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Raynes- Joe, Mark, and Mat · Caught on the Mike...

• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another exciting episode of Caught on the Mike.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: What happens when two guys from North Dakota discover a singer from the UK on Instagram, fall in love with his voice, and convince him to get on a plane and start a band?
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you get Reigns, and nearly a decade later, tens of millions, millions of streams and a growing international audience, and a debut album that explores memory, nostalgia, ambition, and what it means to chase a dream.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: Today I am joined by Matt, Joe, and Mark of Reigns.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: Guys, welcome to the show.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Glad to be here.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having to be here.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: What a great intro.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_03: Wow.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I get complimented on my intros maybe more than I get complimented on the episodes themselves.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: So if that's all anybody listens to, I ain't here.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just be done with it right now.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I have been talking with your publicist for a while now about having you guys on the show.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: I've been excited since I first learned about you guys.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: You guys have the craziest band origin story.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: You discovered Mark through an Instagram video, essentially cold contacted him, and eventually got him on a plane to America.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: Take us back to that moment.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: What made you think this is the guy?
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: We knew this was the guy.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so man, how much time do we have?
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: So we always say when we're asked about this, like it's a seven-hour story, but we've condensed it pretty well over the years.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um so Joe and I, uh, and Joe, you can correct me if I get any details wrong, because I will.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um back in 2017, we uh Joe and I had, you know, I wouldn't even call it necessarily a project, but I had been writing songs since I was 13, and that's all I cared about.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I met Joe, we became friends at college, and we were just pals for like a year before I realized he could play guitar and was good at playing guitar.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so then we kind of just started jamming together.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I'm gonna interject here.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: We both don't like to jam.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we both we don't.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's not what we do.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: We both don't like jamming, but I liked Joe, so he would come over and we just you know work on it.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_03: And I liked Matt.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, thanks.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um so uh the long story short part of it is that we both knew like like this isn't gonna be anything if we're if we don't have a singer.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because I had fronted like several bands by that point, but like I'm not a front man, I didn't want to be.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um and well, Joe is kind of a front man, but we needed, you know, we needed a third person for the band.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um and we looked, I mean, high and low.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: We put out what Craigslist ads, uh like all kinds of just bizarre.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: Everything.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we we had an email that was please send something good at gmail.com.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and nobody sent anything good, but we were uh I think yeah, one day I was sitting on the couch just scrolling through Instagram, uh, trying to actually like find someone looking for a needle in the haystack, and I just happened to come across a video of Mark singing uh a cover song, and I showed it to Joe, and we we both kind of uh went crazy but tried not to get our hopes up.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: Take it from here, Joe.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I mean the the literally I remember like where I was when Matt sent that link of Mark singing, and it was love at first sight.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_03: And I know like we've talked about it since then, like Matt was just like, Man, I I hope you know, I hope Joe's seeing what I'm seeing here, and I absolutely did.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_03: And it was apparent at that moment that we needed to get Mark over here, or we need to we needed to go over to him because it we we could it's like we could see years into the distance, it everything just clicked, and I mean within ten days, what was it, Matt?
