Matt Connarton Unleashed 7-18-26 hour 1

0:03 Speaker 1: You're listening to macconnorton Unleashed on wm n H ninety five point three.

0:17 Speaker 2: Did you say something under your breath?

0:21 Speaker 3: Well, you're talking to me there, because.

0:24 Speaker 4: I'm rather sure you'll hear me laughing as I walk right out of here. Yeah, this is a shirt, your bribe of you want him and she take all you can get.

0:45 Speaker 2: By the way, I don't know what's on him.

0:49 Speaker 5: It was right there when we're now.

0:59 Speaker 2: In case you don't under rin rost, this is all about.

1:06 Speaker 6: This your wander, let me reboot all do.

1:11 Speaker 7: This is me.

1:14 Speaker 2: Just said you goodbye with smile.

1:18 Speaker 5: Upon my facks. This is the up unsiding off.

1:24 Speaker 2: To a band new pet.

1:33 Speaker 5: What in the world that.

1:35 Speaker 6: I've been thinking? I guess up the way out?

1:40 Speaker 4: I was five, a second hand dog on the beeler, not on a Christians able to.

1:47 Speaker 7: Sing a little rescue.

1:49 Speaker 6: Took real far right.

1:52 Speaker 5: You took me straight to hell.

1:54 Speaker 6: You I'll make sure best get back.

1:58 Speaker 5: You want me there?

2:00 Speaker 2: Tell if you you're searching for words, ask me why

2:08 Speaker 2: is your searching? De only what you need about back?

2:14 Speaker 5: This is me.

2:16 Speaker 2: Y your b bye with smile on my fast This is the hot siding up to run new notes. This is the a pusson Now I just need a little space.

2:36 Speaker 5: Al this is me with smile on my face. This you won the friend? What it's all about?

3:04 Speaker 2: This you are the ramp.

3:06 Speaker 5: Get the help me know about This.

3:10 Speaker 2: Is me, he said you good bye with a smile on my bay.

3:18 Speaker 5: This is the US Sady b to around new base.

3:25 Speaker 2: Listen you guessing now this mean this space?

3:32 Speaker 5: Oh?

3:33 Speaker 7: This is me?

3:37 Speaker 5: This is me, she shot to listen.

3:41 Speaker 2: Going with smile on my face shows me little studies.

3:50 Speaker 8: If a wack man.

3:51 Speaker 2: Misses me, listen, this is me.

4:21 Speaker 9: Hey, welcome everybody, here we go. It is that time again Matt Connorton Unleashed and we are live from the studios of w m n H ninety five point three FM and Glorious Manchester, New Hampshire. And of course you can stream the show from anywhere. For an updated list of live streaming options and of course social media links, contact infos archives, et cetera, et cetera. You can go to mattconnorton dot com slash Unleashed, and you can also check out our new site, Matt Connorton Unleashed dot com for the full archive of the show.

4:58 Speaker 9: Today is Saturday, July eighteen, twenty twenty six. That opening song was called Goodbye by the great Sean McCarthy. And that's a little teaser for you because Sean is going to be our guest later in the show, in the third hour. Today. He's got a brand new documentary which I watched the other night, all about his career. Really really interesting. It's called Resilience and Sacrifice. And I interviewed Sean for the first time. I don't even want to think about how many years ago it was. It was a very long time.

5:29 Speaker 9: It might have been like literally like fifteen years ago. I interviewed him on another show that I have called Local Outbreak. But today he's going to be here with us live on Matt connorton Unleashed. He will be joining us via Microsoft Teams in the third hour. So I cannot wait to talk to Sean. But that's one of his great tracks, and we're gonna play some more of his music later, of course, and in the third hour when we interview him. But his documentary is really good. It's called Resilience and Sacrifice.

5:53 Speaker 9: I recommend it and I cannot wait to talk to him about it. I have a lot of questions and my voice even appears at one point. There's a little you know, only for a few seconds, but you hear my voice from the original interview that I did with him all those many years ago. It might literally have been fifteen years ago. Oh my god, the time time goes quickly. But we do have an exciting show for you coming up. In just a few minutes, we're gonna be talking with Johnny Couch, who is a real New Yorker by the way, from the New York, New Jersey area.

6:20 Speaker 9: I cannot wait to speak with him. We're gonna play one of his songs in just a moment. And then in the second hour today we have ex Animal from Texas, and they've got a really cool sound. I've been excited. We're supposed to have them on the show recently, and there was a bit of a miscommunication, so misunderstanding perhaps might be a better term. But but they will be with us today in the second hour, and I can't wait for that. That's gonna be really cool. So we have an exciting show. The ceiling Fan is on, Thank you, Peter White.

