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"It Don't Hurt" with Ryan Osbahr of Pony Creek · Caught on the Mike...

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Warning, due to some language and subject matter, listener discretion is advised.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's not about the journey or the destination, but about the people you meet along the way.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Life has a funny way of always giving us a parallel counterpart.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: And even though your lives don't always directly intercede with one another, your journeys seem very similar, predicated on similar experiences or dreams you may have had.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: Joining me on the podcast today is my friend Ryan Osbar.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: We have known each other for the better part of two decades and have shared similar musical experiences.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to talk about Ryan's current project, Pony Creek, some upcoming releases, and the road that got him here.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm also curious to ask him what inspired him to test the waters of a different genre.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: Ladies and gentlemen, this is Caught on the Microsoft.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: Ryan, thanks for finally joining me on the show, man.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me on, man.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's been a long time coming, I think.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the very first time I listened to one of your podcasts, which I've listened to at least four or five complete straight through great episodes that I just really enjoyed, like just kind of just stuck out to me a lot of the local band stuff, right?
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, we've been talking about it for a long time and super excited to finally get it together.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: So in the intro, I say that you and I have kind of run in parallel paths for the better part of two decades.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's true.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: Very true.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: So why don't you introduce yourself to my audience, tell everybody who you are, and kind of give a little background about how we know each other and your musical journey.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, um, you know, I grew up in Avoka, Iowa, which is about 45 miles outside of Omaha, and went to college up near Okaboji, was in college, kind of got interested in music.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I was always into that kind of I was in choir, I was in drama and plays and stuff like that.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I always liked that entertainment kind of thing, and uh went to college up in Okaboji, started kind of really getting into music and then wanting to play music, and I moved back to Omaha right when the kind was just breaking up and 311 was just blowing up, and uh there was a band called the Coctocans that my brother would tell me about, and then there was another band Five Story Fall that my brother would tell me about, and then there was this another band, Grasshopper Takeover.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_01: He would, you know, and this was why I was going up to call when I was at college, and occasionally we'd come back and I'd go to those shows.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: That was kind of my first exposure to Omaha, the Omaha music scene was going to grasshopper shows when I was really young, too young to even get into bars, right?
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's kind of where I came into the Omaha music scene, and I just kind of taught myself to play.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: My first band was Good Speed, and uh we were we were terrible.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but but we had a lot of fun.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: It was great, it was a great experience.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_01: I learned a little bit about making an album, and so I've been making albums ever since, literally.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: I took a little break, but pretty much putting out albums consistently.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna get to that break, but uh one thing I just caught in that little nugget of fun is you were in choir and you were in drama in high school.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Did you ever kind of think you were gonna do one over the other occupationally at some point in your life?
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: Never.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: No, not at that time.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: Not at no.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't know what I thought I was gonna do.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: But when I was in college, my the first job I had was at a subway shop, like a subway pizza place uh called Dagwoods.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but so the owner had a guitar and he we would listen to music in the back, and he said, Oh, so I'll give you this guitar and this amp uh for like two days pay or something, you know, and that's how I got my first guitar and amp.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so what's what's what's even crazier is so that same guy, he is uh uh one of the uppers at Arnold's Park uh in Okaboji, the big stage that they have up there, and that's how we got booked up there last year.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: So through that guy that gave me my first guitar when I worked at his place.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: So that's kind of crazy, but that was a sidebar.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, I just kind of got into music then too, and I'm kind of lost now.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Dude, no, uh the reason I asked is again going back to those life parallels, choir and acting was my thing in high school too.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Funny thing was, is in high school, I got a lot of college scholarships for acting, and like it was never my intent to go be a band guy, but it just it just kind of lap landed in my lap.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: And your parallels to talking about uh the Omaha scene I had with the Des Moines scene, because I also grew up and or went to high school in college in southwest Iowa, and so I was spending a lot of time in Des Moines, and my my guys were the slipknot guys and and some of those other guys, and it was kind of a roll of the dice.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: It was like you could go to Des Moines and be a metal guy, or you could go to Omaha and experience everything, and that's not a slight on Des Moines, that's just how it was in the mid-90s, right?