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: Within ten days, yeah, from from that initial outreach, he was on a flight to Los Angeles.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: So you guys all came from different musical backgrounds, and the rain sound is very unique.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: Like, one at a time, what was your background before putting this project together?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: What style of music did you guys play individually beforehand?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I think it's fair to say that I probably had the most extensive like musical background um in a couple ways before we started.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um I grew up um in a family bluegrass band with I've got a bunch of siblings and we all played, you know, the violin, fiddle, banjo.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I so I I grew up doing that and like taking classical violin lessons and uh piano lessons, um and all those things actually I hated at the time because I was too young to appreciate it, didn't like bluegrass, didn't like classical.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but then I there were just instruments lying around my house.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: I just picked them up, kept playing them, uh, taught myself how to play a lot of them, and then uh I got into like the local music scene in Minot, North Dakota, um, which doesn't really exist anymore, but at the time it was vibrant, like there were shows constantly, and I would I would go and I was I would I was playing guitar in some bands and bass in some other ones and fronting a couple others, so I was like really in it.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um But my my anecdote, I guess, I think I've said this in a hundred interviews, is that my I I wrote my first song when I was 13.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and from that moment, like that truly is the only thing I've thought about since then, just writing songs.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: It was just like that was the end of that was the end of it for me.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I knew um I didn't know like exactly what I was going to be doing.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like I I wanted to write, I wanted to produce, I wanted to be in a band and uh, you know, make it.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I kind of just learned everything about as much as I could to like kind of set myself up for that.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_03: How about you, Joe?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_03: Um, well, I'm gonna be honest with you here.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_03: I'm just a cowboy.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_03: I was a cowboy in North Dakota.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_03: Um I grew up helping my dad out with his operation, and but music was a huge part of our household.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I'd like to thank my mom for that.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_03: Um, there's always music playing, music videos were on the TV.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_03: She's an incredible dancer.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_03: Um I don't really remember my childhood without something going on in the background, or my mom dancing and singing, and that's all my all my siblings are.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_03: Um I listened to a lot of country, I listened to a lot of rap and hip hop.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_03: I went through a kind of like a strictly pop phase.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_03: I went through a girl hyper pop phase.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, you just anything but classical, which I'm sorry, I mean, classical is great, but um I kind of just consumed and consumed and consumed, you know, whereas you know, Matt, he he's talking about his output.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_03: I was a consumer, right?
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_03: And uh and a studier of performers, I would say as well.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_03: Um, so that that's really the best answer I can give you.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_03: I could say right now, I really love Ella Langley, I'm an Ella Fella.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, um amazing.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: Well how about how about you, Mark?
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_01: What what was your music background before this?
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_02: I was in Greece, uh, and then I was in I was Jean Valjean um of my school production of Les Miz, so that was uh that was really fun, and that was also where I got I think a lot of my background was classically trained, um, and I think that's that's put me in good stead now, sort of vocal training and stuff like that, with that kind of singing has definitely made um going on tour and looking after my voice a lot easier now.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, it definitely started very classical.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: See, I I like picking that apart because one thing that I think audiences don't typically understand about musicians is we don't exist in one singular lane.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's where streaming services, as much as we want to crap on streaming services, is um one of the silver linings of streaming services is it's removed those guardrails of genre where people don't have to marry their whole musical identity to one specific genre anymore.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_01: First of all, I am completely envious, Mark, that Le Miz is my most favorite production of all time, and it's been a dream of my own to be the one Mr.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: Jean Valjean.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: So that's that's pretty amazing.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: But I wanted to point all of this out is how did you guys figure out what rain sounded like without trying to force yourselves into a particular genre?
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I will answer this stupidly first.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: I think we have just always done exactly what we want, and that's it.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like we have been very lucky in that well, and I mean we've made good choices, but we've also been lucky in that uh we've never had um we've never been in a situation where we've been, you know, forced to like um define ourselves or or sort of make something that we didn't feel good about.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, early days, kind of when we were getting our seal eggs like in the industry, there were a couple people who were like, you know, this is kind of what's what's trending now, and and this is kind of what people are listening to, and maybe you should try and do like a darker vibe or like try and be a little cooler, or maybe the lyrics should be like I I heard often that the lyrics needed to be dumbed down, um, which I did not do.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I think the three of us just like we all like the same feelings in songs, by and large, um, and the same sort of chord colors and textures and everything.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I think part of I mean part of the like the sonic identity is you know, I have a lot of just weird instruments lying around.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: So for a first time in LA, I think like I just grabbed a mandolin and and had like a bazookie, had a violin, and so we kind of just cobbled all that together with what all of us knew how to play, and uh kind of started from there.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: So that's my answer.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_02: And also just to jump in as well now, I think all three of us having such distinct musical backgrounds and preferences, I think we didn't try to create anything.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_02: It just all three of us had our own had our own influence and then when put together created what Rains is now.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_02: And is it I mean it's ever evolving as our tastes do, but I think just the by virtue of all three of us being so different musically, you know, I've I'd never played with someone who can play the violin and bazookie and and so that and then I was playing guitar in a way that I don't think you know Matt or Joe had been around someone like that, and same with Joe, and like all three of us were doing things that I don't think we'd been around that combination of ability or I mean that sounds arrogant, but like you know, just traits, I suppose, that it ended up becoming this really cool thing.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: I would describe Rain's music for somebody that hasn't listened to it before, and kind of as a unbiased third party, it's very cinematic, and I mean that in a very positive way.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's cinematic, and you have textures in there that you wouldn't find in traditional, you know, straightforward pop rock style music, and that's something that I really enjoy about your band and listening to your band so far.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: You guys describe the song Roses All Over as being about the desire and desperation to achieve the dream you've been chasing for years.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: Was there ever a point where you seriously wondered whether Reigns was actually going to happen given that kind of construct uh in style that you guys have?
