Great Songs Have Great Stories

SPEAKER_04 0:46

Every great song has a story, and every songwriter has one that's never been told quite this way. Hey everyone, it's Randy Holsey with Backstage Pass Radio. Today on the show, we're joined by a Texas singer-songwriter who has spent decades forging his own musical path, blending rock, Americana, country, and his Mexican-American roots into a sound that is uniquely his own. We'll talk about the stories behind the songs, the road that shaped the man, and why authenticity still matters in today's music industry. Sit tight and we'll join my friend Max Rios right after this.

SPEAKER_00 1:24

This is Backstage Ass Radio. Each week we take you behind the scenes of some of your favorite musicians and the music they created. From chart-topping hits to underground gems, we explore the sounds that move us and the people who make it all happen. Remember to please subscribe, rate, and leave reviews on your favorite podcast platform. So whether you're a casual listener or a die hard music fan, tune in and discover the magic behind the melody. Here is your host of Backstage Pass Radio, Randy Halsey.

Meeting Max Rios In Studio

SPEAKER_04 2:04

I am here with Max Rios. Max, how are you, bud? Good to see you. Good to be here. How long have you been in town?

SPEAKER_02 2:14

I got in last night. Okay. Yeah, I was I went home. It's it's weird because uh I've got some things going on here in Houston. My son's moving, so it's it's there's a lot of back and forth, you know, getting that place that he was at, you know, back to its you know, good standing, and then now moving over. So helping the son move. So that's why I'm here. I I was here middle of the week, went home and uh today, and then I'm heading back tonight.

SPEAKER_04 2:43

Yeah, well, I'm glad this worked out because it's always better to sit in front of the good mics versus doing a zoom. Yeah. Because Zoom compresses audio and video, and it's you you gotta you gotta really manipulate it a lot to get it to sound uh a certain way. But it's it's good to have you here in the studio and you're you're joined by the the brains of the operation. Your wife is with you here. Brains brawn and the whip shape and in line. It sounds like some of the other guests I've had on the show that have brought their wives. It's like, oh, you brought the trainer, did you?

SPEAKER_02 3:13

Yeah, I I I would be lost to be honest with you.

SPEAKER_04 3:15

Yeah, I hear you. And you guys have been married for how long?

SPEAKER_02 3:18

I better get this right. Yeah, don't worry about it. 29 years. Okay. No, did 29 years, August 30th. Did I pass the test?

SPEAKER_04 3:26

How many months? How many days?

SPEAKER_02 3:28

I I have issues with you know keeping dates and uh I'm horrible.

SPEAKER_04 3:34

That's probably one of the uh the funny thing about me. I've always people know this about me. I have a musical savant brain, like trivia that you would never think that I would know. I'll spit it out, right? And it's almost scary. But if you ask me when my granddaughter's birthday is, I might say, Oh man, I forgot what day is that again. Like I just don't, I'm horrible with dates, and I don't know if it's a guy thing, but my daughter, she can remember everybody's birthday, doesn't even have to have a calendar, right? It just works in her brain somehow, and I don't know how that works.

SPEAKER_02 4:06

Yeah, it's uh I had an old boss of mine, he says, I have a head full of useless information. He was a sports trivia guy, sure. And he knew everything sports, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_04 4:16

Yeah, well, and you know, we we talked a little bit pre-hitting the record button here about um, you know, music and and remembering things. And I and I think and also about how the podcast came about and why I started it being a local musician. But the idea was I've got so much of this music knowledge in my head. I think I'm a little bit of a music encyclopedia. How do I apply that knowledge while bringing people like you onto my show, my my fellow musician, and picking your brain and adding my knowledge into your story, right? And what what can I get out of that, right? And that that was kind of the whole idea behind Backstage Pass Radio, right? Was just to talk to guys like you and share some geek out on the gear and stuff like that, right?

SPEAKER_02 5:09

Yeah, like I said, I'm I'm looking at your podcast, your your previous podcast, and I'm going, oh my, this is Earl Slick. And you're and what you're doing is it's kind of a uh uh uh uh it's a service, sure, but it's a service of what you've been doing for a long time. You're plugged into it, and then you're bringing I after being after you get receiving your email, and I'm and I go back and start researching, I'm going, why the hell is he calling me? Seriously, I'm like I look I said, Well, you got top shelf guys, but like you said, you you you you're you're helping fill in those gaps because there's a lot of you know working people who don't get those yeah and I appreciate that Max.

SPEAKER_04 5:54

Like that that makes it solidifies when I hear things like that from my peers, it kind of solidifies that I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. It's we've always heard pay it forward, right? And it's like uh we we talked about monetization of the show, and when I started it, money never crossed my mind about the show. I was never thinking, how can I get people in here and make money on this? It was just about two people, right? Or three people or whatever sitting across the table from one another talking about the shit that they love, right? How do you mean? Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, because it's the universal language at the end of the day. Right, it is, yeah. Well, yeah, it what was interesting, I was talking to my wife a little earlier today, and I was saying, man, this is kind of weird because when Max and I connected, I I really didn't know anything about you, full disclosure, right? And it was Max Rios and the and the Waysiders. And I was like, that's interesting. What's a waysider? And then I happened to look you up on I think Facebook, and you were connected with Larry Barrigan. And I'm like, wait a minute. We live down the street. Yeah, I'm like, wait a minute. Now, this is this is ironic that I've had Larry on my show, Hellstar Larry, right? And I'm like, that's weird. Max is connected with him, and then I start, I said, don't stereotype Randy. All the Hispanics don't know each other.

SPEAKER_05 7:20

No, no, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:21

And then, and then uh, and I said, Well, the waysider thing makes perfect sense. So he must have grown up around Larry. So I text Larry yesterday or day before, and um shout out to Larry Berrigan uh of Health Star if he's listening in today when this drops. But I said, Hey, do you know a guy named Max Reels? He's like, dude, I used to give that dude a ride home from school or whatever, right? Or so it's interesting, it's a small world street.

SPEAKER_02 7:48

He lived on Elm Street uh on the east side of 75th, about five houses, and I lived on Elm Street for 11 years, about six houses. So we were about 10 houses separated. Wow, and you know, we've known each other. I've known Larry since I mean, he's always been a guitar god, yeah. Ever since I was probably eighth grade, you know, he had Black Rose, and then he went to Hellstar and you know, and he's kept it going, him and and and uh James and did you know Rob Trevino and he was in the BemC.

SPEAKER_03 8:29

I knew all those guys, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 8:30

Yeah, so Rob, uh Rob was actually one of my customers, and it's interesting, interesting story about Hellstar and Rob. Um, when Rob was still with Hellstar, um, one of my best friends, he he's a UFC fighter, or was, he's retired now, but he was on season six of The Ultimate Fighter, right? And so this this was back in the day when he was still very involved with the fight scene. And we were in, I was in Vegas with Johnny, and Rob was in Vegas as well, and we all were partying together. So Rob Trevigno, John Colosi, and myself, and then spouses. And I think Johnny asked if he could use uh some Hellstar music as a walk as his walkout music, right? Yeah, so so that that was the connection there. But yeah, Rob and I go way further back than than James or Larry or any of the other guys in Hellstar, but I play at a local place. One of the local places I play, uh, James is at that those shows all the time, right? He's kind of a I think he lives in the place right um right by the venue that I play. So Friday nights, he's kind of a regular there. So I see I see James all the time, right?

SPEAKER_02 9:44

Yeah, yeah. I mean, those guys you talk about persistence and yeah, they've been at a long time. Yeah, you know, good kudos to them. I love when I see they're in Europe. I'm like, you you found your audience. Oh yeah, and you know, you gotta go to them.

SPEAKER_04 9:59

They've got a great following over there in in Europe for sure, Germany specifically. Yeah, wow. Well, I think Larry uh I think Larry was season three for me, and I'm in season 11 now, so that must have been like this time and 2022 that Larry was here. So it's been wow, four years. Yeah, it's like I it seems like it was like a year ago that he was here. It's time the older I get, I think the clock goes starts spinning, right? It's crazy. It's crazy. Well, um, so you grew up off of Wayside, right?

Wayside Childhood And Choosing Music

SPEAKER_04 10:38

And then you you went to Sterling, um, what high school? Sterling High School Sterling High School, okay. Were you always like a musical kid growing up, or did the music bug bite you like later in life? Talk to the listeners a little bit about that, yeah. You too.

SPEAKER_02 10:55

Uh people probably think I'm lying, but I'd say three years old. Because my mom had her 45s and her records, and that was the thing. I just was intrigued by just playing these little discs. And it was rock and roll, it was everything. It was rock and roll. Uh well, it wasn't everything, it wasn't country that came later. But it was rock and roll and Spanish. She had Fernandez, Chuck Perry, uh Johnny Rodriguez. Uh I don't remember Johnny Rodriguez. Freddie Fender? Freddie Fender, yeah, sure. Yeah. I've got the original Delphi uh uh I've got an old old timers coming on here, uh Richie Vallon's La Bombay 45. Yeah. So I mean it was all that, you know, and I remember I had my Mickey Mouse little suitcase, and that's I just loved music, and I and that really that's all I thought about as a kid. Yeah. I got into baseball. I think it was I was about 15 when I decided. I remember making All-Star and going to all the practices, and then I was a pitcher, and then uh and I remembered that moment and I didn't get to pitch, and I was it was and then the coach's kid pitched and he didn't even come to practice. And I remember that day I said, No more organized sports for me. Yeah, I said, and that day I said, I was 15, I said, I'm a musician for the rest of my life. You know, and and I remember just I got my cat put all that away. I said, I'm never doing any of that anymore. I'm just gonna be a musician, that's all.

SPEAKER_04 12:30

That's interesting though that you did come through as a sports kid, though, because a lot of musicians that I speak to never threw a baseball, right? They were just like the music geek or theater geek at an early age, and they never got into organized sports at all, right? So you're you're you're one of uh a few handfuls that that have that sports background.

SPEAKER_02 12:51

Yeah, which is a kid, you know, you you we went to the Astro Dom and watched the Astros and you know and all my friends in school were in the teams. Yeah. And so I remember I was I was 10 when I started. And then like I said, I I played for five years, and I remember that that summer of 15 years old. I said, No more. Yeah, I'm just gonna do one track because they stick with it. And you know, I mean, I still like I know I my kids played organized sports, but I always had a little bit of a bias, like I'm like, of course. Of course, you know, they really should be playing instruments, right?

SPEAKER_04 13:28

Well, and I did you instill the music into any of your uh children?

SPEAKER_02 13:33

They were overexposed, unfortunately. And I think I think that they saw they saw the the struggle. Yeah, my son is uh he's uh very gifted, and he doesn't realize it. You know, he doesn't realize how how wired he is. And I I tell him, You're wired. I said, you know, he can pick up anything accordion, keyboards, drums, guitar, and it's just natural. He just plays it. And I told him I can't play drums. Yeah, I said I'd have to sit there a month and barely be able to see time. And I said, You're wired that way. And he's like, I just you know, sing, sing in English and Spanish. And I'm like, hell, I didn't, I never knew you could sing, you know. I'm amazed by you know when I see him. Sure. And I'm like, how did you when did you start doing this?

SPEAKER_04 14:19

They pick it up by osmosis, I guess, because my son Brandon is like that. He's 20 times the guitar player than I am, um, very technical player, but but I can't get him on stage with me. It's like, dude, what are you doing? You're you're you know, and I and I talk about this a lot in my episodes for anybody that's like a dedicated listener to Backstage Pass Radio. She's people have heard the story at nauseam that you've got this talented kid that just can wear you out on a guitar, but getting him on stage with me to just sit in or what, he just he won't do it. The limelight is not his thing. Yeah, he he's happy just playing in the studio here or playing at his house. That's the limits, right? Now maybe one day he'll grow out of that. But I don't know if your kid has some of that in him. Does he like to be out in front of people or he doesn't care?