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: Des Moines definitely a lot better now than it was back then, I think, overall.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like it's got a really cool, cool vibe and cool scene now.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: So absolutely.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: So your band that followed Good Speed was Icarus, correct?
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, yep.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about the evolution of Icarus and kind of how that came to be and where you were at with your creativity at that point.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I had done good speed.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh after Good Speed, I was in a couple of different bands for a very short period of time.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: I got kicked out of both of them, which is uh something that I've kicked out of people of my bands, and I've been kicked out of a lot of bands.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh I was in the original version or makeup of Man Down.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: Oh wow.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, we played one show open for Grasshopper at uh the brass rail in Lincoln.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I think that's what it was called.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then uh been so freaking long, but oh, Davis Hurley, that's it.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: This other band was Davis Hurley, and those guys were kind of an established band in town, and it just didn't work out.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I think they had already done some recording at the warehouse, and they wanted to really put it out, right?
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: But wanted me to like do that stuff, which I was okay with, but like I think it just kind of changed the dynamic of things, and so it just didn't work out, and they kicked me out, and I was fine to get to Ike Harris.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that's when I was that was when you found people like on Slam Omaha and when you found people on Craigslist still, and you know, it was it was a different time, that's for sure.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I was thinking about it this morning, and a lot of our contemporaries, guys that we kind of both came up with.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: I always feel that we have two bands in our lifetime.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: There's the band that like really introduces us and teaches us about the music business, and then then there's the band that establishes us.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, uh we talk about like our buddy Mark, he had Eyes Catch Fire, and then now he's got Arson City.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he had projects in between, he had projects before, and he'll probably have projects after, but those are the two projects that really established him.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: Our buddy Phil, he had lowercase eye and civic minded.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: You have Icarus and Pony Creek, you know, and I I had a few other bands and Aura Sync.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Stylistically, how would you describe Icarus's music and where you were at creatively with it?
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: I identify you with 3QE, right?
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: Right, a lot of times, right?
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: Like that's the first like band that pops into my head with you.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought we were similar type bands, but different, you know what I mean?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think we were trying to go to I was trying to be like the Foo Fighters.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: I know, I mean, or that's was my influence, you know what I mean?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: And we were nowhere near the Foo Fighters.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: Incubus.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: And you just end up being nowhere near like what you maybe think you want to sound like or what you want to try to sound like.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, I just I'll be honest, back then I was not as into musicianship as I am now in my older age.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: When I was much younger, I just got by on playing bar chords, and uh it was as much for me, I loved to create, right?
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: But like it was just, you know, playing live and just we played everywhere, everywhere, all the time.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: It was just that those days were just crazy, you know, and now like it's not at all like that.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: Not at all like that.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: But but I'm glad you hit on that because I do think that there's something to the fact of finding nuance uh as you mature, like not only musically, but in life too.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: And some people just come out of the womb, they're instantly creative, they're instantly good musicians, and you know, not to say that they didn't work their ass off to get there, but like some of us just try to, you know, get away with just having good stage presence and uh, you know, being very congenial, you know, where where other guys just wrote awesome fucking songs, and sometimes sometimes it took a lot some of us a lot longer to get there.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a really interesting point and a really interesting counterpoint and uh description that you had there.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, man.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's just I don't know, it's just like I said, like when we were playing, we wanted to just be as loud as possible.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like now that's not the case.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I'm I'm making sure like we're all like perfectly sounding, you know.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: Like I take a complete it's a completely different approach to making music than what I did back then.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: Back then it was rowdy, have fun, have a blast, you know, kick some ass, sell some stuff.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: Usually don't sell very much stuff because you drink too much.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: That kind of thing, you know.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: I it was just as much as that was serious, it was never serious for me.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I I know the answer to the reason why, you know, like even Pony Creek to an extent, like I'm a career guy, I've had a career my entire life, I'm gonna have a career my entire life, uh, and I do really well.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so, like, like I'm never gonna be a guy that tours.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: I don't like to be away from home for a long time, you know what I mean?