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_03: This is a tough one.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_03: I think all of us have had such uh you go through hard times.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_03: This is not an easy career to go in, and we knew that getting into it.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe we didn't know how hard it can be, but um man, I don't think any of us had w have wavered in the fact that we know that this is going to work, whether it takes, you know, whether we thought maybe it would have taken three years, or if it takes ten years, which we're coming up on.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_03: Um it's been tough to to stick with it, but we're still here, and I think that speaks volumes, you know.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: I think, yeah, I think it's like uh what else are we possibly going to do?
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: It like not not to say sunk cost fallacy, you know, but Mark well, and Joe and I, but Mark and I or Joe and I are a little bit older than Mark, and I always say Mark just wasted his entire twenties if you know this doesn't work out.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: We had some good times.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: Another one of your songs, Josephine, and it kind of talks about the comparison trap.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I've brought this up on several episodes lately where I talk about there's almost a marketing civil war happening right now in the music industry, and it's the topic of virality versus longevity.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: People trying to make things happen in a 15-second clip that doesn't last a long time, or guys like such as yourselves that are playing the long game because you know that anything worth having is gonna take a bit of time.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: Leaning into the song Josephine, Josephine takes the classic Jolene idea, flips it inward towards envy and security and projection.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: How much of that song came from recognizing those feelings within yourselves?
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think, man, there are a couple topics that when they're mentioned and I hear them, I just I'm like off for the races and gotta hold myself back.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: And the idea of you know the marketing virality versus long drive value, like we've talked about that so much.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think I don't know, like I we we all might have slightly different answers here, but I think like it is sort of a it's tough on if you don't have sort of an identity and a point of view and and you know self-concept, speaking, you know, in general, but also musically, right, artistically, um it is very easy to get shaken by um every new cool artist that comes down the pike and starts blowing up.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um because yeah, like we have been playing the long game indeed.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like we uh we've wanted this um to like, you know, really take off uh since we met Mark in the airport, you know?
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: And but what I always say is like we I I conceive of it as building a cathedral, right?
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: A cathedral takes forever, and it takes a lot of people, uh, and it's exhausting and it's expensive and it's difficult.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: But at the end of it, you have a cathedral, and that will last, and that is something beautiful and real and lasting that exists.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, so I once I started kind of um not convincing myself but thinking of it in those terms, I was like, well, I don't care if this takes 30 years, although I do care if it takes 30 years.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, let me add a little bit more context to that, and I kind of probably jumped ahead of myself a little bit.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: The idea behind Josephine is seeing everyone else's highlight reel and becoming dissatisfied with your own life.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's incredibly relevant right now with how social media is.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, going a step further, do you guys find yourself challenged by the measure of your own success as musicians in such a social media driven world in that regard?
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_02: I think what has made it easier for us is seeing the tangible, like the real people, you know, and and everyone's real, but like to see real um people will DM us and explain how a song that we've that we've that we've released has literally saved their lives.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_02: And I think those real connections with with real people, I think is keeps us sane, honestly, because it's very easy to to to look into well, how many views did it get, how many likes did it get.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_02: But even if from that video one person is talking about it can change their life even this much, then it is worth doing silver.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: I had an artist on recently that used the anecdote that 3,000 fully engaged fans is worth more than 300,000 passive followers.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: For sure.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and and you know, and I talk to you guys about this on a level of somebody that's trying to build something himself.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I've I've had a bunch of big name artists on the show, and you know, I'll have those little viral spikes, but I've never had a truly viral moment.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it is hard sometimes to not get caught up in some of the lower portions and some of the parts where it feels like things are plateauing as you're waiting for that next big spike to happen.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so I know that's something that a lot of artists are facing, and it really intrigued me that you wrote a song where somebody is kind of measuring the highlights and self-worth through through things in an incredibly comparative era of life, right?