SPEAKER_02 15:08

It it it does. I think he's as an early kid, he used to he was in violin lessons and he played violin, and his instructor said, you know, he just plays and he makes mistakes, and he says, but he's so advanced, you know, compared to these students that have been taken. He says he just goes at it, you know, and he's got uh a natural uh ability to to to to find his way into music. And it's the same thing, you know. I I played unfortunately for my father's uh um funeral in March, and my son, I said, you know, are you gonna do some songs? And he says, Yeah, and he sang them. And and it was it was just so heartfelt. And I we didn't practice. I just told him what songs, and and we played them for popo, and and uh everybody was going, dude, why aren't you singing? Yeah, why aren't and he's like, I just don't, it just just doesn't want to do it, you know? And he's and and to me it's like that would be the the ultimate, you know, hey, let's just do a couple of gigs together. And it's not about it's not about money, it's not about it's just it's just shared.

SPEAKER_04 16:12

It's called it's called camaraderie, right? A father-son thing. Yeah, and and Brandon, like you mentioned this, but Brandon has played uh about somewhere between six and eight shows with me, so he it's not unheard of, but yeah, generally doesn't like to be on that side of the microphone, right? And uh, but I don't push it, right? I've never lived vicariously through my kids. I spent 17 years in professional hockey uh as an official, but I played for uh about 13 years, very competitive sports guy. And and Brandon, my oldest son, was a phenomenal hockey player. But you know, it's I I never said you gotta play hockey because that's what I meant. Right. That's you either love that or you don't love it. If you want to go play kickball, just go be the best at kickball. Like I could care less. So I've never I've never tried to live vicariously through my kid. In fact, he didn't even pick up one of these guitars till he was in high school. He never cared.

SPEAKER_02 17:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:09

So the amount of time he's playing and the depth in which he plays is like, man, there there is, I think there's so much elasticity in a youngster's brain. Like they just absorb, they're still a sponge. And and you've heard the adage a million times, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. Right. I doubt you're as old as I am, but like there's a lot of truth to that. There's things that I don't, my brain just like, why can't I remember that song? Right? Right.

SPEAKER_02 17:36

No, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:36

But but then a kid will pick it up like that, and it's like, Jesus, how do you do that?

SPEAKER_03 17:41

Yeah, it's it's it's it's that early, I always say those formative years.

SPEAKER_02 17:45

And and is the neuroplasticity where it's it's it's so fresh in your mind. Yeah. Exactly right. They absorb it faster. And they're not worrying about mortgages and exactly cutting the grass. And my wife told me there's about five projects waiting for me. I'm like, all right, yeah, you know, sure.

SPEAKER_04 18:06

So you know it's like a nothing to lose mentality, right?

SPEAKER_02 18:09

Yeah, so exactly. So they're they're just I always say they're just fresh and open, yeah, you know, and accepting, you know.

SPEAKER_04 18:16

I'd like to be young again, but with the knowledge that I have now. Yeah,

Musical Family Myths And Mentors

SPEAKER_04 18:19

I take that back to yesteryear, right? That would be awesome. Yeah. Well, so did you did you come from a musical family? Like was mom and dad, brothers, sisters, anybody musical other than just queuing up some vinyl on the record player, or did they play instruments?

SPEAKER_02 18:35

Where did you find that at? Me and my wife say there's got to be a crazy grandpa somewhere. A crazy one that you never met, right? You never met. There's gotta be one somewhere in in the DNA because my mom loved music. She was, I always called her the the uh architect of fun in the family. You know, she was the committee of fun. Yep. My dad was the hardworking, you know, disciplined guy. He didn't play. Although he would say, Yeah, I could play, you know, when I was younger. And then he was, you know, maybe a couple of fingerings in there, but uh my mom didn't play. I had a a a an uh my one of my mentors was Henry Sanchez. He was uh he was a uh he was married to my dad's sister, so he's an in-law, uncle-in-law, I guess you can say he was a professional sax player. And so at 12 years old, 14, he had an oldies group, and I would I would go play with them. And you know, that's how I learned. But I also loved the oldies because that got wired in earlier and and and and my uncle would say, Come play with us, you know. And I remember there was a guitar player named Ray, and he had like a 55, 54 strat, and I remember that's a beautiful strat. And he would just go, shh, shh, he would sit next to me and go like quiet, because I'm playing on the wrong chords, you know. Yeah, but you know, that was my uncle giving me an opportunity to be on stage with the guys and rehearsing and and learning, you know, learning how to learning the changes, learning to you know, following rhythm, everything. Yeah, so as far as a direct mentor, I would say Henry Sanchez. And then I had another cousin who sang professionally. He was a Tejano singer. He was Joe Joe, and he and he was and he made like three or four records in Tejano World, he's uh known as uh he's he was just one of the top shelf singers, uh Joe Fuentes. Okay, yeah. But I mean as far as direct anybody that I learned from, uh I don't know any. None of my none of my I have cousins that play guitar, but uh you know, we grew up around the same age limit, same age air, you know, bracket. But uh there was uh no uh grandpa or father. That's interesting, you know. But I'm like saying, it's gotta come from somewhere because I'm so bent and so warped, you know. And I said there has to be somebody, a circus actor or some acrobat, right? Runaway breakaway circus somewhere. It's gotta be some weirdo. Yeah. Because I I think my kids don't play, and maybe they will later, and and and it'll be the bane that their kids start playing and they get serious. But I think it'll be a grandkid who's like, oh yeah, we have some records of this crazy guy that just never gave up. Totally, yeah. Idiot that just kept playing.

SPEAKER_04 21:25

Yeah, you know, hopefully they find well, yeah. I mean, that's great that you have a legacy to leave behind with your recordings, right? And that's something that just being a cover guy, like I I, you know, I've been in music all my life, but really started playing back out in a duo back in 2016. And I never cared and never recorded my own stuff, right? And so I I don't have that legacy to give. I I I always look kind of in the rearview mirror and say, man, I I should record some stuff, right? To leave for my kids and grandkids because we're not going to be here forever at the end of the day. I think I'll live, I'll I'll leave other things to them. Well you that will be it's all posterity, it's sure. And say, Oh, this is but music, you know, being that I love music like you do, and that I don't have any of that to give to them, that that's probably on the bucket list. And I threaten to do that all the time, but life gets in the way, you know. You like you said earlier, you got to go to a job, you gotta, you got music shows yourself, the podcast eats up half your life. Like I don't have time to devote to going into a studio and and figuring all that out, right? It's just not where I'm at in my life, and I'm okay with it right now. I might, when I get old and grumpy, well, I'm already grumpy, getting old, but uh I might look back and say, man, I should have done that when I was younger, right? But you know, there's always going to be some form of regret, I guess, in our lives, right?

unknown 22:55

Yeah.

Live Song And Fiction In Lyrics

SPEAKER_04 22:56

Well, I was wondering before we get too far in depth with the conversation, I was wondering if you'd uh pick up that acoustic that you brought in and maybe play a tune um for the listeners. Sure, cool.

SPEAKER_02 23:08

I'll definitely do that.

SPEAKER_04 23:09

All right.

SPEAKER_03 23:26

So you went to that thing we become your friends. All alone in the past to live in the night come with you.

SPEAKER_04 27:13

And and did I hear an Almeida Ma reference in there, man? Yeah, we were talking South Houston, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:18

There you go. Yeah, that's uh uh the song is is is is uh made up with fiction bits of fiction inter intertwined in it. Like most of my songs, okay. There's some of it most of it is fictional, you're just poetic license, but it has to you have to draw from what you've experienced. Absolutely. You know, to to make to get to have some kind of a footing. And and uh so yeah, uh the song is I uh a shout out to my cousin Rios Guitar. He I was supposed to wear a shirt, but I I didn't have a clean one. So uh he gave me a guitar, a Rios guitar, and it's a telly uh body uh style. And it was brand new, and and I said, I'm gonna play this at home all as much as I can to get a good feel. So I and I was sitting at home, and then I I just came up with that that opening lick on that guitar. And sometimes, you know, instruments will new instruments, not that I need a new instrument every time you write a song, but sometimes when you have something new, it gives you a different sure sound and feel and and an inspiration. So that's where that came from. Started with that, and then the line I sat down on the couch and then just came. Saw you wearing that top headed pen. I knew right then it was that whole line, saw you wearing that top headdy pen. And then I knew right then, and then I added that we were gonna be friends. And so started thinking about to my and it's it's really I think I heard your Earl Slick interview coming in, and uh he says, I'm I don't know how old he is, he I even referenced it, but he says, I'm 15. Yeah, it's the same thing. I think in my mind, I'm still that 15-year-old, you know, and in spirit. It's the whole nostalgic thing. Yeah, you're you're I guess to to keep at it, you're you're you know, your your soul has to be you know 15. And I of course and so that's my kind of reference point. Yeah, and and and in that in in there, I'm I'm talking about you know, seeing someone with a Tom Petty badge, and I'm thinking there's a you know a pretty girl, and she's just new at school, and then like now I get to I I'm you know, I'm not suave, I don't know what to talk about. And I said, Oh, Tom Petty, we're in the same tribe. Yeah, you know, so I that's where I I don't I'm and and I'm fumbling for words and I had this chance rendezvous, and it's just me and her, and I say, Hey, I know this place, and I'll meet them all. They've got all the records stacked wall to wall. Yeah. Hey, how can I meet you there? And that's that's where this fantasy comes in. But it's true that I used to go, I used to take lessons at I'll meet them all, guitar lessons, and before the lesson, I'd get there a little early, and there was I think I think it's disc records. Okay, it was like disc records was across the hall. And I would just go in there and literally look at all the records, Tom Petty, you know, damn the torpedoes, and just like stare at the album covers and then look at who played on it, and you know, read all the lyrics. So that's how that whole thing came about. So there's elements of truth, but it's still fantasy, you know, totally.

SPEAKER_04 30:24

Um it's interesting you talk about the record jacket,

Vinyl, Liner Notes, And Attention Spans

SPEAKER_04 30:29

right? And the liner notes. And I remember um probably two years ago, I started the vinyl collection that you see behind you in the shelf. And and it's not large by any stretch, but it had been since I was a kid that I put a needle on a piece of vinyl. Then I got my first vinyl and I cued it up over here on this EV50. It literally sent chills down my back because I haven't I haven't held a physical piece of vinyl in my hand and experienced vinyl in over 40 years. Was it the low end? That's to me. It's just it was just the whole experience. It was the whole experience. It's the it's the it's touching. It it was the touch of the of the jacket opening up to see what the liner notes, where did they record, what year, blah, blah, blah. Like that was always that's me. I'm the I'm the musical geek, the musical savant that sucks that information into my brain. Most people don't care about the liner notes. Right. Don't give two shits about it, right? Right. But I'll sit and read that for hours. I love that stuff. 100%. And it's like, wow, we really don't listen to music now like we did 40 or 50 years ago. Now it's just like the attention span is 10 seconds. Like if you don't catch somebody in 10 seconds, forget it. Think about that. I mean, you put a piece of vinyl on, it was a an experience to sit and listen and to look at the album cover and just go into your own world, right? Now everything's streamed. Like, okay, next, I don't like that. Next, I don't like that. Right. You're forced to listen to the whole record because you're gonna be up and down, up and down, up and down, right? So I believe the vinyl thing is a whole experience. And you think back to the record store days. Those were I still love going in a record store and just prowling through, you know, finding stuff that one's like, oh my god, I always wanted this record.

SPEAKER_02 32:32

And it's well, they're more expensive now. You know, I used to go to half price and get them for like two bucks. Now they're seven bucks, you know. But it was like, oh, I forgot about this. Sure, you know, snag it, you know.

SPEAKER_04 32:43

But you could you could say I I bet I could name three albums right now, and I bet you could say exactly what the album cover looked like. Yeah. And I'll test you, right? All right, test me. Lover boy, what do you think of uh the fingers behind the back, red pants? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Yeah, the zebra debut. Three guys on the front, right? Like that that's what I'm talking about. Yeah, it's instilled in our brains, right? It's it's etched in our brains. And I bought those, yeah, exactly. They were just the forks in the eyes, right?

