Speaker 1: I don't want to hear it again to the I just
want to be say it. Everything is all rather.
Speaker 2: And if you could just let me, if you hold me, baby,
mold me. It could be so right to the It
could be so right to that. It could be so
right that.
Speaker 1: It could be so.
Speaker 3: To not.
Speaker 1: Looking to your eyes, shall subra.
Speaker 2: I just found a fall, the speed, the dream money,
your rods do that.
Speaker 1: I know we could die away.
Speaker 2: Oh that day you may the same. It could be
so back to the It could be so back to the.
Speaker 1: It could be to it could be soon.
Speaker 4: To the.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what you do me to me?
Speaker 2: I'm so searching you see you bring me higher a
mon bier, My is higher. I've gone awad on benea.
Speaker 1: Open up your heart with me to.
Speaker 2: I just want to lift you want and show you
all the stars tonight.
Speaker 1: When all this is gone away, I know that you
would all save. It could be so that.
Speaker 5: It could be so.
Speaker 3: To the.
Speaker 6: Oh that's nice. That is called tonight and that is
moonlight ride. And we are going to speak with uh,
speak with these fine folks in just a moment. If
you are just joining us, we have entered our number
three new Marrow trace Matt Connorton Unleashed, and we are
live from the studio of WMNH ninety five point three
FM in glorious Manchester, New Hampshire. Actually a little dreary
out this this Saturday, but maybe the sun will come out,
but it is glorious no less here in Manchester, here
at WMNH ninety five point THREEFM. By the way, if
you are wondering, we don't have a video feed today.
The software wasn't working for whatever reason, so we're not
streaming the show to YouTube and Facebook and all that
stuff like we usually do. But of course the audio
feed is working as it always does, and this is
first and foremost a radio show, So if you are
in Manchester you can listen in at ninety five point
three FM, or otherwise you can stream the show from
anywhere if you go to Matt connorton dot com, slash
live for Wmnhradio dot org. And very very happy to
be here with you on this Saturday. I hope you
are enjoying the program, and we've got let's see Jesse
and Michelle from Moonlight Ride. Hello, welcome, Hey, how are
you doing good? Good are you both?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 6: You're Jesse Johnson. Correct, are you Michelle Johnson? No, not yet,
not yet? Interesting? Why is there? Are there a wedding
bell or or are you hinting at something?
Speaker 7: We just got engaged a few weeks ago.
Speaker 6: Congratulations. Well that's wonderful, so we're breaking news here in
the interview. Very well, congratulations on that. So Moonlight Ride,
of course, is a project that you do together. So Michelle,
that's obviously you on vocals, yes, and then uh, and
what else do you do in the project or do
you strictly sing? Her?
Speaker 7: I do vocals, and I do a little bit of keyboard, keyboard, Okay,
you hear keyboard?
Speaker 4: That's me?
Speaker 6: Okay, okay, very good. And Jesse, what do you do?
Speaker 4: Pretty much? Everything else?
Speaker 6: Everything else?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I started out as a bass player, oh you did, okay,
as you are, and over the years have started playing
guitar and delved into singing myself. And yeah, I've been
in all kinds of bands over the years. So yeah,
when she and I met, she had hinted around that
she played music too, and I'm like, well, what a
perfect thing for us to do.
Speaker 6: Together, you know, right, yeah, when you first met so before,
so forgive it, you know, if I ask anything that
you don't want to talk about, I just tell me.
But I am curious. I did what started first, the
music or the relationship?
Speaker 7: The relationship?
Speaker 6: The relationship started first? So yeah, okay, well.
Speaker 1: Kind of, I guess.
Speaker 7: I had heard at work that this guy had a band.
Speaker 3: Okay, oh interesting, and I asked my friend, Hey, you
want to go support this guy who has a band
at work?
Speaker 6: Oh?
Speaker 7: Okay, and we went out to see him.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and at the time, I was in a cover
band called Full Throttle. We were playing, you know, the
typical classic rock that plays in this area. Sure, and
over time we decided we'd start working on some original music.
And of course, actually what happened was COVID hit. When
we first met that kind of squashed Full Throttle, we
were doing really well, playing a lot, and yeah, of course,
nobody could do anything during the COVID years. So yeah,
as we started to get to know each other, she
mentioned she sang a little and played piano, and I'm like, well,
what a better thing to do during these times than
stop playing some music together?
Speaker 6: And you know, okay, yeah, but did you did you
start dating before that or after?
Speaker 3: Uh?
Speaker 6: We were dating before, Yeah, okay, yeah, okay, yeah, because
it makes a better story if it's the other way around,
doesn't it Like like like like someday when you're famous,
do you have a documentary about you? You know, you
kind of want this story to be the other way.
I don't know, maybe not, but uh no, that's cool though,
that's cool and uh so and it's interesting too. So
do you You probably don't still work together, right or
maybe you do?
Speaker 3: We do you do?
Speaker 6: Okay? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, we don't work side by side.
Speaker 6: Okay.
Speaker 4: We both work for Sancho's Hospital and yeah, she's an
occupational therapist. I work in their their facilities department, and
that's kind of how we met.
Speaker 6: Oh okay, cool. I saw I saw a statistic once.
This was years ago, but it probably still holds up.
That that's I don't remember the numbers, but that was
like the majority of married people they they met through work.