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: I completely agree.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_03: This is crazy.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_03: It's you know, going back to Josephine too, you're talking about like the comparison game.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_03: I just texted the team, Mark and Matt and our manager earlier.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_03: Like, I I had sent him a message telling them like I like I don't compare myself to other people, I compare myself to a version of me in my head that I know I'm capable of, and I just can't get there.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_03: And like that's to me, you know, Josephine that that helps, I guess, me process that feeling.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_03: Also, this isn't deep at all, but what a catchy tune.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_03: I couldn't sleep.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_03: Mike, Matt, I even told you, I told Matt and Mark this earlier way this morning.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_03: I I woke up, I can't get Josephine out of my head.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_03: That's all I couldn't sleep last night.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_03: Uh no, you see, Josephine.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_03: Um, that's just a perfect that song is uh man, it's it's meant a lot to me.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_03: It's meaning more and more and more to me as you know, like as the days go on.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_03: And yeah, man.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_03: We have this version of ourselves in our head, and it's so sometimes you just gotta be like, come on, you know, live in the moment a little bit.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, but that's the that's the truth of any creative endeavor, right?
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: You have to be a fan of the thing that you're creating most, or else it comes out very disingenuous, and uh I you know, something that somebody phrased to me long time ago, and I've brought this up in several episodes as of late as well, is if you want people to invest in you, you have to invest in yourself and other people first, and you know I it's such a valuable thing, and I think that comes through in your guys' music, that you guys are truly fans of what you're doing.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: This album that's coming out is centered around time, memory, nostalgia, and so much more.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: What was happening in your lives, aside from just this, that made you want to build an entire record around these ideas?
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: Because that's all core to a lot of the themes that we're talking about right now.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, uh this is not something that we've discussed in uh public ever, but what you know, to the cathedral point, right, like the entire I mean, I think for us we want our entire body of work to be coherent, right?
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: And to all uh make sense together and and connect in a way that makes sense.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so, and this uh this is another one where I could really go off for a couple hours, but um, for example, uh, we had an EP uh several years ago called 49 that came out, and that was sort of talking, it was using the American gold rush as a uh lens through which to kind of look at Our own disappointment and our own struggle and our own failure, frankly, right?
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like it was because we were in California and we were, you know, trying to strike gold essentially, and just it was not working, right?
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so that was what that one was about.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: And then after that came Bloom, which was uh intentionally created because that was sort of a time where, you know, from the sort of desert of the gold rush in the American West, you can have a uh a garden grow.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: And the idea with Bloom was that that was kind of the period of our career, I guess, where things had started to slowly bloom, which uh, you know, I kind of, you know, I think we predicted that beforehand and and uh set it up.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: And then now this this album is in a similar way, like from the garden, like we kind of are taking to the sky, right?
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: And and there's a lot of, I won't give everything away, but there's a lot of um sky and like aerial imagery in this particular album.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: And really, I think this is like a meaningful, a very meaningful, we work very hard on it, album for all of us because we wanted this uh to happen for us a long time ago, right?
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: Like there's a there's a point at which when you're trying to do something crazy and something artistic or creative where you know that you have I think there's a fear that like you're gonna age out, you know, you like you're there we got a lot of hot new TikTok stars coming, and they're 17.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, so but the idea that um we you know we still like we we are missing a lot of things uh in our lives currently because like we're on the road and and we're not gonna get that time back, you can't get the time back, but at the same time, maybe there is time, right?
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe we can actually do this.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_00: So the album as a whole is just reflective again, just like 49 and Bloom of where we are in our career right now.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, and kind of adding to that some of the production choices that you've made with this album, you went towards vintage synthesizers, electronic drums, more electric guitars, and kind of an art Novau-inspired aesthetic while retaining those huge vocal harmonies, and vocal harmonies are such a big key to your sound.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: How intentional was it to make something that feels simultaneously old and new when you think of that sky concept?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, completely.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: Utterly intentional.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I mean, on the production side, no, but I I mean, because yes, everything is intentional always, but I think on on the previous point, I think what's exciting about this album is that that concept of time and or running out of it, I think everyone at some point in their lives either has felt or will feel.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think we're always trying to make something that will last forever.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_03: All this time talk, let's not skip over the fact that this is probably one of the most timeless records collections of like for real.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not even trying to get publicist.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_03: No, this hey, hey.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_03: This is such a timeless record.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_03: People are gonna play this in 20, 30 years and be like, oh man, did this just come up?
