
Speaker 5: All right down on?
Speaker 4: He can take the freeway hour run, Don Brudo being
America round okay, run run Rudof said, don't I get
to child.
Speaker 1: Sat Nick ahead?
Speaker 4: He can take a freeway no hour run Don Brudo,
being like America.
Speaker 3: Ronda saying saying that to you, my girl child, what
would please you want to get.
Speaker 1: A little baby doing?
Speaker 6: They can grass see drink and whit.
Speaker 2: Not a way, he went. Rudolph whiz like a Saba.
Speaker 1: Jets run un Ruddle, Santa.
Speaker 7: Go may get to town.
Speaker 1: Sat I make Amory turn im.
Speaker 4: He can take the freeway down, Run, don bodle feeling
like American Right, Okay, run non go go n n
run on budd run don run good feel America.
Speaker 1: Nothing around.
Speaker 6: That is run Roudolph Run. And that is a brand
new from Neon Gypsy, their rendition of that track, which
we had Neon Gypsy here with us in the first
hour today on the program, and then we had the
Healer Mike McDowell for the second hour, and we've got
Cody Pope and Byron g coming up for the third
hour and they're going to perform live again. So always
love that. By the way, I want to remind everybody,
of course, because today is if you are listening live,
December twenty first, twenty twenty four, this afternoon, we have
the holiday market and psychic event that is being put
on by our wonderful friends at the Sister Witch Company.
Jenny is there right now, which is why she's not here.
She is there getting set up and she's going to
be selling her wonderful Macroma creations and there's going to
be a lot of local artisans there, local small businesses participating.
So if you've got some holiday shopping to do, please
come down. It's at the Masonic Temple at fifteen oh
five Elm Street. And as I like to say, Walmart
and Target do not need any more of your money.
Please support your local businesses and it really does mean
so much. And if you want more information you can
go to Sisterwitch Company dot com. But that starts at noon.
That is where I will be headed after the show
today noon to five pm the Holiday market and a
psychic event at the Manchester Masonic Temple fifteen oh five
Elm Street. And let me bring these mics up and
we've got Cody Pope and Byron g here with us
in the studio.
Speaker 7: Hey guys, Hey, good morning man, thanks so much for
having us.
Speaker 6: Yeah, welcome back, welcome back, And hope you weren't waiting
outside too long. It's a little chilly today.
Speaker 7: No, no, no, it was perfect timing.
Speaker 5: Hey, hat a justice.
Speaker 6: Camera here, Get you guys in the shot. Of course
we are on Facebook and YouTube and all that stuff.
There we go, there we go. How have you guys
been what's going on? Have you been releasing new music
or what have you been up to?
Speaker 7: Yeah, so in October we just released our our sophomore
full length album, Giant Steps in Gates City, excellent. Yeah,
so that spent We did a big release show for that,
and it's been a pretty wild ride since then.
Speaker 6: Where did you Where'd you do the release show?
Speaker 7: 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 6: Nice, nice. Yeah, you guys must know. Do you know
Mike McDowell the Healer? Did you run into him on.
Speaker 7: This We literally just shook hands and met as we
were heading out as we were coming in. Yeah, looking
forward to chopping it up with him more.
Speaker 8: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Yeah, he's doing some he's doing some great stuff. And
you must know Eleanor and Andre from So.
Speaker 7: 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 6: 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 7: Yeah, that's what we're hoping to do something. We're hoping
the dates will align in that we can make something
happen soon.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 7: 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 I'm looking forward to seeing
what they're capable of doing with that. I think that's
gonna be awesome.
Speaker 6: 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 5: This is the Roland SP four O four m K two.
Speaker 6: Okay, and what does that do for the For the uninitiated.
Speaker 9: It does a little bit of everything. It's a sampler,
so you could create like full songs on here.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 9: I use it mainly for our live shows and stuff
like that, so I can load up pads and I
can manipulate the sound.
Speaker 6: Yeah, kind of live as we're going so okay, you.
Speaker 9: Never really get the same experience twice with these types
of machines.