That's like super common. My stepmother was an occupational therapist,
so I know a little bit about that. No, but
that no, that's that's that's really cool. So now so
the song, the song we displayed tonight, you had mentioned
off air that there's a video for that that just
correct just went up or recently or a few weeks ago.
Oh okay, so that's very new.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, we just got a YouTube page together, because,
as you know, it's not like the old days where
you'd get you'd try to go out and grind in
the clubs and find a record company or if record
company finds you, right, and you know, you go through
that whole process of just killing it in the buyers
and killing in the buyers and playing and playing. Today
with social media, we found that YouTube and doing our
own thing like this was kind of the easier way
to promote ourselves. And yeah, it's it's weird today the
music scene as you know as well, how it is.
You know, it's all streaming and people like your guests
from earlier, you're talking to people from Australia and England
and you know, it's it's just a whole different world
these days.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Yeah, the Internet is uh, you know, it changed
everything and the first big you know, because I'm old
enough to remember, Well, it's funny, so you know, I'm
I'm Generation X and that's really the last generation that
grew up without the Internet. You know, anyone who grew
up after us, they don't they don't know just how
different it really was. And it's funny too, because I
think back, I mean, not just as it applies to
the music industry, but as it applies to everything, just
life in general. I don't I don't know if either
of you experienced this, but when I think back, it's
almost hard to remember, Like it seems like another lifetime ago.
It's almost hard to remember what it was like to
even function without the Internet. I mean, I remember things
like I remember going to the library and looking up
information and encyclopedias, you know what I mean. It's like
like and it seems so crazy now to it. It
seems like another lifetime ago. It seems like it was
another world, like like like I grew up in an
alternate universe, but now I'm here in this one. That's
how I sometimes, you know, and I don't, and I'm
but I'm not one of these people who because I
see I see this on I see this happen on
social media, like I see people my age and younger
do this thing like complaining, like you know, well, back
in my day, everything was better because life was simpler.
It's like, was it though, I mean, it was simpler
in some ways. Right, pre Internet. But was it really
like if you wanted to know something and you had
to go to the library to look up look something
up into encyclopedia, well that wasn't simpler. I like the
way it is now. If I want to know something,
I can just google it, you know what I mean.
Speaker 7: It's very nice to have everything at the tip of
your fingers, exactly.
Speaker 6: I wouldn't trade what we have now to go back
to what it was.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 6: That sounds awful now, but and it wasn't. It was fine.
That's you know, that's all we knew growing up. But
I say all that to say I like the way now.
You know, the music industry has completely changed, But I
think so. I'm an optimist. I think it's changed for
the better because I love that I can you know again,
don't get me wrong. Growing up, I have wonderful memories
of going to a music store and flipping through the
vinyl or flipping through the CDs and finding stuff. That's
all cool, great memories. But now like I can, I
can talk to a band from Australia, I can talk
to somebody from the UK who I otherwise would not
have been connected to because they're not you know, quote
unquote famous yet yet. But you know, couldn't do that.
You know, if if if i'd you know, been doing this,
you know in the eighties, you know, that wouldn't have
been an option, you know what I mean, Right, So
I love the way it is now. And and and
to your point Jesse about you know, making you know,
getting a YouTube account, making videos and using that to
promote your music. You know, couldn't do that do that before.
Speaker 4: So, like you said, it's because it's pros and cons
mat you know, sure, but I think the pros outweigh
the cons personally. Yeah, but I'm also someone who embraces
technology and you know, but but you're embracing it too, obviously.
And how you promote your music.
Speaker 3: Definitely, we're learning a lot recently. Yeah, we're making our
own video. We're going on YouTube. There's so much out
there to learn how to do what we need to do.
We're trying to put some video to our music, so
because that's what people like to see as they listen.
Speaker 4: So and the same thing, we recorded our album at home.
You know, you didn't have home studios years ago.
Speaker 6: Right, So, I mean you could, but it was hard.
It was much harder, and for most people that meant
a four track taskam recorder to make a demo right.
Speaker 4: Right, right, And today there's just so many tools that you.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know, I think it's an amazing time to
be alive. I embrace all of it technology, I embrace
all of it absolutely. But yeah, so you have the
right attitude about it, because, like I said, there's some
people some people are like, oh, some people want some
people want it to be so much the way it
used to be so badly that they'll they'll kind of
delude themselves into believing that it is. I'm thinking of
a specific guest who's been on the show, and I
won't say who they are because I really like them
because they're good people, but that my conversation with them,
there was a lot of in their minds it was
clearly still twenty years ago, maybe even thirty years ago,
you know what I mean.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And it's like and it's it's difficult to change
with the times, but I think if you can and
if you embrace that, like you said, there are so
many more opportunities. There's no way we could reach the
people that were reaching today in the past.
Speaker 6: M Yeah, absolutely, on so the so these songs, these
were all recorded at home.
Speaker 4: They were they were there's songs that I had written
years ago.
Speaker 2: Matt.
Speaker 4: Actually, it's funny that you mentioned the four track demo
because that's where they started years ago on a task
him four track that I had recorded and I threw
them on a shelf because I've been through all different
bands and situations over the years that I just kind
of recorded them and forgot about them. And then when
Michelle and I put this project Moonlight Ride together, it
kind of picked up where my last cover band I
was telling you about, Full Throttle, left off, and we
were playing music for ourselves and for our friends because
there wasn't anything else to do with COVID. And then
we started getting some local gigs playing around in Hudson
and up and hooks it, and we were asked to
play by our work, the hospital, to do their Christmas parties.