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_03: People had never heard of us.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_03: Well, hopefully by then we're just like the Beatles, you know.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_03: But um, I don't know.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_03: I think it's probably one of the most timeless pieces of work that's been put out in a long time from anyone, and I'm just glad that it's us.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_03: Dude, that's amazing.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: I love that you said that because before I jumped on the session, I kid you not, I was having a text chat with some of my buddies, and I'm a former musician.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um, all my friends are musicians.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: We got musician group chats all over the place.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: There's probably five, six different versions, groups of us that are constantly chatting, and one of my friends was getting kind of down about it, and it was very much about the same themes that you guys are talking about.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I said to him, I'm like, you know, the thing about making music right now is the rules are completely being rewritten as it happens, right?
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: 30s are the new 20s, 40s are the new 30s, and 50s are the new 40s, and we might as well just embrace that fact.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, thank God that we're able to have these opportunities in life at this stage in life.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a more pointed comment here, and Joe, you can probably answer this one.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: You guys have gone from an Instagram introduction to Sony Music Publishing, tens of millions of streams, bottle rock, Netflix?
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: No, we didn't even mention the fact that you guys were on an episode of Love is Blind on Netflix.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_01: In stages across the US and the UK, when you look back at that original Instagram message, does the reality of where you are right now feel real?
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_03: No, I yes, no, maybe, I don't know.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_03: All I know is I'm having the time of my life right now, even though it's really hard.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_03: I'm just okay.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_03: Let me restart this.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_03: I'm in a band with two Michael Jordans.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_03: People always talk about Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_03: I'm in a band with a person who has a once in a generational voice.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_03: Once in a generation voice, okay?
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_03: Best singer I've ever heard in my life.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_03: I'm in a band with literally a once-in-a-generation songwriter.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_03: Okay?
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_03: Like, I get to be with that every single day.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_03: I'm very lucky.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_03: So looking back at that message, well, I'm sure glad that we sent it because I just wanted to give the flowers to to Mark and Matt here.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_03: Um, you know, people always, like I said, talk about the Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_03: Sh shoot.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_03: There are you can say whatever you want to say.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_03: Shit.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_03: There's yeah, it's uh it's pretty special.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_03: It's a very special thing that I think we have going on.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_03: And man, looking back at that message, it's just like, whew, we sure have come a long way, but there is a lot more uh road left ahead of us that we have yet to we have yet to traverse, but um we're on our way and uh the sky is not the limit, it's beyond.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_02: So I just say I just say thank thank God that we all found each other because the it's only when we do interviews like this that we revisit how crazy it is that the three of us met and then not only met despite all uh resistance logistically, geographically, that what we were up against, created this band and have and I can say it confidently have changed people's lives, I think is all the more reason why, yes, it's taking too long, and it always feels like it's taking too long, but it will always feel like this is the only thing that we were supposed to ever do.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_02: I love that.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_02: I love you guys.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_01: I love you, Joe.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: I gotta tell you uh a term I've heard thrown around a lot, again, a lot by artists that have jumped on the show recently is hope dealer.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know, um I I'm always one that kind of focuses on optimism, looking through windshields versus looking through rear view mirrors.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_01: You guys have spent almost a decade building towards this debut album.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: If Radio Remind Me is the beginning of the next chapter rather than the culmination of the first one, what does Reigns look like five to ten years from now?
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: There are a lot of ways to answer that question.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, hopefully all three of us are even better looking.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's the first thing.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: No, I think I think uh what's amazing, what I love, is that it's very hard to say, right?
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: Because uh sonically, like we have done a lot of stuff.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: Like we can do folk, you know, we can do afro pop, we can do rock, we can do 80s, we can do straight down the middle pop and world music, like all this stuff.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I think um as long as we kind of continue to A, get lucky and B, make you know smart choices, um, I really think like I don't know, this is a question I like to think about because it's exciting to think like what can we do next?