Speaker 6: Right right.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: 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 fucking easy. Yeah. This is always the
that's always the moment, right when when you guys come on,
it's like, let's let's hope this last.
Speaker 1: This works well.
Speaker 6: 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 7: That was our first album together too.
Speaker 6: Oh that's right, yeah, yeah. How many times have you
guys been?
Speaker 7: Is this this is our third time?
Speaker 8: Now?
Speaker 7: No, it's not your fourth.
Speaker 5: No, I think you've been up here before.
Speaker 7: We had done stuff up in Laconia. Oh okay, maybe
that's we did local outbreak up in Laconi.
Speaker 6: That's why I'm thinking that, yeah, both of us.
Speaker 7: 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 Renaissance Park. Yeah.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you guys have released a lot of music.
Speaker 7: It's hard to Yeah, yeah, it's been a while.
Speaker 6: Well, do you want to perform something?
Speaker 7: Or yeah? All right we have you have No Sugar
Added A good way to warm up. This is the
h This was the first single that we released from
the new album. Okay, it's the second track. It's called
No Sugar Added.
Speaker 6: Okay, check check.
Speaker 7: I've been in a days. Mine's amazing a blaze. I've
been catching fighter since before the twelfth grade. I had
this design you for couldn't getting out my way. Now
I'm double the age, still rewinded the days. Can't believe
what all I's done. I'm still looking back, been cleaning
up because still remember the cooking crap. The strength 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 sign 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,
and then stay in the sun to makeup of days
the shrouded in dens, I am the howling man standing
upon the howland winds, night of the hunt of the preacher,
upon the prowl. Again not perfect, not even close to
all right. I 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 lea I
can pad.
Speaker 5: No sugar added, no sugar added.
Speaker 7: Somewhere between apocalypse now anxiety and alarms again, hope my
horrible ways 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 sorry 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 things, 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 shaft.
No sugar added, no sugar added. I just need water,
meant to leave, I get padded, no sugar added, no
sugar added. Somewhere between being happy and mad and.
Speaker 6: I love it. I love it. Thank you Cody Pope
and Ryron g Here whatever live in studio on this
Saturday morning.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I couldn't hear everybody. At first. I was like,
oh crap, what's going on?
Speaker 6: You made it work, You made it work.
Speaker 7: Volumes a magical thing.
Speaker 6: Yes, yes, Now tell us about you know. For people
who are not familiar, so because you refer to it
Hellhound Publishing, Yeah, what is that exactly? For people who
don't know.
Speaker 7: 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 in 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 6: 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 7: I think, Yeah, I think what when we came on
and put out Meet Me in gate City, we 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 6: Oh wow, Yeah, okay, okay, Yeah.
Speaker 7: I feel very fortunate to say that after all this time.
But yeah, it's been quite the wild ride.
Speaker 6: Yeah, no kidding, know, Wow, so who now, who else
are you working with currently were you releasing music?
Speaker 7: 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. 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 Tripsey 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, 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 okay, but for twenty five where
we're hoping to kind of expand the palette a little more. Yeah,
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 6: Oh okay, yeah, very good. 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 too 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. I mean,
does does that play a role?
Speaker 7: 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 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 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. But as artists,
we have certain expectations for ourselves, and so it's not
fair to apply those expectations to everybody unilaterally. Every artist
requires a specific kind of like catered two means of
getting their thing done, and if we love the art enough,
we're going to work on on how to be that
to each artist and still maintain the integrity of what
we're trying to do personally.
Speaker 6: That makes sense because everyone's process is different.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Yeah, Now, now what about AI in terms of like, uh,
like releasing music? Do you have to? Does it get
complicated now?
Speaker 8: With UH?
Speaker 6: 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 this 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 9: 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 you know, Snoop and dre are releasing.
I mean, it's probably a little bit different because they
have the actual stems from the artists, but.
Speaker 5: There's different avenues where you could go for that type
of stuff now.
Speaker 9: But on the other side of things, I've been using
AI to generate uh hord progressions and and different sounds
and stuff like that, and i've you know.
