Keith Samland of Alienstone | Matt Connarton Unleashed

0:00 Speaker 1: Hm. I really like that a lot.

0:01 Speaker 2: The track is Breathe, the artist is Alienstone, and we're

0:05 Speaker 2: going to talk with the gentleman behind that project in

0:08 Speaker 2: just a moment.

0:08 Speaker 1: But welcome everybody.

0:09 Speaker 2: We have entered our number two numarrow Doos of Matt

0:12 Speaker 2: Connorton Unleashed. For those of you listening live today is Saturday,

0:15 Speaker 2: September thirteen, twenty twenty five, and we come to you

0:18 Speaker 2: from the studios of wm NH ninety five point three

0:21 Speaker 2: FM and Glorious Manchester, New Hampshire. Jenny is here, of

0:25 Speaker 2: course at the news table, and of course hello to

0:28 Speaker 2: everybody listening online or even around the globe. Matt connorton

0:32 Speaker 2: dot Com. Slash live is how the easiest way to

0:35 Speaker 2: get the show from anywhere, so we appreciate all of

0:38 Speaker 2: you who tune in with us. And let's go ahead.

0:40 Speaker 2: I'm gonna bring this mic up and we're gonna talk

0:42 Speaker 2: with mister Keith Samland, the gentleman behind Alien Stone.

0:47 Speaker 3: Keith, are you there? I am, How you doing good?

0:50 Speaker 1: Good?

0:50 Speaker 4: So?

0:50 Speaker 2: I know you can't see us on video, but I

0:52 Speaker 2: can see you on video and you look like you're

0:54 Speaker 2: in a radio studio and I saw something online.

0:57 Speaker 1: Do you also do a radio show.

0:59 Speaker 5: Yes, upright, mo own internet radio station for about the

1:03 Speaker 5: past eleven twelve years outstanding.

1:05 Speaker 3: I have a show too, Oh very cool.

1:07 Speaker 2: Very cool, and what's the station and what's the show called.

1:11 Speaker 1: Let's give that a plug.

1:12 Speaker 2: Just partly for selfish reasons, I do want to talk

1:14 Speaker 2: to you about the music, but also as a radio guy,

1:16 Speaker 2: I'm just super curious about what you do as a

1:18 Speaker 2: broadcaster too.

1:20 Speaker 3: For sure.

1:20 Speaker 5: The station's called alien X Radio okay, and the show

1:24 Speaker 5: that I currently do is called Inside the Mothership okay.

1:27 Speaker 5: And I used to do interviews and all kinds of

1:31 Speaker 5: stuff with movie stars and things like that, but as

1:33 Speaker 5: of late, it's just become mostly just like comedy and

1:35 Speaker 5: entertainment show.

1:36 Speaker 1: Oh interesting, I'm gonna have to check that out. Very cool.

1:40 Speaker 2: So I have questions about Alien Stone, and a big

1:44 Speaker 2: one and part of the reason I picked that track,

1:47 Speaker 2: and I chose another song too that will play at

1:50 Speaker 2: the end of our conversation that I really like. But

1:52 Speaker 2: I love your sound. I love the songs. I'm particularly

1:56 Speaker 2: taken with the sound of the guitar. Is that you

1:58 Speaker 2: on lead guitar and all.

2:00 Speaker 5: These I did everything on these songs with the exception

2:04 Speaker 5: of leads and solos. Okay, what I did is I

2:06 Speaker 5: went through all of the bands that I've played with

2:09 Speaker 5: through you know, different bands that have played shows with me,

2:12 Speaker 5: and I've gotten their guitar players from all the local

2:14 Speaker 5: bands and had them all individuals, each one of these

2:17 Speaker 5: tracks as a completely different person playing on it.

2:19 Speaker 1: Gotcha.

2:19 Speaker 5: So they all contributed these from their home studios and

2:22 Speaker 5: sent them over and I chopped them up, spliced them

2:23 Speaker 5: and put them together, and I got different. That's how

2:26 Speaker 5: I got such different flavor throughout the course of the album.

2:28 Speaker 2: That makes sense because I really love the guitar tone

2:31 Speaker 2: on that track Breathe And is his name David Quick?

2:35 Speaker 1: Is that how you say his name?

2:36 Speaker 3: David Schwick?

2:37 Speaker 1: Oh Schwick? Okay, yeah, I wasn't sure.

2:41 Speaker 5: The crazy thing about that, too, is that he's actually

2:43 Speaker 5: one of the most talented drummers that I've ever met,

2:46 Speaker 5: and I didn't even know he played guitar, and now

2:49 Speaker 5: he's the he's the drummer of a band called Sonic

2:51 Speaker 5: Smut in this area right now.

2:53 Speaker 3: But that's how a drummer plays guitar really.

2:55 Speaker 2: Yeah, wow, Yeah, he's really good. Yeah, and it uh,

3:01 Speaker 2: you know, it fits the song perfectly, and I love

3:02 Speaker 2: the I love the tone.

3:05 Speaker 1: Everything about it is is so good.

3:08 Speaker 2: And tell us about I mean again, I listened to

3:12 Speaker 2: the you Know You sound Us a whole album. I

3:13 Speaker 2: listened to the entire album. It's funny because we had

3:16 Speaker 2: kind of talked I'll pull the curtain back a little bit. Uh,

3:19 Speaker 2: we kind of talked online about you know.

3:21 Speaker 6: Uh.

3:22 Speaker 2: One of the songs you gave me a four warning

3:24 Speaker 2: has a word in it that we would have to

3:26 Speaker 2: make a radio edit of I and I was willing

3:28 Speaker 2: to do that, but then, you know, I listened to

3:30 Speaker 2: the whole album and it's like, well, there's so much

3:32 Speaker 2: great stuff here, there's no reason to even bother making

3:33 Speaker 2: a radio edit of that song because there's no shortage

3:36 Speaker 2: of great songs here.

3:37 Speaker 1: So I that.

3:39 Speaker 2: So I picked a Breath to open with, and I'm

3:41 Speaker 2: gonna play criticize yourself at the end of the segment

3:43 Speaker 2: because I love that one too. Those are my two favorites.

3:46 Speaker 2: So selfishly, I picked my two personal two favorites. But

3:49 Speaker 2: but I'm curious about your creative process, and it sounds

3:52 Speaker 2: like you do all the production yourself.