SPEAKER_02 33:16

It was the provocative, and a lot of times I bought out just because of the art, yeah. The artwork, you know. So and they they used to like hire, I think it was hypnosis, was like the Pink Floyd and Scorpion Guy uh uh artist that just it was artwork, yeah. This was art, you know, sure a picture and you know the graphics was what was part of the album, and the albums were the artists labored over like and the producers like this one should go next. Sure should go next, you know, to get that flow. Yeah, you know, like you say now, it's like just one song, I'll just it wasn't what I wanted, you know. You just stream it and forget it and move to the next one.

SPEAKER_04 33:59

Yeah, it's crazy, you know. We brought up the lover boy record, the get lucky record. It's funny.

SPEAKER_02 34:04

I remember that right going down the the lover boy uh rabbit hole like two weeks ago with my son. He never heard it. We went on a road trip and then we were just playing it. My son's going, This guy reminds me of Foreigner, you know. And I said, You know, I didn't think about that, but you're thinking it from a per uh fresh perspective. Yeah, and uh, and it was just we had a good time just listening. And then we get on podcast and we're because we had a lot of road time, and um, we were listening to uh I forget the singer's name, but uh Mike Reno. Mike Reno. Yeah, and we were just listening to his his you know stories of Lover Boy, you know what I mean.

SPEAKER_04 34:42

Well, it's what was interesting to me, you know, those are again the album is etched into your brain. Like you don't ever forget that, yeah, right. And I guess a couple of years ago, I was fortunate enough to, so I've had the guys from Lover Boy on my show, and and I met Doug, the keyboard player Doug John Doug Johnson from Loverboy at the hotel they were staying at. They were actually in town playing the uh Cynthia Woods pavilion with Foreigner. Oh wow. And uh I hung out with Doug for the day over at the hotel, and they they gave me the purple guitar over there, all signed up by the band and everything. So yeah. But yeah, you know, nostalgia is everything. And I and I think back, Almeda, that that's my stomping grounds. That was the ball for me, right?

SPEAKER_02 35:26

Yeah, you just get dropped off as kids and you go running around. Absolutely. Back when you could still your parents could just throw you out of the car and leave you there for the day. Or we talked about Govcake, you know, going to the same thing, they drop you off, or and you'd go to the movies. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 35:42

Go over the and even Aster World. My parents used to buy the season pass, me and my brother, mom drop you off going to work, pick you up when she's leaving work. And it's like ma'am, like all these people coming out at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 35:54

Yeah, and then you're waiting for your mom and you're absolutely saying hey, nope, we're right here.

SPEAKER_04 36:00

You're just sitting there waiting, like, oh no, that's not it. That's exactly it.

Writing Without A Schedule

SPEAKER_04 36:04

Well, do you consider yourself a structured songwriter, like where you where you set aside time daily to write, or are you the type of songwriter that you just wrong when things hit you? Or which which kind of songwriter are I just?

SPEAKER_02 36:23

I I think I just write when things hit me. Uh I just spoke two days ago to a good friend of mine and he's like, Well you got anything new? And I said, No, I don't. I said, you know, it it's funny because when I go and start writing, it's like you get into a groove and it's like you can't time it. It just happens. And usually when I start one, other things start getting in the way. Because my little my little girl was little. I would play guitar and I would be playing, and she'd wedge her head in there like, I need attention, you know. She'd just stick her or something. Like head, you know, into my body, like, you know, get away from me, you know, playing. But you know, but that's you know, she did that earlier, and I said, Oh, I I just saw her two days ago. And uh and she gave me a hug. I said, Remember, you used to stick your head in there and like like trying to get in between the guitar playing. But uh so other songs do that. So that's when I love that feeling when I'm started on a song, and then everything I you know, I hate to say that, but I hate my wife's here, but it's like you go into a a mode of like just that. Yeah, sure. You know, and there's other things that we're like piling up, like you know, you got the dryer broke, and then this, you know, yeah, and then you know you're just life happens, yeah, and you're just like and it's it's a meditative thing when I'm driving, I'm listening to the rough track, and then we're just gonna take a walk, we're just just start falling in the line just starts. I love that feeling. Yeah, so no, I don't do it every day, but when I do it, and I get in that zone and like three or four songs, and start I start writing like maybe just the the beginnings of one, and then three or four creep in, and that's like the ultimate, you know, where we're working on three songs at one time. It's like a puzzle, yeah. Three puzzles together, you know, and so yeah, and it and and I just saw Billy Joel and coming back, I didn't see him. We were I was listening to the podcast because we had that long drive, and he and he's like, I don't want to write anymore. He's like, I don't like that solitude, and I and for him it'd be totally different. So much more pressure because he has to have hit records. Yeah, but I know what he's talking about where you know you have to be alone, you have to be alone, you have to be in that place, you know, where you know everything it's a very solitary process.

SPEAKER_04 38:51

Yeah, it's interesting to hear how people write, and I've heard it all over the board. I had uh my friend Michael Sweet from Striper on, he's been on my show a couple of times now, but he's a very structured writer, like every morning, 10 10 a.m., he locks himself into a studio and writes. Yeah, that's just the way he does it, right? But but then you have somebody like yourself, it's like whenever the urge hits me and whenever an idea hits me, that's when I sit down and pick up a pencil, right? Yeah, um, so I I there's no right or wrong way to songwrite for sure. It's everybody has their own preference, but it it's always interesting to pick the brain of the songwriter to see how you work best at the end of the day.

SPEAKER_02 39:36

Yeah, and I need to be more disciplined, you know. You know, I I don't I guess I don't have a a career that's waiting on like when's the next. So I can understand where there's no pressure. There, right. You know, you have to immerse yourself in I could understand like Michael's sweet because he's not only got that, he's got four other projects going on. So he has to keep that muscle, you know, memory going, going, going, you know. So I think there's more I'm not saying that's why he does it, but some people do work on a schedule, you know, like the national riders, they go into national sessions at 10 o'clock, and then they go somewhere else. Yeah, it's like absolutely, you know, they gotta be always riding. Yep, yeah, yep.

SPEAKER_04 40:13

Talk

The Waysiders And The Tejano Years

SPEAKER_04 40:14

to me about uh the band, the Waysiders. Who are the members of your band? Do you have a solid band or do you pick people up along the way?

SPEAKER_02 40:22

No, it started as uh neighborhood guys, you know. It was Chuck Benya on vocals, and he's from Pasadena, but he was still from the neighborhood. Odie Rodriguez is from the neighborhood, he's still with me. Uh and the drummers have have changed. There was Izzy Lopez, he's from the neighborhood, and Joe Lopez, no no relation. They I played with Joe back in the Tejano days. I I did Tejano uh like nine years early most of my most of the 90s from like 87 to 96 or seven, somewhere in there. Joe, I've known Joe since then. So we've we started the wayside. We had another band called Los Gallos, okay, the Cox.

SPEAKER_04 41:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:07

And it was a Spanish rock. You know, and and we were in that scene, and uh Joe was with me then. And so I would say the core group is Joe Lopez, Odie Rodriguez. Chuck's no longer with me. Uh he sang for most of the time that we had the waysiders. Yeah, he got uh stage four lymphoma cancer, but he's fine, he's doing good, he's you know, he's he's uh uh gone through radiation treatment, he's you know cancer free. But I told him, you know, he wanted to come back, and I said, Man, I I work a lot, I travel a lot, you know. I and I I don't want to be part of you know it's it's stressful because when you leave Houston and you have to be in San Marcos by eight o'clock and you go down I-10, you never know if there's gonna be traffic. You're always you're always with Spanish words, in chingas, you're you're hauling ash, you know, you never know what's gonna happen. It's stressful, and then it's the stress of after the gig coming home. And I said, I think it's best you know, I said if you want to continue playing, that's your thing. But I don't want to be part of making you feel like or saying, hey, we gotta gig in San Antonio, we gotta gig in Austin. And then you know, cancers love stress, you know. Yeah, you know, so you know, it's it's just that, and then getting, you know, I come in sometimes you know, three in the morning. Yeah. So, you know, and get up, go to work Monday. Yeah. So it's a lot of that. And I said, you know what? And you know we we s he still comes by and sets in, you know, when whenever I'm in town. Sure. You know, but yeah, so we we were together like 20 years. Okay. You know.

SPEAKER_04 43:02

I went to I went to high school and played baseball with a with a cat named John Lopez, and he's uh he sings in a Tejano band on the south side of town. And I don't I don't even know if the band is it Silverado?

SPEAKER_02 43:15

Maybe so, yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know him personally, but I know the name man.

SPEAKER_04 43:19

He he and I were played on several little league baseball teams together, and then we went to high school together, and I played ball with him and his brother Felix. And um yeah, great singer, man. And you when you were telling me about you know the the guys in the band, so Tejano, John, oh yeah, John, yeah, yeah, Silverado. Now that you mentioned it, I think that's what that is.

SPEAKER_02 43:42

Yeah, I don't know him personally, but I think we've met each other.

SPEAKER_04 43:44

Yeah, right on. But it's a it's a small world that we live in. Well, you you know, you you talked a little bit about the band, um, but you do you also play solo shows? Do you do solo stuff?

SPEAKER_02 43:55

Lately I've been doing a lot of solo because it's so expensive. Yeah, that carry the band. I you know, you know, you don't want to harp about the money, but there are shows that I can afford to pay everybody, you know. And but for me to stay busy, I have to play solo. You know, I have to go, I gotta, you know, and it's it's helped me in regards to just being standalone and and and and just you know having to hold a rhythm up, yep, connect with the audience, absolutely keep all the lyrics. I don't write lyrics down and that that's one of the things I I and I don't put I don't write a set list. I don't I don't I don't have I I wanna just be in the moment. Yeah, yeah you know, and to me that's my uh challenge to just go get my guitar, I don't know what I play I'm gonna play. And then I I I play you know sometimes two hours set straight, sometimes an hour and a half, three hour night. And uh it's a good challenge. Yeah. And and so so you know, I I I save my funds and then a a nice gig will come up and uh I'll get to pay everybody. So yeah, the bad thing is uh it it's a little tougher to to uh you know I have I work with a set of guys in Austin and I work with a set of guys in Houston so we can kind of not have to travel as far. Of course, you know, yeah, you know, and and eventually, yeah, I I love playing with a band because I don't have to do as much. Exactly. I don't have to play like I don't have to keep the rhythm going. Exactly. You know, no, I have to do you know I can just play one chord and let everybody else everything everything you know floats along. Absolutely. But um, you know, lucrative, I mean financially, it it's it's it's a little tough. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 45:44

You know, what um how many shows a year do you think you play on average?

SPEAKER_02 45:49

On average, uh probably about 70. Okay, yeah. I you know, I I'm open to do more, but if that's just the way it sure it happens. You know, I I do play cover gigs and I play original and I try to play as much original. You know, I play a lot of you know, restaurant bars and stuff like that, you know, but and they want to hear what's familiar, and then I'll try to edge, you know, set it up where I can sneak in a record store day and tell them, hey, this is my latest, you know, 100 record or out. And but uh yeah, I mean I I saw your schedule like yeah, 130 days.

