Matt Connarton Unleashed 5-17-25 hour 3

0:19 Speaker 1: I don't want to hear it again to the I just want to be say it. Everything is all rather.

0:37 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.

1:13 Speaker 1: It could be so.

1:20 Speaker 3: To not.

1:39 Speaker 1: Looking to your eyes, shall subra.

1:48 Speaker 2: I just found a fall, the speed, the dream money, your rods do that.

1:57 Speaker 1: I know we could die away.

2:00 Speaker 2: Oh that day you may the same. It could be so back to the It could be so back to the.

2:24 Speaker 1: It could be to it could be soon.

2:40 Speaker 4: To the.

2:49 Speaker 1: Yeah, what you do me to me?

3:03 Speaker 2: I'm so searching you see you bring me higher a mon bier, My is higher. I've gone awad on benea.

3:22 Speaker 1: Open up your heart with me to.

3:30 Speaker 2: I just want to lift you want and show you all the stars tonight.

3:39 Speaker 1: When all this is gone away, I know that you would all save. It could be so that.

3:57 Speaker 5: It could be so.

4:22 Speaker 3: To the.

4:44 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.

5:14 Speaker 6: 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.

5:42 Speaker 6: 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?

5:55 Speaker 2: Now?

5:55 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?

6:08 Speaker 7: We just got engaged a few weeks ago.

6:10 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?

6:30 Speaker 7: I do vocals, and I do a little bit of keyboard, keyboard, Okay, you hear keyboard?

6:34 Speaker 4: That's me?

6:35 Speaker 6: Okay, okay, very good. And Jesse, what do you do?

6:38 Speaker 4: Pretty much? Everything else?

6:39 Speaker 6: Everything else?

6:40 Speaker 4: Yeah?

6:41 Speaker 2: Yeah.

6:42 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.

7:04 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?

7:19 Speaker 7: The relationship?

7:20 Speaker 6: The relationship started first? So yeah, okay, well.

7:23 Speaker 1: Kind of, I guess.

7:24 Speaker 7: I had heard at work that this guy had a band.

7:27 Speaker 3: Okay, oh interesting, and I asked my friend, Hey, you want to go support this guy who has a band at work?

7:34 Speaker 6: Oh?

7:34 Speaker 7: Okay, and we went out to see him.

7:37 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?

8:18 Speaker 6: And you know, okay, yeah, but did you did you start dating before that or after?

8:27 Speaker 3: Uh?

8:27 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?

8:56 Speaker 3: We do you do?

8:57 Speaker 6: Okay? Yeah?

8:57 Speaker 4: Yeah, we don't work side by side.

9:00 Speaker 6: Okay.

9:00 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.

9:12 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.

9:48 Speaker 6: Oh okay, so that's very new.

9:49 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.

10:27 Speaker 4: 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.

10:39 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.

11:08 Speaker 6: 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.

11:41 Speaker 6: 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.

12:10 Speaker 6: I like the way it is now. If I want to know something, I can just google it, you know what I mean.

12:14 Speaker 7: It's very nice to have everything at the tip of your fingers, exactly.

12:18 Speaker 6: I wouldn't trade what we have now to go back to what it was.

12:21 Speaker 2: You know.

12:22 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.

12:52 Speaker 6: 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.

13:24 Speaker 6: You know, couldn't do that do that before.

13:27 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.

13:40 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.

13:57 Speaker 4: So and the same thing, we recorded our album at home. You know, you didn't have home studios years ago.

14:05 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.

14:17 Speaker 4: Right, right, And today there's just so many tools that you.

14:21 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.

15:00 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.

15:18 Speaker 6: M Yeah, absolutely, on so the so these songs, these were all recorded at home.

15:27 Speaker 4: They were they were there's songs that I had written years ago.

15:31 Speaker 2: Matt.

15:32 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.

16:07 Speaker 4: 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?

16:41 Speaker 4: 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.

17:16 Speaker 4: So if we go to music break, maybe we can play that song.

17:20 Speaker 6: Why don't we play it now?

17:21 Speaker 4: Sure?

17:21 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.

17:31 Speaker 4: Play let's play that one next, Down in a Hole? Down in a Hole?

17:35 Speaker 6: Is there a story behind this one? I guess They're all.

17:42 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.

17:58 Speaker 6: Absolutely absolutely all right, hear it is down in a hole, this is moonlight ride.

18:27 Speaker 4: There was a time.

18:31 Speaker 8: It was a time let's sell on lagoon. I had no love, I had no one. Two would come out.

18:44 Speaker 1: It was a boy.

18:47 Speaker 8: I needed time and time be groove to love weed certain things too broon.

19:15 Speaker 2: Down in a hole.

19:19 Speaker 5: I'm feeling down. I'm sick and so low, feel out of control.