3:54 Speaker 1: Is that correct?

3:55 Speaker 3: Yep?

3:55 Speaker 5: Right here where I'm sitting right now, is where I

3:57 Speaker 5: did all of the production on that whole album. Yeah, ye,

4:00 Speaker 5: recorded everything in myself. I used Superior drummer to program

4:05 Speaker 5: and edit all the drums. I recorded my own bass tracks,

4:08 Speaker 5: my own rhythms on the acoustic and actually all the

4:11 Speaker 5: vocal tracks, I recorded scratch tracks that I was going

4:15 Speaker 5: to re record later, and I ended up just cleaning

4:17 Speaker 5: them up and using the ones that were already in there. Okay, okay,

4:19 Speaker 5: so everything was a one take on all the vocals.

4:22 Speaker 2: Okay, Wow, Have you ever done this before? Or is

4:26 Speaker 2: Alien Stone this album? And by the way, what's the.

4:29 Speaker 1: Name of the album?

4:30 Speaker 3: The album's called After the Gray.

4:32 Speaker 1: After the Gray is After the Gray?

4:34 Speaker 2: Is this the first album where you've done that or

4:36 Speaker 2: have you released previous work where you've done all the production?

4:40 Speaker 5: Well, I it was kind of a collaborative effort. But

4:43 Speaker 5: I was in a band for about twenty years called

4:45 Speaker 5: Freak Stark and not to be confused with the current

4:48 Speaker 5: Freak Star out of Los Angeles. But yeah, we were

4:51 Speaker 5: together for about twenty years and we got into recording

4:54 Speaker 5: our own stuff too, But of course it was much

4:56 Speaker 5: harder to do back then with the equipment. You know,

4:59 Speaker 5: it's much easier to do today. You can do with

5:01 Speaker 5: a laptop and you know, a very small mixer. So

5:04 Speaker 5: I and I also went to as you can see,

5:05 Speaker 5: I am into radio, so I went to radio school,

5:07 Speaker 5: so I know about mixing and and you know, engineering

5:10 Speaker 5: and all that kind of stuff. So it just it

5:12 Speaker 5: made it much easier when the technology caught up to

5:15 Speaker 5: me and what I wanted to do.

5:16 Speaker 1: Absolutely.

5:17 Speaker 2: Yeah, it's an amazing time to be alive, isn't it

5:19 Speaker 2: in terms of technology? And oh, for sure the things

5:22 Speaker 2: you can do now really because.

5:25 Speaker 5: That great track that was was given to me in

5:28 Speaker 5: many many takes from someone who never even came into

5:31 Speaker 5: my studio, recorded at elsewhere and just emailed it over,

5:34 Speaker 5: you know. So that's that's huge. Yeah, And had to

5:36 Speaker 5: get a bunch of people in a room.

5:38 Speaker 2: Yeah, especially when you come out with something that sounds

5:41 Speaker 2: like it was recorded, you know, with a live band

5:43 Speaker 2: in a studio.

5:44 Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's fantastic.

5:45 Speaker 2: So so that that's a good good for you being

5:49 Speaker 2: able to do that.

5:50 Speaker 1: And then and then you mentioned so you you recorded

5:53 Speaker 1: everything else.

5:55 Speaker 5: Yeah, pretty much everything else on there was me with

5:57 Speaker 5: the exception of piano that that came from another gentleman.

6:01 Speaker 5: That he's the lead singer and piano player for a

6:03 Speaker 5: band called Sweet Crystal, which is a Detroit Detroit Music

6:08 Speaker 5: Award winning band for the last thirty years. I mean,

6:10 Speaker 5: he's a huge, huge artist around the Detroit area.

6:13 Speaker 2: Okay, that's obviously very satisfying when you can do all

6:16 Speaker 2: of that yourself, I assume. I mean, did you feel

6:19 Speaker 2: any pressure putting this album together because so much of

6:21 Speaker 2: it was on you? Or maybe you did and you

6:24 Speaker 2: thrive on it, or maybe you didn't and you just

6:27 Speaker 2: enjoyed being able to have such autonomy and so much control.

6:30 Speaker 1: I mean, what was what was that like?

6:32 Speaker 2: Did you feel any pressure or was it just like, yeah,

6:34 Speaker 2: I'm just gonna do this mostly myself.

6:37 Speaker 5: That that was the best thing about it is that

6:38 Speaker 5: there was nobody on my heels. There was nobody saying, hey,

6:41 Speaker 5: we got a deadline. We got to get this done.

6:43 Speaker 5: You know, someone's coming over to do the bass tracks.

6:45 Speaker 5: We got to get them all done today, right. There

6:47 Speaker 5: wasn't any of that. You know, if I came home

6:49 Speaker 5: and I was tired, I just didn't do anything. I

6:50 Speaker 5: went to bet you know, if it takes me a

6:54 Speaker 5: year to record it. It takes me a year. I don't

6:55 Speaker 5: even know how long it took me. I didn't even

6:57 Speaker 5: pay attention to that.

6:58 Speaker 2: Yeah, no, that makes sense. And is this your first

7:01 Speaker 2: because a project officially is called alien Stone, is this

7:04 Speaker 2: your first project that you've recorded as alien Stone?

7:09 Speaker 5: Well, I did something a long time ago when a

7:12 Speaker 5: freestar had like a hiatus in the middle where I

7:15 Speaker 5: did my own kind of thing on the side, and

7:16 Speaker 5: it was under the name alien Stone. But it was very,

7:19 Speaker 5: very different from this, and it was much lower on

7:22 Speaker 5: the production scale. It was kind of like a techno

7:24 Speaker 5: e beat kind of thing with a lot of heavy

7:26 Speaker 5: guitar on it. Yeah, and yeah, I just it never

7:29 Speaker 5: really released or anything anyway, so I don't really count

7:32 Speaker 5: it right right.

7:34 Speaker 1: Where does the name come from, alien Stone?

7:36 Speaker 5: It actually comes from all the way back in high school.

7:38 Speaker 5: This would have been like eighty eight eighty nine. I

7:41 Speaker 5: took a media production class and we were supposed to

7:43 Speaker 5: write and produce a small video, and I wrote a

7:48 Speaker 5: script that would have required me to get about thirty

7:50 Speaker 5: or forty million dollars, So I never made the movie.