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: Like, the idea of touring has never like really ever appealed to me, which is crazy.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Don't you think the music industry at whole is kind of to that point, though?
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like, because everything's being done so digitally and online marketing and live events being broadcast nationwide, that you know, maybe touring isn't the only way to be a career musician anymore.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, absolutely.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I mean, look at the last, you know, what we've been through these last couple of years, which has just been insane.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: And like, we went from playing well, we did we were never a high-volume band to begin with.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I made that on purpose with Pony Creek, at least, you know, like ICarus was play everywhere.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: And this band, uh, it was play as little as possible and only play good things, right?
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: And we tried to, when we first started, we did do play everywhere, and we just kind of built our way up, you know, and put out those videos and stuff like that, and that's kind of how we built that up a little bit, and then we started just trying to be very selective with the gigs that we took, right?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so that was completely different from the Icarus days, right?
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: And when we, I swear to God, we took every show, you know, but they were good shows.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, right, it was a great time.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I I don't I don't feel bad for playing all the shitholes that we used to play back then, but I don't feel bad for that.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: I had fun on them, you know what I mean?
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: That was that was a blast.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think we all have our own version of that same exact story, and as we evolved throughout our career, we kind of did it a little better than the time before.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like my thing, my thing with the last band was look, none of us are trying to do this for a living, but it doesn't mean we can't give the mirage that we're trying to do it for a living, you know, and that's that's kind of what separates the men from the boys to a certain extent.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, like we can't play every single week and we can't play the same clubs three times in a two-month period.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: We need to space things out and treat them as events, and I see you're doing that with Pony Creek right now.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it was about 2011, 2012 that you called it a day with Icarus, and then you moved away, correct?
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was actually 2009.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's um, yeah.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: Nope, nope, that's fine.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: I I uh it's crazy.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's been we've been doing this a long time, man.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's a that's a crazy thing.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, uh 2009, uh, me and my wife, we moved to Denver.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um like I said, we had a chance uh for a career out there that we took, and while I was out there, for the most part, I uh completely put all of my music gear away for three years, didn't even have an acoustic laying around the house.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: I did eventually, towards the end, start to get into a band in Denver, but I uh wanted to try to just be a front man, not a guitar player.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, because I thought at that time I couldn't get better at guitar.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe mentally I couldn't at that time.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if that's crazy or what, but um I wanted to see if I could just be the front man.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I did that band, which was very, very short-lived.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: It was probably about six months, tops, uh, called Red Letter Day.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I threw away the guitar and it was a blast.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: It was freeing, it was different, but you also feel naked too.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: So uh it was definitely a different feeling, and it gave me gave me a different point of view and a challenge.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like I like things that are gonna challenge me, right?
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know why I wouldn't have taken the guitar challenge earlier.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: I think I was just burnt out when we moved to Denver.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that was the end of ICARS, you know.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I just think I was just overall burnt out on music in general, and just thought, you know what?
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: I did it, it was fun, that's over now.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: Let's move on to something else, you know.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't off by the dates, maybe timeline-wise, I was off, but it's about 2012 that you actually came back then.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: That's correct, yes.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, there we go, there we go.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: So let's get to 2012.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: So you're back in Omaha and you're exploring music again, or uh, my good friend Dan Olson, who uh plays in the band Sack of Lions, he uh he was always asking me to start playing music with him.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: He's like, I'm doing this country thing right now, and I'm going around, I'm playing all these little private shows.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you should get in on it, you can open up, I'll play, then you'll play, we can play together, you know.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: Let me know.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: You should buy a PA, okay, I'll buy P, you know.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: So then all of a sudden, you know, with before I knew it, me and him are literally playing everywhere and every nook and cranny.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: We played a pool party, we joke about on Slam.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: That really happened.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, nice.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: We played a pool party with a lot of people, but we were set up right by the pool.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: Oh shit.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: And these kids are like doing cannonballs, and like the water's like splashing, you're feeling it drop around you with all this electric gear.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, it was an interesting kick to say the least.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: But like that's where that started, you know?