Speaker 6: You cant firing. Can you pull that, Michael a little bit?
Just yeah, just I noticed it was just dropping out.
Yeah it is, that's better. Yeah, thank you, it's just
it it starts to sorry about that, want to make
sure we can hear you. I'm sorry, good, Yeah, go ahead. Yeah.
Speaker 5: On the other other side of things.
Speaker 9: I've been using AI to generate melodies and chords and
picking my keys and blending and mashing a bunch of
like AI generated stuff and basically using them as my
samples as of late.
Speaker 5: Chopping it up that way, okay, and doing it that way.
Speaker 9: 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 doing 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 these days, you're gonna fall behind. So
there's good and there's bad. It's just all about how.
Speaker 5: You look at it. I think.
Speaker 6: Yeah, adaptability is so important absolutely, and yeah, adapting technologies. Yeah,
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 9: Yeah, Like I would never like take someone's voice right
and have them say specifically rics 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 5: Yeah, it comes to creating melodies and stuff like that. Sure.
Speaker 7: Sure, So 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 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 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. 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 6: Got to be proactive with it.
Speaker 9: Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure, 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 artwork whatever it is, right, Yeah, definitely
use AI to help you out on that side of
things too.
Speaker 7: 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 mixer
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 a I 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 9: Yeah, 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 effort to figure
it out.
Speaker 6: Yeah, absolutely, yeah, No, I agree. Well said you guys
want to play another one?
Speaker 7: Yeah, what do you think? Maybe gratitude?
Speaker 6: Sure, if you're just joining us. We have Cody Pope
and Byron g here with us live in studio. Let
me get that. Uh, there we go.
Speaker 5: I gotta find this joint.
Speaker 1: Some days I wake up and I wish I had it.
Speaker 7: I hate that I'm sad, but my love monks feel
so glad that he's a lead tripping Don't know, Vie,
I'm so mad man, got a lot to be gratefulfore,
You've awn I'm down, bad man.
Speaker 1: Some days I wake up and I wish I had it.
I hate that I'm sad, but my love monks feel
so glad that he's a lead tripping Don't know why.
Speaker 7: I'm so mad man, got a lot to be grateful for.
Speaker 1: You've awen. I'm damn bad man.
Speaker 7: Wake up in my brain already feeling dark. Get the couch, already,
chase a spot, contemplating in my sick or unhealthy. It's
this depression of calma for unwealthy enough Cleverty to know
that I'm the end of me, the one destroying me,
the one should be defending me. Gotta 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 gone well in your family with the real money tree,
life's optical standing fees. Still days I'm fighting to guest trooper.
But I survived when not for me, my trooper, when
the fight come at the door, you can't be true.
You missed that chance. Might well.
Speaker 1: Some days I wake up and I wish I had it.
Speaker 7: I hate that I'm sad, but my loved ones feel
so glad man.
Speaker 1: He's the lead tripping. Don't know why, I'm so mad man.
Speaker 7: Got a lot to be grateful for even when I'm down,
bad man.
Speaker 1: Some days I wake up and I wish I had it,
And I hate that I'm sad, but on the loved
ones feel so bad man.
Speaker 7: He's the lead tripping Don't no, Bob, I'm so mad man.
You got a lot to be grateful for, even when
I'm down bad man. Some days I wake up.
Speaker 4: Wake up.
Speaker 6: Mmm, good stuff, guys, good stuff.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 6: 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.
Speaker 7: I Uh I have those 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 for a minute, yeah,
and stop thinking about what's weighing on me and like
figure out what's like lifting me instead.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Yeah, no, I like that a lot. You know,
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. I get it.
Speaker 8: Now?
Speaker 6: Are you so the new album it just came out.
Speaker 7: It came out in October.
Speaker 6: Came out in October, so pretty recent.
Speaker 5: Yeah are you?
Speaker 6: Are you already working on the next one? It seems
like you guys are pretty prolific. You put out a
lot of music.
