S3: E11: Byron Nemeth - Night Life, Casinos, and Guitar Virtuosos

Byron Nemeth Mixdown Master

Mon, Oct 03, 2022 4:28PM • 1:18:41

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

guitar, music, song, people, work, called, vegas, byron, studio, business, randy, backstage pass, absolutely, guitar players, days, tour, nashville, playing, producer, thinking, Martina McBride, Byron Nemeth, Las Vegas, Everybody Knows, Fight, Riding on the Flames, You Know It’s True, The ZEN of Guitar, Backstage Pass Radio, Backstage Pass Radio Podcast, Randy Hulsey, Randy Hulsey Music, Randy Hulsey Podcast, Podcast, Music Interview

SPEAKERS

Randy Hulsey, Byron Nemeth, Adam Gordon

Randy Hulsey  00:00

Hey everyone, we are finally in October and gearing up for some much needed cooler weather. Hope everyone is doing well. It's Randy Hulsey here with backstage pass radio. Today's guest has toured the globe and is supported such x as y and t warrant, Rick Emmett, and many, many more. He is an author, a producer, a web designer, guitar instructor and one of the best players out there. We're going to head out to Sin City and catch up with Byron Namath when we return.

Adam Gordon  00:29

This is backstage pass radio, the podcast that's designed for the music junkie with a thirst for musical knowledge. Hi, this is Adam Gordon. And I want to thank you all for joining us today. Make sure you like subscribe and turn the alerts on for this and all upcoming podcasts. And now here's your host of backstage pass radio. Randy Halsey.

Randy Hulsey  00:58

All the way from Sin City. Byron, what's going on, brother? How you doing?

Byron Nemeth  01:02

Randy? I'm doing great. Thank you so much for having me on your show. I really, really appreciate it.

Randy Hulsey  01:07

My pleasure. Happy Labor Day. I guess we'll get that out of the way real quick. Oh, yeah.

Byron Nemeth  01:13

Good Labor Day here. Just relaxing, doing some grilling hanging out by the pool playing some acoustic guitar. And now I'm talking to

Randy Hulsey  01:19

you. Awesome. Well, I'm glad to have you. How's the weather in the desert right now?

Byron Nemeth  01:24

It's super hot. And that's exactly why I'm in the pool to cool off. And that's the best way to handle the super heat.

Randy Hulsey  01:30

I hear you. You know, it's there's always been this back and forth with people who live and in my area, Houston, Texas versus you know, out there in Vegas. Everybody says, well, that's a that's a dry heat. And it's like, yeah, you're right. But it's still hotter than hell out there. It gets really really hot in Vegas, and it gets really hot here too. But it's a Wet Hot here versus the dry hot there in Vegas.

Byron Nemeth  01:54

Yeah, that's correct. Yeah. My, my personal preference out of the two is definitely the, you know, the dry heat for sure. I like this climate a lot. I just, you know, I just assimilate really well to it.

Randy Hulsey  02:06

Yeah, I think that you know, at least in the evenings, you know, you guys, once the sun goes down, it actually cools down really nice. And the desert, you know, it's it's dry and it and it almost feels like it cools down. Versus here. It can be 10 o'clock at night and it's still you know, 7880 degrees, but it feels like 95 just because of the wetness in the air. It's crazy.

Byron Nemeth  02:30

Exactly right. And going out at night. I really liked lax never have to wear a jacket, which is wonderful. I love the southwest.

Randy Hulsey  02:37

Absolutely. Now you move to the United States when you were young share with us the Biron origins, right?

Byron Nemeth  02:47

Yeah, absolutely. I would love to this, of course, you know, has to include my wonderful parents, Paul Namath and mighty Animas. They, they were spectacular parents, I feel so blessed to have had them. And then this, this is the story of how I got, you know, tuned in to the United States. Let me back up here back up to 1956. My father Paul, he was part of the Hungarian freedom fighters that tried to stop the Soviets from coming into coming in to Budapest, Hungary, you know, very similar to what we see going on right now over there almost. Absolutely. And because he's Hungarian national, and he was born there, it was brought up there. And he tried to stop that, you know, the Soviets were targeting all Hungary nationals for execution. And that's what they were doing. And because of that, he had to leave the country and become political refugee and leave like overnight immediately. So he's very young man. This is way before my mom and, and, you know, he leaves Hungary overnight, unfortunately. So gets rollin. They take over the typical for Hungary, outgrows the Iron Curtain, and it's a disaster for the next, you know, 40 years. So so he leaves Hungary comes to the United States, and the State Department ended up making a decision why these two cities I don't know, but that contingent of the refugees would end up in New York City and in Cleveland, my dad just ended up in Cleveland completely by chance. So he lands there, restarts his life, learns English, goes to college becomes an engineer becomes an American success story, which is wonderful thing that that happened, of course, and in the process, you know, Hungarians and South Americans. They worship soccer, they call it football, but soccer, they'll travel anywhere in the world to see a World Cup game. So there's a World Cup game in Mexico. So my father is in Cleveland. He's hanging out with his buddies. He goes to this World Cup game in Mexico. And my mom who's there from Ecuador has a number she's Ecuador and she's there with her buddies doing the exact same thing hanging out checking out, you know, the World Cup game. He needs sir. And he loses his mind falls in love and follows her back to South America. And that's when I happened and I'm born in South America. Okay. Hey, yeah, and then and then I grew up in South America till I was about 10. And then my father brings us back to Cleveland, Ohio. And then I grew up in Cleveland in the 80s and 90s. And that's how I ended up in the United States.

Randy Hulsey  05:12

So the family moved once you were born. That's when you guys came back to Ohio, then, and that was the Cleveland area. Is that correct? Okay.

Byron Nemeth  05:23

Right. Yeah, I grew up in the I went to high school in Cleveland, in a specifically smaller town called Lakewood, Ohio. Okay, the west side of Cleveland. And, you know, I'm a child of the 80s and 90s, for sure. And what's so great about this family story is that out of an unbelievable situation, that happened in Europe, a wonderful family came to be and it's, it's a beautifully, you know, positive story.

Randy Hulsey  05:49

How long were you in the Cleveland area or in Ohio, to what age

Byron Nemeth  05:54

I was there till about 2010 in a decision to move to Phoenix, Arizona, because I really wanted to move to a better climate and wanted to be closer to the west coast. The number of clients in web design business here that thought suggested to me that felt that there would be a good idea that was and I bought a beautiful house and Phoenix moved there in 2010. And got a lot of stuff done there and about 10 1011 years, did a number of great videos on the west coast and a number of tours. And then right after COVID I decided to move to Nashville to take my career to the next level. And I accomplished a really great video there called you notes true. And and my goal was to buy a house in Nashville, but the market last year and it's still very difficult but last year was especially difficult. So I couldn't I couldn't purchase a house because I kept getting outbid by these corporate buyers okay. They would show up short every every showing and they wait for the last person then add another 200 grand to that and that's what the new prices unbelievable situation. Yeah. So my agent said got two choices either continued running forever, which it's not a good idea to want to do that or consider another market. So I considered another market can Vegas found a great agents. We looked around put in a couple different bids on this beautiful condo here on the Silverado Ranch area of Vegas where I live, there was no one else's table. I bought it immediately. And that's why I'm here. Well, I

Randy Hulsey  07:29

think you like non trillion other people were trying to move into Nashville, I played a show in Nashville in 2020. It guess it was 20, October ish of 20. And somebody was saying then that it's the fastest growing city in the nation, like people are just moving there by the truckloads. Right, so. So it's probably not a bad move for you think I think Vegas is a pretty good market, I would imagine from an entertainment perspective, right?