7:53 Speaker 5: But it was about a meteorite that falls into Los

7:56 Speaker 5: Angeles and an alien comes to retrieve it because it's

7:58 Speaker 5: some kind of power source, and he goes a murderous

8:00 Speaker 5: spree to retrieve the alien stone. Okay, it's just stuck

8:04 Speaker 5: ever since.

8:05 Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, all right. And the album is called After

8:07 Speaker 2: the Gray? Where does that come from?

8:10 Speaker 3: That's actually uh.

8:11 Speaker 5: In one of the songs there's the title says, after

8:15 Speaker 5: the Gray, maybe there'll be some kind of light, Okay,

8:17 Speaker 5: And that's basically what the song was about. All this

8:20 Speaker 5: crap that happens to you, is like, well, maybe after

8:22 Speaker 5: this crap passes, you know, there'll be something better after that.

8:26 Speaker 5: So after the Gray, maybe there'll be some kind of light.

8:29 Speaker 2: So are these songs? Are they reflective of things that

8:33 Speaker 2: you've been through? Because in listening to the lyrics, I

8:36 Speaker 2: do feel like, you know, these aren't you know, they're

8:39 Speaker 2: not just simple feel good rock songs.

8:42 Speaker 1: There.

8:43 Speaker 2: I feel like I feel like there's some heavy stuff

8:48 Speaker 2: behind the lyrics of these songs. It definitely, you know,

8:51 Speaker 2: without I mean, you know, there's ambiguity. And of course,

8:53 Speaker 2: one of the wonderful things about music or any kind

8:55 Speaker 2: of art is that you can kind of interpret it

8:57 Speaker 2: however you want to. And sometimes people different people find

9:01 Speaker 2: different meanings behind different you know, the lyrics to different

9:03 Speaker 2: songs and so forth. But my impression because I listened

9:06 Speaker 2: to the entire thing in one sitting, you know, I

9:08 Speaker 2: wasn't like, Okay, I'm gonna listen to a song now

9:10 Speaker 2: and I'll listen to another one later. So I listened

9:12 Speaker 2: to the full thing, from front to back, and I

9:15 Speaker 2: felt like there's a story there, like like there's something

9:17 Speaker 2: that you're getting out, but I'm curious about that.

9:21 Speaker 5: Yeah, there's definitely a lot of heavy lyrics. I've been

9:23 Speaker 5: criticized by a lot of people saying, can you write

9:25 Speaker 5: a happy song? I'd be like, if there's any happiness

9:28 Speaker 5: inside me, I want to keep it there, keep it inside.

9:32 Speaker 1: You know.

9:32 Speaker 5: If I get all this heaviness that's thrown on me

9:35 Speaker 5: from the world, let's let's get that out through the

9:37 Speaker 5: therapy of music, let's remove that. You know what I'm saying. Right, So,

9:40 Speaker 5: I don't need to write a happy song. I just

9:42 Speaker 5: live the happy stuff. But you know, yeah, the darker stuff.

9:47 Speaker 5: If you don't talk about the things that get to you,

9:50 Speaker 5: that the things that bring you down, then it's just

9:53 Speaker 5: going to keep you down. So that's pretty much you

9:56 Speaker 5: know what I do. It's like, if something bothers me

9:58 Speaker 5: enough to wear I'm thinking about it a lot, then

10:01 Speaker 5: then yeah, it's going to translate into the music. You know,

10:03 Speaker 5: I'm gonna I'm gonna write a story about you know,

10:06 Speaker 5: what once was that is no more or something that

10:09 Speaker 5: has changed for the not for the better. M you

10:12 Speaker 5: know that that's you know, that's that's gonna come out

10:15 Speaker 5: that way. I have one song that's on there. It's

10:17 Speaker 5: called long Way Home, which is basically about thinking that

10:21 Speaker 5: the grass is greener on the other side. So you

10:23 Speaker 5: take this long journey going around trying to find something better,

10:25 Speaker 5: and then you find out that everything that was better

10:28 Speaker 5: was actually at home, so you're right back where you started.

10:30 Speaker 5: You took the long way home. So that's not really

10:32 Speaker 5: a dark story. That's like, hey, you just you didn't

10:35 Speaker 5: know now you do.

10:36 Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's relatable, you know, because I think we

10:38 Speaker 2: can all we can all relate to that, uh you know,

10:42 Speaker 2: at some point in our lives.

10:44 Speaker 1: So certainly.

10:45 Speaker 2: But I like too that you use the word therapy

10:48 Speaker 2: when you're talking about about, you know, songs about dark

10:51 Speaker 2: subjects and so forth, because something that comes up on

10:53 Speaker 2: this show a lot because we talk about music, we

10:56 Speaker 2: also talk about mental health and uh, something that comes

10:59 Speaker 2: up on the show a lot is how creating art,

11:01 Speaker 2: whether it be music or you know, visual art Jenny

11:04 Speaker 2: as you know, she's a visual artist, or whatever it

11:07 Speaker 2: is that you're creating.

11:08 Speaker 1: It's it's a way.

11:09 Speaker 2: I think it's the best form of therapy, right because

11:12 Speaker 2: you're you're working whatever it is that you need to

11:15 Speaker 2: work out through creating something. Not only are you creating

11:18 Speaker 2: something that ultimately that helps you, it helps you to

11:21 Speaker 2: express yourself, but it also helps others because then they

11:24 Speaker 2: are able to relate to what you've created. And I'm

11:27 Speaker 2: sure I don't know if it's happened to you. I

11:29 Speaker 2: assume it has. Maybe you've heard from someone who said,

11:31 Speaker 2: you know, hey, I listened to this song and I

11:33 Speaker 2: get what you're saying, and I really relate to it

11:36 Speaker 2: and it kind of helped me, helped me feel better,

11:38 Speaker 2: help me feel like I'm not alone, whatever it is, right,

11:41 Speaker 2: So I think that that's you know, the best form

11:44 Speaker 2: of therapy is to is to create. And if you

11:47 Speaker 2: can take your pain, your trauma, whatever it is that

11:51 Speaker 2: you've been through, or maybe you're just upset about something

11:53 Speaker 2: going on in the.

11:53 Speaker 1: World, whatever it is, If you're able to take.