6:51 Speaker 9: The ceiling Fan is on in the studio today, which I'm very happy about because although it's you know, it's not as hot this weekend as it has been, but I did see an air quality alert. Currently the air quality is going to continue to be awful. I don't know. Again, you know, we have people who listen online from all over the place, but where we are here, and I guess in a lot of not only the Northeast, but in the Midwest, upper Midwest. Of course, they've had some days where the sky has been literally yellow and the sun has been like this sort of orange.

7:25 Speaker 9: It's been very, very strange because of you know, Canada is on fire, and that's become a regular thing. I think every summer now Canada is on fire, but this year it seems to be a bit worse than usual because I don't remember ever seeing anything like we saw a couple of days in a row this past week where the sky literally was sort of this yellow. I mean, you know, haese, I've seen hazy skies before, but nothing like this. And and and the air is so bad, like I could literally taste it at one point, you know, can't really smell it because of my sinuses, but I can taste it.

8:00 Speaker 9: It gets that bad oddly enough, not that this is a bad thing, I'm happy about this, but my lungs have handled it really well. I do have asthma, and usually when the air quality is this poor, I might be hitting the inhaler a little bit now and then, but I haven't had to use the inhaler once since this current wave of smoke has begun to waft down from Canada, or as I like to think of it, northern Michigan. But so I'm holding up okay, and I hope you all are too, but please be careful, you know. I see I see these days where the air quality is so bad that this, like I said, the sky is yellow, and I see people out there running, you know, jogging and doing other things outside where they're spending an an order amount of time outside in that weather, well not weather, but in that air that is so toxic, so poisonous, when all that smoke is coming down, and I would just say, if you can possibly help it, please don't do that, because it's very, very bad for you, and it may even be bad for you in ways that you don't notice in the moment.

9:09 Speaker 9: Maybe you're breathing as fine and you don't think there's a problem, but the stuff is getting into your lungs. That you know you might have to deal with later on, you know what I'm saying, So please, if you can help it, when we get an air quality alert, just try not to be outside for more than you have. I know it's hard this time of year. Obviously, people like to do things, you know, especially things like camping and boating and fishing and all that. I mean, I don't do any of that. I always say, And anyone who knows me personally knows this about me.

9:38 Speaker 9: I'm probably the least outdoorsy human being you'll ever meet. I don't do any of those things, not even because of the poor air quality in the summertime when the Canada is on fire, but because I'm terrified of deer ticks. That's a big problem in the Northeast. You know, these deer ticks they carry they carry lime disease. You end up with lime disease. Who wants to be stuck with that for their your life? And that's like, and you know, I'm not even kidding when I say like I am legitimately, I mean, yeah, I try to be kind of funny about it.

10:07 Speaker 9: You know, I don't like the outdoors. I prefer concrete and steel. But I'm only half joking. I really am legitimately terrified of the idea of being, you know, coming into contact with a tick and then ending up with lime disease. I personally have known quite a few people who've had to deal with that. And the thing about lime disease, from what I understand, if you get it and you're diagnosed with it, or like with so many things southwise, early detection is the key. If you get it and you're diagnosed with it, they can early if you're if you're diagnosed with it very early, they can knock it out.

10:42 Speaker 9: They can try to knock it out with some pretty heavy antibiotics. But if you don't catch it early enough, well then you're just screwed because you're stuck with it. You're stuck with it for the rest of your life. And then it becomes just all about managing it. And I guess it can be managed, but wouldn't you rather just not have it? So that's that's my whole thing. So I don't go out into the woods. I've never I've literally never been camping in my life. In my entire life, I've never been camping, and I just don't want to and it's not gonna happen now.

11:09 Speaker 9: I went fishing once when I was a kid. My uncle took me fishing, and I'd never been so bored in my life, you know, because you're literally sitting there waiting for something to happen. I guess it's peaceful and tranquil and all that, but who has time for peace and tranquility?

11:23 Speaker 5: All right?

11:24 Speaker 9: We are joined by Johnny Couch. So what we're gonna go He's joining on us online via restream. So what we're gonna do right now? We're gonna go ahead and play the new single I love this. This is called He's got a unique sound. I'm really looking forward to talking to him. I love this. It's called Where the Sidewalk Ends. And we're gonna talk to him all about it. And then we have another track. We're gonna play his first single, Overwhelmed at the end of our conversation. But I am excited for this.

11:48 Speaker 9: We're gonna talk to Johnny Couch in just a minute, but first, let's listen to this track. This is from the new album. This is the title track from the album Where the Sidewalk Ends. This is Johnny Couch.

12:11 Speaker 7: Long God Overcoat on your back across the street. I catch a glance. I'm back almost. I slipped through the cracks. So he give me half a chance, say you say what you will.

12:30 Speaker 10: Won't know nothing until we know where where sib of don do you know what you desire?

12:47 Speaker 5: You got.

12:52 Speaker 8: Where?

12:52 Speaker 11: Ciald long lost the only night real Well, it depends how you feel, soaked up in my blood, start to crash, trying to take out the trash.

13:12 Speaker 7: Saying the gunner saying up chair.