Byron Nemeth  08:02

Absolutely. And now the setup that I have, Randy, which is a very unique setup, I think, is by by living in Nashville for a year I established that network. So that network is completely in place of really great studios and producers, and musicians and friends that come to know they're, they're not my very, very good friends. And I'll talk about that in more detail in a second. So that network is all is all set up. And now by by moving to Vegas, not only am I a homeowner, which is, which was a huge priority in my life personally. But I also get this market and establishing this market and getting this network set up. In the old days. It used to be New York City and Los Angeles, it is shifted. It's now Nashville in Vegas, while Vegas is a huge entertainment network. Yeah, I mean, absolutely huge. So now now that I'm setting up that network, I'm going to have the best of both networks. And I feel that by doing so it's going to be able to elevate my career to the next level. And I'm really glad that this whole turn of events have brought me here to to you know, to be a homeowner in a great climate. And now another great network and the number one and number two areas of music business.

Randy Hulsey  09:18

Yeah. And that's interesting that you say that, because now that I think about it, and you mentioned it, of course. Of course we still hear about you know, California and New York, but I don't think it's as prominent as it was, you know, back in the Sunset Strip days, the 80s you know that that was where it was at Hollywood, you know, the Sunset Strip, you know, it was huge. Of course, there was the East Coast scene, you know, out of Long Island and up in that area, which was really big. And I'm not saying that those aren't big anymore. But all you hear these days it seems like Nashville, Nashville Nashville and the crazy thing is a lot of the rock stuff ours are moving to Nashville. We used to think about Nashville is the cowboy town or the Hatton boot town. Right? But there's, there's a lot of rockers that live in Nashville. Correct. Correct me if I'm wrong there.

Byron Nemeth  10:13

That's exactly correct. Isn't everything Music City, there's everything happening there. Besides the traditional and pop country, there's everything out there from hip hop to metal to rock to jazz to classical, I mean, everything.

Randy Hulsey  10:26

Well, I'm sure that it probably has the largest conglomeration of badass players there, right. I mean, I mean, surely everybody goes there, whether they're a country picker, or I shouldn't say I shouldn't limit my what I'm saying to just guitar players, but musicians in general, whether they're drummers or bass players, or keyboard players, or whatever, I would think that that is just a smorgasbord of talent out there. Without a doubt.

Byron Nemeth  10:54

It is it 100% Is, and there's a there's a ton of great talent here in Vegas, who I'm sure there is. So many of the LA guys, producers and players, you know, if they didn't move to Nashville, they moved here.

Randy Hulsey  11:08

Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. So it's,

Byron Nemeth  11:11

it's to Burgundy in the market. So just a lot of talents. Yeah. You know, a lot of studio talent, a lot of producer talent, a lot of plane talent. And, and Vegas as a whole, it's just a big entertainment. City. Entertainment going on 24/7. That's slightly different than the Nashville just because of the nature of what Vegas is. That just creates a big a big vibe, a big energy, if you will, for producing great shows and big events and trying to just be you know, be be in a location where you can do career launch, which is great.

Randy Hulsey  11:53

Yeah, absolutely. Now, let's walk back to Cleveland for just a minute. You went to Cleveland University, correct. Walk the listeners through the focus at at Cleveland university when you were attending there?

Byron Nemeth  12:09

Um, well, I only went there for about three months, okay. It was in that process where I figured out that the destiny of my life was going to be in being an entrepreneur, and not following the traditional path of super formalised long term education. Makes sense. Yep. All of my heroes in life, like Richard Branson that has, you know, rise, Virgin, music, Virgin Airlines rich and everything. And Steve Jobs that has, you know, has run Apple, you know, all of my heroes, my for entrepreneurs. So they all had a vision and a path and it almost never involved formal education. So I quit Cleveland today.

Randy Hulsey  12:50

I was, I was thinking that you might have gone there. And were studying music. I wasn't sure what you had originally gone there for. But was it music? Is it safe to say, yeah, it

Byron Nemeth  13:00

was definitely music. And that part of it a little bit, it was great, had great guitar teachers. And that was super helpful at that time period. But in terms of pursuing a degree situation, I'd say that's not what I want to do. To me, it was very clear that computers were coming in to society, and that they were gonna be a very big part of society, and that I needed to understand them more than pursuing a traditional path. And I'm not saying people shouldn't go to school. I'm not saying that I think everyone should be as well educated as possible. But for myself, as knew what I wanted to do. So I wanted to pursue that path. And I learned computers and I learned technology. And I knew that I could have, I could have a path forward by studying computers and studying web design, that would be able to allow me to have a great career that now I've had for over 12 years, I'll see it. And then the beauty of that is that that knowledge of technology of building websites just helps me directly with what I do in music and my my web stuff and getting myself out on social media. And it's the same gear, the same computer gear, the exact same thing that helps me do web stuff and helps me do music stuff. So just some wonderful symbiotic choices of careers to have that help each other tremendously.

Randy Hulsey  14:19

Sure. Well, I want to get into a little bit more of the technology with you shortly. But we talked about, you know, being you being a guitarist and you know, the studying of music over the years, when did you actually pick up the guitar? Was it at a pretty young age for you? Or was it later on?

Byron Nemeth  14:37

When I was five?

Randy Hulsey  14:39

I was I was pretty young.

Byron Nemeth  14:42

My parents turned me on to Elvis Presley, and that was the beginning of it all.

Randy Hulsey  14:48

That's all it took. Right.

Byron Nemeth  14:50

You know, they were fans. They're not musicians, but they were fans of music and super supportive of everything I was doing, which is why I love them so much. And that's that's how I started into music as a fan. And then, you know from the from from Elvis and went to the Beatles and then from Beatles and went to, you know again Halen and it just kept going on from there.

Randy Hulsey  15:10

You picked up the guitar really early at the age of five, when did when did formal lessons start for you? Do you remember

Byron Nemeth  15:19

your former formal lessons started when I was about 16 1718 years old, I had three really great teachers when I was going to Cleveland State. And they were wonderful. I had a classical guitar teacher, a jazz guitar teacher and a rock guitar teacher. I picked those three on purpose just to have different, you know, ideas come into my my thoughts about how music can and possibly could be white. It was super helpful. And it just once I had that start, I just kept going.

Randy Hulsey  15:51

You mentioned a couple of very well known artists in Elvis and the Beatles. And specific to, I guess, guitar heroes growing up now, when I think of Elvis and I think of the Beatles, I think of them more in a kind of a, a group in my mind. But if you were to single out guitar players for just a second, who was doing it for you, as kind of your guitar hero from, you know, from the formidable years when you were just getting into the guitar, who was encouraging, not encouraging you, but who were you looking up to from a playability standpoint and who did you want to be like, you know, when you were young,

Byron Nemeth  16:38

in the rock round the Hard Rock Metal room, for sure. There was two guitar players and that was Eddie Van Halen. At first Van Halen album devastating oh my god, he's just really fabulous. He changed everything. And Randy Rhoads, okay,

Randy Hulsey  16:57

quiet riot, Ozzy Osbourne Sure.

Byron Nemeth  17:00

Super well classically trained, educated guitar player that brought those sensibilities into his playing, just like just like Van Halen, to where he was more of a spontaneous genius. Whereas Randy was more of a focus genius. Sure. categorize them in that way. You know, they're both geniuses in their own way. But in rock, it was definitely those two guitar players. And then there's other guitar players and other forms of music that I completely love to, like ltbi in jazz circles, for sure. Incredible. And then other musicians have tremendous talent like Miles Davis and jazz, just as a fan of listening to that, that is literally influenced me on guitar, or John Coltrane before my time, but just as an education source for my ears, you know, it's a knowledge base to just know about music. And same thing with with classical composers like, you know, Mozart and Beethoven and Bach and in it all.