SPEAKER_04 46:26

Yeah, that was that was pre-the podcast. Like that was about 130 a year previously, what three gigs a week? That's it was a lot, you know, and uh I had to back that off. I can't sustain my time because the podcast is a time suck, like it takes a lot of time to talk to the artist pre-having you here, write an outline, record, edit, social media. Like it it, I mean, luckily I have a couple of people that that help me in the background, but I mean it's uh I don't think a lot of people understand how much time to have a good podcast to do it right. I mean, you could slop something and do it in half the time, I'm sure, right? I'm not a I'm not a half-assed kind of guy. Like it's either all in or all out. Like, and and I said that when I started the podcast. Go buy all the best equipment, right? That way you're gonna be in. You have to be in, right? Because you don't want to just go piss money away, right? So, so that was my commitment to myself. You buy all the good gear, but you're gonna do this 110. There's not gonna be 90, 80, you're all in, right? You're going to the top or you're going to the bottom, and uh, the bottom's not an option for me, right? So um, yeah, it's interesting. So, yeah, about 130. And I think Chris and I are more like uh 60, maybe 60-ish around there. But but what I did was it was very easy for me to cut out the outdoor gigs in the summertime, right? Just took them right off the schedule. So a lot of the breweries that I play, lone pint, and I only play them early in the year and late in the year. I'm not an outdoor guy. I hate the heat, right? Like I don't want to be outside in the summer. So that was real easy to cut the ones in the summer out, right? Makes sense. Yeah, yeah. Well, so what percentage of your shows, if you were to put a percentage on it, are solo versus band shows?

SPEAKER_02 48:27

The last couple of years, probably band shows probably 20. I would say two-thirds of what I do is is is solo. Okay, you know, and as a matter of fact, a friend of mine, I drop another name, uh Joel Guzman, he's an excellent recording player. He played Paul Simon, as a matter of fact. Uh, he says, Max, you're you're heading towards being a solo artist, and I want to help you develop that. He played with Joe Ely, as a matter of fact. Sure, okay. Yeah, and he said it took 10 years to do the Joe Ely, him, Joe Ely uh format. It was just accordion and then Joe Ely on guitar. And he's like, you know, you looks like you're kind of heading that way. And I don't see it, but I want to play in a band and be raucous and mess with the guys. But it it it's tough to get 60-year-olds, let's say, hey man, come to come to Dallas, come to Austin for, you know, for the weekend. Sure. And then, you know, so it's it's getting harder unless you you make that you know, there's that breaking point where the you have enough success to to to make it feasible. But I like the solo part because I don't really have to answer anybody. Exactly. I just pack you know, there's no I'm not gonna quibble about the fee, and like I'm good with that, pays my gas, I can get their back, come back with a little money, pack my guitar, yeah, I'm gone. It's easy, right? It's a lot easier because you don't have to negotiate. And you know, my wife goes with me a lot now because the kids are older and they're out of the house, and so I have a partner. Yep. And uh it's a lot easier to to manage and and and uh to commit yourself and say, Yeah, I can do that when I can do that. When then there's no like I don't, you know, I don't I don't really want to go this weekend. I got I, you know, and I understand people I have a baby shower, yeah. And I understand, you know, and so it's harder, it's harder to sort musicians when you're when you're you know older and you have a band.

SPEAKER_04 50:37

Absolutely. No, I I totally get it. Are you do you have to SWAT the women off of them? Or no you go to SWAT the ladies off.

SPEAKER_02 50:45

That's never been my I I've never uh I've never been that lucky, you know.

SPEAKER_04 50:50

I've apologized it's a thing for a lot of people, right? Yeah, it's like I I'm not into all that either, right?

SPEAKER_02 50:57

Yeah, it it it I was never the the the chick magnet, you know, and uh you know it just it is what it is some guys yeah that's that was their thing, yeah. A lot of my babies totally that's that's what they uh excelled at, yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_04 51:14

Some are good at it, there's no

From KISS To Country Bones

SPEAKER_04 51:15

doubt. Well, you did you describe your music, um, I guess Tex Americana, right? Which is uh certainly a sub-genre out there when and when I think of this genre, Tex Americana, I think Robert Earl Keen, uh Hayes Carl, uh uh the late and my friend Charlie Robeson. Uh you know, uh I think Tex Americana when I think of those guys. Um has this always been your subgenre? Or have you always been an Americana guy? Were you a rock and roll guy back in the day and then and then morphed into that later on?

SPEAKER_02 51:55

I've had several stages in life. Early on, like I mentioned, as far as back as I can remember, it was my mom's 45s, that rock and roll. And when my mom would drive us to school, she was a city girl. My dad was from Victoria, Texas. Okay. Inez, small town. He was a country boy. So he somehow got her to listen to country music. So in the time the time that she would drive us to school from like kindergarten to fifth grade, that's all we listened to was K-I-L-T. Yeah, I remember that. And we go back to the city. Yeah, those formative years country got in my bones. Yeah, yeah. You know, it was Tammy Wynette, uh uh Ronnie Melson. Yeah, sure. Uh all the all the country greats, you know, Merle Haggard. Because that's I listened to just going to and from school. And it's to me that was very formative because for a long time when I play something to people, four people later, they say it sounds country. And I'm like, I'm not trying to be country. Yeah. I'm not trying to sound country. Yeah. And the people would make fun of me, you know, my Tejano friends, my guys and the band, I was like, dude, that sounds country. Never, never wanted to be country. But it does happen, though. It just gets in your bones. And then when I was uh, you know, you you get into your rebellious rock and roll, and then I got into KISS because every kid in the 70s was into KISS, and then Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple and all that. And then I get that rebellious, you know, uh 15, 16, and listen to Iron Maiden. You know, you go through that whole phase that rock and roll. And but Tom Petty, that that spoke to me. Melanchant, you know, that that American Roots Rock. Yeah, Roots Rock, yeah. It was uh derivative of the stones. Yeah, it was all kind of from that. And then I love the Beatles too, you know. Yeah. I remember sitting there and my my grandfather uh Beatles come on, and I'm like a little, I'm probably like seven years old. The Beatles had of course broken up, but there was a my my grandfather's goddamn queers, you know. You know, because he sees the long hair, and I'm going, I kind of like those guys. Yeah, that's pretty cool. Yeah, I don't want to fess up, you know. He said, I like the Beatles. But uh, you know, uh so all that yeah, all that blended in. And then, you know, you learn a few chords on guitar, and then I got into my jazz rock phase, you know. But now, and then I got into the Tajano phase. I never thought about it, never listened to Tejano music. I was I think 20. Yeah. And friends of mine came, called me, and said, Hey, would you be interested in playing tehano? And I'm like, I don't know what it is, but I'm thinking I can just play in the weekends and make money because I needed a gig. And then uh they said, Well, here's they had a record. And they brought the record over and I learned all the songs as best I could. And then they get there for for they come to my garage for audition, and then they said, Well, actually, the guitar player's not leaving, the bass player's leaving. And I'm like, he goes, Would you be interested in playing bass? And I said, Man, I never touched a bass in my whole life. So I went and bought a bass. And then I, you know, then I got lost playing that for like 87 to 96. And I started managing the group. We got we were signed by Sony Records, Capitol Records. We used to be managed by Selena's people, so we knew Selena. So it was the whole trapping was just uh that whole all my 20s got you know got booked into that period, and you know, I was lost. It was just like and then Selena died, and then then I left in uh I think the following year. Because it just and I said, you know what? I want to go back to the reason I picked up that guitar, and I just want to be me again. Although I was I loved it, it was challenging. I had the highest lows, highest highs, and lowest lows during that because it was such a roller coaster, it was it was exhilarating rocket ride, but I wasn't me. And and and I wanted to get back, and I've always wanted I've always wanted to be a songwriter. Yeah, and that's why, and I remember telling the guy the reason I left was I had written three songs, and I got the one song, A B, uh Selena's brother, said, I like that song. I'm gonna take 50% of it. You guys are gonna record it. I didn't care, you know. I got one song on The Last Record, and then I wrote five, and I told the guys, look, we gotta record a new album. And uh they said, Well, AB's gonna write it. I said, AB, he's out of his mind, man. He's just lost his sister. He can't, you know, his whole world's upside down. And I and they said, Well, no, AB's gonna write. I said, Well, I've got five songs we could start working on. And then they said, no, and I said, All right, it's either or I said, I've I'm tired of carrying the bathwater. Yeah. And so that from that day period, I said, I'm gonna be a songwriter, and that's all I don't care if I sell a record, I don't care. I'm gonna do my own thing, and I've been doing it ever since. You know what I mean? So yeah, and I was like, I had to find my way back to why I wanted to, I wanted just to play guitar and just create stuff. Yeah, you know, that that yeah, that that was that was always always there. Yes. We would get songs from songwriters, they were they were supposedly name brand songwriters, and I would listen to them, I'm going, that's crap, you know. But the guys were like, oh man, that's a great song. That's a great song, let's record it. And I'm thinking, I don't know, man, I think I can do something like you know, at least comparable to that. Yeah, but you know, and it took me a while to finally get the guts to say, here's some songs. And like I said, I got one on the last record I uh we recorded, it's on Capitol Records, so I'm very proud of that. But like I said, I was ready to like, let's okay, now I got the opening. And then it was like, oh, doors are shut, we're not doing it here. So I said, no, man, I I'm gonna, I don't care if I and I tell I remember telling them this I don't care if I play for a $200 bar gig for the rest of my life. I'd rather do that and do my own thing. And here I am, I can pay for $200 sometimes, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, but I'm doing my own thing. Absolutely. So it it it it uh it may have manifested that way, but I'm in 100% control. And yeah, and and I just told Joel that I said I've never been more uh free and never been more in touch with what I want to do. Of course. Till you know, till the last few years. Yeah, you know, and then it like I said, I don't care if it goes anywhere, yeah, you know, I just want to do my own thing, absolutely, and you know, getting opportunities like this, it it just like juices you even more. Absolutely. You know, I'm like, oh I can maybe somebody is listening, yeah, you know, and and you

Becoming A Songwriter For Real

SPEAKER_02 59:26

just keep going.

SPEAKER_04 59:27

Yeah, well, I love the whole Tehano thing. And I had a a guy on my show, I don't remember what season it was now. His name is Gabe Garcia out of uh the San Antonio area. And his his kind of claim to fame was there was a show back in the day called the Nashville Star. It's like what American Idol is now, right? And he was like second runner up, and a guy named Irv Woolsey signed him. Uh Irv Woolsey was the the guy that found George Strait and signed him, right? So that's the the Woolsey fame is um so yeah, and and Gabe, you know, he recorded a record some years back and he did it with uh David Lee Garza and uh Ram Herrera. Uh and it was I think it was a song called uh um I'm the one that ain't coming back. And there's there's a lot of the accordion on it and everything. It's just it's really super cool, super cool stuff for sure. So I love that, you know, that style of music. And I guess you know, you're talking about the songwriter in you. When when do you think it dawned on you that you were a songwriter? Like, was there was there an age where you said, Wow, I'm I I've actually written a song, I consider myself a songwriter now.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:43

Truthfully, I thought everybody that played an instrument wrote. And I didn't discover that that's not true. That's not true at all. Yeah, until about 25 years ago. I always thought uh that everybody that plays an instrument and you know was you know proficient at it wrote. And I because I've always written tidbits and and you're your own self-critic, you say, Oh, that sounds like this. Oh, that sounds like this. Stop, stop. It's all in your head. Yeah, you know what I mean. It's about 25 years ago where I was like, wait a minute. This is not this is my lane, because I'm not the greatest guitar player, I'm not the best singer, but I I I can I can tr kind of visualize this vision, this vignette in my head, and then try to put a little storyline behind it and stay within, you know, four and a half minutes. If you can get to three, cool. You can get you know, you try to draw a picture. Yes. And I and I I I think because I've always I remember I think I was eight years old, I wrote a song for my chicken that died. And I I remember like being so emotional, and I buried it, and I wrote a little song, and it was like I was watching MTV one day, and then I heard this melody, and I'm like, that's that chicken song. And it it's the the kids in America. Uh I don't know if you know.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:14

Oh, yeah, yeah, we're the kids in America.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:18