Speaker 7: 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 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, and we
have a documentary coming out for it on Monday, which
really covers like from when we did meet Me in
Gates City to 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 Gate
City was shortly after we met as Peple, 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. 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.
Cool 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 some great artists from Maine.
So we have stuff that we're hoping to put out
next year. 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
market place, 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 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 6: Yeah, no, that makes sense.
Speaker 9: We also went to a legit studio this time around
two oh before we were it was all in house
like doing all the engineering, mixing, mastering.
Speaker 5: All that stuff.
Speaker 9: This time, due to you know, time and our mental
capacities with work and stuff like that, it just wasn't
gonna come out the way we wanted it to. So
we 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.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and he absolutely crushed it, blew it out the
like hit it right out the park.
Speaker 4: Like.
Speaker 5: The synergy between the three of us was fantastic.
Speaker 9: 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.
Speaker 5: So sonically it's definitely like our best sounding record.
Speaker 7: Too, Okay, it really it allowed us to be like
it allowed us to operate as a duo as artists
where doing meet being 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 5: This step what it was. Yeah, the upbraid for sure.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's a huge and that's and it's supposed to
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 6: Yea, was that a difficult decision to to because you
had done the previous tracks?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 7: And yeah, yeah we tried. Frankly, like we we we
took a couple of 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, and it.
Speaker 9: Was juggling family with work and at the studio till
two am and then waking up and going to work
and doing the same thing, and.
Speaker 6: It's a lot.
Speaker 5: Yeah, there was a lot. And we have been doing
that for like three years straight.
Speaker 7: So yeah, you don't get that same off filming, right right, 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.
Speaker 9: It was starting to feel like work and that's the
complete opposite artist, right right.
Speaker 7: 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, those 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 going to 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
in the art 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 6: Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. By the way,
you mentioned so you do you've done most of the
artwork for the artist who released through All Lound. Yeah,
is there is there any kind of a 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.
Speaker 7: Specific style pixel.
Speaker 8: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm curious if if, like, do you have a
specific style that you try to use.
Speaker 7: 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, 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 6: Yeah.
Speaker 9: 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.
Speaker 6: Oh okay, Yeah, he was.
Speaker 9: Just the the artist in him, Like he was literally
laying down almost like head in traffic to get that
perfect angle.
Speaker 5: Yeah. He's one of a kind, awesome.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he's actually based here in Manchester. His name is
Robert Bates okay, 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, So you.
Speaker 9: Could totally feel it when you're like when you see
his photos. Really, he's incredible, man, And I think what
Nick did? Beat me in Gay City? So okay, Nix
is girlfriend?
Speaker 7: Yeah, okay, 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 to manipulate them.
Speaker 6: Oh that's cool? Yeah, yeah, very cool. Uh you guys
want to play another one?
Speaker 5: Sure? Yeah? What do we go?
Speaker 6: Dying to hear more?
Speaker 8: Here?
Speaker 6: If you're just showing us, we have Cody Pope and
Byron g here with us a live and suit.
Speaker 7: And leant do exit more. Yeah, it's a funny 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 eye jazz got me feeling like Cyclops
every year for a little closer to the 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've taken the leaves and still jump hurdles.
But I got these long legs for ramp up my
pro team. What 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 5: A little short one.
Speaker 6: That is a short one.
Speaker 9: Well yeah, there's a lot of those little kind of
like interlowers between each, a lot of the tracks on
this one.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, No, I like it though. One day it's spring,
next day or taking the leaves, then that is true,
That is our weather tends to go up. 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?
Speaker 7: They 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 a already the rugged
Man for a night. We did some nights in Vermont,
came here you're with the first stop. 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 5: Yeah, yeah, that's that's part of that that same night.
Speaker 6: Okay, okay, wow.
Speaker 7: But after that run of shows, it was pretty quiet.
For the most part. We did something, you know, something
here or there.
Speaker 5: A lot of life stuff was going on.
Speaker 7: Yeah, 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 ore lighting, our caterers that we brought
like just like a show the way that we think
it makes the most sense, and like, I think it
was one of the best decisions we made because the
event turned out like really memorable.