And they have a project at our work called Project
Search that helps handicap kids get jobs and employment and
move on. And we've played their graduations and whatnot and
done some of the shows with the covers. Well, meanwhile,
I found these songs that I had written and thrown
on a shelf and Michelle and I were talking and
we're like, well, why don't we record them? And so
we bought the stuff to make a home studio and
put this together kind of on a whim. And then
Michelle said to me, well, maybe we should do something
with these songs because they're pretty good, and I'm like,
you think so? So we put the CD together and
as she said, we learned how to navigate YouTube and
we're making videos. We're currently working on our second video
right now for the second song in the CD called
down in a Hole, which is a little bit heavier
than Tonight, and I sing that one. So if we
go to music break, maybe we can play that song.
Speaker 6: Why don't we play it now?
Speaker 4: Sure?
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I like this one a lot. If
you are just joining us, we have Jesse and Michelle
from Moonlight Ride here with us, live and studio, and yeah, we'll.
Speaker 4: Play let's play that one next, Down in a Hole?
Down in a Hole?
Speaker 6: Is there a story behind this one? I guess They're all.
Speaker 4: Just little experiences, life experiences that I've had. And yeah,
kind of you know, as we weave our way through
writing songs and making songs, just yeah, kind of life experiences.
I guess yeah, we all go through different things.
Speaker 6: Absolutely absolutely all right, hear it is down in a hole,
this is moonlight ride.
Speaker 4: There was a time.
Speaker 8: It was a time let's sell on lagoon. I had
no love, I had no one. Two would come out.
Speaker 1: It was a boy.
Speaker 8: I needed time and time be groove to love weed
certain things too broon.
Speaker 2: Down in a hole.
Speaker 5: I'm feeling down. I'm sick and so low, feel out
of control.
Speaker 9: I'm feeling down a feeling and so low and insane.
Speaker 5: I'm feeling love and love and bumping upside down.
Speaker 1: Don't feel letting know put down past my time.
Speaker 10: I'll looking down and stand every lid, going upside down,
speaking rounding around like a man around.
Speaker 8: Down in a hole.
Speaker 5: I'm feeling down, up, sinking, so low, feel out of control.
Speaker 9: I'm feeling down and feeling so low.
Speaker 8: Please help me, please, I'm begging you down the body
s up.
Speaker 1: With my hands.
Speaker 8: Spinning rounding around a mine my brain to kick it
down again, back.
Speaker 1: Into a hole.
Speaker 5: Down in a hole, I'm feeling down of sink and
so low, feel a lot of control. I'm feeling down
and feeling it's so low, down in a hole, I'm
feeling down of sinking so low, feel a lot of control.
Speaker 9: I'm feeling down. I feeling it's so low, down in
a hole.
Speaker 6: That is down in a hole. That is Moonlight Ride.
And we have a Jesse and Michelle from Moonlight Ride
here with us live in studio on this Saturday morning.
But so we're talking off air while as long as plained,
and Jesse revealed something fascinating. Jesse Johnson the original bass
player for Malia Ridge. Oh I did. I'm sorry your
mic isn't I'm sorry. There we go.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I had a mutual friend. His name is
jim Corey, who's the lead one of the lead guitarists
of maliar Age. Tony Nichols is kind of the main guy.
Malia Rage was his project. He's also lead guitarist and
the main songwriter. But I knew Jimmy from high school
and over the years got a call from him saying, hey,
we need a bass player. You want to try out
for our band? And I went down and did it.
And at the time I wasn't really into metal metal.
I was in the Aerosmith Judas Priest Alice Koopa, which
this is the late eighties, So yeah, I mean that
was kind of metal for its time, but bands like
Megadeth Metallica were up and coming and becoming popular in
those days, and that's kind of where Malia Age was.
And yeah, we got lucky enough to get signed to
Epic Records. We did a few albums for Epic and
some videos that were on the head Banger's Ball on MTV.
They were they were in the rotation there for a while,
and we had some success for for quite a while,
and then grunge came in and really threw a monkey
wrench in the music scene, which changed metal a lot
and stuff. But yeah, Malia, they had some really good
success with me and without me. After I left the band,
they continued on for quite a while and had Silly
Earner from god Smack. He played on a couple of
CDs and played drums. He wasn't singing then, yeah, and yeah, yeah,
and yeah, the band kept going and actually still is
kind of active. I'm still friends with the guys and
and see Jimmy from time to time, and yeah, have
been in and out of the band, and wow.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that's pretty cool. What was the biggest video that
that you were in when you were in Malai.
Speaker 4: Rage. Well, two videos were really popular on MTV for
a while. The first album, which was called Kill to Survive,
had a song called the Beginning of the End which
was played quite a bit. And then our second studio album,
Solitary Solitude, had a song called the Witching that that
got a lot of airplay. That was a fun video
doing that one.
Speaker 6: Okay, yeah, well I rage on tour with Gang Green
February thirteenth. I pulled up a video and it's like
this thing scrolling over the video for the Beginning of
the End as a song. That's wild. Yeah, because I
remember Malira, because I.