13:16 Speaker 3: Well, no, nothing unless we know where.

13:22 Speaker 5: Where the silk is? Do you know what you desire?

13:30 Speaker 8: Cousing your election? Where the siwalk?

13:41 Speaker 5: That's where I'm mad, nanymous.

13:45 Speaker 8: Where the side where we get from the friends.

14:23 Speaker 9: That is catchy as hell. That is where the sidewalk ends from. Johnny Couch and we have him on the on the line with us via restream.

14:30 Speaker 3: Johnny, are you there, I'm here, can you hear me?

14:33 Speaker 9: Absolutely? Welcome to the show, my friend. It's it's great to have you on. I've been excited about this because I you know, I listened to the whole album via the SoundCloud link that we received, and really good. But I love that track. I love the bassline and that I love the groove. I love everything about it, just so catchy, kind of reminds me of you know, Brian Faery roxy music. Oh great, just really really good. Where are you from, by.

14:57 Speaker 3: The way, I'm originally from Cleveland, Ohio. Oh okay, but I've been a New Yorker for about about twenty years now.

15:09 Speaker 9: Okay, okay, did you pick I trying to detect it? Did you pick up the accent at all? Because obviously a couple decades. I mean, is that something you do you learn to talk like a New Yorker or do you still feel that you sound like you're from England?

15:23 Speaker 3: No, I don't really. I don't really have the accent at all. It's just something I start using if I say I've been in New Yorker. But no, I don't really have the accent.

15:33 Speaker 9: Gotcha, gotcha. I want to know more, of course about you know, not only out the album, but the single where the Sidewalk Ends. I know the album comes out July twenty fourth, Is that correct?

15:45 Speaker 3: That's coretrct It comes out this coming Friday, this Friday twenty fourth.

15:51 Speaker 9: That is correct, outstanding? You know obviously when I hear Friday, when I hear that phrase where the Sidewalk Ends. You know, my first thought was when I was a kid, I had the shel Silverstein Book of Poetry, and that, for some reason, the cover of that book too, It always sticks very vividly in my mind. But but but tell me about the inspiration for that, for the for the song and for the album, and why you decided to call it Where the Sidewalk Ends.

16:17 Speaker 3: Well, you know, it's funny. I am a big Shell Silverstein fan. I mean, Shell Silverstein is is just brilliant in my opinion, and all of all of his work. But the funny thing is, I was writing this song and I am a big fan of of film noir, fifties kind of film noir detective movies, and also even later period when it went into color, they called it neo noir movies like Chinatown or Body Heat and all of those types of all of those types of film noir, neo noir types of movies. And so I was writing this song, and I was looking for some inspiration, and I was in the middle of writing it, and I did actually come upon a movie called Where the Sidewalk Ends, and I watched it.

17:08 Speaker 3: I watched it because I watched these movies. Sometimes I'll just randomly watch a nineteen fifties movie, and this movie's from nineteen fifty and it's called Where the Sidewalk Ends. It predates the Shell Silverstein work, oh I, and I really loved it. And then I went back to working on this song and I thought, you know what, that would actually be a good title for this song. And so then I started to incorporate that into it and it just all kind of fell into place, and I put the pieces of the puzzle, so to speak, together as I was, you know, once I had that song title, I kind of wrote the rest of the lyrics from there.

17:51 Speaker 12: Yeah.

17:51 Speaker 9: Yeah, no, it's it's really good. The Uh I'm curious on the album, So what do you do on the album? And I mean, is it all you or do you have other musicians on there with you? Or because I know you start you started out as a drummer right in the New York City scene.

18:08 Speaker 3: That's that's right. I was a drummer for many, many years in the New York scene and some bands that were touring. Yeah, and I had a punk band called The Choke and so yeah, so I do play drums on all my records. So on the record. What you're hearing on that track, for instance, is I'm playing all the drums. I'm playing a lot of the keyboard, not all of it actually, because usually on the songs I record, I'll play the drums, I'll play the keyboards, and then I'll have a producer or someone I'm working with will play bass and guitar.

18:46 Speaker 3: And on this track, this track is actually there's a few people on it. It's me, it's this producer in Texas, and it's this other friend of ours that played some percussion. So the producer in Texas, Jonas Willison, he's the one that played that slamming bass line that you hear on Oh oh okay, Yeah. He just really put together this great bass line while we were tracking it, and then all of a sudden it took on a whole new life once he put that bass line down and I did the drums and the keyboards, and then he added more keyboards, and then we turned it into like this whole kind of like nineteen seventies Georgia Moroder inspired kind of peace because we added these swirlings and claviers that you can hear in the synthesizers that you can hear in the chorus.

19:39 Speaker 3: Yeah, and a lot like what you might hear in like a song that Georgia Moroder did with Donna Summer.

19:46 Speaker 9: Okay, yeah, I'm a bass player myself, so you know, my ear tends to be tends to be drawn to that. But I'm sorry, what did you say? His name was again the producer.