11:55 Speaker 2: That and then make something out of it, create something

11:58 Speaker 2: from it, you've taken something this negative, but you've done

12:01 Speaker 2: something positive with it by creating something.

12:04 Speaker 3: Yeah.

12:05 Speaker 5: And also, like you said that, if somebody else listens

12:07 Speaker 5: to it and they say, hey, I you know, connected

12:10 Speaker 5: with you on this level, it's like, okay, but you

12:12 Speaker 5: wouldn't have, right. You know, you had no idea that

12:15 Speaker 5: this person was on the same level with you, that

12:17 Speaker 5: was there right there with you. But you didn't know

12:19 Speaker 5: until you said something in the form of a song

12:22 Speaker 5: or a poetry or a painting or whatever. Then somebody

12:25 Speaker 5: looks at it and goes, you know what, I feel

12:26 Speaker 5: the same way, and it's like, okay, well I had

12:27 Speaker 5: no idea you did. Now at least I have a

12:29 Speaker 5: kindred spirit. I now feel like there's more people with

12:33 Speaker 5: me instead of against me.

12:35 Speaker 1: Right exactly exactly.

12:36 Speaker 2: Yeah, do you play any of these songs out or

12:41 Speaker 2: I mean with all these guest musicians, Maybe that's challenging

12:44 Speaker 2: to pull that off.

12:45 Speaker 1: I don't know, But do you perform any of these live?

12:48 Speaker 3: Yes?

12:48 Speaker 5: Actually, what I did is since I'm the one that

12:50 Speaker 5: was in charge of producing the album. I was also

12:53 Speaker 5: the one in charge of rendering the tracks. When I

12:55 Speaker 5: was done, so of course I had rendered the entire album,

12:57 Speaker 5: and then I went through and muted the acoustic guitar

13:00 Speaker 5: and the vocals and rendered it again. Okay, So I

13:03 Speaker 5: load that onto a loop pedal and I can go

13:05 Speaker 5: out to any place I want now hit the track

13:07 Speaker 5: and it plays everything with the exception of my acoustic

13:10 Speaker 5: guitar and my vocals, and I can just play right along.

13:13 Speaker 1: Oh that's great.

13:13 Speaker 2: And you know, once again, it's an amazing time to

13:15 Speaker 2: be alive, isn't it with all this technology.

13:17 Speaker 3: Yeah, that was not available. That was not available.

13:20 Speaker 5: You had to come out there with a reel to

13:21 Speaker 5: reel and all kinds of crazy stuff.

13:25 Speaker 1: That's great.

13:26 Speaker 2: They were able to do that, So, uh, does anything

13:29 Speaker 2: ever go wrong with that? By the way, when you're

13:31 Speaker 2: when you're you know, trying to play to these loops.

13:34 Speaker 5: And uh, the only time it really went bad is

13:38 Speaker 5: before I'm not I use loop pedal itself, which plays

13:41 Speaker 5: the wave file straight from there, and that pretty much

13:43 Speaker 5: is solid.

13:44 Speaker 1: Okay.

13:44 Speaker 3: But I used to use a laptop.

13:46 Speaker 5: Yeah, and you know how laptops are, Yeah, you know,

13:49 Speaker 5: right in the middle of a song and goes, we're

13:50 Speaker 5: gonna do an update in the middle, Like, dude, you

13:54 Speaker 5: didn't even ask me, you just we're restarting your computer.

13:57 Speaker 1: Really yeh, yeah up, or.

14:00 Speaker 5: You'll get a notification or something, but right in the

14:03 Speaker 5: middle of your song, you're like, that's not cool it

14:05 Speaker 5: I deleted those.

14:06 Speaker 3: I thought I turned those off.

14:08 Speaker 2: I mean, if you're a if you're a DJ, you know,

14:11 Speaker 2: you could say, oh, it's the part of the remix

14:13 Speaker 2: or whatever if it suddenly goes meek.

14:14 Speaker 1: But if you're you know, you're playing a rock song, you.

14:17 Speaker 3: Know, and you get to know a critical error.

14:19 Speaker 2: Yes, but but it sounds like so now it works

14:25 Speaker 2: pretty It all works pretty smoothly though.

14:28 Speaker 3: Yeah, it's pretty solid.

14:29 Speaker 5: When you when you you have to actually hit the

14:31 Speaker 5: button to stop it. Now, yeah, you know it's not

14:34 Speaker 5: gonna just empower would have to go out?

14:36 Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, when you when you play out, are people

14:40 Speaker 2: ever surprised because obviously, you know a lot of people

14:43 Speaker 2: who maybe haven't seen someone play with loop pedals and

14:46 Speaker 2: so forth. You know, they might see you with your

14:49 Speaker 2: acoustic guitar and think that you know, that's going to

14:51 Speaker 2: be it and not that there would be anything wrong

14:52 Speaker 2: with that, But are do you ever see people in

14:54 Speaker 2: the audience who are just surprised when they, you know,

14:57 Speaker 2: when they start to hear these other instruments and these

14:59 Speaker 2: other and they realize that it's actually a bigger production,

15:04 Speaker 2: so to speak, then maybe what they were expecting.

15:07 Speaker 5: That's always the case when somebody who hasn't seen me

15:09 Speaker 5: at first, they think I'm gonna come up there and

15:11 Speaker 5: do some Hank William seeing your tear and my beer

15:13 Speaker 5: kind of stuff, right, and you know, and there's nothing

15:15 Speaker 5: wrong with that either, you know, IF's and there's other

15:18 Speaker 5: people at these shows too that do that kind of music.

15:20 Speaker 5: So maybe somebody right before them just did that, and

15:23 Speaker 5: then I come up there and they think, Okay, this

15:24 Speaker 5: is gonna be a continuation. And then all of a

15:26 Speaker 5: sudden they hear the drums kick in and a and

15:29 Speaker 5: a big fat bass kick in, and you've that guitar

15:31 Speaker 5: solo that you just heard on that song. You know,

15:34 Speaker 5: they're not expecting any of that, yeah, and it kind

15:37 Speaker 5: of shocks them a little bit.

15:38 Speaker 3: First, dude.

15:39 Speaker 5: Sometimes they're like, are you just playing along with your album?

15:41 Speaker 5: And sometimes I actually have to explain to people it's

15:43 Speaker 5: like no, what I'm playing is live. Yeah, that's removed

15:46 Speaker 5: from the sound.