Speaker 4: Used to watch a Big Ball of course, Yeah, of course,
I mean that that was the play the place to
catch all the new music at the time. You know,
MTV was huge then, and yeah, yeah, and the Headbanger's
Ball was a big thing.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 4: We toured with Gangreen, and we toured with Metal Church
if you know who Medal Church is. Yeah, of course, yeah,
of course, did a lot of small tours and small
shows going through New York with bands like Testament and
Suicidal Tendencies and yeah, stuff like that.
Speaker 6: I see you in the video, but I can't although
I can't actually tell it to you because your hair
is in your face. Yeah my hair was a lot
longer than Yeah, yeah, mine too, I can relate to that.
But yeah, wow, that's that's really cool. That's really cool.
So so you guys were Yeah, so you guys were
doing pretty well and and then, like you said, grunge
came in and it changed everything because this is more
I mean, it's heavy, it's not hair metal, no, no,
but but but really it wasn't just because when people
talk about grunge coming in, you know, it didn't just
kill hair metal. It affected anybody that wasn't that wasn't alternative.
Speaker 4: Right and absolutely yeah, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 6: So it affected you guys, but probably not as much,
right like the like because the hair metal bands all
of a sudden, we're not.
Speaker 4: Cool, yeah, warrant poised in all the you.
Speaker 6: Know, rat whereas bands like Malayah Rage, I would argue,
we're still cool, but suddenly not as cool, just not
as prominent.
Speaker 4: I would say, definitely cool.
Speaker 6: We were always cool, yeah, but you know what I mean,
But just in terms of in terms of public perception,
in terms of what people were listening to, what the
kids were listening to Yeah.
Speaker 4: You know, you know, as we know over the years,
music has changed that. I mean, yeah, you had the
thirties and the forties that were the swing generation, and
then the fifties rock and roll. Now you hit the
eighties and you kind of get this pop rock. Yeah,
and today, as we were talking, you know how music
has changed. Now we're kind of all over the place
because of the way music is marketed these days, you know. Yeah,
and going back to our conversation earlier, you and I
when we were off air, that kind of reflects why
our CD, Michelle and Mine Moonlight Ride is it's also
all over the place. The first song you played tonight
was kind of a pop ballad. Down in a Hole
is a little bit heavier. We have some songs on
their Live for Today that's a little bit heavier, and
then we have baby Come with Me that's kind of
Beatles Beach Beach Boys influenced with the handclapping and the
bop duop type stuff. So yeah, yeah, you know, music
over the years has changed, and again that is kind
of reflected in what we're doing here. We're kind of
hard to nail down as far as when people ask us, well,
what's your CD about. You know, it's all over the place,
and I hope that's a good thing.
Speaker 6: Like I think. So, you know, some people like.
Speaker 4: One genre of music and one genre only, and I.
Speaker 6: Don't trust those people. I don't people only like one thing.
It's like there's something wrong with them. Well you know
what I mean, Like there's something defective in a person
who only likes one thing. Yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 4: I agree with you totally, and that's kind of I
We're all over the place. When I was talking to
Michelle while we were creating this CD, you know, I
was like, oh, how is this going to do because
it's so diverse, And she thought, if I'm not mistaken,
that it was a good thing.
Speaker 3: Oh absolutely, yeah, absolutely yeah. I think most of us
enjoy multiple genres.
Speaker 6: Oh absolutely yeah. Of course. Of course, I'm curious about
your musical background, Michelle, did you I mean, I assume
you weren't a bass player in a famous band prior
to prior.
Speaker 3: To this, But yeah, I would say my story is
completely different. I think I'm a more typical kid who
maybe was in high school band I played the French horn. Yeah,
I went to college for something completely unrelated, But I
was in the choral society. Yeah, then you know, started family,
And then my neighbor talked to me about.
Speaker 7: Barbershop. I was in a barbershop group for a.
Speaker 6: While, you were, I was. That's interesting because I've always
my perception has always been that that's probably very challenging
to do, I would think, because it's one this is
just my perception. I've never done anything like that, but
I I would imagine, well, like myself, like, I'm not
a good singer, except I'm not a bad harmony singer.
I can kind of find the octavan lock in, but
I can't sing on my own. I get lost. But
what if you're doing if you're doing that, if you're
doing barbershop, like, you've not only got to be able
to pull off harmonies, you've got to be able to
do it flawlessly. That's my perception. It's like being an
air traffic controller. You have to be perfect. You can't
make any mistakes. Am I right about that?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 3: I think you have to be somewhat precise because you're
singing along with someone, and if you're not right on,
there's that weird.
Speaker 6: Yeah, like you can't be off at all with that
is my perception.
Speaker 7: I think I agree with that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, there's no room for error. So I mean
that is that challenging to do? Or maybe it can.
Speaker 3: I think you're in a high school band and I'm
in the French horn section and we don't all play
the same notes. Yeah, so you're already hearing some harmonies there.
Speaker 6: So your brain's already trained right to do that. Okay,
that makes sense. That makes sense.
Speaker 3: And then for singing, it's a nice challenge because when
you get it very rewarding.
Speaker 6: Okay, yeah, I can imagine. Yeah, how long did you
do that?
Speaker 7: For just a couple of years.