19:55 Speaker 3: So his name is Jonas Wilson. Jonas Wilson, and he's brilliant. He actually it toured with a lot of bands. He toured with The Heartless Bastards for a few years, and he's toured with Alejandro Escovedo, who's a really well known musician and he has many years as a touring musician but also as a producer and engineer, and he was just a great collaborator for this track. He did the guitars, the bass, and extra since I brought in my original demo with the synthesizers and drum machine, and then the first thing we did is we recorded the drums.

20:33 Speaker 3: I played real drums on it, and then we kept a lot of my sins from the demo, we added more and then he played some bass and guitar, and then we had a friend come in and played tambourine.

20:44 Speaker 9: Now I'm curious, how did you come to work with him? Because obviously where you are in New York, you know, you're surrounded by so much incredible talent. I mean, that's really the well. I guess what is the musical capital of the country would depend on who you ask. Some would say Nashville, But obviously where you are, you know, in New York, I mean I would I would consider that the music capital of the country in terms of how much talent is there. So how did you come to work with someone in Texas?

21:10 Speaker 3: That's a great question. So I have this other great producer. His name's Peter Maverck Georgis, and he's also a great producer, and he and I did some shows. We took the Johnny Couch Band Show on the road and we did some shows in Texas. We played we played Denton, we played Fort Worth, we played Austin, And at the Austin show, we ended up being recommended to Jonas Wilson became recommended to us as a keyboard player, as a synth player, and so he joined us on the show in Austin and we met him there and he was just this great guy, and we had a great time with him, and and then I just kept in touch with him, you know, over the years, because that gig and Austin was in twenty nineteen, and so I kept in touch with them, and then eventually I said, you know, hey, we should do a couple of tracks together, and so we ended up.

22:07 Speaker 3: I ended up doing four tracks with him that are on this upcoming album. Four songs that are with Jonas, and Where the Sidewalk Ends is obviously the main one because that's the title track single release. But yeah, I just kept in touch with him and he added that incredible baseline, and then the whole song took on this life of its own in the studio and we started adding more and more ingredients and it was a lot of fun putting it together.

22:35 Speaker 9: Yeah, no, it sounds like it. It's a fun like I said, I listened to the whole thing on SoundCloud. It's a fun album. So now the four tracks that Jonas Wilson is not on, are those done with the other producer that you mentioned.

22:49 Speaker 3: Yeah, So it's actually quite a number of producers because the producer that I did my last record with, Peter Maverick George's he's fanatic he lives in Georgia now and and I did two records with him, but it's hard for me to always go down to Georgia. So what we did was we and I have some friends here locally in Jersey City that I also work with. So this record is actually four tracks are produced by Jonas down in Texas.

23:22 Speaker 6: Uh to.

23:23 Speaker 3: Two of the tracks with Peter, my my buddy in Georgia, and then there's two there's four other tracks, two of them with a producer here in Jersey City and the other two with a producer also here in Jersey City, but with a studio and Hoboken. So the songs were recorded and basically Hoboken, Jersey City, Atlanta, and Texas. Okay, Yeah, there's four producers on this record, which is which is not the way I usually do things, but it's just kind of worked out that that way. You know, a few of the songs were released as singles first digitally, Yeah, but I wanted to include them on the vinyl release.

24:08 Speaker 3: So it's kind of like a Greatest Hits of like a few songs are released plus seven brand new tracks. Yeah, and I'm excited about it.

24:17 Speaker 9: Your first solo album, Mystery Man which was in twenty nineteen. If I'm not mistaken, that was that also with multiple producers or did you have a different approach with that one?

24:29 Speaker 3: Right, So, my first solo album was actually twenty sixteen, although oh well, it's called Animal Instinct and it's also online, but it's actually an ep so that maybe that's why it's probably not showing up as a full album, cause gotcha, Okay, So online it's an EPA, it's a five song but I did release it as a five song twelve inch vinyl release and it's five songs. Animal Instinct is lead. That was produced by Peter Maverick, Georgia's all in Savannah, Georgia, Okay. Then we followed it up with Mystery Man, which is released the end of twenty nineteen.

25:11 Speaker 3: That was a ten song release, also on twelve inch vinyl, full album ten songs, also produced by Peter Maverick George's in Savannah, Georgia, Okay, at Dollhouse Productions. And then he moved to Atlanta, and then we did like I said, we did two songs on the new record with Peter, four with Jonas and Texas, and two with a couple more producers. Actually overwhelmed, produced by this guy John Chin who lives here in Jersey City.

25:41 Speaker 9: Oh okay, okay, Now when you're doing an album that way, because obviously that's not how you did your previous work, did it ever concern you at all? Like, did you ever think, what if, you know, having all these different producers, what if it's not the final work doesn't seem cohesive, of what if it doesn't all sound like it goes together? I mean not that, I mean for me as a listener, Like I said, I listened to a whole thing on on the SoundCloud link that that was sent to us, and you know that isn't available publicly yet obviously, and and to me it sounds like one you know, like I wouldn't be able to tell like it sounds like one cohesive work.