Randy Hulsey  18:05

Now, Randy row, of course, you know, everybody loves any guitars would say they love Randy Rhoads and Eddie Van Halen they Randy Rhoads was huge for me probably even more so than Eddie Van Halen. Just love the style of play. And but but a huge fan of both of those. Now, those were the ones that kind of did it for you kind of coming up. Are the players today, like in your adulthood years, right? That are doing it for you that that you are kind of dig in or vibe in on these days.

Byron Nemeth  18:37

There are many that I have found on YouTube by chance. And there's just so many there are so many great players at such a very young age today. It's just astonishing how good they are, in terms of any of them being like what would be quote, unquote, considered a famous band that anybody knows. No one that I can point out to exactly because there's just so many of them. Yeah, it really are.

Randy Hulsey  19:03

Isn't it funny? How 2030 years ago, you know, when you were, I think you and I are probably not too far off from being the same age. But, you know, back when I was learning the guitar, it was pop the cassette tape in rewind, play, rewind, play, rewind, play, and you just heard it over and over and over again until you just went back and you mimic you kind of mimicked it right. Now fast forward to the Internet age, you've got tablature you've got all you know, you've got YouTube, and you know where it might take guys like you and I as young kids coming up, couple of weeks to really dialogue, a guitar song or you know, a song in general or learn a song. Now these kids are, they're learning it in a day and they're just spectacular players. I mean, I see kids out there that are like 789 10 years. Old that are like, just polished me. years. It's crazy, right?

Byron Nemeth  20:04

It's crazy, isn't it? I think the the plus side of that is that it's giving them a jumpstart on technique and on how to be brilliant on their instruments from from a just a strong technique perspective. My my wonderment though thinking long term here is where are they going to be as songwriters? I'm sure there are more songwriters out there now, of course, because of the internet. And that's totally great. But I think that's important too, because you can't just focus on technique, you need to kind of focus on both. Absolutely, to be a well rounded artists, I think and some just seem only to be focusing on technique. And you have no idea where their compositions are. And then there's some others that are great composers that don't really focus on technique at all. I agree. Using those two, right? Sure. I think today in today's world, you really need to really have

Randy Hulsey  21:04

both you do you do now not that you come from a musical family where mom and dad musical people instrumentalist, or were they not like for me? My mom was a pianist. But But dad never did anything really with music. How about you? Did you did you have that musical background growing up?

Byron Nemeth  21:26

Oh, I did not my parents were not musicians, but they were unbelievably supportive and loving for me to want to pursue musically. They were absolutely fans of music. You know, they were huge Elvis fans, for sure. And they appreciated the Beatles. And they appreciated you know, music from their era and music from their own countries to you know, their own ethnic countries. So they were absolutely lovers of music, but they were not musicians themselves, but they fully encouraged me to get into it as a musician and to pursue it all the way you know, which I feel very thankful for

Randy Hulsey  22:01

sure. And I think that that's probably just as important is them actually being musicians, right playing an instrument. I mean, if you've got the love for the music, then you almost got to support you know, your kid when he says I want to learn the guitar, I want to learn the violin or whatever the instrument of choice is, if you really love music, you'll never deny the learning of that instrument, right. So I wanted to take the listener so for the listeners that maybe haven't heard of you, I wanted to share a couple of clips of your music. The first one I'd like to share is a song called everybody knows and this is a I believe an older song that you did but I wanted to share an older one and then a newer one so I'm going to share a clip of everybody knows and then we'll come back and chat about it fair enough. That's good Awesome. That was a clip of Byron song everybody knows if my if my math is correct, Byron you correct me if I'm wrong that I believe came out somewhere around 2014 Does that sound about right to you?

Byron Nemeth  24:30

Everybody knows this is part of a four song EP called the video Chronicles and the video Chronicles has a video to go with each song which is why I called it that and it was recorded at Steve Vai studio out in the Hollywood Hills, and it features two members of his band band Philip Binah on bass and Jeremy Carlson on drums and on vocals. It's smart Bowles who used to be the lead center of the NBA momsteam and the songs are written by me I wrote all the music and all the lyrics and directed the focus and was executive producer along with studio producer and engineer Greg Werth. Awesome. Great time. Great experience.

Randy Hulsey  25:16

Nice. And what would you say? Is the kind of the first ingredient for you? When it comes to songwriting? Are you the you hear the melody? Do you start with music? Like what is the first ingredient? Typically for you, I know it's not the same every time. But what's the formula for you and writing music,

Byron Nemeth  25:39

the groove of the song, and how it's feeling just with the guitar with no other instruments. As I'm in the middle of composing. The groove is kind of where I start with it. The song has to have a great chorus hook to it. And a very interesting verse and just a great groove of transitions between the verse and chorus, verse chorus, to bridge to solo to the course. And I think that's the most important thing because if you don't have that vibe, that groove, you don't have the beginnings of a good song. And then after you've got that establish, and it literally feels good to you. Then you find points, each of the sections in terms of music, and then certainly in terms of the lyrics and the vocal melodies. That makes

Randy Hulsey  26:29

perfect sense. I wanted to share with the listeners a clip of another song called you know, it's true. This was a song that was released, I believe, just recently, like September of this year, correct.

Byron Nemeth  26:43

Last September, yeah. Okay. Last September, and that was recorded at Blackbird studios in Nashville. Blackbird is a beautiful studio complex. It's owned by John and Martina McBride was in our in country music business. Martina McBride is super successful in business. And John runs the studio her husband, and in in this particular song in video, I found some really great players in Nashville and a really great producer named tuned older that helped me put the whole song together and came up with his cellar I thought

Randy Hulsey  27:17

Yeah, for sure. We're gonna take a quick listen to that and we'll be right back things the things you do when you die when you know renew meet by June that was a clip of you know what's true by Byron Nimeth. Great song there, Byron. Lyrically, where do you? I'm sure it's all over the map. But lyrically, where do you pull inspiration from I guess, that comes from all different places sometimes. Right?

Byron Nemeth  28:49

Comes from all different places. And, and what I like like to do with my lyrics is I'd like to emphasize, you know, a positive, forward leaning, you know, thought process on whatever the topic is, every song could have a different topic, of course, but most of the time, you know, they're about just moving forward and in doing good positive things in your life and, and, and just, you know, taking control and, and just being in a good position where, where you can have a good outcome and that's that's a very broad stroke definition pacificus of each song has its own flavor and twist to it, but that's that's where I'd like to take it. I want to leave a good mark in this world.

Randy Hulsey  29:34

I know that most artists don't, don't like to be put in a box and don't like to be labeled for the music that they make from a I guess a genre perspective. it in your own words, how would you describe your music? What is in your wheelhouse? How would you describe that muse?

Byron Nemeth  30:00

Uh I would definitely you know, say it's definitely hard rock. Definitely. Metal for sure. Sometimes prog rock and sometimes instrumental rock to Okay. It's definitely in the in the wheelhouse of, you know, rock and roll leaning into the, into the Hard Rock heavy metal arena. progressive rock at times to certainly.

Randy Hulsey  30:21

Yeah. And I was I was thinking that very word I was thinking. When I asked that question, I was thinking progressive, like, that's the, it's one of the, I guess, genres that come to mind, or that style of music kind of in the along the progressive lines.