Speaker 6: Excellent, excellent. By the way, what was our a the
rugged man like he seems like an intense dude, Like.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he's very tense. Yeah, we we didn't get to
meet him. I 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 that's just how rappers.
Speaker 6: Are, though, Yeah, he I I I heard I heard
an interesting story about him. Do you guys know daver So?
Speaker 7: 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 6: Okay, yeah he he opened for Uh.
Speaker 7: I bet you that was probably I bet you I
might have been on that show too, okaybe maybe that's
where I know him from.
Speaker 6: Yeah he he. He told me an interesting story which
I won't I won't repeat.
Speaker 5: But I never want to be as loud as a
live sound engineer. Man. I felt bad for that night.
Speaker 6: Really why I did the engineer take some verbal and
yeah he did?
Speaker 9: And uh you know, I mean if you're an art
like as around for you know, over two decades.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, it's like there's a there's a level of expectation.
Speaker 9: Yeah, you gotta if you're gonna you know, oh yeah, yeah,
do anything with them, which is you know, he earned that.
Speaker 6: So if you guys ever seen the mouthdown he had
with Tim Poole on his podcast.
Speaker 7: That sounds wild.
Speaker 6: 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 out.
Speaker 5: I got to check that out.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you gotta get a little angry with Tim Poole.
It was 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, but
I'm really angry with it. Was awesome, It's fantastic.
Speaker 7: I can just like picture that in my head.
Speaker 6: Yes, it's really good. Now who else?
Speaker 8: Now?
Speaker 6: Is there any is there anyone else coming up in
the short term who you're releasing through?
Speaker 8: Uh?
Speaker 7: In sometime this spring, we are hoping to release so Biza. Yeah, yeah,
really yeah. Business just dropped a Merry Christmas beat tape
which is on all streaming platforms, 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 kind of
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 like vocal features
on the record and produced it and put them all
together and it's 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 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 Boom back recital Spring,
as well as some more stuff from us.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, business incredible. Yeah, I haven't interviewed him and
a really I gotta get him on the show.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he's always got stuff going on.
Speaker 9: I went into the studio it was like two weeks
ago to and and ran into Biza there and what
he was doing that night, I actually got it.
Speaker 5: I had was like taking videos and stuff.
Speaker 9: Just the way he manipulates samples and audio is like
no one's doing it like him. He could literally you
can smack this wall and he'll make a full beat
out of it.
Speaker 5: Like, yes, he's on another level.
Speaker 9: And I hope I think he'll get his flowers soon
where everybody really Yeah.
Speaker 5: You know, I can see that he can just he's
he's the mad scientist for that's what I call it.
He just can anything any sound.
Speaker 9: He's manipulating it in his way, and it's really incredible
to see when he's in his zone at the studio.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 8: Yeah.
Speaker 7: 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 were sorry that 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 there. 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 if they weren't already doing it,
you know. And so with Bizy, you almost have to
chase him sometimes because he's so motivated that'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 6: 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.
Speaker 7: Just doesn't absolutely yea, yep, yeah, 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 yea. 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, ah, 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 yea, 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, 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 act to meet to what's going to
work for them to be the most genuine.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, exactly not. And you could tell, you could
tell when.
Speaker 9: You know, the passions not fully there right as well,
you know, and it kind of sucks the air out
of the room. So yeah, you kind of learn real
quick when you get into a couple of sessions with somebody,
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 got to have that, like it's
just an artist in general or musician or whatever, like, yeah,
you got to have the passion or else it's not
gonna work.
Speaker 6: Yeah, exactly, exactly. We have time. You guys want to
play one more or star right.
Speaker 5: The last one?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I guess we should.
Speaker 4: So.
Speaker 7: This is the title track from Giant Steps in Gates City,
which is affectionately called Giant Steps.
Speaker 6: Okay, Cody Pope and Byron g.
Speaker 7: My lace is tight enough for all my giant steps.
Now easy get every day to wait say I'm the best.