15:47 Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.

15:49 Speaker 2: Do you ever, I mean, do you have any thoughts

15:52 Speaker 2: of putting together a band to play these? Or obviously

15:56 Speaker 2: doing it yourself? It gives you a lot of freedom

15:58 Speaker 2: and autonomy, and if you want book shows, you don't

16:01 Speaker 2: have to check with three or four other people what

16:03 Speaker 2: their schedules are. So I so maybe this, maybe this

16:07 Speaker 2: is a pointless question, but I am curious. I mean,

16:10 Speaker 2: have you thought about trying to put together a band

16:12 Speaker 2: to play these?

16:13 Speaker 5: Yeah, I've I'm always open to that idea. But it

16:17 Speaker 5: you know, something that I've learned from being in bands for,

16:20 Speaker 5: you know, thirty plus years, is that, you know, the

16:24 Speaker 5: more people you get into a band, the more schedules

16:26 Speaker 5: you have to coordinate. Everybody has wives and lives and

16:31 Speaker 5: husbands and car problems and jobs and vacation time and

16:37 Speaker 5: all that kind of stuff. And to get five people

16:38 Speaker 5: in a band and have all that lineup so that

16:41 Speaker 5: you can record and you can do a show, it's

16:43 Speaker 5: really hard.

16:44 Speaker 3: It's really hard.

16:45 Speaker 5: And then on top of that, you've got egos and

16:47 Speaker 5: personalities that you also have to get along with, and

16:50 Speaker 5: it makes it very, very difficult. So I'm always open

16:54 Speaker 5: to the idea. But then you've got to find somebody

16:56 Speaker 5: who's willing to play my music and then move forward

16:59 Speaker 5: writing stuff yeah together, you know, don't change what I've

17:03 Speaker 5: already written. That's already done, right, you know, So you've

17:05 Speaker 5: got to be willing to do that. And a lot

17:06 Speaker 5: of people are like, no, I don't want to, you know,

17:08 Speaker 5: I don't want to be in the Dave Matthews band,

17:10 Speaker 5: you know, right, And I'm like, no, that's what I'm

17:13 Speaker 5: not trying to do that either, you know.

17:15 Speaker 2: Yeah, where are you from, Keith? I? I just realized too,

17:21 Speaker 2: I never asked you where where are you located?

17:23 Speaker 1: Exactly?

17:24 Speaker 5: Well, I'm originally from Westland, Michigan, but I moved over

17:27 Speaker 5: to Taylor, Michigan, which is a suburb of Detroit, pretty

17:30 Speaker 5: close to Detroit.

17:31 Speaker 3: Okay, be there in about ten minutes if I chose

17:33 Speaker 3: to go.

17:34 Speaker 2: Well, you're a you're in an area then you're you know,

17:37 Speaker 2: being close to Detroit where. I mean a lot of

17:38 Speaker 2: great music obviously is come out of that region. I

17:41 Speaker 2: mean you must have. I mean, what's the music scene

17:44 Speaker 2: like there right now? I mean there must just be

17:47 Speaker 2: talent everywhere I would guess.

17:49 Speaker 3: Yeah.

17:50 Speaker 5: I do a lot of open mic nights obviously, you know,

17:53 Speaker 5: because that's the easiest thing for me. I go to

17:55 Speaker 5: places like Grizzlies and Windott or Three Nicks in Allen Park.

17:58 Speaker 5: But like the place I go to, it's a bar.

18:00 Speaker 5: It's called road Rangers, and it's and Taylor and this

18:03 Speaker 5: bar is set up as a concert bar. I mean

18:05 Speaker 5: it has the full backing line, the full everything. I mean,

18:08 Speaker 5: anybody can play there. Docing could play there tomorrow and

18:11 Speaker 5: it would sound great. Yeah, you know what I'm saying, Well,

18:13 Speaker 5: the sound would be great. I don't know if Docing

18:15 Speaker 5: would be great, but.

18:17 Speaker 1: Yeah, depends if George Leitch's and the band or not.

18:20 Speaker 3: Right.

18:21 Speaker 5: So when I go and play there, it's like the

18:23 Speaker 5: bands that come through that bar because of the fact

18:25 Speaker 5: that it has such good sound and you don't have

18:28 Speaker 5: to sell tickets and you don't have to be part

18:30 Speaker 5: of a national thing. There's a lot of huge talent

18:33 Speaker 5: that comes through that that bar. You know, bands like

18:36 Speaker 5: the Creeping Chaos is around here right now. That's an

18:39 Speaker 5: enormous band. And the band's like whole shot the WRF,

18:42 Speaker 5: which is a huge radio station around here. They constantly

18:45 Speaker 5: hire that band to play all their events. Oh yeah,

18:48 Speaker 5: so yeah, there's a lot of really good bands that

18:50 Speaker 5: come through there.

18:51 Speaker 2: Yeah. It's something that we talk about on the show

18:54 Speaker 2: quite a bit.

18:55 Speaker 1: Is you know.

18:55 Speaker 2: Every around here, you know, because sometimes people will ask us,

18:59 Speaker 2: they ask me, or they'll ask Jenny because she does

19:01 Speaker 2: the booking. You know, how do you find all this

19:03 Speaker 2: great talent? And it's like, well, it's everywhere, you know,

19:05 Speaker 2: And I think that's true of probably every city, in

19:08 Speaker 2: every town in the country. You know, there's there's local

19:11 Speaker 2: musicians who are doing great stuff. And if you you know,

19:14 Speaker 2: because sometimes people, you know, they get to a certain

19:16 Speaker 2: point in their lives where they sort of say, Okay,

19:20 Speaker 2: all the music that I've heard up to this point

19:21 Speaker 2: in my life, that's all the music I ever need

19:23 Speaker 2: to hear, and anything made after this point I'm not

19:26 Speaker 2: going to listen to. I'm going to reject, you know.

19:30 Speaker 2: And people who do that, they're they're missing out, you know.

19:33 Speaker 2: I mean there's first of all, I mean, you can

19:35 Speaker 2: get access to there's so much there's so much new

19:37 Speaker 2: music being put out, but also right right in your

19:40 Speaker 2: own backyard, you know, there's musicians making music and you

19:43 Speaker 2: know you need to. I always use my father as

19:46 Speaker 2: a very positive example of this. My dad, you know,

19:49 Speaker 2: he's in his seventies, but he still loves hearing new music.