So it was uh that melody, and I'm like, oh wow, that and I think and I'm thinking back, where did that melody come from? But it came from the 45 daddy, don't cry, daddy. I went back and listened to the to the 45, and I said, that melody is from there. And so I started thinking, that's what people do. They they're just products of what they're listening to. Yes. And then and then I started reading a lot of, I'm like a autobiography junkie, music autobiography junkie. And I would listen to John Lennon, I've read the John Lennon books, I've read the Ray Charles book, and they said we deliberately ripped other people. Yeah, we deliberately, and I'm like, oh, there's no shame in this. This is what he says, we wanted a song that sounded like Bo Diddley, or we wanted to take the Bo Diddley thing, and then and I'm like, wow, there's no shame. There is, and then Keith Richards will say, I've only written two songs in my whole life. Everything is a variation of everything else. You know what I mean? And and I said, Yeah, that makes sense because we're all just borrowing. You know, that's our inspiration, is we're oh, you know, not that we're doing it deliberately, right? It's just it's subconsciously you're saying, Oh, this makes sense to me.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:34

Well, you take inspiration from so many different things. I mean, I think one of the most famous stories about taking something and making it your own is Richie Blackmore with Smoke on the Water, right? I don't know if you've heard that story. It's it's it's it's an inversion of you know Beethoven's fit.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:57

That's where it came from. Yeah, like so.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:59

Yeah, I mean, you're just taking something, you're inverting it, right? But you it's your idea kind of like I mean, but if you think about it, there's only so many keys in music like that that you can play, chord progressions you can play in. Every bit of music is the same. Whip no music. Yeah, it's all the same. Yeah, it's the same three chords, right? Yeah, it's just like there's gonna be some overlap because there's tens of millions of songs, but there's only so many chord progressions that you can play, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:26

Is it 90,000 songs get loaded every day? I don't know. It's some astronomical number. Wow. So people are recording music and loading it on Spotify every day. Like I said, there's only there's only so many keys. Yeah. And and there's only so many chord variations that make sense, you know, sure that feel comfortable at work, sure at work, absolutely. So, yeah, you know, there's a lot of overlap.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:54

Yeah, well, I know your song record store days, it it's a nostalgic song,

When A Song Is Finally Done

SPEAKER_04 1:05:00

right? And do you consider yourself a nostalgic writer? Like, or or not so much? Did that one just happen to be a nostalgic song? That happened, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:11

I uh that that is to me is the most pop song I've ever written, I think. Pop-wise, yeah, you know, because it it has a lot of pop element. Normally uh my songs are a little more, I think Rootsy, but to me that was the most that's the most the slickest song I've ever recorded. Slickin' meaning pop-wise. Yeah, but I mean that's the way I can when I hear it, and and and that's the first song I've ever written in F sharp. And I've never and I and I uh the bass player Odie Cody uh uh Odie Rodriguez, he says, you should sing more songs, that's your key. That's the key. And that's interesting. I said, you know, that's that's the first song I've I've ever written in F sharp. And I'm like, I kind of you know, you think about it, well, well, it's one one degree back or one one one degree forward. I've done F and I've done G, but I've never done F sharp. Yeah, but that's new, and I think that makes makes it a little different too. Sure.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:06

I think the voice is different, you know. That's we're our our vocals are all different, right? You're either you have either have a nice high tenor voice or I'm more of the baritone voice, and I think you're more of the baritone voice as well. I wish I had that that you know glass shattering high, you know, thing that a lot of the rock singers do, but I just wasn't I wasn't blessed with that high pitch of voice, right? So a lot of a lot of yeah, a lot of songs have to be re-keyed, yeah, right.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:34

You know, um but yeah, you gotta get used to it. Yeah, that's the tools you gotta totally.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:40

I'm just fortunate enough that I can pick up a guitar and sing, right? And it and it's not But like people don't want to hold their ears. I'm not I'm never gonna say that I'm a great singer, but but but a lot of people can be great guitarists, but they don't necessarily sing. So I was blessed with both of the talents. And I always say I'm not a great vocalist and I'm not a great guitar player. I just happen to do both pretty well. Well enough to not get howled at or run out of a out of one of my gigs.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:09

Call it a stylist. Yeah. You're a stylist, you know. I consider myself a stylist, you know. You you have your own style.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:15

Yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:16

Make the best of it.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:17

Well, is there a songwriter that comes to mind for you that that changed the way that you write, or someone, a songwriter that you can think of that you took inspiration from that because you really liked him? It's like, wow, I really like that guy. That's I really want to get into this whole songwriting thing. I don't know if something there was some inspiration along the way.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:40

So many and so many different genres. I mean, I love John Lennon because he he didn't play by the books. I don't I don't think he knew what he was doing technically, but some of the chords that he would use and the imagination that he had. It's like, wow, how did this guy from Liverpool with no formal training? No, and you have these scholars going, oh, he did this and he did this. You know, he's a sub sub-five of of the whatever key, and you know, it's like he wasn't thinking that. Yeah, even Sting, I uh you I'm sure you've seen Rick Beato, right? Oh, yeah. I love Rick Piotto, and he'll just say Sting, you know, this and that, and you sang a a four a third on this mine. And Sting is just like, huh? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:26

And he's like, Did you know he Sting's like there's so many musicians though like that, Max, that like I I came up through a theory background. Like I was uh I started out uh on piano with a with a classical teacher, right? And you you learned to read. I I read music, I I sang in the choir many years, you learned to sight read, right, as a singer. Um so I could I could sit, you could put a piece of music in front of me, and it I would be really slow, but I could read it, right? I know, I know like what a half note is, how many, you know, intervals, beats that a half note gets, and all of the things, but there are so many professional musicians that you and I grew up with, like that would say Brad Gillis was one of them. Yeah, Paul McCartney. Dude, I don't yeah, what I don't I wouldn't know a C chord on a on a tablature or page if I saw it. Like I just play, I'm an ear player, right? That's all I just play by ear, right? I listen to it and I can recite it back.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:28

Yeah. Wow.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:29

I don't know what all that three-quarter time and shit like that is. Yeah, it's and it's because you we we've put those guys on such a pedestal, they have to be technical players, and they are in their own right. But you know, they're they're they'll tell you that we're not theory guys. A lot of us are not theory guys. We just play like it just feels right, you know, right? Like we don't even know what key we're in, right? But we just it works, right? Right. And but I think that you can get so good at something, whether it's piano, guitar, drums, where and you just know how to make it work regardless. You know, I know a lot of those musicians that say, Oh, yeah, I'll just go sit in with that band tonight. It's like, wow, that's that's pretty ballsy. Like I would want to rehearse and do all the things. They're just that good to just sit in and be able to just respond to react to with that. Absolutely. Yeah. Um what music, you you know, we talked a little bit about the music, the formidable music years, like as a young teenager. What what really inspired you? You know, you start high school. What were you listening to? What what really had you at that point in time? Who was influencing you? Was it all the old rock and roll, like the Iron Maiden stuff?

SPEAKER_02 1:10:42

Yeah, I I see Texas Tapes and Records over there. That's right. I I was there. I mean, yeah, because we were I had a heavy metal group, you know, or heavy rock group back in the high school days. And so all our buddies, we you know, we we after that 15-year-old, like a 15-year break, I said, just music, just music. Like just light bulbs, you know, just music here. Uh so all my friends, we were all into music. So yeah, we we it was a gang, you know. We go to all the shows we could, I cut grass, and that was my thing. Ten dollars a yard had enough to get a cheap trick ticket. I'm there, and then after a while, the guys start their interests start changing, girlfriends and different things, and then I'm like man alone, you know, and I was just like, hell I'll just go by myself, and I'd get better tickets because I just want one ticket. Absolutely. So I yeah, uh and yeah, it was that 15 to about 19 rock and roll, yeah, right.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:53

Heavy rock was was on the pallet. Yeah. You know, you you made me think about I was looking through one of the drawers the other day and I stumbled across an old ticket stub, and it was man, I think it was 1983, Max. I don't, like I said, dates don't stick with me for whatever reason. But it was the Texas jam at the Astrodome, and it was um, I remember it being Gary Moore, Brian Adams, 38 Special, Ozzy Osborne, and Rush. And the ticket stub was $18.95. And it's like, what the hell? You can't you can't even get a beer for $18 anymore, right? And I just saw three of the biggest bands on the planet back then in front of 80,000 people in the Houston Astrodome, right? Yeah, it's like wow. I saw Rush in June. 300 bucks. Cheap ticket. Yeah, yeah, you're probably up in the rafter somewhere too for 300 bucks, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:12:57

Yeah, well, we it was a long story. Uh I got it from Stub Hub and they ended up selling my ticket. Like, because I I never checked it out until we were like two minutes before the show started. Oh wow. My tickets disappeared off my phone. They I guess they reclaimed it. They gave me my money back. Yeah, it was with four of us. My cousin, two two of my cousins and my brother. We have a like a ritual we do every year, we'll we'll get together. And my cousin bought four tickets on the floor by the soundboard. They were available. Same price, but we got great seats. And like I said, last minute, I I I saw the tickets there right before I I guess I was supposed to claim them to let them know that I was coming. Gotcha. And and I said, Well, I'm not gonna mess with it because I don't want to mess anything up. And then I I go open the app and they're like, Tickets aren't there. And I was like, I went up to the and the guy's like, Oh yeah, your tickets, somebody in Atlanta bought your tickets or something like that.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:59

No kidding.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:00

So we had no tickets two minutes before the show, and then my mother cousin just broke out of credit card and found four seats right by the soundboard. And anyway, we got to see Rush, but it was 300 bucks. That's crazy. Where where were they? Toyota. I said Dick and Dickey's Arena in Fort Worth. Oh, yeah, up in the Dallas area. I gotcha. Yeah, yeah, tickets have changed from the old days.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:21

Yeah, I think I saw the last big show I saw was Cheap Trick and Aerosmith. And I think I play I paid a couple of hundred bucks for sitting up with the pigeons, you know what I mean? Like it was crazy. And and it's not even fun sitting up that high. I'd rather just see a concert on YouTube or at a smaller venue. Yeah, it's like, yeah, you're so far removed. Yeah, it's not enjoyable. Well, what what artist would you say come to mind that inspire you today? Is there is there any peers out there, their music, any anything new coming out that that you are into these days?

SPEAKER_02 1:14:59

Tom Petty was a huge influence. I mean back in the day, but he's not around anymore. But nowadays, I've been listening to Blackberry Smoke a lot. Oh, yeah. And and I catch myself copying a couple of their little because you listen to it so much, and then a little a little anti.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:20

Something comes out, and you're like, that's Blackberry Smoke.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:23

Chris and I play a lot of stuff by Blackberry Smoke, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:26

They're one of my uh go-to. There's a lot of them. Yeah, there's a lot of good bands out there.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:32

There's some good Americana stuff out there. I'm a I'm a huge Jason Isbull in the 400 unit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, you can't hardly.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:38

I didn't realize how good a guitar player he was.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:40

He's a great guitarist, but he's like probably the quintessential songwriter. Like, I don't know that there's a better songwriter out there than Jason Isbull. I mean, he's that good. Yeah. I mean, some of his stuff is just amazing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:53

He's uh to the point, man. Yeah. I'm right now I've been debating Blackberry Smoke Rabbit Hole for a couple years. And there's a lot of other bands out there, you know, that you know, that are rocking and got a really good sound. Sure.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:10

You know, we talked a little bit about writing, and it made me think like, when do you know or how do you recognize when a when one of your songs is finished or is it ever finished? Talk to the listeners a little bit about that because I think you know we we talked earlier about well, there was a mistake in a song, right? And you want to go back and you want to redo it, and there's a little of that in songwriting. You write the song, you think it's done, and then you're like, oh, maybe I should have put this word. Let me go back and think about that more, right? So you you keep overthinking it. How do you know when a song is just complete? It's done.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:53