26:18 Speaker 9: But I'm curious if, as you're making the album did that was that ever a concern for you? Or were you not worried about that part of it, that that maybe with all these different people involved, that might sound, you know, like it's going in too many directions, you know it.

26:34 Speaker 3: It was not a concern, And I'll tell you why. It's because at one point I did this one track with one of the producers here and his names as I mentioned, John Chin, and we did we did a song. It's there's a song that's not on the record. It's called found Out You're a Zombie. Yeah, and it was played. It's actually been played on Serious XM. Peter is Arimba from the Flesh Tones. He's played it on his show on sis XM. And because he likes to play scary, spooky, Halloween e kind of songs, and it's called found Out You're a Zombie.

27:11 Speaker 3: So anyways, I did this song just kind of as a joke, and we did it kind of as a joke for Halloween because he's he's an old buddy I went to college with and he was in town and he said hey. I said, hey, man, could I do a song with you? And we recorded it and it ended up being great and everyone loves it and there's a lot of people it's their favorite song to hear live. And it's crazy because it just it sounded so great that from that moment on, I wasn't worried at all about about putting the record together, you know, with a combination of him, Peter Jonas and then there's a fourth producer Dan Haig, who's also fantastic.

27:54 Speaker 3: But we actually had John Chin mix and the those recordings, So so John was kind of uh, you know, I had I had a good enough team that I wasn't worried about any of that.

28:11 Speaker 9: Yeah, yeah, no, that makes sense. And what what transpired between because obviously it's seven years between Mystery Man and Where the Sidewalk Ends? Uh did you did you intend it for for it to be that long? I mean no, as we get older, you know, we we kind of start to realize the time passes quicker than we know.

28:31 Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, you know, you could say seven years, but to me, it feels like, you know, it almost like COVID was. It was really COVID was in there, and that made it really hard to accomplish things. But because you couldn't really collaborate as much with people, I guess I could have done some records during COVID where I you know, uh, you know, but I like to get together with people, yeah and stuff. So anyways, I did do a side project during COVID with a guy called Greaser Phase, and so that was kind of like that was kind of a record we produced more that way where we'd set tracks back and forth.

29:14 Speaker 3: He didn't actually get back get together in person. We just sent things back and forth and did a record that way. But No, to answer the question, I didn't intend for it to be so long between releases. It kind of like, you know, the music industry has changed so much that people aren't really expected artists aren't really expected to release full albums so much anymore. And so what I was doing instead was I was just releasing a single heir in there once in a while, you know, I was keeping my music out there.

29:49 Speaker 3: And then I'd released a new single, and then I'd released a new single, and then you know, and you know, I was keeping active and keeping myself out there that way and not even really thinking about that. But enough time passed that I thought, you know what, I need to put out another full length and you know, and and I believe there's a little bit more time than I wanted to pass between the two.

30:16 Speaker 9: It's interesting how even now in twenty twenty six, how much COVID still comes up on the show, and how you know, the the interruption and the disruption that it created, that it caused in the careers of so many people, and not only that, but also this weird sort of time distortion thing.

30:34 Speaker 3: It's you know, yeah, I mean that. The exciting thing about COVID was I put out Mystery Man, and I was able to promote it a little bit and then and then when I would have really done an even harder push, then it was lockdown and I wasn't able to push it as hard with tour dates and stuff. So yep, that's why I'm excited about this new record. I'm doing a bunch of stuff now to promote this and some touring, so it's a little bit better of a situation. They'll be able to push it harder.

31:03 Speaker 9: Absolutely, So, when you were playing drums in you know, twenty years ago in New York and in punk bands, did you always kind of have Was it always your goal to become eventually a solo artist and do what you're doing now? Or did is like if you if you kind of go back in time and think about yourself back then, would you have foreseen all of this or or did you think at the time, you know, this is you know, I'm a drummer, I play in a punk band, and you know I'm in the moment and this is it. I mean, was this always a goal for you to get to this point.

31:38 Speaker 3: No, and uh, you know, I wish that it was, actually because it would have been cool to start this solo career and the earlier on. Yeah, it would have been interesting to do that. But I was really into being a drummer. That was my that was my vibe, that was my identity. I was really into it. And so, you know, at the time, I was really into being a songwriter because I ended up being in a band with a buddy of mine, Eric, and we had a couple of other great people in that band. It was called The Choke, Yeah, and we ended up co writing most of the material, So it was it was really it became important to me to be a songwriter, even more than the front man.

32:27 Speaker 3: At that point I was I was writing, co writing all the songs and playing drums and even kind of managing a lot of that band and do the day to day and the booking. But uh, you know, and then I ended up doing that even in another band after The Choke, I ended up co writing a ton of material, and so it just became important to me to be a songwriter. But then I kind of finally realized later on that I wanted to sing sing these songs.