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because the answer, and I think I'm not even gonna say this is arrogant because I think this is just a fact.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: For us, we have uh kind of built such um sort of wide parameters around what we're like allowed to do artistically in the public perception that um we can, you know, I probably wouldn't do a jazz album, maybe, but I I feel like there are just so many things that we could do um in the way that you know we wanted to.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: I had the privilege of watching the pure blue video, which is not out as of this recording, it's it's still kind of private.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I gotta tell you, you know, when I went back to my commentary about you guys being cinematic, I think that visual matches the sound of your band so well.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: So through each of your own words, try and keep it short, a sentence each, what is a reason that somebody who is unfamiliar with your band should check out Reigns today?
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_00: I sincerely believe that we have some of the best songs out there.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: We have never released a bad song and we never will.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's hard to top.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_02: If you want a safe space to fully be yourself in whatever way that manifests itself, then Reigns is the right band for you.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_02: Reigns frickin' rules.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: You guys did such a good job.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: Those were three answers that really kind of sum up each of our whole entire personalities.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: That's exactly what I was going for.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: That is very funny.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_01: Amazing, guys.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_01: I have been excited for this conversation for a while now, and uh as I expected, 40 minutes has just absolutely flown by.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_02: Keep it going, come on.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: My closing question that I ask every single guest that does my show, again, it's a one-at-a-time type question.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: Given your guys' experience, everything that you guys have gone through, the culmination of all things considered, what's your advice individually for making the world a better place tomorrow than what it is today through your eyes and your experience?
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_00: The world is built by people who have passion.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: The world is a passion project.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: Everything you see was because someone loved it enough to make it.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I think that that, in and of itself, I don't think you need to have a message, I don't think you need to uh put together a mission statement.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think that if you love the thing you're doing, whatever that is, then you A personally will be fine, and B, you can't help but make the world better.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_02: Do not be afraid to feel things.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I say that because I think too many times people are told I I I am so grateful that I feel very deeply, and I think more people should lean into that because if you listen to your own feelings, especially in the creative space, but even just in day-to-day life, people are going to understand you more, you are gonna be more seen, you are gonna be more understood, and I think if more people did that, a lot of people would be in a much better place, and I think a lot more people would probably argue a lot less, too.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_03: Man, okay, Socrates and Plato, it's hard to follow that up.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_03: Those are great answers, guys.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_03: Um honestly, I'm not even kidding.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_03: Be a good person and try to have a bigger world.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_03: And what I mean by that is I just saw something yesterday.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_03: I'm talking, I can't believe I'm about to talk about a TikTok.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: But um No, dude, I've been on the Anthony Bourdain rabbit hole on TikTok lately.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, so so I get it, bro.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's culture, you're allowed.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_01: Go ahead.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_03: The whole thing there was I can't remember who said it or what, and I'm gonna butcher this.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_03: I'm just gonna try to summarize it.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_03: It's like you need to have a bigger world, meaning, like uh if you're but like if let's say something's bugging you, and whatever it puts you in a bad vibe, that's gonna affect everyone around you.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_03: So create a bigger world for yourself so that problem seems a heck of a lot smaller, and really ground yourself and put things into perspective, things are not that bad.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_03: It is bad for some people, right?
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_03: But these four people right now on this screen, me included, we have a pretty good life.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_03: And let's take our blessings and try to send those to other people who might not have blessings like we do.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_03: So create a bigger world for yourself and be a good person and be a good vibe, and everything's gonna be okay.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, everybody just needs to embrace the term nuance again and realize that this is a nuanced world.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, and it's a nuanced podcast.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_03: You've had great questions.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, guys, I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know you.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Tell everybody where they can find your band online and your music.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_00: Find us all over the internet.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, the band's name is Reigns, R-A-Y-N-E-S, and our handle across everything is Reigns Music, because Reigns was taken, but we're gonna get that someday.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_00: So Reigns Music on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, or X, whatever it is, uh, TikTok, uh, Instagram, whatever.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: Guys, Matt, Mark, Joe, Reigns, thank you guys so much for doing the show.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_01: I have really enjoyed getting to know you guys.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_01: Mark me not only as a fan, but as a friend, and the door is always open for you guys to come back on.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks again.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: The world is a much better place with you guys in it.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much, Mike.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's been an honor.