19:52 Speaker 2: He lives on the sea coast here in New Hampshire

19:55 Speaker 2: and there's a great college station at the University of

19:57 Speaker 2: New Hampshire called WUNH and my dad I'd love to

20:00 Speaker 2: listen to wun H because he loves hearing new music.

20:03 Speaker 2: He loves hearing you know, new artists that he's never

20:06 Speaker 2: been exposed to before, either young, new upcoming artists, or

20:11 Speaker 2: just artists who maybe are not young but have been

20:13 Speaker 2: around a while but he just had never heard them before.

20:15 Speaker 1: He loves hearing new stuff.

20:17 Speaker 2: And you know, and I can only imagine what the

20:20 Speaker 2: scene is like there and how much great music there

20:22 Speaker 2: must be there. But you know, I always encourage people,

20:25 Speaker 2: you know, take a look around. You know this this great,

20:29 Speaker 2: incredible music being created by musicians right in front of you.

20:33 Speaker 2: You know you're just not looking.

20:34 Speaker 5: You know what I mean, I know exactly what you're saying. Well,

20:38 Speaker 5: I hear it all the time. You know, people are like, well,

20:39 Speaker 5: I don't want to go see that band. I'm like,

20:40 Speaker 5: why No, I don't know who they are. I was like, okay,

20:43 Speaker 5: but did you know who Metallica was before you heard

20:44 Speaker 5: them for.

20:45 Speaker 3: The first time?

20:46 Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly.

20:47 Speaker 3: Everybody has to be unknown before they're known.

20:49 Speaker 1: Exactly.

20:49 Speaker 5: Go and spend two hundred and fifty dollars on a

20:51 Speaker 5: ticket to see Metallica, whom you'll never meet, or you

20:54 Speaker 5: can go to a bar and here's some brand new

20:56 Speaker 5: music you've never heard and talk with them and do

20:57 Speaker 5: shots with them after the.

20:58 Speaker 1: Show, right exactly. And then if it was a.

21:02 Speaker 5: Fifteen dollars ticket instead of two hundred and fifty bucks,

21:05 Speaker 5: you know.

21:05 Speaker 2: Come on, yeah, yeah, and then if you know, if

21:07 Speaker 2: they get big, you can say, hey, I knew them when.

21:10 Speaker 5: Exactly I did shots with you know, come upcoming Metallica

21:14 Speaker 5: back in the day, you know.

21:15 Speaker 1: There you go, Yeah, I hear that a lot. You know.

21:17 Speaker 2: In this area where we are, people will say, you know,

21:20 Speaker 2: I saw Aerosmith, you know, back in the day when

21:22 Speaker 2: they were you know, just a bar band, you know,

21:25 Speaker 2: and it's it's that's usually an example people use from

21:28 Speaker 2: from in this part of the country. But yeah, there's

21:31 Speaker 2: there's so much, uh, there's so much great talent out there,

21:33 Speaker 2: and people people should definitely keep their eyes open for that.

21:37 Speaker 2: Do you use your now with your your online station

21:41 Speaker 2: and your show, do you use that to showcase indie

21:44 Speaker 2: artists or do you do you use that to promote Sure?

21:47 Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I'm.

21:49 Speaker 5: Sure all the all the indie artists that are around

21:51 Speaker 5: here that have they have, you know, recorded music that's

21:54 Speaker 5: you know, you know, you know the level it has

21:56 Speaker 5: to be at.

21:56 Speaker 3: Yeah, you know the quality level it has to be at.

21:59 Speaker 5: You know, anybody that has those albums and stuff in

22:01 Speaker 5: it and they submit to me they've been on the

22:02 Speaker 5: radio station. I go through those albums too, and I

22:05 Speaker 5: pick a nice wide range of all the local music

22:07 Speaker 5: and put it in there. And then I sprinkle in

22:08 Speaker 5: some national stuff too, just for the people that can't

22:10 Speaker 5: handle not knowing what the next song is, right, you know,

22:14 Speaker 5: just to kind of keep them okay.

22:16 Speaker 2: I think there's value in doing that too, is sprinkling

22:18 Speaker 2: in some national artists, because I've I've always felt that

22:21 Speaker 2: that lends, uh for you know, for some people, that

22:25 Speaker 2: lends a certain credibility to the independent artists, maybe the

22:29 Speaker 2: local artists if they're mixed in with some national artists,

22:33 Speaker 2: you know what I mean.

22:34 Speaker 5: Just yeah, for sure, you can have an unknown person

22:37 Speaker 5: selling bar bells on TV, or you can have Arnold schwarzeneg,

22:39 Speaker 5: you're selling bar bells on TV.

22:41 Speaker 3: Which one's going to sell faster?

22:42 Speaker 1: Very well? Put exactly, put a couple of.

22:45 Speaker 5: Pearl jam songs on a couple of things in there

22:47 Speaker 5: around all these local artists.

22:48 Speaker 3: Yeah, it'll attract a little bit.

22:50 Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely. So the where where should people go? Like,

22:57 Speaker 2: where can they find the online station that you have?

23:00 Speaker 3: Well, it's at alien x radio dot com.

23:02 Speaker 5: Okay, And unfortunately I've realized within the last couple of

23:05 Speaker 5: days that the player isn't working, so I have to

23:07 Speaker 5: figure out how to fix that since it's been a

23:10 Speaker 5: decade since I've been into the actual controls of the website.

23:13 Speaker 5: Oh really, Yeah, there's no reason to change the website.

23:17 Speaker 5: We just changed the music and stuff, you know, and

23:19 Speaker 5: everything's live, you know, most of our shows and stuff,

23:21 Speaker 5: so we don't have to go in there and change much. Yeah,

23:24 Speaker 5: and I can't get back in there, so I got

23:25 Speaker 5: to figure that out. Yeah, that's at alienxradio dot com.

23:28 Speaker 5: And then I of course have a Facebook page. The

23:31 Speaker 5: artist page is just alien Stone. Yeah, and you can

23:33 Speaker 5: get me at Keith samlan at Alien at Facebook as well.

23:37 Speaker 2: Okay, and then the album. Can people find the album anyway?

23:41 Speaker 2: I mean I assume it's on all the streaming platforms

23:43 Speaker 2: and everything.