Now life be like some big beautiful breasts now over
a windy day when all the sun dresses out. Even
when stressed out, stop and taking nothing 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 maverick thns take training more than saying words.
Sometimes you're on the path alone that's evading herds.
Speaker 8: You lucky.
Speaker 7: If your lifeline it's exchanging verbs. There was a time
in my life I was exchange and 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 box first LIFs
to fight. You might want to learn how to box first.
Progress means getting up when you beat down, dedicated to
the baby's born beating down. These giant steps come by
learning how to walk first LIFs to fight, You might
want to learn how to box first. Progress means getting
up when you beat down, dedicated to the baby's born.
I meat 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 of the rest.
Understand it takes time. Try your by Riskin test, 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 offering 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 your thrones. Don't worry about what the kings say.
You play lifelike shredding guitar like in 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 Dawn. 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.
Speaker 1: Dedicated to the babies born feet damn.
Speaker 6: Pre Well done, guys, Thank you man, well done.
Speaker 7: Well, Thank you for having us.
Speaker 6: Cody Pope and Byron g here with us live in studio.
What should our listeners know about? Where to find you
guys online to keep up with everything that you're doing.
Speaker 7: So everything in our universe can always be found at
Hellhound 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 6: Oh yeah, I'm very very curious to see that, thank you.
Speaker 7: Yeah. So it's my first like big video editing project.
It's like a forty minute documentary just about our whole journey.
Speaker 5: Cool.
Speaker 9: I saw it yesterday for the first time. Really yeah,
blown away? Yeah, oh very cool.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 7: 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 hell Hound Publishing of course too. But hell
Hound till we're underground, all right.
Speaker 6: I love it.
Speaker 5: I love it.
Speaker 6: 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 a going on. I make sure we
didn't leave anything out.
Speaker 7: No, So we're, like we mentioned earlier, we're in. This
is our kind of weekend wrap up 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 6: Very good, Very good guys, Thank you so much, and
thank you everyone who joined us today. Of course we
had Neon Gipsy in the first hour, second hour, we
had the healer Mike McDowell. After the show, I'm going
to be headed over to the Manchester Masonic Temple for
the holiday market and psychic event being put on by
our wonderful friends at the Sister Witch Company, and that
goes to five pm. Jenny is already there getting set up,
or she's probably all set up by now and please
come see us shop local. It is so very important
And if you missed any part of today's show, it'll
be up in just a little bit at wmnhradio dot
org and my website Matt Connorton dot com and Cody
Pope and Byron g Thank you guys again so much.
Speaker 5: Thanks for having us.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much, absolutely, and Merry Christmas everybody. If
anyone's wondering, yes, we will be here next week, we are.
We're just gonna keep going right through the holidays, so
we will see you next Saturday, and we'll close out
with We'll end today the way we started with the
new from Kendra Erica, her rendition of it's beginning to
look a lot like Christmas, which I suppose is appropriate
locally here in Manchester because we have some snow that
actually stuck more like ice. But whatever, but a couple
of times today, yeah, yeah, it's it's it's not not
great like it was, just it was just enough snow
to be a nuisance. But uh yeah, we'll wrap up
with this and uh that's it for me for now.
We'll talk to you a little bit later, everybody.
Speaker 8: It's beginning to look like Chris smile.
Speaker 1: Everywhere you go. Take a look at the five and ten.
Speaker 8: It's glistening once again with candy hans and silver lanes.
Speaker 1: They're globe It's beginning to look alive like Christmas.
Speaker 8: Tis on every store, But the prettiest sign to see
is the holly than the move on your own road.
Speaker 1: It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.
Speaker 3: Everywhere you go.
Speaker 8: There's a tree in the Grand Hotel, one in the
park as well.
Speaker 1: It's a curdy kind that doesn't mind the snow. It's
beginning to look alive like Christmas.
Speaker 8: So the bells will start, and the thing that'll make
them ring.
Speaker 1: Is the Carol Bet your son right, the thing your home.
It's beginning to look alive like Christmas. Ties A Lorystal