Byron Nemeth  30:37

Absolutely, too. And one thing that I've been doing is I've played a lot of progressive stuff in the past, and a lot of instrumental stuff too, in the past, but recently, like, within these past recent three, four or five songs, especially the new one that I'm working on, literally right now, I've been really focusing on on really strong, catchy choruses and hooks. Nothing wrong with being progressive, but maybe a little less of that now, and more, more strong hooks, because I'm trying to bring the people in with catchy music and, and get them back to an atmosphere where they're enjoying themselves and enjoying a great song out of summer night and just loving hearing by the tool I'm trying to buy, they happen, you know, it's a little bit of a fun vibe to happen with the songwriting because sometimes things in this world can be so serious, I think it's important to bring that vibe back with a loud blazing guitar and just come back to the time timeframe in place where we, you know, can enjoy life a little more and enjoy the music.

Randy Hulsey  31:37

Right on No, I don't disagree with that. And I think that it could be any genre of music, that you're just thumbing through the radio stations, and you hear that hooky, song. And even if you're not a rap guy, or, you know, a country guy, or whatever, if you hear that hook, and it catches you, the genre doesn't even matter, right, or the type of music. So when you say I focus more, trying to get the hook in the music, catch the listeners, I mean, I think that that's where it's at, that's where hit songs come from right hooky songs, or hit songs at the end of the day.

Byron Nemeth  32:14

Absolutely. And that common dovetails exactly into what I wanted to chat about for a second year. And that's my brand new song that is not out yet. It's called get what you need. And because of the current, you know, algorithms if you will, as to how Spotify and YouTube deliver music and all of these, you know, DSPS and how they deliver music while it's turning into a single space market. It's kind of going back to the way it was in the 50s and as much as I love Prague and trust me I'm a diehard rush fan completely I love rush, love long songs and everything you know, 30 minute songs. But I think where it's at right now for artists and especially where it's at for my music guys, I'm focusing on playing a little shorter songs about four minute songs with strong votes really interesting lyrics interesting verses that that really give a uniquely delivered musical statements as a single and as a video and I think that's that's kind of how I'm feeling the market from a technology point of view, how the delivery systems are, are trying to get music out there for artists today to be a band like Rush and put out 30 minute songs even though some are certainly doing it. And it's great that they're trying I think it's just a difficult sell wisher with Spotify giving you higher algorithm rankings are something shorter. Yes. Across the board for all styles. Yeah, no matter what you do.

Randy Hulsey  33:41

Now there's a there's a place for the songs like Anegada de vida and the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald the songs that are just wonderful songs, but they're asked weapons they go on for 6789 minutes, right and you're like, it's like, is this song ever going to end so I think yeah, the the hooky the short songs those are those seem to be what's very popular right now. You You talked a little bit about John and Martina McBride being in their studio studios, Steve Vai studio, but I was reading somewhere about did you have some involvement at Abbey Road as well? Did you do something there? And can you talk about that a little bit?

Byron Nemeth  34:25

Yeah, I've been there. I've been there three times. And not outside of it but inside of it as a client. And that's been an amazing experience. First time was a nice friend of mine used to work for Yamaha instruments got me a personal tour. They don't they don't give tours by the way. You just can't show up and yeah, so you have to get that pre arranged and that was the first time I was there. And it just blew me away. And incredible studio and all the studios I've been in are freaking fabulous studios but shirk Abbey Road isn't another level. And it was super was super great time, I got to go into all of the all of the studios because it's a complex, it's not one studio. It's a big complex with many studios inside of it, and I got to check it out. And then in 2004, I returned to the master and album there with Nick Webb, who I also saw in 2007. The 2004 album was now called 100 worlds. And the 2007 album was called the force within. And both of them were mastered at Abbey Road, and I mastered them with with Nick in mastering room seven, which is a really, really great mastering room at the top of the Abbey Road complex. Nick started his career as a tracking engineer with The Beatles and then moved down to become a mastering engineer. Later on in his career, he mastered a bunch of stuff for Queen and a bunch of bands like Duran Duran and a bunch of great albums and albums that he did. And his credentials are pretty impeccable. And just seeing him do that with my son was an amazing experience really was,

Randy Hulsey  36:01

I have to think that there had to be some hair on the arm raising experiences beat being over there, right. And I only say that, as I was in Studio B, and Nashville, you know, the same studio that the Everly Brothers wrote a lot of hit songs in Elvis wrote a ton of songs in Studio B. And to just be in that same room where some of the greats of Ben, and some of the greatest music of our time was recorded, was a very moving experience for me. And I would have to think that you probably had to have been tied to like a kid in the candy store over over there. And I don't want to put words in your mouth. But am I far off base there by making that assumption?

Byron Nemeth  36:47

Oh, you're totally right. You know, that's exactly what it was. And it was like a, like, being in a dream. It's what it's the only way I could I could place it, you know, and many people visit me rota and are outside by the crosswalk and visit and go by and that, you know, obviously we've all done that. But to be inside and be working on a project.

Randy Hulsey  37:07

It's just, it's amazing.

Byron Nemeth  37:10

Pretty amazing. You know, one of the songs on the force within it was it's a 10 song, it's instrumental, original album, but one of them was a remake of I Am the Walrus, which is awesome video from the album. And when we got to mastering that, that was especially, you know, spine tingling, and it was just just beyond moving to say the least, there was great, Tony, great.

Randy Hulsey  37:33

I could imagine. So have you been thinking that you may need a little exercise in your daily routine while having a little fun doing it? I may have the solution. Hey, it's Randy Hulsey, here with backstage pass radio. And about six months ago, I purchased an electric bike from eco trick and just thought about using it as a way to kind of get the blood flow and few days a week. And to my surprise, I find myself on the bike just about every day. Not only am I getting a little exercise each day, but I'm also having a fun time seeing the neighborhood, and maybe some areas that I probably would never have seen before I got the bike. Today, my family owns four of these eco trip bikes, and we're looking to add a few more soon. Make sure to check out the link in the description below for more details. I wanted to talk just for a few minutes about a couple of other side hustles that you have going on. And the first one I'd like to talk about is a little bit about guitar instruction. Can you share with the listeners, what you're doing by way of guitar instruction and how people may be able to contact you if you're teaching and to you know, maybe get on your radar for lessons, that kind of thing?

Byron Nemeth  38:53

Yeah, there's there's two areas that have flourished since I got here to Las Vegas. In one is whenever he is in being a published author. I have a brand new book out it's available on Amazon that people can get right from my website by renumbers.com. And that's beautifully artwork book that details with everything that you need to know with with playing Atari. It's called the Zen the art of guitar playing. And it's available there right now.

Randy Hulsey  39:26

How much work goes into writing something like the zen of guitar,

Byron Nemeth  39:33

usually about a year. I tried to make it sooner than that, but it just doesn't. It just never seems to work out. It takes takes about a year to pull it all together. Because there's just so much I want to put into it. And at the same time I want to keep it a smooth easy read. That's important, by the way for being able to I think, you know polish, at least method books. Are we all types of fiction books can be an extremely, you know, extensive read, but I'm not doing fiction, at least this. This is much more of a method book. And it just took me about a year to do each one and this is a second one.

Randy Hulsey  40:15

Okay. Yeah, I was gonna say there's two volumes out and I think both of those are for sale or you can get them on Amazon to correct.

Byron Nemeth  40:22

Yeah, that's, that's correct. Yeah, if you go to my website, you can you can see the button right there. Okay. That's right in the middle of this zone guitar. Yep. Is that guitar understanding guitar through direct intuition, volume two. And Volume Two is the one that just came out and student very well. It's got a really cool cover on it. And that cover is also heard of my merchandise line that you can see here. Yeah,

Randy Hulsey  40:49

love it. Yeah. And for the for the listeners, he's showing a shirt and I'm assuming that that that is designed by yourself, correct?