Speaker 3: But after that, whenever I hear a song on the radio,
I try to find the harmony and so on with
the harmony, and I find that very enjoyable.
Speaker 6: Yeah, oh that's cool. That's cool. Now, So the Jesse
the songs are all. Did you write all these that
you've recorded so far? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Like I said, I kind of wrote them years
ago and threw them on a shelf and forgot about him,
and then pulled them out and started listening to them.
And of course we revamped them because when I wrote them,
I didn't know someone who sang as well as Michelle. Yeah,
and I leave a lot of the harmony work and
all that to her. I just kind of put down
my pots and I say, here you go, and she
goes into the room like a mad scientist and starts
playing on a piano and finding all these different harmonies
and notes. And when you listen to the CD, you'll
realize that a lot of the harmonies and backing vocals
are all her.
Speaker 6: Okay, okay, oh, very cool, very cool.
Speaker 4: And of course when I wrote the songs, they didn't
have piano either, so yeah, it's great having her to
collaborate with and put her touches on these songs. So
they're kind of getting revamped as well.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, oh excellent. Yeah. We were also talking off
her a little bit about when you play out. So
right now it's just the two of you when you
play out, but you've thought about adding additional musicians, right,
But then that becomes is it worth it to do that?
Speaker 4: Well, you've been in band yourself, Matt, and you know,
the more people that are involved, sometimes it gets complicated.
Speaker 6: Yes.
Speaker 3: So we were really impressed listening to your guests just
before us and how they managed with just the two
of them to get out there and have a full
sounding band and experience.
Speaker 6: I think in their case though, if I understood correctly,
with Andre and Sasha, it sounds like they have other
band members live, but just but they can do because
I think I can't wait to have them in studio
and sit down with them because I want to know
everything about I mean that you know, they're originally from
Russia and everything. I just want to know everything about them.
But it sounded like because I thought Andre said something
about having a live drummer who plays on pads, but
but but he aments it. Yeah, correct, Yeah, I want
to see what their live setup is like, that's really
interesting to me.
Speaker 4: They out did great.
Speaker 6: But in a sense though, but it's not actually drastically
different from what you're doing, right because you've got when
you live, do you have the do you have those
electronic drums playing machine? Use a drum machine live? Yeah,
so actually it is kind of the same same idea. Yeah, yeah,
but yeah, when you when you start adding people, yeah,
it doesn't get complicated. Then you got to work around
everyone's schedules and you know, like right now, if you
get an offer for a show, you know, it's just
you just decide to get together. But then you know,
you have a whole band that you got to check
with everybody. And that's one of the things I don't
miss about playing in bands. It's like you get to
check with everybody and then somebody says, oh, yeah, I
can do it, and then they tell you, oh no,
actually I was wrong, I can't do that show right. Yeah,
that sucks.
Speaker 4: So with that, we're we're trying to figure out too,
where like do we just pursue the original music or
do we do our cover shows and mix it with
the original must I don't know. We're pretty open minded,
so yeah, whenever comes along comes along.
Speaker 6: I guess do you know a lot of covers together.
Speaker 1: That you've played?
Speaker 7: Yeah, we have quite a few.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we probably have about fifty songs ranging from the
early sixties to modern time. And of course, just being
the two of us, we have to be very selective.
What is going to work for two people, you know, piano,
guitar and just two vocals, and using the tracks that
we use to play along with us so that we
can sound full, you know.
Speaker 6: Yeah, is it important to you with the studio tracks?
Is it important to you to replicate them as close
as possible live or do you kind of approach it
more like, well, it's live, it might sound a little
a little more stripped down, but that's okay. Or yeah,
I think live we are a.
Speaker 4: Little more stripped down because we're not layering all kinds
of stuff. We want to sound as authentic as we can.
Speaker 6: Yeah, guess that's probably better, right, because you know, because
a lot of bands, bands or duos or even solo artists.
But I think it's it's I think it's more of
a band thing than anything. They're very and don't get
me wrong, I respect this, but a lot of bands
are very committed to this idea. Maybe Malaia Rage was
like this. I don't know that. You know, whatever we
do on the record, we have to be able to
replicate that live. And just a random example, Queen's Reich.
I remember the first time I ever saw Queen's Reich
live and I went with a friend and his great
show and everything.
Speaker 3: It was.
Speaker 6: It's kind of at the height, actually at their peak.
So on the Operation Mind Crime tour, I think, uh
oh no, it was on the Empire's tour. Maybe I'm
not sure. It's all a blur, but the point is
I remember saying to my friend, Wow, they sound great,
great show and everything, but they're they're very precise, like
they're playing everything exactly the way it is on the record.
And I understand why some bands do that, but I
also think it's kind of cool if maybe not everything
is exactly the way it is on the record, if
maybe live it is a little more, especially when it's
a band where maybe they've they've recorded something that's really
sophisticated and complex, and then they go out and play
and you know, maybe they're a band that doesn't usually
have any synthesizer, but they have this one song that
has synth, so then they have to decide, well, when
we play this live, what do we do? And if
they decide to just ditch the synth and turn up
the guitars, personally, I'm all for that. Great. Yeah, it's
gonna sound louder and heavier and more raw live than
it does on the record. Cool. I want to hear
how it sounds live. I'm excited to hear how it
sounds live. I don't need it to sound like it
does on the record, you know what I mean. But
I also know but some people are like, no, no,
we have to be able to replicate what's on the record,
or we can't do it live.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think I think both ways are good. I
think it's great when a band can go out there
like Queenswick for example. We just saw Jeff Tait not
too long ago.