23:43 Speaker 5: Yeah, I went through that distro kid, so it's on everything.

23:47 Speaker 5: So you've got Spotify, Apple Music. You know, it's even

23:51 Speaker 5: on like Pandora and things like that, so you can

23:52 Speaker 5: find it pretty much everywhere.

23:54 Speaker 3: Outstanding by the way in the freak Star stuff.

23:56 Speaker 1: Oh good.

23:56 Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I'm curious. I'm curious to check that out too.

24:00 Speaker 2: Do you do physical copies of the album.

24:02 Speaker 1: Or is strictly online?

24:04 Speaker 4: No?

24:05 Speaker 5: I have physical copies too. I've made some CDs and

24:06 Speaker 5: also what I really like is they look like business cards,

24:09 Speaker 5: but they're actually a flash drive. It pops out the side, oh,

24:12 Speaker 5: perfectly straight in. Those are really nice too.

24:14 Speaker 2: We had someone on the show recently who used that

24:17 Speaker 2: same concept, and yeah, that's a great idea.

24:20 Speaker 5: Some people you hand them a CD and they go,

24:22 Speaker 5: what is this? Is this America online?

24:23 Speaker 3: What is this? They don't know?

24:26 Speaker 1: Well, it's interesting.

24:27 Speaker 2: That's a subject that comes up a lot on the

24:29 Speaker 2: show too. Because there was a point where, because I've

24:32 Speaker 2: been doing this a long time, and there was a

24:33 Speaker 2: point where it seemed like none of the guests we

24:35 Speaker 2: would have on nobody was doing physical media. I'm talking

24:38 Speaker 2: like maybe seven or eight years ago, and you know,

24:42 Speaker 2: and that's fine, you know, just you know, email me

24:45 Speaker 2: the tracks whatever. But lately, well I shouldn't say lately,

24:48 Speaker 2: I'd say probably for at least the past five years,

24:51 Speaker 2: it seems like, at least in this area, for the

24:53 Speaker 2: guests that we have coming in person from our area,

24:56 Speaker 2: physical media has had quite a resurgence.

24:59 Speaker 1: A lot of our guests bring in CDs.

25:01 Speaker 2: Now, you know, they send us the files ahead of time, obviously,

25:03 Speaker 2: but they'll also bring in a physical copy or even

25:06 Speaker 2: we've had some who even do vinyl and they'll bring

25:09 Speaker 2: in a vinyl record, not for us to play, but

25:11 Speaker 2: just to have. Although we do have a record player

25:13 Speaker 2: here that one of the other hosts uses, and we

25:16 Speaker 2: even have a CD player that I've never used, but

25:18 Speaker 2: we do have one here in the in the studio

25:20 Speaker 2: that I know one of our hosts sometimes will bring

25:22 Speaker 2: in CDs to play. But but it's interesting, you know,

25:25 Speaker 2: uh physical media never seems to completely go away, and

25:30 Speaker 2: sometimes it has these little resurgences, and uh so a

25:34 Speaker 2: lot of the artists around here are releasing things on

25:36 Speaker 2: CD and even on vinyl, which I understand is very expensive.

25:39 Speaker 2: But but I like your I like your concept with

25:41 Speaker 2: the flash drive.

25:43 Speaker 5: Yeah, it's it's you know, the physical media is kind

25:45 Speaker 5: of it's just kind of changed what its purpose really is.

25:48 Speaker 5: It's like, we know that when this guy gets home,

25:49 Speaker 5: he's probably going to listen to it on his smart

25:52 Speaker 5: device or whatever from a streaming service.

25:54 Speaker 1: Right.

25:55 Speaker 3: But you know, now the physical media I don't.

25:57 Speaker 5: Even like when I when I ad a show or something,

26:00 Speaker 5: I find people who were interested and I just give

26:02 Speaker 5: them one. Yeah, okay, it's it has become the physical

26:06 Speaker 5: media has become the promotional tool to get you to

26:08 Speaker 5: go and stream exactly.

26:10 Speaker 3: It's almost what it's become now. You know.

26:11 Speaker 5: So I'm not trying to sell I'm not, you know,

26:13 Speaker 5: out of the trunk of my car out there going

26:15 Speaker 5: I got yeah, I you know, I don't do that.

26:18 Speaker 3: You know.

26:19 Speaker 5: I just find someone who I think was interested and

26:21 Speaker 5: I give them a copy.

26:23 Speaker 1: Yeah.

26:23 Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's an excellent strategy. Well, Keith, I

26:27 Speaker 2: appreciate you joining us. In a moment, I'm gonna play

26:29 Speaker 2: this track. Criticize yourself because this is this is the

26:33 Speaker 2: other one that I like, I said, I enjoyed the

26:34 Speaker 2: whole album, but breathe and criticize yourself for the two

26:37 Speaker 2: that really really kind of struck me. I'm curious if

26:41 Speaker 2: there's anything we should know about this song, if there's

26:44 Speaker 2: a backstory to this one, or what this one might

26:46 Speaker 2: be about, because again, this is another one of those

26:48 Speaker 2: songs too where I'm listening to the lyrics and it's like,

26:50 Speaker 2: well there's something here, you know, and and and I'm.

26:54 Speaker 1: Really curious about it.

26:54 Speaker 2: And by the way, and also too, if you want

26:56 Speaker 2: to talk about the guitar player on this one, because

26:58 Speaker 2: this is also another song where I really love the

27:00 Speaker 2: guitar work on this.

27:01 Speaker 5: Yeah, the guitar this one is really involved. Yeah, it

27:06 Speaker 5: really is. Basically, he came over and he had nothing planned.

27:10 Speaker 5: This is Donnie Stanfill. He's the league. He's one of

27:12 Speaker 5: the guitar players from the band Creeping Chaos here in Detroit,

27:16 Speaker 5: and he probably recorded I just I just played the

27:19 Speaker 5: song and just let him go and improvise. He did

27:21 Speaker 5: probably fourteen tracks. Wow, just improvised. Yeah, and then I

27:25 Speaker 5: went through and cut and spliced and put together all

27:27 Speaker 5: my favorite pieces Okay, so that's what we ended up with.

27:30 Speaker 5: And then when I played it back for me, he goes, dude,

27:33 Speaker 5: I don't think I could play that.