The more I've done it, the more I realized it space is more important. Because when you I guess earlier on I wanted to put everything in there, I want to have this, I want to have that, I want to have this, I want to put all this little jingle stuff in there. And then you can overdo it. Yeah, you know, you you it's and and I can hear that now. Like, oh yeah, too much, too much this or that. You know, you wanna you wanna be creative and you want to put all this uh you want to fill every every hole, but now as you get older, you start saying, ah, those holes are better. Yeah, it gives it more spinning. It lets it breathe, right? Let's it breathe, you know. So uh as I get older and and I guess more experienced, I I want to be able to be a little more uh selective and sparse about how I handle an arrangement, you know. Because I'm I'm I'm essentially the producer too, because I just do it, you know, I have I work, I've done a lot of work with Brian Baker at Sound Art Studio, and he's kind of helped me produce, you know what I mean? Like you can do you got another take, you're better, you can do better, and and then he'll help me with you know getting the balance of the mix, you know. But pretty much it's down to me. And then like I said, after after you step back, you listen to it, and you say, Maybe we shouldn't have done that extra keyboard part, you know what I mean? Less is more, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:18:22

Less less is more, and what's the other adage? Keep it simple, stupid kid. You know, and and I I I think there's a lot of truth to that. You you try to boil the ocean and it doesn't sometimes it's just better to just yeah let it go, let it alone, right? You know what I mean? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:40

And the more I guess the more experienced and older I get, I learn to trust myself. Of course. You gotta trust yourself. And I thought you were gonna ask, when do you think you have a lyric? And it's like sometimes it's early on, and then I know that I gotta hold on, I gotta I gotta commit to it. I I've written songs and recorded them all the way up to the last vocal. I've got like three or four sitting in the studio, but you lose you lose interest. Yeah, no, that's that's a real thing. Yeah, you know, and it's like man, I spent all that money and just sitting in a hard drive. All it needs is a vocal, but I can't get myself to motivated to finish it to make sense, run it out because you lose that that initial enthusiasm. Yeah, you have to have that, yeah, you know, to follow it through.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:29

Yeah, there's got to be a desire there to complete, you know.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:32

Um we we all go through that. I like to I like to joke and say our A D D kicks in, but it's not always A, D, and D, it's just desire sometimes, right? Like I don't magic. Yeah, some days I wake up and I just don't have the desire to do anything, right? You know, I don't desire it. So well, I was wondering, man, if you would uh maybe pick up that Ibanes and and play another song for the for the listeners of Backstage

Live Performance And New Album Plans

SPEAKER_04 1:19:55

Pass Radio. Cool, all right.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:46

Look at what's coming in. Sweet is it really just a dream.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:57

Sorry about that. I thought I hit the record button, but apparently I didn't. So if you don't mind just taking it from the can. Yeah, no problem. What it does feel.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:08

All right, I'm ready.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:38

I'll be so weak. Now it's a five look at what sweet so angelina beat you take my hand for the two night of you, watch the shell process, I'm still alone, I just come I can eat the day and joke, all the same adjustments.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:12

Thank you so much. That's a song called Angelina, right? And you correct me on the date. Like I I mentioned that my dates are horrible, but this was a song that was released in somewhere around 23, 2023, right? So it's a little it it dates back a couple of years, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:25:30

I went in uh actually the I'll give you a little backstory. Yeah, I was I recorded it as a single. It was two songs. We we I was gonna name the project uh the underdog diaries, and I had uh written those two songs we're gonna kick it out. There were two songs. There's there was that, and then there was another song called uh uh I can't think of the name now. Uh oh for what it's worth. Not the Buffalo Springfield, but for what it's worth, but it's but for what it's worth. And uh uh then I got involved with a uh a Go it was uh uh an opportunity to do a uh uh uh GoFundMe or or or uh what do you call that? Uh uh I got involved with Edgewater Records. Edgewater Records.

SPEAKER_04 1:26:21

Oh, where where people pay to get you recording. It's a campaign. Yeah, yeah. I know what you're talking about. I don't know the name of it.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:28

It was a campaign, and uh so I went ahead and pulled those two songs over and put that on the album. So it's a it's gonna be a nine-song album that's coming out in September. But yeah, that was previously released because I was gonna uh I was gonna do another EP. And I have seven EPs, five song EPs, and uh I said, well, I I have the material to do three more songs, and then uh somehow I got contacted. Um I may have submitted and they got back with me and they say, Would you be interested? This is what it's gonna entail. And it was it was it was uh a challenge, a laborious challenge, because it you have to uh ask people to help you out and to join your the journey, right? And it you know, and it it's it was tough. And uh and I guess I said the record will be out in September, the full C D and then so I owe people C D's and t-shirts for contributing to the project, so that'll be out in September. But uh so yeah, though those two songs got pulled over onto onto this full uh recording.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:37

Yeah. When when did when does an artist decide that it's gonna be an EP or an LP? Is it just a matter of how much material you have? Money and material, right? Yeah, yeah. That makes sense.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:48

And I and I've done uh like I said, seven EPs, which I normally do five songs in an EP. And then I my plan was to like pick the f the best uh ten tracks and then make a record. Until then this opportunity came up, and then I I I had just written record store days, and I said, Well, I can do that, and I can these songs are fresh because they're they're they're you know within the two year span. And then I wrote three more. So I in on the project I'm gonna have four new originals and then five five songs that I'd previously recorded. So those those two are in the within the five previously recorded. Awesome. So Record Sor Days brand new, you know, fresh off the rack. So okay.

“Angelina” And Writing Through Grief

SPEAKER_02 1:28:34

Who who is Angelina? Ah, good question. That that my mother. Okay. Yeah, her name is Ivan Kelina, but everybody called her Angie or Angelina. Yeah. And uh she passed away in 2016. And she was, you know, like I said, the chairman of Fun, the committee of fun. You know, she took us to the Astro Games, Astro World, you know, went to see Freddie Fender at the President Rodeo. You know, so she was always the fun, you know, uh loving part of my musical uh uh uh upbringing. And so when she passed away, man, it was it was you know, like every mother, you know, it just knocks you off your feet. And I couldn't record uh I mean I couldn't write a song, nothing came out that year. The only thing I had, I remember I was at work and I was in a hotel in Phoenix, and uh and that that lick came out bum bum bum bum bada ba da bum. One whole year I recorded it, and I just I couldn't come up with anything. And then seven years later, I had that and I knew there was something there. I liked the lick. I knew there was something there, and then Odie and Joe said, Hey, do you have anything you know to to do to record? And I said, I have this lick, and I have a couple of little chords, no lyrics, and and then we just basically synchronized the parts that we thought were gonna work, and then I just wrote the lyrics. So it's for my mom, not directly about my mom. And then during that time, I would go visit my dad in Victoria or Inez, and he would say, Man, I'm lonely, and and I could see like shadows, I can hear things in the house. I know it's your mom, but I'm not worried about it, you know, I'm not scared. And he says, you know, insomnia's getting to me. So there's a line in the second chorus where he says, uh uh, I don't remember the lyrics there. You're asking me directly, I can sing it. But in the line was, you know, basically him speaking to me, like, you know, I can't sleep at night and I'm staying up. And and that's where there's a line that says, uh, you know, I curse the moon, you know what I mean? Because I can't go to sleep, you know. And uh that's you know, just basically insomnia. And uh so I wrote the song loosely about a person you couldn't get to. And this Angelina is like, you know, uh, I can't sing the lyrics. I can't think of the lyrics just sitting here, but it's about not being able to get to a person. You see a person, it's like, wow, I'm attracted to. And it's not it's not in any way sexual, it's just you know, and it's not about directly about my mom. It's just there's a lot of poetic looseness there. But it's like I see this person, but I can't get to them, and I can hear them, but I can't get to them, you know what I mean? So that's what the whole thing, there's kind of a longing and the separation, and and and and actually, you know, from one person's perspective, not being able to reach, and it's kind of a dreamscape, you know, where she she you're so close, I could see you, sure. You know, I could feel you taking my hand, you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:45

So you know, a lot of loose, loose uh I I I love the stories behind the songs, Max. Like this is why I ask, and I think a lot of artists would say I guess a lot of artists don't necessarily care to divulge what their songs are about because it's a canvas that they've painted, and their songs, I think they want the listener to just have their own blank canvas and interpret the song how they want to interpret it, right? But I love that story because if I go back and listen to Angelina after you leave, I'm gonna listen to that song differently than I did the first time because now I know the meaning behind that song. And it made me think of I had a guy named Kyle Hutton on my show, and um he had a song, Country Artist, and he had a song called Three More Bottles and She's Gone, right? And on the surface, you think about that and you're like, gee, another country song about drinking and the bottle, right? Like every song has to have something about the booze in it, right? And that's that was the surface of the song. But as you started peeling back the onion, you realize that him and his wife are foster parents, and they made three bottles for one of the babies and put the bottles in the refrigerator because they knew the mother was coming to get the baby later that night, and there were three more bottles, and they were gonna have to give the baby up. And it's like, whoa, mind-blowing. Whoa. Yeah. Now I listen to that song completely different. It's not about alcohol at all, it's about being a foster parent, right? There's a good song there. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like, so that's what I love about the stories behind the songs because it just kind of takes you into the world of the songwriter. Yeah. And where did that creativity come from? Right. And that's that's a that's a pretty cool story, man. Um that song had a real kind of Latino vibe to it. What what percentage of the songs that you write are Latino influence? Is it a small portion or a heavy influence?

SPEAKER_02 1:34:00

I think that's where I I kind of coined it Tex Americana, because it's a Tex-Mex in Americana blend. And there's elements in there. I haven't sung, I I did early on when I was doing Los Gallos, the Spanish rock group, I did sing one song in Spanish, but I have not sang a song in Spanish uh from 2000 to today. And that's that's my next. Yeah. Uh I want to I want to do something Spanish. That has elements of Spanish or the Tejano or Latino flavor. Yeah, it has that in there, and but I have other songs that have those elements in there because there's a I love the sound of accordion, yeah. I love the sound of steel guitar. To me, those are my bookends, and that's where I want to like reside from left to right. In between, yeah. In between, because that's the range that I want to be in. You know, to to me, as when I hear music, uh I have a song called Waysiding, uh, and it's talking about going up and down Wayside Drive, and that has like a it's a it's a it's a hybrid beat. Like it's got a like that Cajun shuffle, yeah. And then it has a little bit of a cumbia. And so people have said, and I'm not intentionally doing this, but I I think that's what I want to be represented as, as like, you know, because that's my world, that's what I lived in, and that's that's what what uh what's in the the stew for me. Yeah, you know, I don't want that to come out, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:35:42

And it's it what's interesting is when you were playing that and you went into the second verse, I almost wanted to hear the second verse in Spanish.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:53

Ah, never thought of that, yeah. Never thought of that.

SPEAKER_04 1:35:55

I thought that that would because you know uh Freddie Fender did that a lot where it was first verse English, second verse Spanish, right? And then come back to English, and I love that. Yeah, he had a lot of guts, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:07

He you know, I just did a Freddie Fender uh thing down in San Benito, Texas, and it was just for his museum, they opened up another wing, and so I went down the Freddie Fender, me and my wife, the Freddie Fender rabbit hole, because we're like, listen, and I said, Man, for for Mexican American back then, this dude had a lot of guts, man. And I thought, and then we read in his interview, and he was a mechanic, and he did a lot of stuff, and I'm like, uh, this guy was brave, man, and he was he was resilient, yeah, but he was also very talented. Oh, yeah. His voice cut through, like you talk about pure tenor, yep. And and you know, so he was extremely talented. I didn't know he was in the military. Yep, I didn't know that. So, you know, we went down a rabbit hole and said, Wow, I didn't know that. I didn't know that. But I said, Man, that guy had a lot of guts, man. To to like you say, to say, hey, I want to do this in English and I'm gonna do Spanish, and then and try to stay within the genre. Sure. Because you know, it was it it was tough, you know, for him at that time. I can't imagine. Yeah, you know, I can't imagine.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:13

Absolutely. So I give it a groundbreaking, yeah, yeah. For sure. Yeah.

The One Song To Last 100 Years

SPEAKER_04 1:37:18

If one of your songs, I guess if only one of your songs was still surviving a hundred years from now. Which of your songs do you think would best represent who you are as a songwriter and a performer?