Speaker 6: Oh ok at the Tupelo Yeah yeah, yeah, he was great.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And it's it's nice when they can get out
there and they just kick it. They do it like
on the album. But I also like it when bands
changed things up. And it's kind of the approach that
we take where I'm sure you remember the MTV unplug
shows that a billion bands did.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, that's.
Speaker 4: Kind of how Michelle and I approach our live shows.
It's more of a stripped down acoustic you know, we
try to really make the vocals stand out. Of course,
her harmonizing and her harmonies are great, which really makes
this a lot easier. But we kind of take our
show and it's a little more of a stripped down
show live.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Oh that's cool, that's cool. Are all the are
all the songs that you've recorded? Do you do you
do all those live? Or does it depend on how
much time you have in the set or we've actually.
Speaker 4: Taken a small hiatus from gigging live so we could
work on this. Yeah, so we don't have any live shows,
and most of the stuff we've done in the past
has all been the cover work that we were telling
you about. And yeah, since we started recording this and
working on videos, it's so much work met oh yeah
to get the videos and every hours and hours that
we kind of took a little break from playing live
so we could get this out. Yeah, get it up
onto YouTube, get it on streaming. We're trying to work
on getting Spotify going. I mean, you know, this is
all new to us, so yeah, we're learning it as
we go. It's exciting though, too, right, that part of it.
Some people get intimidated by that part of it, all
the learning. But I get the impression this is just
the vibe.
Speaker 6: I'm getting that that you're both kind of excited about
learning and really embracing that part. Instead of just saying, oh,
this is too much, is overwhelming. It sounds like you're saying, well, yeah,
it's a lot, but we're here for it. We want
to do this.
Speaker 7: Yeah learn.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's good because some people. The thing
is that I tell because a lot of it industry.
People listen to the show, and what I say all
the time is all of these tools they're designed, like Spotify,
for example, they're designed for you to be able to learn.
So because some people you know, especially you know people
who you know like my age or even people younger
than me, will get or like the people I referred
to earlier, who kind of were existing like twenty years ago,
but trying to apply twenty years ago to today, they
get discouraged because they think, oh, this is too complicated,
I can't learn it. And the only reason they can't
learn it is because they've told themselves they can't learn it.
And if they just tried to learn it, they could
because these things are designed for you to be able
to learn. Spotify is designed for you to be able
to learn how to use Spotify to promote your music.
That's literally what it's there for. And and but but
people kind of psych themselves out, you know. It's like
it's kind of it's technophobia, but it's a it's a
different kind. It's like, you know, I geez, I mean,
I remember when I was when I was in high school.
This this is when I first observed this. I had
a retail job, and I had to. I was good
at training people, so that even though I was I
was in high school, I was just a kid. But
they let me train other people on the cash register.
And sometimes someone who had never worked a cash register before,
and you know, usually an older person, they'd be very intimidated,
just terrified of running a cash register, you know, which
seems like the easiest thing in the world. But the
only reason it was frightening to them was because they
told themselves it was hard. They had already determined in
their brain this is hard, I can't do it, and
it's like, just do it and oh and then it's like, oh,
this is actually pretty easy. Well y, I no kidding.
It's designed to be easy. It's designed for anyone to
be able to do this. So anyway, I say all
that to say, I think you have the right approach,
on the right idea, and I wish more people had
that idea, you know. I mean, it's one thing for
you know, a twenty year old kid who grew up
with the internet. It all seems easy to them, not
because they're smarter, but because they grew up with it.
So to them it's easy. But to people like us
who didn't up with it. Like I said, you know,
you can really trap yourself into thinking it's hard. It's
not hard.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of resources out there to learn. Yeah,
you can look up a lot of things that help
you step by step.
Speaker 6: Absolutely.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I mean that's what you YouTube. You can learn anything
you have to do. There's a million different YouTube tutorials
on a million different things you can you can learn
any of this.
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 6: And then once you've learned it, then you have control.
You have control over your music, yes, and how it's
marketed and what you do with it now it's distributed,
all of it.
Speaker 4: Yeah. And this goes back to earlier in our conversation
where we were saying, you know, the music industry has changed,
and if you can embrace the change and learn from
it and do this Because we started with you know, okay,
we have to build a home studio. We have to
learn how to do this, and we've done it, and
then we started learning like we have to create a
video and put it up on YouTube so people can
see this stuff. And we started with Facebook actually yeah,
and we have a Facebook page moon Light Ride for
you guys that are listening, and we have a YouTube
page Moonlight Ride, yep. And you know, we had to
learn all of these skills, and we've done it and
it's been very time consuming, which is why we said
to you a few minutes ago, Matt, that we kind
of took a little break from playing live so we
could get this music out there in many different ways,
in many different places. And then once we get it
all out there and people start learning who we are,
then we figured, well, okay, we'll go back out and
start doing some live shows and promoting our original music,
because we started out as a cover band really, the
two of us, you know, yeah, we did. Yeah.