Byron Nemeth  40:58

No, no. Yeah, it is not just just like with my music, I don't produce myself and I don't do my own artwork. Even though I have done that for clients in my web business. I want to keep that that aspect of it. Separate. Separate Yeah, because I want to see how other people view what I'm doing. So I'm taking this very seriously as a as fine art. And and I want to hear another set of ears when I'm doing music, which is why I worked with Greg Werth and Tim doll bear, you know, respectively, in Los Angeles and in Nashville, and and that in same thing for my book, obviously, I'm composing the book, and I'm the author of it. But as far as the artwork for the book, I hired my friend, Timo Juarez from Germany, who did the artwork for the video Chronicles to do the artwork for this, because I wanted to get his take on how he was viewing me as a term strung on purpose. And that turned into the, the t shirt line that I have out now that students are doing really well and I'm very thankful for that. And that's also available off of my website. And then the other thing that I'm doing with guitar education is Guitar Center approached me they call me when they found out I had come to live to Vegas to come and teach for them. So I'm also I'm also teaching here locally at Guitar Center at the Summerlin store. Summerlin store. Okay, and that's going really well, Saturdays are all completely booked now. And we're adding another few days.

Randy Hulsey  42:22

What about from a? Do you do anything virtually, like somebody could call you and say, Hey, Byron, I'd like to take zoom lessons with you or is that not a preference? Or is that a preference? And is that an option for people?

Byron Nemeth  42:35

Well, that's, that's certainly an option for people. And I still do that I have, I have a number of clients. It's our clients in Phoenix when I used to live in Phoenix that I used to teach him personally that it now teach through zoom.

Randy Hulsey  42:48

And I'm glad you cleared that up about you know, your artwork, your your book, art, your that type of thing, because I was going to assume that being the technologist that you are that you would have had the tools that you would have designed your your own stuff, so So thank you for clearing me up on that. I didn't want to assume anything. Like myself, for my show, I developed my my own artwork. So I just assumed that everybody does that, right. So not a fair assumption on my part,

Byron Nemeth  43:18

I think a lot of people do and that's totally fine that they do and some are fabulous at it. And it's wonderful. But for me, I definitely did not want to do that just because I am so close to the music in terms of composing the music and trying to, you know, establish a new band and record it that to be produced or on top of that. And just like the book, so close to writing the book that's been artists for the book on top of that, it's almost like too, too much.

Randy Hulsey  43:46

No, I get it, no, I get it.

Byron Nemeth  43:48

And I want to have time to do the composition aspect of the business management aspect for it all in adding you know, producer aspect and artists aspect on top of that, you know, five fine artists is why many aspects of that would have been just just too much. Plus, plus I you know, when you work with people that just are so good at what they do, like my producers, you know, in LA to Nashville, you know, Tim and Greg, they're just such great producers you want them involved? Yes, you want another set of years you want to bounce something off of what you're doing because to be producer yourself and you're just too much into yourself and you there's no reflection and you need some reflection when you're creating music and you want an honest answer and that's super important. Same same thing without you know the the cover of the book. I want the team most involvement because he's he's like a Michelangelo of his work is

Randy Hulsey  44:48

good. I get it. I get it from from a from a web design. I know you have you do web design out in Vegas as well talk to the listeners a little bit about that gig and you know what you bring to the table from, from a web design perspective? What do you do for the clients?

Byron Nemeth  45:07

Yeah, I, for my clients, I do basically whatever that they need for their business. And I have all different clients that all different levels, and 99% of my clients are have nothing to do with music or not the music business at all. They're their doctors or lawyers, their real estate companies, their medical companies, and I do professional web design development work for them. That's a wonderful career to have. I've been doing it for over 12 years now. And I'm fully licensed here in Nevada as an LLC, and it's the whole nine yards.

Randy Hulsey  45:42

What is the program of choice for designing a webpage these days? And the reason I asked that is, back when I was a more of a technical guy on the engineering side, I was teaching Microsoft curriculum at a local college here as an adjunct instructor. And this was back in the HTML days, right? Front Page, Microsoft front page html. What is the primary language that websites are developed in these days? Hopefully, I'm asking my question correctly.

Byron Nemeth  46:13

The answer is that there's many okay. Oh, there's many there really is. And you almost can do yourself a favor by specializing in one or two, and having a little knowledge of almost everything else, because no one can know it all? No, it's just watch, I've received much software coming into, into building structures on the net on a daily basis. And there's just such an abundance of it all, that it's good to kind of specialize in a few things. When WordPress came into prominence in the 90s Joomla was the big thing back then, I don't know if you at all remember that. But Joomla sunset has been sunset sunset. And WordPress has now become, you know, one of the PHP language building platforms to build on. And that's, that's a specialty that I do. And why I think that one is because it's so scalable, you can make a one page site, you can make a 10,000 page site, you can make 100 page website, it's fully scalable for E commerce. And the third party plugins that are available are just unbelievably great these days, that further skills, a website and to do whatever you needed to budget wise depends on what the client has in mind. Sure. So a small website can be developed, you know for called $1,000. And then the ceilings the limit on the other end at what is 510 $20,000 $30,000, I've worked on websites that are hundreds of $1,000, that 1000s of dollars, and I'm part of a team that is part of the build that makes it so big. So it's all relative to what the client needs and to what they want. And then to help my music friends out there, if they're on a very limited budget, and they just want to get started, you know, use Wix, Wix is a great platform, you can do it yourself, very inexpensive. And it's a good starting point, just to get yourself started and going out there and getting your music out there. And then if you can down the road, you know, upgrade to custom WordPress, you know, hire a developer, don't do it yourself, because you won't have the time, you know, and take it at that level once the career goes to that level. And that's one of the advantages of that I feel, you know, I have with what I'm doing by being a developer, that's one huge and at this point, it'd be like really huge payment that I don't have to pay anybody else, because I'm doing all that for myself now. So if I were to put a value on my website throughout the years for what I've put into it 100 grand, easy, easy, you know, what's the time and customization and making it all perfect and everything so

Randy Hulsey  48:57

absolutely, and I use WordPress for mine, mine has become more static these days than anything, there's not really much dynamic content to it, you know, other than updating some pictures or you know, a show schedule or something like that. But you know, it was all built in, in WordPress some years back. You talked about being able to do you know, guitar lessons and whatnot, virtually, but you also serve as a producer, right. And I and I think that folks can hire you from a a producer perspective as well. Correct. Can you speak to that a little bit?

Byron Nemeth  49:34

Yeah, totally. And that would be essentially two areas. If you're in the Vegas area, then I can certainly be a producer at any studio of choice. And that that way we can meet face to face I can help out in that perspective. And then, if you're remotely how I can help with my studio here at home is I'm a mixing studio. I'm a Pro Tools HD Logic mixing studio and I've got all of the all of the bells and whistles for all of the plugins for that here. So I can mix in mine. And I can track a guitar in mind. Okay, how about any one at a distance in that capacity is so depending depending on who you are and where you're at, I can help out in those two various ways.