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: And then I started enjoying just like playing again, playing guitar.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: I bought a really nice Gibson, which I'll tell you what, if you buy a nice guitar, um, it'll really get you back into something.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know what I mean?
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: Like, like sometimes you want to like get into something, but it's usually an investment, right?
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: Or something you gotta invest in to feel do what you want to do, right?
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_01: And that's how I feel, anyways.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like, and so a lot of times I buy a new guitar per album, right?
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I'm not done.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: Or I'll be like, oh, I really want to make this kind of sound, and so now I want to go buy this guitar, right?
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: And then I buy that guitar and then I write that next alb album with it.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: I've done that, I don't know, a ton of times.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: So that's just kind of how it goes.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so I bought an acoustic guitar and then I Dan's putting out music, I should be putting out music.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: Dan can do it, I can do it, kind of deal.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I mean, that's literally how it started.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and neither one of you originally came from a country background.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, how did you make the genre shift from what you were doing in Icarus to what you're now doing with Pony Creek?
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and that's the thing is, you know, Dan's first band was like a punk rock band, right?
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: So, and my first band was probably just hard rock band, right?
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: And but the thing is, is, and even though we both didn't play country, we both listened to country, sure, we grew up in a small town, and that was kind of my point kind of from the beginning, especially with the music change, was I I feel like I'm probably more country than most people are, you know what I mean?
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I've actually worked on farms and uh my daddy was a truck driver.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: And uh uh these are all true things.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're you're not being disingenuous, right?
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: I detasseled corn and I walked beans and I uh dug freaking ditches and fucking worked in fields and shit with my old man.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: My dad moves dirt for a living.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh my entire family are contractors and construction workers from this small town, and so you know, that's about as country as you're gonna get, you know.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: So uh that's kind of what I always kind of felt.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, if anybody wants to question that shit, let's talk about it, you know?
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, for sure.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's no, I mean, I I mean, I had a different, I went, I got a different path here, right?
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, but like, fuck, I'm as country as anyone, you know, and I'll I'll talk about it with anybody who wants to.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right, right.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: Well, genre changes are are are kind of always surprising for people, you know, like like Ryan Adams going and recording a hip-hop album or a punk rock hardcore punk rock album or something along those lines.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: I remember my last year in RSing.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: People we basically we had a third album prepped and ready to go, but I had no lyrics written because I was just over it.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: And people were like, So, what's stifling you creatively?
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, uh, the fact that I'm listening to Ryan Adams and Jay-Z for the past year and I have no interest in doing this style of music anymore.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_00: So, going to your point about the new guitar thing, you know, 2014, 2013, I bought myself a new guitar, I bought myself a new Martin Acoustic, and I had been listening to Ryan Adams, Gregory Allen Isaacov, uh, Jason Isbull, like and that style of music.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I started writing a lot of stuff in that vein too, just because that's where I was at at that point in life.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: So I kind of wondered if it was also something similar to that with you, if it was just maybe a more nuanced thing.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's just where you were at that point in life, too.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'd grown up on a ton of Dwight Yoakum, and so I've always been a Dwight Yoakum fan.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: I've seen Dwight Yoakum probably at least six or seven times.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and yeah, and so I'm a huge Dwight Yochum fan, and I always have been.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so, like, he's always been cool country.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I always liked that twangy rock country, right?
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: Right, and um, you know, obviously you ask, how did I make this transition, right?
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: There are other elements to it besides me saying that fuck you, I'm country, right?
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um no, I'm just saying, right also Billy Frost, right?
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'd be remiss to not mention Billy.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: She's awesome.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: She immediately gave me country credit because she's true blue crunchy.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh she is a total farm girl, grew up on a farm.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh all of our videos were shot pretty much on her farm.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so uh I'd be remiss to say that she didn't help in that transition as well, because when I first did it, I did a solo album, which basically was the first Pony Creek album.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um and you know, she lended that.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Cred to, right?
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: Having her in my band.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: And then also Eric Nelson, our guitar player, um, who is somebody that like I think is so underrated as far as a player, like as far as what he can do and the sounds that he can make, um set him aside, right?