Speaker 6: How long were you playing out before you decided to
dig into the original material? Oh?
Speaker 4: Three years? Four years?
Speaker 6: Wow, that's what I was thinking a while.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean we weren't doing a lot
of shows because we work full time jobs and yeah,
we have lives, and so we were playing you know,
here and there once a month or whatever, just doing gigs,
and then, like I said, I kind of accidentally came
across these songs that were on cassette on a shelf
and we started talking and working on this and saying, hey,
let's do this, you know, let's let's see what happens.
Speaker 7: It's very exciting.
Speaker 6: Yeah, no, that is very very cool. Well, let's let's
get the time goes quickly. But let's play another track.
I'll let you, I'll let you all pick.
Speaker 4: Oh, you pick one, Michelle about one that we both
sing on.
Speaker 6: Oh, that'd be cool.
Speaker 4: You want to go with is it baby come with Me?
Is that the one that has it's it's kind of
a poppy song.
Speaker 7: I mean, don't hold back?
Speaker 4: I think is okay?
Speaker 7: Don't hold bah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yes, I've forgotten the names of my own stars.
Speaker 6: It happens. You write a lot of songs. That happens. Yeah,
all right, so we're gonna you want to go with
that one? Don't hold back?
Speaker 2: Sure? Please?
Speaker 6: And uh I got that loaded up. Okay, if you're
just joining us, we've got Moonlight Ride here with us
in studio, and let's give this a spin. This is
called Don't hold Back.
Speaker 2: Mm hmmmm. When I think about you, I didn't I
live without you.
Speaker 11: These days are series and the day I found you
to see my life surround you.
Speaker 1: A new be by. If you're in sweet button of my.
Speaker 2: Longing body, I'm don't you ever go away? I want
you for my own own the water be on long home.
Speaker 8: Don't you tell me what you.
Speaker 11: Want?
Speaker 1: You say on my other.
Speaker 2: Until the end of time, send my si sadly.
Speaker 1: Did you give my hug?
Speaker 4: Or you.
Speaker 12: Feeling when you spied? My arms are reaching for you?
Will you be my guiding glad?
Speaker 3: But you want you up by want you up, but.
Speaker 1: You want to upd but you want du up that
you want doup but want du up but you want
to up do but you want you up bast Now
the time has stopped up.
Speaker 2: You said to be the on My love is goway.
I'm trying to restraint, IM trying to ref.
Speaker 1: Holding him back.
Speaker 9: Un be.
Speaker 2: I can't resist though the cloudy way stunning yet stronger
I could, feeling off my bed.
Speaker 4: Very nice. Oh oh, there's a little trou cool.
Speaker 6: I came in a little little quick there as a
radio guy. That's a no no, well not necessarily because
there was no vocal there at the end, So I guess,
I guess I'm all right. Very nice, so very nice.
That's called don't hold back if you are just joining us.
We have Jesse and Michelle from Moonlight Ride here with
us in studio, and yeah, we were kind of talking. Uh,
we were talking off their about the music video which
I'm gonna check out later for what was the song
again Tonight Tonight and all the work that that is.
And you know, that's another interesting thing that's kind of changed,
but not in the way that some people think. Because
with music videos, a lot of people people who uh
don't know, they they assume that music videos are dead because,
you know, because MTV doesn't really play them anymore and whatnot,
and VH one probably doesn't either. But but in reality,
there's more music videos than ever on YouTube. You know,
everybody does a music video now, and some major label
artists who have, of course, you know, gazillions of dollars
will you know, they've got an album and they'll make
a video for every album. You know, Metallica has done that,
Beyonce has done that. So really, I would argue music
videos are more more important than ever.
Speaker 3: I think we get a better response on Facebook when
we first start, when we put our first video out.
Speaker 6: Yeah yeah, I believe it, no doubt, Yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 4: And we have put our entire album on YouTube as songs,
you know, just yeah, it's got the album cover on it.
And but we made when we made the video for
the song Tonight, I think it's much more interesting for
people to watch, so I think hopefully we'll catch people's attentions.
So if you guys are listening to us, type in
tonight Moonlight Ride and you can see our video.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, excellent. And you said, did you start working
on the next one or you're planning to or we did.
Speaker 7: We started working on Down in a Hole, Okay, do.
Speaker 6: You have any kind of an eta on that?
Speaker 4: Or we're hoping within the next couple of weeks that
will be finished and out.
Speaker 6: Yeah, very good.
Speaker 4: It spends on how much time Michelle wants to put it.
She also is doing a lot of the videography for us.
It's she she does a lot in this project that
kind of doesn't get a showed as much or talked about.
But like I said, she she does all the harmonies
and all the piano work, and she's done a lot
of the research getting us on YouTube and putting the
video together and making the video. So I commend her
tremendously and really appreciate all of her work and hard
work that she does to get help me get this
music out.
Speaker 7: Well, we're trying to get up with the times.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know, yeah, excellent, excellent. No, I think you're
on the I think you're on the right path. We
should we gotta, we gotta wrap up in a in
a moment. What should we What should we close out with? Uh?
What we'll close out our conversation.
Speaker 2: With h what?
Speaker 6: We played a couple pop songs? What's the heavier one?
Speaker 4: Let me hold on? Let me put grab the CD
so I can see the title tracks. Like I said,
I kind of forget the names of our own songs.