19:27 Speaker 9: I'm feeling down a feeling and so low and insane.

19:35 Speaker 5: I'm feeling love and love and bumping upside down.

19:43 Speaker 1: Don't feel letting know put down past my time.

19:51 Speaker 10: I'll looking down and stand every lid, going upside down,

19:59 Speaker 10: speaking rounding around like a man around.

20:19 Speaker 8: Down in a hole.

20:23 Speaker 5: I'm feeling down, up, sinking, so low, feel out of control.

20:31 Speaker 9: I'm feeling down and feeling so low.

20:35 Speaker 8: Please help me, please, I'm begging you down the body s up.

20:44 Speaker 1: With my hands.

20:47 Speaker 8: Spinning rounding around a mine my brain to kick it down again, back.

20:58 Speaker 1: Into a hole.

21:15 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.

21:43 Speaker 9: I'm feeling down. I feeling it's so low, down in a hole.

21:53 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.

22:14 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.

23:03 Speaker 4: 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.

23:40 Speaker 4: 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.

24:00 Speaker 6: Yeah, that's pretty cool. What was the biggest video that that you were in when you were in Malai.

24:07 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.

24:31 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.

24:51 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.

25:03 Speaker 6: Yeah.

25:03 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.

25:22 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.

25:55 Speaker 6: It affected anybody that wasn't that wasn't alternative.

25:59 Speaker 4: Right and absolutely yeah, absolutely yeah.

26:02 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.

26:10 Speaker 4: Cool, yeah, warrant poised in all the you.

26:13 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.

26:23 Speaker 4: I would say, definitely cool.

26:25 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.

26:33 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.

27:10 Speaker 4: 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.

27:47 Speaker 4: You know, it's all over the place, and I hope that's a good thing.

27:51 Speaker 6: Like I think. So, you know, some people like.

27:54 Speaker 4: One genre of music and one genre only, and I.

27:57 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.

28:10 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.

28:29 Speaker 3: Oh absolutely, yeah, absolutely yeah. I think most of us enjoy multiple genres.

28:35 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.

28:46 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.

29:09 Speaker 7: Barbershop. I was in a barbershop group for a.

29:13 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.

29:46 Speaker 6: 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?

29:54 Speaker 1: Well?

29:54 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.

30:01 Speaker 6: Yeah, like you can't be off at all with that is my perception.

30:07 Speaker 7: I think I agree with that.

30:09 Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, there's no room for error. So I mean that is that challenging to do? Or maybe it can.

30:15 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.

30:23 Speaker 6: So your brain's already trained right to do that. Okay, that makes sense. That makes sense.

30:27 Speaker 3: And then for singing, it's a nice challenge because when you get it very rewarding.

30:32 Speaker 6: Okay, yeah, I can imagine. Yeah, how long did you do that?

30:35 Speaker 7: For just a couple of years.

30:36 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.

30:44 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?

30:55 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.

31:24 Speaker 4: And when you listen to the CD, you'll realize that a lot of the harmonies and backing vocals are all her.

31:31 Speaker 6: Okay, okay, oh, very cool, very cool.

31:35 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.

31:46 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?

32:02 Speaker 4: Well, you've been in band yourself, Matt, and you know, the more people that are involved, sometimes it gets complicated.

32:09 Speaker 6: Yes.

32:10 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.

32:23 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.

32:52 Speaker 6: Yeah, correct, Yeah, I want to see what their live setup is like, that's really interesting to me.

32:59 Speaker 4: They out did great.

33:00 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.

33:29 Speaker 6: 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.

33:50 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.

34:06 Speaker 6: I guess do you know a lot of covers together.

34:08 Speaker 1: That you've played?

34:10 Speaker 7: Yeah, we have quite a few.

34:11 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.

34:33 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.

34:53 Speaker 4: Little more stripped down because we're not layering all kinds of stuff. We want to sound as authentic as we can.

35:02 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.

35:33 Speaker 3: It was.

35:35 Speaker 6: It's kind of at the height, actually at their peak.

35:39 Speaker 6: 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?

36:31 Speaker 6: 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.

36:53 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.

37:03 Speaker 6: Oh ok at the Tupelo Yeah yeah, yeah, he was great.

37:07 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.

37:24 Speaker 6: Oh yeah, that's.

37:25 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.

37:45 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.

37:56 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.

38:25 Speaker 4: 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.

38:38 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.

38:51 Speaker 7: Yeah learn.

38:52 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.

39:31 Speaker 6: 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.

39:59 Speaker 6: 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.

40:27 Speaker 6: 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.

40:57 Speaker 6: 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.

41:05 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.

41:11 Speaker 6: Absolutely.

41:12 Speaker 4: Yeah.

41:12 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.

41:20 Speaker 10: Yeah.

41:21 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.

41:30 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.

42:05 Speaker 4: 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.