Randy Hulsey  50:20

Yeah, I guess the Pro Tools that's kind of the de facto standard in the industry, right for for most professional producers, is that a fair assumption? is still

Byron Nemeth  50:30

is but it's becoming less and less simply because there's other alternatives, like logic that are just becoming great. Yeah. Logic and Ableton, and they're way cheaper. And third party plugins are way, way cheaper. Okay. That's one thing that Avid, who now owns Pro Tools is going to have to address because the cost of their third party plugins are just still too expensive, I think and their high end systems are still a little too expensive. And there's just more more choice these days. And as you know, with choice competition forces price down. So I think we're in probably the beginning of the ending stages of the golden era of Pro Tools, probably. Well, I

Randy Hulsey  51:09

was I was gonna say that I've used Cubase forever, because it came with a device that I bought some years back, but I was looking to maybe change that. And I and I've seen a lot of stuff about Ableton lately. Like, I'm assuming that they're probably one of the the better dolls out there. Like, they've gotten a lot of awards or won a lot of awards. And it seems like there's a lot of they always rank in the top five somewhere, you know, so I don't know if you have an opinion about Ableton or not, but I'm sure they're,

Byron Nemeth  51:39

I think it's excellent. I think it's really excellent. Are you producing a specific style of music? Or do you

Randy Hulsey  51:45

need something just in general? Yeah. broad strokes.

Byron Nemeth  51:49

You America.

Randy Hulsey  51:51

I am PC, I have a MacBook, but I really don't do anything when I'm Windows based, though.

Byron Nemeth  51:57

Okay, got it. Because if you're a Mac, I would have suggested logic. Okay. But if you're a PC, you're able to work fine, for sure. All right.

Randy Hulsey  52:07

Well, if we shift gears just for a minute, I wanted to talk about the guitar specifically with you. Is there a go to not not a brand but a more of a specific guitar that you like to record with? Or are you kind of all over the map with it just depends on what you're playing. Depending on the type of guitar you use. Can you talk a little bit about specific guitars? And maybe Is there a brand that you're really married to versus any other branded guitar?

Byron Nemeth  52:39

Yeah, right. Now, by the way, I view this question in two different contexts, the recording studio contexts, okay. band concert contacts. So let's let's chat about the recording studio context for recording rhythm guitars only just really guitars. I really love my Gibson Les Paul ace really modeled that three, pickup one. Okay. For less haul custom with three pickups. It's the classic one he had on the alive two album. It's that guitar. And it's beautiful for recording really thick, meaty, beefy rhythms that play well, yes, the bass guitar and the drums in a studio session, just big fat rhythms. And it's wonderful for that. Live wise. Two reasons I don't like to play live is number one. I don't want to I don't like taking it out of the house because it's too precious. And number two, it's really heavy guitar. Yeah, so So playing it all night tends to just kind of wear you downs, especially on the guitar, but it sounds great. It's just a heavy guitar. So because that in the security aspect of it all. I like to say that guitar for you know, rhythms in the studio, and then for leads in the studio, and these two guitars are the same ones that I would use live for concerts. That would be the brand new new one that I got, which is this sharp Bell Jakey Lee model guitar. It's a super strap, and it's just a kick ass guitar, one knob, Royal Purple American guard, and there's there's no way to unit on it whatsoever. It's stoptail piece and it sounds great. And then the other one that I have is the Adrian Smith signature Jackson there is similar to the Chevelle and that one has silver Picard and that does have a Floyd Rose along with Van Halen. Detune after doing these crazy dive bombs, yeah, and those guitars work well for live and recording too. They're great recording guitars also. And they were they worked especially well for life because they're not super heavy guitars. They're light and and I don't know why but live wise and this may sound funny in some ways with live wise I've been just channeling Jeff backbore just feeling your strength style guitar live wise more and I know that sounds silly. but just feeling like, you know, we feel our guitars, I

Randy Hulsey  55:03

think I get it, I get it. Well, it's it's interesting that you said that about the weight of that Les Paul, my son, Brandon had purchased a Les Paul signature, a year or two back and I went through it around my neck and I'm like, Holy shit, this thing is heavy. Like, you know, it is a heavy guitar. And I could imagine, if you're playing a two hour show, or two and a half, three hour show, even it, I would think that it would wear on you at the end of the night for sure.

Byron Nemeth  55:34

Totally. Absolutely. And that and plus the security aspect of knowing not knowing where your guitar is at backstage or anywhere. You know,

Randy Hulsey  55:43

it's a little unsettling, isn't it? How about

Byron Nemeth  55:49

your favorite girlfriend? Don't? Don't? Girlfriend?

Randy Hulsey  55:52

Exactly. Don't let her out of your sight. What about a string of choice for you? Is there a go to string a choice for you on all the guitars? Or do you do change it up across guitars? Talk to me a little bit about that.

Byron Nemeth  56:05

I got hybrid Slinkys and all of them got the lower vitamin. Row.

Randy Hulsey  56:12

Okay, and what about what about from a pedal perspective? Are you are you a certain type of pedal guy

Byron Nemeth  56:19

at the moments and it kind of seems to change with the seasons sometimes. But at the moment, I'm using the hughes and kettner slurred spirit floorboard 200 and all in one amp unit that's got all the effects all built right in I'm not using a head at all. It's it's four board directly in the cabinet. And it's all contained in my pedal board along with my wireless. I've been a morally endorser for a really long time and using that, and I'm using their latest, your latest title. And it's just great sounding room. I can't wait to show it to people live. Yeah,

Randy Hulsey  56:56

absolutely. And what about from an acoustic perspective? Do you do you play much on the acoustic or are you primarily an electric guy these days? I live acoustic I

Byron Nemeth  57:07

bought a Martin DC 50 II. And that's a cutaway acoustic Martin with a built in pickup, great for doing clean, clean stuff in recordings or even playing live if I wanted to. And that's a wonderful guitar. And then I have a gypsy jazz Flamingo Ramirez with specific gypsy jazz strings for that gypsy jazz. Sanyo gypsy jazz guitars from the smaller, smaller hole in their bigger body and they're more louder vocal guitars and you have to play them more aggressively with a different pick, and style of playing then classical or acoustic actually,

Randy Hulsey  57:47

gotcha, gotcha. I wanted to give you the platform real quick to talk about anything that may be new and exciting for you as it relates to music technology producing anything come to mind for you that you'd like to share with the listeners maybe giving them a heads up on something new coming out from you, or, or whatever the case may be.

Byron Nemeth  58:08

Yeah, absolutely. I'm working on a brand new song right now called get what you need. That has all of the, the vibe in the format of what we discussed it for a four minute song with great hugs, great energy, great in your face, Van Halen guitar style, you know, tones. And it's going to be hopefully, in the coming months and putting together a new band for it, the song is written lyrics are written. And now I'm going to love auditioning a couple of great drummers and bass players for it. And I'm going to be working with a great singer here in Vegas. No names to be revealed just yet, but I will soon. And what I want to do is a two step goal. And that is to come out with a live band, do a one hour set, and it hit the script running and then immediately record the song. The song is ready and ready to go. And as soon as I find the right guys will start playing out and then immediately you know record the single put out a video because with every song now I'm thinking singles and that means video. So single, single video, that's business methodology that I'm thinking and I think that'll that'll garner the best results from you know, the social media sphere where everybody has the attention span span of a gnat.

Randy Hulsey  59:23

Yes, yes, exactly. Yes.

Byron Nemeth  59:27

All of your energy into one song with great video and just work it you know, you give someone tough songs swing by them. Yeah.

Randy Hulsey  59:34

It's funny how that's changed over the years, you know, back in the back in the day it was buy the album and listen to it from top to bottom right and learn to love all the songs. Hopefully you love all the songs now it's cherry pick one off of an album or just buy the single write this check.