We're doing so much right now.
Speaker 6: Oh who did the cover art? By the way on
the CD. That's a combination of the two of us.
Oh cool, Okay, what do you think shell to me?
Speaker 4: Maybe?
Speaker 7: Yeah, that's a great song.
Speaker 4: Okay, this one's a little bit heavier. This is probably,
you know, a little bit more rocking.
Speaker 6: Okay, So we'll play that in a moment. I just
wanted to have it ready. But before we do that,
So where should people go online to keep up with
with everything that you're doing, with everything Moonlight Ride is
doing well?
Speaker 3: We definitely have our Facebook page. That's where we started out,
so it's Moonlight Ride, and then where we started our
YouTube channel, a few weeks ago. It's Moonlight Ride twenty
twenty five. We have the album up there, like Jesse said,
we have the video up there. We hope to put
our new video on there in a few weeks. So
that's Those are all great places to find us.
Speaker 6: Excellent, excellent.
Speaker 3: We're definitely looking into expanding. We're going to be researching
Spotify and how to do that, so look for us
there soon.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 4: You hit us up on Facebook though, and let us know.
If you like what we're doing and you want a CD,
contact us because we've been getting our CDs a physical
copy for people if they like one. That way, it's
an easy way to contact us, So hit us up
on you on Facebook.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's cool too that you're doing physical CDs. Actually,
I think we had talked about that off air too.
You love CDs. You've got a huge collection.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, Oh yeah. I'm the type of guy who
I like, I like the artwork, I like, you know,
the old days of the albums. We open them up
and you get these double albums with pictures and the
credits of who played on it and all that stuff.
So we tried to do that with our CD as well.
And yeah, we have a copy for you and Jen too.
Speaker 6: Yeah, thank you, thank you. Yeah. I've noticed over the
past five or six years, see have really come back
as far as you know, artists releasing CDs. I was
surprised when I was talking to in the first hour
Killing Flaw and I mentioned that, you know, they're from Australia,
and I guess in Australia nobody cares about CDs anymore.
But that's one of the things that's interesting too over
the years, to see how technology changes and what technologies
go away, what technologies hang around, what technologies kind of
go away but kind of come back.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it seems like vinyl has a huge resurgence.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, and it never really went away. But I
think I want to say it was either twenty twenty
two or twenty twenty three was the first year on
record since CDs came out that vinyl actually outsold CDs.
Oh is that right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Vinyl is here.
But my theory though, is that most I don't know
if it's most people, but who knows, But I think
there's probably a large percentage of people who buy vinyl
who never actually open it, just buy it because if
you're really into an artist and you just you know,
I mean, we actually have a record player here in
the studio because one of the one of the other hosts,
one of the their host brought it in. And we
do have a CD player that I've never used, but
Rob as a Vito, who host granted State of Mind here,
he uses it. But but yeah, vinyl is uh like,
if you're really into an artist and you just want
to support him, it's cool to have and you know,
you can mount the cover on your wall or something
or do whatever with it, you know. But but no,
but thank you for bringing us a CD. That's very nice.
Thank you for having us. Absolutely absolutely we will do
it again in the future as you're releasing new music
and we'll definitely do that. And uh so we're going
to play that track in a moment shelter me and
thank you everyone who joined us today. Of course, we
had a very busy show killing Flaw from Australia, and
then we had Ryan Redwood from the UK his great
track Tomorrow, such a great single. We had Major Moment
from Boston and really looking forward to having them on
for a full conversation, and of course we finish off
today with the Moonlight Ride, and thank you both so much.
If you miss any part of today's show it we'll
be up in just a little bit at Wmnhradio dot
organ in my website Mattconnerton dot com. And Jenny's not
here this week, but she'll be back soon, but visit
her website Jencoffee dot com. She is always up to
a lot of great, very positive stuff. Very proud of her.
And she was actually just on a It's on her website.
I'm also gonna put it on YouTube. But she was
on Bob Henley's radio show again in New York City.
She didn't go there for it, she called in, but
she was on that show for a segment talking about
healthcare and the health insurance industry that just went up.
That was yesterday. I think was the interview or was
it the day before, but it just went up yesterday. Anyway,
it's online, it's available, it's on her website, and so
check that out. And we will leave you with this.
This is shelter me, This is Moonlight Ride.
Speaker 1: You to me tis a child? Think holm in this spill?
Your spill is good?
Speaker 9: How tired about half Diner?
Speaker 1: Loose? How found Dad? Go right the blue, Help it be?
Shall it be.
Speaker 6: With me?
Speaker 13: If it's please release, if it's so weak, nocturnal care,
You'll never think, Just be willing.
Speaker 8: A page, just lost a fight, the dust proroted run.
You'ly can still your seva choice without a sound?
Speaker 10: My heads a time?
Speaker 9: How could boot comes?
Speaker 1: Living high child and route you feel my head comfort
be sheltered, be the help of bee, give me, please,
please your leads. I feel so weird.
Speaker 10: Nocturnal cad You're never there, Just be waiting. I rageous lust.
I back the dust prooted rod?
Speaker 4: What did I do?
Speaker 8: What did you know?
Speaker 3: Did this?
Speaker 5: Can't I need to know?
Speaker 9: I just can't speak of it today. I can't see
the fire with the single