SPEAKER_02 1:37:38

I would have to say waysiding. Okay. Because it's who I was. That's that 15-year-old kid. I share this story wherever I played. I say we were eight knuckleheads, and my buddy Mo Fernandes' mom's broham, we called it broham Cadillac, Broham Cadillac. He had this big Cadillac. We put four in the front, four in the back. And then we go cruising all the way out down the wayside, go to I-10.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:11

And still had uh room for beer to put on there.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:14

Yeah, and yeah, I don't mention anything else, but we turned turn back around and go to 45. Okay. So yeah. And that's a 15-year-old's world. We thought, man, we were on top of the world.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:28

We were living. Think about it, man.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:30

We did the same thing, but on Edgebrook, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:33

You think, man, I whipped my kids' ass if they took my car, no insurance. I mean, they had the car had insurance, no licenses. Yeah. Eight knuckleheads, but we we we were ruling the world.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:46

But we could do things back then that we could never get away with now, right? There were not cameras everywhere. Like, you know, there's a lot of times have changed for sure. Times have change.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:56

So that's that song is kind of a and then a friend of mine that I played with in San Marcos, because the band is named Wayside, Waysiders, and he would always say, Hey man, where are y'all waysiding at this weekend? He, you know, he would travel with us whenever we played. And I said, You know, I like that title because you're basically taking the neighborhood everywhere we go, but not sharing the neighborhood. Like, yeah, this is Wayside Drive, and in there I throw down, I throw out canal, navigation, you know, I name all these streets, edge uh uh uh what's the park uh where Odie lives? Uh not Pecan Park, is it Pecan Park, but Idlewood Park. Okay, yeah. You know, so all those things are in a island club, you know. I I say all these things to to basically capture that photograph of that time. Yeah. And so and so I think if if there's any song, I mean I'll there's certain songs that I would consider my favorite, and other people would say that's your best song, but I think if anything represents what I've done and recorded, I think that song kind of captures the 15-year-old uh uh just a 15-year-old loving life. Yeah, you know, just uh and that's that Peter Pan sure period of you know, you want to stay 15 the rest of your life, of course. I mean, yeah, so you you kind of capture that spirit of no responsibility in just in exploring the world, even though the world was only from I tend to uh the I-45.

unknown 1:40:34

We saw it all.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:35

Yeah, you know, yeah. But it was bigger than life back then, it was bigger than life or 15-year-old knuckleheads, you know, we hadn't gone even to high school yet.

SPEAKER_04 1:40:43

Yeah, I totally get it, man. At this point in your life, like what are you still trying to learn as it relates to songwriting or just music in general? Is there any one thing that you feel like, man, I've got to I've gotta accomplish this before I've gotta figure this out before it's all said and done?

SPEAKER_02 1:41:06

Just to be a better songwriter, better meaning more I think the word is a economy, you know, being able to say and play less and mean more. Yeah. You know, it's it's to me, it's about economy. Where like I listen and read books about Keith Richards, and he's like, I will take a phrase out until it almost the song falls apart. And then when it's like falls apart, I gotta put it's like Jingo. I have to put a block back in. But at least the most amount of space, and yeah, and then hopefully, like you said, this listener creates their this own mindscape of what the song is. You know, and then like you said, sure, if you get more insight, then you're like, oh, okay, that that clears up a little more of the dark, the shaded spots. Now, oh, I think I think I I see what he's saying now. Yeah, you know, but that that would take a more intuitive listener to say, Oh, you know, I want to go a little deeper and listen to to what Keith Richards was thinking about. You know, like what's the song about? Um is it Dandelion or something like that? And it's about one of his kids. Maybe so, and then you start, you know, and it's tragic because I think he lost the child, and you when you start like investigating, you say, Oh man, that's that's a heavy thing. Yeah, just like the song you just mentioned. No, that's heavy.

SPEAKER_04 1:42:37

Yeah, and that's like you know, that's kind of like Tears in Heaven by Clapton, right? Like it's like tragic things.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:44

We just take it and oh, that's a nice tune, it's got a great melody.

SPEAKER_04 1:42:46

Yeah, and you go along, not not knowing what he suffered and what they went from.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:49

Yeah, yeah. I I can't imagine that guy. But I mean going through different tragedies and still still has legs, yeah. You know, yeah, like Laura Orbison, you know, yeah, he's lost kids in a fire, and and you find that you you think, well, that would be the end of me, man. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:43:06

But these guys It kind of makes you wonder like people go through tragedies in your lot their lives, and you wonder how they come back from it. You know, I had I've had a lot of people say why to me. Um, and what I mean by that is I had Jack Russell from Great White on my show before he passed. And I've done two interviews that I never aired. One was his, and I never aired the one that I did with Mike Trump from White Lion. And when you were talking about, you know, we're talking about the tragedies, right? And you know, the the big one for Great White was when 100 people in the fire, you know, died in that fire, right? And I think I think that fucked Jack up forever, man. Like I didn't talk to him about that in the interview. Like, I totally you have to respect that because um, but I couldn't imagine like feeling like I was maybe maybe the culprit of that, or I or my team had something to do with that. Whether you did or not, it was at your show, right? And you're like, wow, like how do you ever erase that? Something's not erasable from the brain, right? It definitely had to affect him. I I couldn't imagine. I couldn't imagine. That's tragedy on another level that I've never had to experience. I mean, we all deal with death in the family and stuff, but man, yeah, when something happens on your watch like that, like that's that's rough.

Redefining Success Without The Tour Bus

SPEAKER_04 1:44:44

Do you think your de definition of success has changed over the years? Um and and and and what do you define as success, right? Like if I ask you, define success, Max, like what does that mean to you?

SPEAKER_02 1:45:04

Now, yeah, I mean, back then, yeah, I wanted to tour bus. I wanted to I wanted to work and just play, but not that I'm getting lazy, but I want to live life too. I I don't want to be it's like I told my wife, I I I I don't want to be managed and told, hey, you got 40 dates you gotta do next month. And you gotta, you know, I want to do things at my own pace. Yes, I I want to I want to play at a higher level. And the success is I want people to hopefully listen to the music and say, you know, this guy's not all bad. He might he might be on to something, you know. And and just the success for me is being able to do it again, I just record, do it again, do it again. Yeah, some of those some of the the fantasies of having a tour bus outside my my next to my house. So it's just kind of waned, you know what I mean? Yeah, no toast. It takes I know now it takes a lot of money to start that bus and keep it rolling. You have to keep it rolling once it's on, you know, nowadays it's like I don't know, two grand a day. You can have a driver, you gotta have, you know, the insurance and the maintenance and and everybody in there, you know, it's a lot. And I I I not that I don't have ambition, but I want to keep playing, but I I don't think I want to be in that world. Yeah. You know, because it it it it takes a lot.

SPEAKER_04 1:46:35

Yeah, and but I bet your 30-year-old self would have said something totally different.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:40

That bus right there and you're at the grocery store in it.

SPEAKER_04 1:46:42

Totally, totally, you know. Hey, but H E B. We become a little more practical practical and sensible as we get older. Like that's that's a a want, yeah, but that's an itch that's not gonna get scratched at this point in time in my life, right? Like, like, you know, like I just know my lane.

SPEAKER_03 1:47:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:47:03

Um, and and it probably goes back to why I haven't recorded, like, dude, you're 60. Like, what who wants, you know, like that's kind of my thought process. And it's just my thought process, not only for myself. Like, right. Um, so if I did that, I would have to do it for myself, not for something, you know, for other people, right? So it it it again, success for me is way different than it was 30 years ago, even 10 years ago, yeah. Right, that the thought processes definitely change. What um I think you spoke a little bit about this earlier, but what can the listeners look forward to from Max Rios in terms of new music coming out that you can speak of, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:47:48

Uh well, I have this new album, and it's called Two Sides to a Story, and it's it's four new songs. And and I've released Record Store Days. There's another song called uh Little Sumsum, and uh another song called Highwire, another song called Ching Out. Looks like I did it again. That's a honky tonker. Okay, and uh no one's ever heard, no one other than my wife has heard those songs. So I'm looking forward to, and those will be the the three singles that I put out, I put out Record Store Day in March and Late May, Angeline. I mean uh uh Better Than That was It was an older song that I re that we I went ahead and put it on here because I thought that never got a chance. It never no one ever I I that's my favorite song personally. Of all the ones that you of all the ones I've recorded, that's my favorite. I think performance and right written song.

SPEAKER_04 1:48:53

And I and if I if my memory serves me correctly, that that one sounds just straight country to me, right? Like there was no Tejano flair in that one at all, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:49:03

Yeah, steel guitar and uh I think that goes back to that you know eight-year-old, ten-year-old Max, you know, that was driving, of course. You know, that I mean the country's there, and like I said, people have said country. I'm not trying to be country, yeah. And but that one came out that way. And so that was the second single. Like I said, I had previously recorded that, but I I I I really wanted people to hear that, you know, because it was on the older material, and I thought it would match what I'm doing on this album. And then I'm gonna release Angelina, which was the one I just played, and then the other three songs no one's ever heard, and hopefully they'll they'll they'll they'll like those, you know. Yeah, so that's cool. That's the upcoming that that'll be in September. Okay. And so we'll be on the lookout for for that. Full record, yes. Um first first record. Okay, that's our first full album record. Every everything's been five song EPs. Yeah. Yeah. Only C D format, anything on vinyl? All right, yeah. It's getting cheaper at the moment, but more feasible, you know. I mean, you know, you go to uh Disc makers now. I mean, I maybe I shouldn't be throwing names out, but uh it's it's a lot more feasible. You know, back then it was you know, a couple of years ago, it was like crazy expensive, you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:50:24

So I tell you what, I'll make you a deal. I'll support the record and buy one from you if you'll sign it. How's that?

SPEAKER_02 1:50:29

Oh yeah, and I'll get you one for future.

SPEAKER_04 1:50:31

I don't I'd like to I'd like to give back like every record that's ever been sent to me on from the show. You know, I've had, you know, of course, Graham Bonnet from Rainbow was just here in my house, stayed overnight before they went to to uh on their South America tour. He he signed his record and Tony Carey, who was also with Rainbow, you know, Tony Carey and Planet P. Like I I like, I enjoy buying those because I know it supports the artists. They can take those funds and put back into new recordings. So that's that's my gift to you as to I'll support you if you'll just sign it and I can add it to my collection, right? It's a pretty fair trade-off. So definitely do that. Uh what about any projects outside of music? Uh anything to speak of there that the listeners might be interested to hear about? Oh man. You know, work on cars, nothing like that.

SPEAKER_02 1:51:19

Any projects outside of I I I want time. I want time to. I'm a Super Beatle fan. I used to have a Super Beetle back in the day. Okay. Volkswagen. But I right now I got so many honeydews on my so many. Is he lying? No, I'm not lying.

SPEAKER_04 1:51:38

Yeah, she she validated you. Yeah, I don't like liars on my show, so she she validated that.

SPEAKER_02 1:51:44

I've been I've been I've been doing a lot of that. Uh I've been doing a lot of sinks and painting, and you know, I I'm looking forward to being you know relieved of all my duty, my checklist. And uh if there were a side project, that's what I I've been wanting to do. That's bucket list thing interesting is to buy uh I sold my 71 Super Beetle a long time ago, and man, I I want to just put one in the garage and just build it from new yeah, build it from scratch, yeah, and then just get in it and cruise down the grocery store. Wayside. Yeah, wayside. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I used to cruise down Wayside 75th. I picked her up in it a few times. That's awesome. I didn't have a front seat because I had I think I had taken it out because I had my amp there, you know, super reverb, you know, so there was no seat, it was just me and no seat and the back seat. Yeah, that's awesome, man. Yeah, so I want to I want to that if there's a bucket list and I want to paint it silver and black. Silver beetle, like silver. Okay, yeah, you know, but that's yeah, that's that's a bucket list thing that I've got to clear the table. Yeah, I'm not a great mechanic, but you know, I could I could twist wrenches, you know, and well you only live once, Max.