Byron Nemeth  59:50

And now in so many ways, it's almost like recorded music has become the loss leader to bring people in to see the concerts. Yes, it's good. Done. Exactly 60 from the old days, I don't know how you feel about that this is a very odd situation it is. It's a whole new different music business. And then with touring in, tell me your thoughts on this, Randy, for unknown ask this whole business, if you're a third or fourth down on the bill, and I'm talking a touring situation, that one off locally, you know how he is a situation of where you have to do these Bionz and buy on these tours, and sometimes buy on at a very expensive price. What are your thoughts on that? I kind of find it a bit disturbing.

Randy Hulsey  1:00:36

I, you know, I really don't, I don't really have a comment one way or another on it. Because from where I am musically, I don't go down that path. And I don't have a reason to. So I've never had to do it. And to be honest with you, I haven't. I think that I've had some artists on my show that have probably been subjected to that or have done it, but it never came up in conversation. So I don't I guess I don't know, I don't know how to answer that. What I mean, if I spin the question back around you what, what are your thoughts around it? Like? It's, it's kind of new to me, right?

Byron Nemeth  1:01:16

Yeah, well, the thoughts on it are, if you're an unknown act, you're trying to get your presence out there by being able to actually tour and do cities, but you don't have a record label that can finance this the scenario that I'm describing, and you're doing it yourself, there's opportunities, if you want to call it that, of where you can buy on to a tour by paying X amount of dollars. And I'm not going to use any names here but paying X amount of dollars to get on so and so's tour so that you open up for them. Okay. And the thought process here is that you get a chance to showcase yourself,

Randy Hulsey  1:01:58

on their name, on their name, write their name

Byron Nemeth  1:02:01

on a 20 3040 city tour. But the cost to get on is pretty substantial five figures sometimes if not more. And and then and then the question is, after that run is done, what do you get in return besides the experience? I don't know if those people that are fans of the other band come to you and and become your Yeah.

Randy Hulsey  1:02:25

And now that makes sense. And I understand. I understand why they would do it for sure. I mean, I think it's a quick way to maybe get that notoriety or to get your name out there. You know, I mean, if you come through town with REO Speedwagon, and you're attached to that bill, right, how many people actually do remember the opening act? I mean, sometimes they're there. They're forgotten. But

Byron Nemeth  1:02:54

remember, you're playing You're early. You're playing early.

Randy Hulsey  1:02:56

Yeah, you're playing early. And you're you're no, you're probably only have what a 30 minute 45 minute set tops, right. Be in two or three down on the bill. It's hard to say, you know, I mean, I guess if the, I guess if the artist has a lot of money in their bank account, and I don't see a problem with it, if that's what they want to do. You know, I can see where it could work for them. And I could also see it where it may not help them at all, depending on I mean, because if you if you think about, you know REO Speedwagon, Byron Nimeth, and Randy Hulsey, on the same bill, first of all, people would probably look at that and say, well, let's get there for Byron, but I don't I haven't ever heard of this Randy Hulsey guy. And, you know, we certainly want to see the headline or right, so people probably go out to dinner missed the whole first part of the show, right? So you've paid all this money to be on this attached to this tour? And what's the ROI on that? I don't see that the ROI would be very good. I mean, personally,

Byron Nemeth  1:04:05

as a business guy, that's my number one question salutely. What's the ROI on it? And remember, some some of these costs for these quote unquote, avails as they call them, meaning available, so they all just what the term is in the music industry. You know, it's five faders. Randy, if you can imagine that, you know, just think about that for a second. You know, what's the ROI on that? It's just wow, I can't believe that. That's even a situation in the music business. And now what's going on is you've got two groups of situations, the unsigned agate that's trying to do it themselves, where they're getting that money from, I don't know rich uncle, whatever. I don't know. Yeah. And for recently, sine x labels are doing that their methodology of putting the band on tour, but obviously that's at a cost to the band in the contract. Sure. And you know, that that's going to be recouped at some point somehow down down the road. So labels are getting involved in in the music business now and You know, in that aspect and then taking a piece of that artists career now No, that's a good idea.

Randy Hulsey  1:05:05

That sounds uh, that sounds a little, a little shitty to me, you know, it's like, well, I'm gonna put them out there. And we're trying to get this artist to make money for the label, the label says, you know, we'll front you the money, but we're going to get we're not only going to get it back, but we're probably going to get it back to fold right somehow. Right. You know, that's, you know, the contract is all written in their favor. There's because they would be dumb business people if it wasn't written in their favor, right?

Byron Nemeth  1:05:33

Where it starts is that merchandise, you know, they want a piece of merchandise and questions, how much and how big of a percentage, right? So so it's just bizarro land world of the music business that we're in right now. And in and I'm, I'm like many artists trying to navigate that because I want to tour but I don't want to turn to the loss now. Used by anybody. So obviously, I wouldn't let that happen. You know, that just would never happen. But I see it with other parents and what's happening to them and their emotional state after it. Yeah. It's like, wow, you know, they're not in a good spot.

Randy Hulsey  1:06:06

Well, I don't know about the metrics of it, let's say so I had Joel Hoekstra from Whitesnake on my show not too long ago, so let's pick on Whitesnake for a minute. If David Coverdale called you tomorrow, and this is a dumb hypothetical scenario called you tomorrow and said, you want to go out on a on a 20 city tour, and you had $50,000 in the bank. There's, there's no way to guarantee your ROI on that. I mean, it sounds great on paper, like, Oh, I'm opening for Whitesnake, that's great. But there's nothing written in there that says you will be returned that 50 grant, you will make 50 grand back, at least to cover your costs. There's no guarantee. So at the end of the day, it's a crapshoot of whether you take that chance, are you a gambler? Or are you not a gambler, I guess is what it boils down to. I'm not really a gambler. So I don't know that I would take that. But that's just me.

Byron Nemeth  1:06:59

I'm not a gambler, either. I'm an investor, for sure. And, and in business, there's something called calculated risks. Absolutely. So seems to me that the calculated risks, the way this scenario is set up is really too high. It really is. Because I don't think the bands, especially the independent ones, that are doing it themselves and paying for it themselves, are getting the ROI that they really should be getting. And it's an abusive system, I think.

Randy Hulsey  1:07:27

Yeah, I mean, if you if you take a simple scenario, and I'm just gonna throw out a simple number, a place local to Vegas says, Hey, Byron, you want to come play a solo show with your acoustic guitar, and we'll pay you $100 to come down for an hour in play. I mean, if it takes you three minutes to get there, you're not really spending any gas, they have all the gear, it might make sense to you to go down and play for 100 bucks, right? It's easy, you say easy, 100 bucks. But if you start factoring everything in well, I've got to drive an hour outside of the city of Vegas to get to the venue, I gotta bring my my own stuff, set up my stuff, tear down my stuff, that 100 bucks is no longer worth your time is my point. And it all goes back to what you're talking about. There's no guarantee you can't even wrap your mind around how you would get your money back on that you had hoped that you would be in on a bill with with Whitesnake, but maybe you would maybe it wouldn't. And are you willing to take that chance or not? I guess, what's your, what's your tolerance of loss? I mean, if your tolerance of loss and you've got, you know, a couple of million in the bank 50,000 bucks Ain't you know, it doesn't amount to ship to some people, you know, they would take that risk in a heartbeat. But for the person that only has $50,000 in their savings account, and it costs 50 to go out with them. And I don't know about that, man. That's not a very good calculated risk there as far as I'm concerned.

Byron Nemeth  1:08:53

Exactly. And in this in this is the status of where we said with the new music business, you know, it's just because truly bizarro land and aren't miles to put it. It really is, on the flip side, recording costs have come down. And if your independence, what has gone up is advertising costs. I would consider this conversation by turning like an advertising costs conversation. Sure. So now we can save money by recording more efficiently and smartly. But now to get yourself out amongst all the clutter on the internet has increased ethics.