32:58 Speaker 9: Yeah, you know, know that makes sense. Yeah, of course I'm curious too about the album artwork. Uh this says here it was created by and forget me, I'm not familiar, but New York artist and Moncus. Am I saying that correctly?

33:13 Speaker 3: I think it's pronounced monchies mon.

33:15 Speaker 9: Cheese, moncheese. Okay, Yeah, and I guess I guess she's a big deal, right from what I from what I've read.

33:23 Speaker 3: Yeah, she's very accomplished because she's uh an artist that's had work featured in some kind of iconic books about women in rock. Okay, at least there's one very well known book. And uh so she's she's had her work published, you know, and she has also worked with music before. She's done work before with bands. This isn't really like public knowledge, but but she but she, I believe, used to work with bands in Rockchester and do like some posters for them, and used to do a lot of work with rock bands.

34:08 Speaker 3: And so when I found that out, I thought, oh, well, that's cool. And then when I saw some of her work for the Women in Rock book, and I saw her her drawing of Tina Turner, and she had one of Sinead O'Connor, and she was already someone who was used to drawing rock rock artists and doing a great job of it. And the work I saw was incredible, and I thought, well, I'd be honored to have her draw me on this album cover. And so she did a wonderful job.

34:41 Speaker 9: Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely, that's excellent. And I'm also curious about the video for where the Sidewalk Ends. This is pretty cool. I actually have it pulled up right now. I'm taking another look at it, but it looks like it looks like it's all it's all outdoors. Where was this shot this video?

34:58 Speaker 3: So the doctor and I, Richard were on the phone and he said, he said, where do you want to shoot this? And I said, I don't know. Maybe Jersey City is kind of cool. And he said, nah, nah, no, we need something a little bit more. I want something that looks a little bit more desolate, maybe just like empty kind of feeling. And I said, oh, we should do it in Red Hook, Brooklyn. It looks like it just looks like deserted all the time, you know, And and so we so then we met up for a beer in Red Hook at this some great bar, I forget the name of it, but we went there twice and we did a whole brainstorming session of what the video should be and how should capture the song and how should capture the meaning of the song and all of that.

35:50 Speaker 3: And then since we were there, we went location scouting, and then while we were location scouting, we luckily, luckily came upon Sonny's Bar, which a really famous bar in Red Hook. And then, uh so then we were able to take part at the festivities at Sonny's. So that that was I mean, that wasn't important for the video, but it was a they have good good alcohol.

36:11 Speaker 9: There, gotcha? Gotcha? So yeah, I'm looking at the credits. Richard Jordan was the director, and then who's Who's Alexander saris Am I saying that right? Is that that's the name of the guy and the other guy in the video?

36:22 Speaker 8: Yeah?

36:23 Speaker 3: Yeah, Oh that's a funny story. That's a great story. Yeah. So Richard is this guy I met at a party and he's just this great jovial guy and he's he's so cool and he ends up getting he's actually an actor as well as a casting director, but he's he's had these bit parts and shows like Vinyl that was on HBO, and then he was in this new newer show that Share Company, I think it's called on HBO or one of those channels, and he gets these like small little parts. But he's also a casting director. And I called him up and I was like, hey, man, we need to do a video.

37:05 Speaker 3: And he said, oh, we should have someone in it. And so we wanted to get someone that was kind of like, you know, a rocker like me, you know.

37:16 Speaker 7: And so.

37:18 Speaker 3: What's funny is he he put out a casting call and he sent me like like fifteen people and I was looking at and I was looking at them, and I was like, okay, well, you know, none of these look quite right. They don't necessarily look like musicians that much and stuff. And then and then he sent me another uh, he sent me another actor, a profile of an actor that he that he found on Instagram because he put up an Instagram post and the guy, uh. He sends it to me and I say, oh, I know this guy. This is Alex.

37:52 Speaker 3: It was a guy that i'd met at a bar and I was like, I've met this guy and I'd only met him once. Yeah, only met him once, and and I only but i'd met him in the last like two or three months recently. Yeah, and I only and I met him once, and I said, oh, Richard, I know this guy, and this guy is cool. Let's just get this guy. And so that was that was how he got Alex. Yeah, and then he showed up and he was just all like ready to go and excited and energetic and he had swagger and yeah, he was. It was cool because the idea of the videos, well, you know, I'm I'm supposed to let people draw their own conclusion according to the according to the director, but it's like, uh, you know, it's almost like he's a former version of myself or something, and we're trying to or or or at least like a you know, and we're trying to heal the relationship or whatever.

38:47 Speaker 3: I don't want to get to uh detailed, because it's kind of opened interpretation, but you know.