42:39 Speaker 4: Yeah.

42:40 Speaker 6: How long were you playing out before you decided to dig into the original material? Oh?

42:45 Speaker 4: Three years? Four years?

42:46 Speaker 6: Wow, that's what I was thinking a while.

42:48 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.

43:13 Speaker 7: It's very exciting.

43:14 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.

43:23 Speaker 4: Oh, you pick one, Michelle about one that we both sing on.

43:27 Speaker 6: Oh, that'd be cool.

43:28 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.

43:34 Speaker 7: I mean, don't hold back?

43:39 Speaker 4: I think is okay?

43:40 Speaker 7: Don't hold bah?

43:42 Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yes, I've forgotten the names of my own stars.

43:47 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?

43:53 Speaker 2: Sure? Please?

43:54 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.

44:10 Speaker 2: Mm hmmmm. When I think about you, I didn't I live without you.

44:40 Speaker 11: These days are series and the day I found you to see my life surround you.

44:54 Speaker 1: A new be by. If you're in sweet button of my.

45:15 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.

45:36 Speaker 8: Don't you tell me what you.

45:43 Speaker 11: Want?

45:44 Speaker 1: You say on my other.

45:47 Speaker 2: Until the end of time, send my si sadly.

45:58 Speaker 1: Did you give my hug?

46:00 Speaker 4: Or you.

46:05 Speaker 12: Feeling when you spied? My arms are reaching for you?

46:19 Speaker 12: Will you be my guiding glad?

46:25 Speaker 3: But you want you up by want you up, but.

46:32 Speaker 1: You want to upd but you want du up that

46:40 Speaker 1: 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.

47:03 Speaker 2: You said to be the on My love is goway.

47:14 Speaker 2: I'm trying to restraint, IM trying to ref.

47:22 Speaker 1: Holding him back.

47:23 Speaker 9: Un be.

47:29 Speaker 2: I can't resist though the cloudy way stunning yet stronger

47:50 Speaker 2: I could, feeling off my bed.

48:01 Speaker 4: Very nice. Oh oh, there's a little trou cool.

48:12 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.

48:41 Speaker 6: 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.

49:11 Speaker 6: You know, Metallica has done that, Beyonce has done that. So really, I would argue music videos are more more important than ever.

49:18 Speaker 3: I think we get a better response on Facebook when we first start, when we put our first video out.

49:25 Speaker 6: Yeah yeah, I believe it, no doubt, Yeah yeah yeah.

49:28 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.

49:53 Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, excellent. And you said, did you start working on the next one or you're planning to or we did.

50:00 Speaker 7: We started working on Down in a Hole, Okay, do.

50:02 Speaker 6: You have any kind of an eta on that?

50:04 Speaker 4: Or we're hoping within the next couple of weeks that will be finished and out.

50:09 Speaker 6: Yeah, very good.

50:10 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.

50:42 Speaker 7: Well, we're trying to get up with the times.

50:44 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.

50:59 Speaker 2: With h what?

51:01 Speaker 6: We played a couple pop songs? What's the heavier one?

51:04 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.

51:13 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?

51:20 Speaker 4: Maybe?

51:21 Speaker 7: Yeah, that's a great song.

51:22 Speaker 4: Okay, this one's a little bit heavier. This is probably, you know, a little bit more rocking.

51:28 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?

51:39 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.

52:05 Speaker 6: Excellent, excellent.

52:06 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.

52:15 Speaker 6: Yeah.

52:15 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.

52:32 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.

52:38 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.

52:55 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.

53:23 Speaker 3: You know.

53:24 Speaker 4: Yeah, it seems like vinyl has a huge resurgence.

53:27 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.

54:01 Speaker 6: 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.

54:26 Speaker 6: 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.

54:58 Speaker 6: 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.

55:29 Speaker 6: 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.

56:23 Speaker 1: You to me tis a child? Think holm in this spill? Your spill is good?

56:38 Speaker 9: How tired about half Diner?

56:41 Speaker 1: Loose? How found Dad? Go right the blue, Help it be? Shall it be.

57:00 Speaker 6: With me?

57:03 Speaker 13: If it's please release, if it's so weak, nocturnal care, You'll never think, Just be willing.

57:20 Speaker 8: A page, just lost a fight, the dust proroted run.

57:46 Speaker 8: You'ly can still your seva choice without a sound?

57:56 Speaker 10: My heads a time?

58:01 Speaker 9: How could boot comes?

58:04 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.

58:36 Speaker 10: Nocturnal cad You're never there, Just be waiting. I rageous lust. I back the dust prooted rod?

59:09 Speaker 4: What did I do?

59:11 Speaker 8: What did you know?

59:16 Speaker 3: Did this?

59:18 Speaker 5: Can't I need to know?

59:24 Speaker 9: I just can't speak of it today. I can't see the fire with the single