Randy Hulsey  1:09:27

Well, I think it's maybe it's not one in the same but it's kind of the same where some people will go out on social media and buy followers, right? And then there's others like myself, and probably you too, that are we just let it grow organically. I'm not paying for fake accounts to follow me like I don't give two shits about that. And you can relate that back to you could either like yourself, build your name, build your brand, play local, grow organically or you could dip into the bank account and pay to get on one of these bills. That's the two ways that we could do it. Both from a touring perspective. And something as simple as just growing your your social media following, right? I don't believe in. I don't think I do either one of them. I'm not paying somebody to follow me. That doesn't care anything about my show the people that follow me, genuinely, I think, care about hearing the artists that I'm talking to, and care about what I'm doing. And there's there's nobody there that doesn't want to be there is my point.

Byron Nemeth  1:10:33

Yeah, absolutely. I couldn't agree more. And one thing if I paid for followers, and this is one of the one great knowledge base, thought here that I have is being a web web guy, web designer, is you know, paying for followers, music or otherwise, or any other business, that's a complete waste of time, AI is getting so good. So incredibly, incredibly good that you're gonna get busted for that. So don't do that out there. You music guys out there, if you're paying for followers don't do that. It's not a good idea. It's just not.

Randy Hulsey  1:11:06

I saw an artist not too long ago, that had, let's just call it 100,000 followers. And then like, three months later, there was like, 210,000 followers on Instagram, and I'm thinking there's no fucking way. There's no way. I mean, it's not that quick, you know, I could understand your maybe growing that over time with, you know, if you're, you know, a big name actor something but and so it's almost anybody can see right through that, like, I don't believe that for a minute, though. Those people are not real. The accounts are not real. They're all in India or wherever they are. And they've made no post on Instagram, it says zero by post that tells you right there. It's not a legit account, right?

Byron Nemeth  1:11:50

Yeah, that's not a good good thing to do. Best thing to do is to hire a public relations person to work for you. I agree. That's what I've done. And that's what I'm doing for my book. And I'm gonna send them this this interview when we're, you know, whenever you publish it, and that's how you work it. That's social media organically. And to some degree, paying for very well targeted campaign as for different things that you're willing to take a low risk situation with?

Randy Hulsey  1:12:21

Yeah, I find that to be perfectly within the, I guess the guidelines have legit, right. I mean, that's people do that. But I mean, paying for fake people to make them look bigger than they are. I mean, that's, first of all, it's deceitful. You're building your brand on the seat. And if I looked you up, if I fell in love with your music on YouTube, or wherever, Byron. And then I looked you up and looked at your Instagram and saw that, like, Byron has 1 million followers, and you start combing through there. It's like, man, like, none of these are real like, Dude, I wouldn't give you the time of day. I mean, but to me, you're a phony. And yeah, you're, you know, maybe you're a great guitar player, but you're buying people and I don't I mean, it just kind of goes a kind of goes against, you know, what I believe to be the way to do business. And that's just me. That's not right. wrong or indifferent. But sounds like you agree with that to a certain degree.

Byron Nemeth  1:13:19

Oh, completely. Yeah, totally. Don't Don't worry, Randy. AI is gonna fix all that.

Randy Hulsey  1:13:25

It's gonna it's gonna weed out the subway. Yeah, for sure.

Byron Nemeth  1:13:29

I think stuff, but for other businesses, too. It's gonna clean all that clutter up. I think that's in the process of happening now. We should have that I think cleaned out within the next year or two.

Randy Hulsey  1:13:38

Yeah, for sure. You mentioned earlier. Byron namath.com. Where else can the listeners find you on social media? What platforms do you live on? Mainly?

Byron Nemeth  1:13:50

I'm on all of them. And it's just the app sign. Byron Namath? That's it. Okay? Being very straightforward.

Randy Hulsey  1:13:57

Simple enough. Yeah, a couple of quickfire questions for you. Then I'm gonna let you get back to your the rest of your labor day there. But I was wondering, these are usually intended to just be a simple answer and kind of fun. Maybe something that people didn't know about you that follow you around, but you remember what your worst subject might have been in school?

Byron Nemeth  1:14:19

Attending?

Randy Hulsey  1:14:24

Okay, well, we'll move right along, man. That's a great answer. I love it. It's ending in general. Yeah. How about right. How about favorite food for you? Do you have a favorite one?

Byron Nemeth  1:14:38

Oh, my God. Where do we begin? Jesus? You know, I like I like everything is cooked really well, whether it's a dinner or breakfast item,

Randy Hulsey  1:14:47

okay. All right. So you're not a picky eater than it sounds like

Byron Nemeth  1:14:51

only the quality of how it's put together.

Randy Hulsey  1:14:56

Do you have a routine and how you start your day? What do you do? You wake up in the mornings normally,

Byron Nemeth  1:15:02

usually, you know, my scheduled pattern out really well on my calendar. So I know like weeks in advance, and sometimes once in advance, like with this interview what's happening. So the very first thing that I do is I get up and I work out. I'm an avid yogi, I've been doing yoga for a long time. And it's a great thing for for maintaining health, and I run a lot. And I take care of take care of myself, always have them do a little bit of coffee, then I turn on the computer and see what I have to do next with either a website client or what I'm doing the next thing with my music career. Yeah,

Randy Hulsey  1:15:41

I think that's really cool that you've, you've managed to make your living kind of in the almost in the confines of your, your four walls there, right. And that's really cool that you're, you're able to do that, I guess some would call that live in the dream, you know. And I think a lot of people that are self employed doing their doing their thing. You know, you don't, you don't have to make a lot of money, sometimes to be happy, right at the end of the day. And whether you're making a lot doing web design, whether you're making a little at the end of the day, if you're happy, it doesn't matter. And I think that that's cool that you've you figured out what your your niche is, and where your strengths are, and you're exercising those. And so that's very commendable. Congrats to you on that.

Byron Nemeth  1:16:30

Thank you so much. I've worked very hard to have it at this level. And it's, it's, it's a wonderful thing, Randy, because I can work from anywhere in the world. I just need a Wi Fi connection. Absolutely. I even worked on tour, and I'm off while traveling. So it's a great setup. It's a it's a very symbiotic relationship between both of the careers.

Randy Hulsey  1:16:53

Yeah, and I say that quite often. To people in my eight to five job, you know, all I need is a chair and a Wi Fi connection and a cell phone and I could work from a cruise ship or in Paris or at the zoo. It doesn't matter to me right at the end of the day. Here. It sounds good. Right? For sure. Well, listen bar and stick around. I want to thank you for joining me on the show. And I also ask the listeners to like, share and subscribe to the podcast. Also, don't forget to follow Byron on all of his social media platforms, including Byron nimeth.com, as well as at Byron Nimeth. On all of the other platforms, Facebook, Instagram, so on and so forth. I also want to thank you guys for tuning in. As a reminder, you can follow the show on Facebook at backstage pass radio podcast, on Instagram at backstage pass radio, Twitter at backstage pass PC and on the website at backstage pass. radio.com You guys stay safe and healthy. And thank you again for tuning in to Backstage Pass radio.

Adam Gordon  1:18:05

Thanks so much for joining us. We hope you enjoyed today's episode of backstage pass radio. Make sure to follow Randy on Facebook and Instagram at Randy Halsey music and on Twitter at our Halsey music. Also makes sure to like, subscribe and turn on alerts for upcoming podcasts. If you enjoyed the podcast, make sure to share the link with a friend and tell them backstage pass radio is the best show on the web for everything music. We'll see you next time right here on backstage pass radio