SPEAKER_04 1:53:09

You know, yeah. When you when you get 80, you're not gonna be able to do that kind of shit. So yeah, you have to figure out how to start to incorporate it, you know what I'm saying? You gotta get started. I say yeah, I say that all the time. Like there's no rewind button on life, right? You you better you better be able to look back and have no regrets. You know, we hear that all the time. No regrets, no regrets. And and there's a lot of truth to that. Um, I'm I'm not the physical man that that I once was, right? I can't, I don't jump on trampolines anymore. I don't do I don't jump off my house. I don't put, I don't change light bulbs where I have to get up on a ladder. Like I just careful. 100%. And it and to the listener out there that's not 60, it's it's a very real thing. Like I'm I'm that guy. I'm the guy that you know would try to figure out how to jump a car on my bicycle back in the day, right? That's just what we just did dumb stuff, right? Right. And I would never dream of trying that now, right? Because I know if you if you fall, you're never gonna heal from it. So you you have to look back and when you or when you do look in the rearview mirror, you have to say, damn, man, I should have I should have built the Beatle, right? Yeah, yeah. You gotta figure it out. I gotta figure out how to get that in the garage and start right on fingering. Yep. So as it relates to any shows uh coming up that you wanna talk about, I know that you know we have a delay here since this is not a live show, but any shows coming up that you might want to speak of uh for the for the listeners.

Gigs, Social Media, And Staying Relevant

SPEAKER_02 1:54:40

I've got a bunch of small acoustic gigs, and I think this Thursday I'm in San Marcos uh Zealaks. Okay, you know, cool little bar. But uh the big show I have is gonna be at Rockefeller's uh August 21st. Okay. We'll drop by then. Yeah, I'm uh I'm going to open for Alistair Green, up and coming blues guitar player. He's really good. I saw him open for Tab Benoit and Cedar Creek. Sure. He lives in Austin. I'm looking forward to meeting him because I I I I live in Bass Trop and hopefully we can connect. But uh uh yeah, he's a phenomenal he played with Alan Parsons project, you know. You know, and I mean it's it's not the same as the uh Eye in the Sky, you know, sure as Alan Parsons continued in that band. Yeah, but uh that that's that's a big show. We we go on at seven. I'm gonna full band, you know, accordion steel guitar, and uh maybe maybe some trumpets, maybe you gotta put that time. Some chingasso songs maybe. I'm still we're we're gonna get together and rehearse next week. I love it. Get the rhythm section you know right. Um and then after that, I've got uh I've got a couple of I'll play over at Sponzel's Brewery in in China. Yeah, we're doing uh uh we're doing their Halloween uh show. Awesome. So I'll have a full band for that. And then a bunch, everything else is just uh acoustic shows. I I play Kreitz over in I'm looking forward to getting some barbecue. They they whine and dinus, and I'm like, man, this is getting expensive. Yeah, they're gonna be cutting and they're gonna say, no, you guys get one slice of brisket and half a sausage because you guys because it's so expensive now, you know. So I'm looking forward to that. I think that's in the full band too in September, I think. Okay. But you know, a lot of one-off shows, a lot of acoustic shows. But the main one that uh I think uh is uh the main one on the marquee for me is gonna be that Rockefeller show where we go out and uh uh open for Alistair Green. Yeah, that's awesome. It's uh tickets are moving pretty well, all the tables are sold out. There's uh limited seating.

SPEAKER_04 1:56:59

But yeah, how do the listeners, yeah. How do the listeners get their hands on the tickets? Is there uh uh just go to the Rockefellers Rockefeller to the ticket uh I forget who the ticket agency is, but it's a Rockefellers awesome system. Yeah, where can the listeners the backstage pass radio find you and the boys on social media?

SPEAKER_02 1:57:21

Yeah, it's it's real simple. It's www.maxreos.com. And uh I keep it pretty updated with gigs and you know things that are coming up. I think that one has uh the news flash that I'll be at the Rockefeller show. But yeah, I keep that and then I I'm on Facebook, maxreos.com, Facebook, and then you can go to Max and the Waysiders for the the band page, but they're they're they're linked, and then the uh the the the site is linked to Instagram, so yeah, and they all link together. And I I don't do TikTok. My wife's like, you gotta do TikTok because all the kids are doing it, all the cool kids, and I'm like you gotta be relevant, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:58:04

You know, that's that's the that's the love-hate thing about the social media. Like I I curse it every day, but you know, as a musician and and as a podcaster, we have a due diligence, right? That we have to do.

SPEAKER_02 1:58:16

And going back to what you spoke earlier, Dana Steele, KLOL was our our way of like the drum beat. Oh, sure, these guys are coming. Yep. That's no longer, you know, now it's nobody listens to the radio anymore, right? You know, so you have to find your tribe through you know, your your your your avenues or media, whatever outlet, yeah, whatever outlet. And I'm I'm like, I'm a little too old for TikTok. My kids are like TikTok, dad. You know, what are your old fuddy duddy? I'm like, and then it takes a lot of time, you know. Yeah, really. To go, okay, I gotta update all this stuff. And you have to do it. So it's your that's your line, you that's your your your outreach to to to the public, you know. And so you some people are really good at it. Yeah, and I'm not, you know. I'm I I I I'm adequate, you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:59:11

Well, I think I think where you and I might get our uh maybe a bad taste in our mouth about the platforms like the Snapchats and the TikToks, is because it seems like a lot of young people, and we're we're not, I mean, we're not old, but we're not 25, 30 years old, right? But the thing is, I think a lot of people on those platforms are going out and a lot of their videos are really creative, but it's not anything a 60-year-old guy is going to go out and do. So they're a little corny, like are there, like you would just never catch me doing some of those things, right? But um, I I I believe if you just use the platform just for kind of what it's meant as, hey, it's Max Rios with Max Rios and the Waysiders, right? We're playing, you know, Rockefellers on this date, and you shut the video off and and post it, right? It's certainly fine for that. But nobody wants to see Max out like doing a polar bear plunge in the pool or something like that. You know what I mean? You know what I mean? Like, like we don't want to be silly, but I think we can still utilize the platform to get the message out, right? Just use it as a message.

SPEAKER_02 2:00:18

You know, after I mean with this project, I've spent a lot more time learning about content and the value of content and how you want to be viewed. You know, there's a lot of good podcast or a lot of good content people, you know, there's some that are younger and they're saying you could do the Philly faces, and I but I just want to be known as a songwriter, so you have to curate how you want to be seen, how you want to be and I've gotten a lot of advice, you know, just listening to these people talk, and it's like, you know, don't worry about getting a hundred thousand views, don't do it for that, but put good content out and they say there's nothing wrong with getting 100 1,000 views a hundred times versus doing something silly like jumping off a ladder polar plane for the attention. Of course, but you know, think of it as curated as content that you want your public to see you in how that the light that you've seen as and it has to be constant too.

SPEAKER_04 2:01:19

You can't just post something once every four months, right?

SPEAKER_02 2:01:22

It has to be so I'm learning that's like be consistent, put performance videos or talking videos, and if you're getting to 800 or 1000, you're you're on the right track. After a year, you all and it's the algorithm.

SPEAKER_04 2:01:39

Yeah, I don't yeah, I don't I don't get how all that works. Like it's funny because some videos get you know 500 views, some get 5,000. Then I posted one of me and Brad Gillis, and it was up to like over 80,000. Like, like it's all in timing, I think. The algorithm you do, you can try to figure it all out, but at the end of the day, it's just you you just post and hopefully it gets out to the message.

SPEAKER_02 2:02:06

Yeah, and eventually, hopefully your tribe will find you and say, Oh, I'm like that guy, I like this guy. Sure. So you can absolutely you gotta yeah, I'm learning. Yeah, be consistent and and be mindful of what you want to put out, how you want to present yourself. Sure. If I go out, I I remember doing some dumb videos of me drinking at a bar drunk and it got so many likes, you know, and I'm like, I gotta I don't want to do that. It's just my age, yeah. And it's and it's like, but people like some people thrive on that type of stuff. Yeah, okay. And you're just like, oh, here's my new song, and it's about this and that, and nobody cares. Yeah, but you see y'all, yeah, and it's like, oh man, Max is all drunk in a bar. It's like, no, so that that that was early on. So I said, no, I you know, I gotta you know, be mindful of how I want to present myself.

SPEAKER_04 2:03:00

Absolutely, absolutely.

Closing Thanks And Where To Follow

SPEAKER_04 2:03:02

Well, listen, Max, it's uh this has been fun, man. I appreciate you stopping by, brother, and and sharing the stories uh with the listeners and allowing them to uh get to know you. So thank you and your wife for for coming into my humble abode here and and spending some time. I mean, we're at two two hours and sixteen minutes, right? And it seems like we've only been here 20 minutes, right? That's what happens when you have good conversations.

SPEAKER_02 2:03:30

Yeah, well thank no, no. Thank you for uh reading the email reply. I don't think it was Facebook, maybe it was Facebook. I think it came by way of email, yeah, actually. And uh and you know, giving me a platform to, you know, because I like I said, I looked at your like look at your list of interviews and I'm like, holy crap, this is this is like phenomenal. Like, and and like I said, I haven't got to fee Waybill. I love I love the tubes, man. I I haven't I'm going down the list and picking out the ones I really know, and there's other guys that I don't know, but you know, it's like the guy in Alice Cooper, uh the guitar player Brian Roxy. I gotta listen to that, you know. So I'm I'm I'm gonna whatever road trip we're on, me and Misty we're gonna be listening to all these catching up. I appreciate that. So you know, but I I appreciate you. I think we're from the same time period because you had Dave Steele on here, and I like I said, growing up, KLOL was the boy. That was it. That was the drumbeat. You know, you knew what was going on, and and and uh now that I know that you grew up in that area, so there's there's there's a nice little connection there. Yeah, there's a connection there. I I I appreciate you you know even responding to my email because I, you know, I'm just a guy with a guitar trying to write some trying to connect the dots.

SPEAKER_04 2:04:54

Well, you know, you know what, Max, yeah, and I appreciate the kind words. And I think at the end of the day, for me to have a guest on, there there has to be something that appeals to me, right? As a as a listener or a connoisseur of of music. So I I would I would reciprocate back to you by saying you're here for a reason, right? Uh, because there's a lot of people that reach out to me and say, hey, I've got this new single, I I I want to be on your show. And and I'm not saying tens of thousands because I'm not that full of myself, but I do get reached out to, right? Uh there's no doubt about that. And if I would have queued up something of yours and it just didn't hit me, I probably I would have given you a response because I like closure for things myself. So I would have respected you enough to say thanks, but no thanks, right? I I I respectfully decline. But some something appealed to me to have you sitting in that seat over there. So kudos to you. Thank you for being here, man. Thank you. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 2:06:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 2:06:01

Um, you guys make sure to like, share, and subscribe to all the sites, uh, Max Rios and the Waysiders. And also make sure to bookmark that official page for Max Rios. That's uh www.maxriosrios.com. I ask the uh listeners to also like, share, and subscribe to the podcast on Facebook at BackstagePass Radio Podcast, on Instagram at BackstagePassRadio, and on the website at BackstagePassradio.com. You guys remember to take care of yourselves and one another, and we will see you right back here on the next episode of Backstage Pass Radio.

SPEAKER_00 2:06:41

Thank you for tuning into this episode of Backstage Pass Radio. Backstage Pass Radio. We hope you enjoyed this episode and gained some new insights into the world of music. Backstage Pass Radio is heard in over 80 countries, and the streams continue to grow each week. If you loved what you heard, don't forget to subscribe, rate, and leave reviews on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback means the world to us and helps us bring you even more amazing content. So join us next time for another deep dive into the stories and sounds that shape our musical landscape. Until then, keep listening, keep exploring, and keep the passion of music alive.