27:35 Speaker 3: I was like, you just did? You just did.

27:39 Speaker 5: That's what we're telling everybody, right right, So that's where

27:43 Speaker 5: that came from. And the song itself is basically about

27:46 Speaker 5: just all the things that can kind of build up

27:49 Speaker 5: and start suffocating you. Is basically what it is, you know,

27:52 Speaker 5: the just the day to day grind, the things that

27:56 Speaker 5: happen around you and stuff. It's just it's choking you.

27:58 Speaker 5: It's it's suffocating you. And it's like, when will we

28:00 Speaker 5: get a chance to breathe? Yeah, give us a chance

28:03 Speaker 5: to take a breath. You know enough, it's enough, right right?

28:07 Speaker 2: Well again, congratulations on the album. I think it's really good.

28:11 Speaker 2: And uh, and remind people again to uh where should

28:14 Speaker 2: they go to keep up with everything that you're doing online?

28:17 Speaker 5: Well, it's alien Stone on Facebook or Keith Samlan on Facebook.

28:20 Speaker 5: And then you got alien x Radio of course, when

28:23 Speaker 5: that's all you know, moving and grooving again. Yeah, and

28:26 Speaker 5: anywhere on any streaming site anywhere you type in alien

28:29 Speaker 5: Stone or after the Gray and it should pop right up.

28:32 Speaker 3: Man, it's everywhere YouTube everything.

28:34 Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, excellent. Yeah.

28:35 Speaker 2: I suggest people check it out and alien Stone is

28:38 Speaker 2: one word, by the way too for people when you're

28:39 Speaker 2: looking for it. And yeah, fantastic. Keith, thank you so

28:43 Speaker 2: much for joining us this morning. We will we will

28:45 Speaker 2: definitely have to do this again. In fact, maybe we'll

28:48 Speaker 2: have you on again soon. I'd love to talk to

28:50 Speaker 2: you more about your your career with you mentioned you

28:53 Speaker 2: used to interview movie stars, and I'd love to talk

28:55 Speaker 2: to you about that in the future too, because you know,

28:57 Speaker 2: we we kind of mostly we talk about music on

28:59 Speaker 2: the show, but we do mix it some other things

29:00 Speaker 2: as well, so we'll have to figure that out and

29:03 Speaker 2: set up a time for that. But congratulations on the album.

29:06 Speaker 2: I think it's great. I suggest everyone check it out.

29:08 Speaker 2: I'm gonna hit this track in a moment, criticize yourself,

29:10 Speaker 2: another very very strong track from the album.

29:13 Speaker 1: But we'll let you go for now. But Keith, thank

29:15 Speaker 1: you so much.

29:16 Speaker 3: Thank you for having me on the show.

29:17 Speaker 1: All Right, you got to take care.

29:19 Speaker 3: I have a good one.

29:20 Speaker 1: Bye bye, all right. Wonderful.

29:21 Speaker 2: So that was Keith sam Land and the project is

29:24 Speaker 2: called alien Stone. The album is after the Gray and

29:28 Speaker 2: we're gonna give this a spin, and then we're going

29:29 Speaker 2: to come back and Jenny and I are going to

29:31 Speaker 2: talk to you for a couple of minutes about for

29:32 Speaker 2: those of you who are listening live on Saturday, some

29:35 Speaker 2: exciting things going on today that Jenny and I are

29:37 Speaker 2: going to be doing. That you can come join us

29:39 Speaker 2: and be a part of. But for right now, again,

29:41 Speaker 2: this is Alien Stone and the track is called Criticize Yourself.

29:45 Speaker 1: I really like this one a lot. Check it out.

30:54 Speaker 7: There's a Storemas's brewin.

30:59 Speaker 6: It's gone. Then the real slow from glass houses, your

31:06 Speaker 6: programs a question all I know by then out. By

31:26 Speaker 6: then I ride out.

31:33 Speaker 7: There's a fire that's building your entry and the flames

31:42 Speaker 7: and now the fire is raging.

31:47 Speaker 6: And killing and the names. By then I ride out.

32:05 Speaker 6: By now I had out.

32:10 Speaker 4: Well your story in this by life with your neighs

32:13 Speaker 4: and Saty getting here for your big moment, by face

32:17 Speaker 4: uh Bran's you sell him a wheel.

32:23 Speaker 6: Till you print sash yourself.

32:28 Speaker 4: Don't you print sash yourself? Why can't you print sash yourself?

32:40 Speaker 6: There's a war.

32:41 Speaker 7: Wheel flight is.

32:45 Speaker 6: It's not a battle with it.

32:49 Speaker 7: You're judgment strikes light light me.

32:54 Speaker 6: Is this a warking within by me? Not hide up

33:12 Speaker 6: by men? Add an, will you go in this sideline?

33:20 Speaker 4: W dornaser safty get on? You gonna jumping on in

33:23 Speaker 4: my BASI bet not? Your sails can get the wheel

33:30 Speaker 4: till you priti sis your sell? Don't you pretty stash

33:37 Speaker 4: your sall? Why can't you pretty sis you sell? Will

34:15 Speaker 4: you st don my life with your neighs? And sat

34:19 Speaker 4: to kill you for your bingle in my faser? But

34:23 Speaker 4: I just sail be never within till you pretty side

34:29 Speaker 4: to sell?

34:33 Speaker 5: Well, don't you.

34:33 Speaker 6: Bread out to sell?

34:37 Speaker 3: Why can't you fret side you say?

35:05 Speaker 2: I love the guitar sound on that. I love that

35:07 Speaker 2: guitar tone that is alien Stone. The song is called

35:12 Speaker 2: Criticize Yourself. Alien Stone, of course is Keith sam Land.

35:16 Speaker 2: And thank you again to Keith for joining us. Check

35:18 Speaker 2: out alien Stone, check out alien x Radio and I'm

35:22 Speaker 2: going to be checking that out looking forward to learning

35:24 Speaker 2: more about that. We'll probably have Keith on again because

35:27 Speaker 2: like I said, I'd love to talk to him too.

35:28 Speaker 2: I'd love to have a supplemental conversation with him about

35:31 Speaker 2: his radio career. And you know he mentioned Houston interview

35:34 Speaker 2: movie stars and some of the other things he does

35:37 Speaker 2: on his show. Very very interesting guy.