38:53 Speaker 9: Sure, sure, absolutely no. I like the video a lot. I'm also curious too about it because you mentioned touring. How does all all this work live? Because obviously on the album, you know, everything's you know, there's a lot there, everything's very layered and so forth.

39:07 Speaker 3: What what do you do live?

39:08 Speaker 9: Do you have a band that plays with you?

39:10 Speaker 3: Do you do?

39:10 Speaker 13: Uh?

39:11 Speaker 9: Yeah, okay.

39:13 Speaker 3: I always play with a live band because you know, you need to bring the music. You need to bring the music to life, you know, and you need to bring it, you know. And Plus I come from the rock world, from the punk I was in. I was in you know, loud punk bands and loud rock bands, and so I believe in puting on a loud rock show. And so I always get a great band together. I've got a really wonderful band of musicians currently. This great guitar player that has been working with me for for ten years now.

39:46 Speaker 3: His name's Andy black Sugar and he's also last for the last i think four years, played in Blondie.

39:56 Speaker 9: Oh okay cool.

39:57 Speaker 3: Yeah, because and and he's he's just great, great guitar player who he plays with me in the New York bandy. And then I also have a great drummer, John Weber. I have a couple of drummers that I've used depending on who's available, but John Weber, Mike Mann's a few few different people that have worked with me. And uh uh, and you know I have it's great new bass player Paoul and this great keyboard player Origin and uh, it's it's been really fantastic.

40:33 Speaker 9: Is it hard to find the right players who can really replicate the sound that you're looking for? Or has that been again? You're you're in an area where you know, you're surrounded by so much talent, So maybe it's not hard at all. I don't know.

40:45 Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I think it could be. But but I've been around for a long time and some of these guys have been playing with me since the beginning, and so it's, uh, it usually it usually falls into place. Yeah, for the most part, I've had really good luck with that. And I've also had a really good luck, Like you know, the producers that I mentioned earlier have all been super helpful. So, for instance, Peter maver Georgis, when I've gone and played down South, he's arranged to have because he's a studio guy, he's arranged to have a band play with me down South when I've toured down there, and so I have this great I have this great Southern band.

41:25 Speaker 3: Same with Jonas in Texas. He's had he's put together a band for me down in Texas. That was the Texas Band. Yeah, and we've done two shows down there when I recorded down there. I've played Texas a few times in Austin, I've done Atlanta and Savannah. And I have this southern band that's going to be amazing for this UK tour because it's like the two best producers I've ever worked with. Peter and Jonas from Texas are coming with me to the UK. So I'm gonna have Peter on guitar and Jonas on bass. You couldn't ask for a better lineup.

42:02 Speaker 3: And then what's even better is I've got these two

42:08 Speaker 3: these two other individuals coming with me from the indie band Barrel Barrow. They live in Savannah. Their names are David and Veronica. Okay, and Veronica is the most amazing since keyboard player. She backing vocalist and David is also in Barol Barrow with her and he's going to play drums on this tour. And so I've got a really solid lineup for the UK tour dates.

42:32 Speaker 9: Oh that's awesome?

42:33 Speaker 3: Good good?

42:33 Speaker 9: When is that happening? When do you go to the UK?

42:37 Speaker 3: Yeah? So my album release show is coming up this Friday in Brooklyn. It's at Sleepwalk July twenty fourth early show at seven pm and then then I'm playing at the Wonder Bar in Asbury Park which is next to Stone Pony, very famous venue, the Wonder Bar. That's August third, and then is the UK. Then is the UK and the UK tour is August eleven, twelve, thirteen and sixteen, and the shows are Nottingham, Hastings, London and Brighton and the London shows at the very famous venue of the Dublin Castle and we're headlining that.

43:15 Speaker 3: It's gonna be great. Wow kind of our London album release show if you will, yep. And yeah, So it's to answer your question, yes, August eleventh through sixteen are those dates.

43:26 Speaker 9: That's fantastic. Have you toured there before?

43:29 Speaker 7: I have?

43:29 Speaker 3: Actually I was in that that punk band that Choke, and we toured. We we've went to London once and we did like five shows in the London area, I think once and four or five shows, similar to what we're doing now, although now we're touring around so it's even better. But yeah, and then the Choke went back and later on we went back and we did like a whole tour of the entire UK with a with a famous band called two famous bands. It was a Theater of Hate and Jeane Loves Jezebel and the Choke and it was like a really cool, solid touring lineup and we played all over the UK.

44:08 Speaker 3: We even played in Glasgow. Yeah, it was That was a great tour.

44:12 Speaker 9: Oh that's fantastic, that's great. Good good, Well yeah, no, I'm coming back to the UK, Matt, excellent. Well we do have listeners, We do have listeners over there. Absolutely well great, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm out. This show is multi continental. I don't know if that's really a word, but.

44:31 Speaker 3: That's a word today. No, that's great, I'd say come out. We're playing great venues, Billy Bootleggers, Nottingham, the Jenny Lynde In in Hastings, Dublin Castle and London Dalton's in Brighton. These are great venues, great lineups, everything sorted as far as the venues, the lineup, the bands, it's really really I have a great artist. There's a great artist songwriter in London named Veronica Bianki and she's playing on this bill with us at Dublin Castle. And I'm so excited because we actually did a show in Brooklyn in twenty nineteen together in Brooklyn at this venue, the Broadway, and that was amazing.

45:12 Speaker 3: And now I get to play with her again in London, so oh fantastic. We're old friends and she lives there now, so this is just super exciting that the London show is super exciting.

45:24 Speaker 9: Yeah, oh outstanding, excellent, excellent. Well, in a moment when we let you go, we're gonna play Overwhelmed, which was of course the first single from the album. Anything we should know about this before we play it.

45:37 Speaker 13: Johnny.

45:40 Speaker 3: Overwhelmed is one heck of a cool track that I didn't It's actually really cool because Peter. That's another color. It's another one that where the producers collaborated because it was like, you know, my buddy John Chinn and Jersey City here produced it, but we actually had Peter down in Georgia play the bass on it. And it's just a really cool It's a different flavor for me because it's kind of a bouncy, jangly track. In my yeah, a lot of my songs tend to be more straight ahead rocking, you know, straight ahead rocker, kind of power pop songs, more like a cheap trick kind of deal.

46:21 Speaker 3: But this one, this one's a little bit more bouncing and jangling and has more of a maybe even a more of a British feel, And I'm really excited about it because it's it's a different kind of flavor for me, just like the Sidewalk Ends is a little bit different for me because it's more more disco even you know, yeah, uh and and uh you know. That's that's what I what I try to uh, what I try to to do to to to define myself. What I try to do to define myself as an artist is I try to not define myself.

46:57 Speaker 3: I try to go off in as many different genres is possible because I don't want to be limited to genre. I don't want to be stuck in a box. And I want to be able to do a song that goes in this direction or that direction, or or even blends genres. And that's what I really love to do in songwriting is blend genre, blends something that maybe a sixties influence blended with an eighties or seventies glam influence. Because that's that's what I do, That's what I can hopefully do to be unique.

47:30 Speaker 9: Right right, No, I think you've accomplished that absolutely, So before we let you go and before we play that track. Where's the best place for people to go online to keep up with all things Johnny Couch? Where should people go to keep up with everything you're doing?

47:44 Speaker 3: Yeah, so great. Question Number one, of course is you know, is Instagram and so that's Johnny Couch Music, but there's no agent, Johnny, So it's Jay j O and why c o uh music Johnny Couch Music. And you're gonna find me right there on Instagram. And then there's of course my website Johnnycatsch dot com has everything and that has links all my videos. There's also my YouTube channel Johnny Casch YouTube channel where you can see where the sidewalk ends the brand new amazing video.

48:23 Speaker 9: Yep, yeah, definitely yeah. People should should absolutely check it out. Johnny Couch. Thank you so much, my friend. This has been wonderful. We're gonna hit that track, so we'll let you go for now, but sounds like you got a lot of great stuff coming up, so I'm sure we will have you back in the future. But thank you so much for joining us today.

48:39 Speaker 3: Thank you so much, Matt. It was a real pleasure and I really enjoyed speaking with you. Thank you so much.

48:45 Speaker 9: Same thanks, Johnny.

48:46 Speaker 3: All right, take care, bye bye, take care bye bye.

48:49 Speaker 9: All right, that was Johnny Couch. We did play at the top of the segment his newest single, Where the Sidewalk Ends. But let's play now the first single from the album, Where the Sidewalk Ends. This is really good too. I like this a lot. This is called overwhelmed. You see it my way.

49:09 Speaker 3: To bring me down.

49:12 Speaker 6: And I want to see, well, Jesus almost reaches this town.

49:21 Speaker 5: We're all doing out what you have to say?

49:26 Speaker 6: Did the contents name and it was over raining and also many.

49:41 Speaker 5: Well my own throwing my way and nothing else in it.

49:58 Speaker 5: Don't name me, Okay, I'm telling you it's gonna be over.

50:08 Speaker 9: You can get the pieces.

50:11 Speaker 5: To marry too many side.

50:16 Speaker 6: And the end of this aside.

50:20 Speaker 3: Because I'm listening to chieve myself.

50:22 Speaker 5: N We're all knowing that what he has to say,

50:29 Speaker 5: you look at yourself. It was all grain as bad. I'm sad a way, well, ok I all of brow

50:52 Speaker 5: and I say I'm sills.

50:55 Speaker 6: Listen, you know what hate me telling you it's gonna be all.

51:10 Speaker 5: With a non when you has it saying that you it can chance on me. But it was all the rain but they changed my wage. But even on that age, you said anything so tight. Oh it's so mad understanding you go away. I don't know well, I all the world check the winnay and not say say listen said as you don't need me, I say it was gonna.

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