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: He can make sounds like you know, like Dwight Yoakum's guitar player, you know what I mean?
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a hard art.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so you hold on to those guys, and so I'm very lucky to play with those two talented people as well as the rest of my band, and that's that's how I made the transition, you know.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't just me.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: It was a lot of it was a lot of other pieces to make that happen, right?
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: So it worked.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, and and and honestly, the the end result has been fantastic, and it's been very impressive to watch from afar.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like your videos have been top-notch quality, the the the production's been top-notch, everything you guys have put out.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: You even put out a live uh performance album.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'll hit on that just for one thing.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: When I grew up, live albums were like everything, like every band, not I mean, this is the early 80s, I guess.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: Well, but like all the albums my parents had were like live albums, like where you'd hear the crowd and and then you'd hear them say something after the song, or you know, or like the the kick drum, give a couple boom boom boom boom kind of thing, you know, and then it had this more raw feeling to it, you know, that had so much more passion, I felt, you know.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, man, and I started noticing this after Pony Creek started playing, and we started getting better gigs, playing better stages, and I started just noticing how much better of a live band we were, you know, uh, and how good we just started sounding like altogether once we started playing, and so we recorded that on a couple different shows, recorded some video to go along with it, and we dropped it right after COVID-19.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: So I remember sharing the hell out of that uh Stapleton cover you guys did.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: That was fantastic.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: I can't uh I can't wait.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: When we sell our new album, um people that pre-buy our vinyl will get a copy of our cover of Hard Living by Chris Stapleton.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if you know that one, which is it's on the same album as that.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, which is so like if you listen to that album, you'll understand like why I like Dwight Yochum.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because like it's very similar type of like open chord kind of country kind of rock.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so like that's my style, you know.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm way into Sturgil Simpson, Dwight Yochum, those guys, uh Chris Stapleton.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: I really like that type of country.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Jason Isbell, yeah, um, you know, a lot of guys that me and you have talked about you know as liking, you know, over the years.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so, you know, those are guys that I really aspire to try to make a sound like, you know.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's fun, it's fun.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: I've enjoyed, I've I've really enjoyed uh I take playing guitar way more seriously now, right?
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I enjoy the whole process a lot differently than I did when I was younger.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: I still drank.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: But but but like I swear to god, like there were some times in a in in our band, and that was what's crazy is like none of the other guys drank that much.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: It was just me, right?
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: Like I I drank myself, that's it.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, but people that came to the show, obviously, you know, like usually Dan, right?
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: So we always played together, and that's still the case, you know what I mean?
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's what's so freaking crazy about it, is Dan is so frickin' successful.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: I love what he's doing, it's awesome, and uh I'm just excited to be able to keep making music and uh write and put out stuff that people enjoy.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's that was another big part of my transition, right?
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't want to keep doing what I've done.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: And we we rag on our favorite bands for doing it, right?
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: We're like, oh well the stones changed, or you know, or these everybody bands changes the way that they sound as they progress.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: The Aerosmith.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: You either do that or you don't move forward, you know?
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm really glad that this other opportunity has arised, and I've really enjoyed doing it.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, absolutely.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: You hit the nail on the head with you know talking about what Pony Creek is doing, what Saka Lions is doing, and I think that's why you guys are both getting a lot of respect locally, regionally, and beyond, because you are falling in line with the the Stapletons, the Isbells, the Simpsons of the world, because those guys are a different breed of country, they're not the they're not the Nashville top 40 type country.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: They're they're telling stories and they're actually eliciting a sense of soul in their music that may have been lost from more modern and contemporary country in the past 20-some years.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I just like real music now, you know.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I like I like the drums and I like the bass and I like the room and I like you know music that sounds that was actually I don't know.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: Some of it is just so huge and big now and slick and overproduced, and every voice sounds like it's just going through an auto-tune machine.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I just I'm I can't do that.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so I love kind of the style that we have, the kind of rock, kind of country, you know what I mean?
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because let's face it, I was in a rock band, and I I let I tend to like that stuff better, right?
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like I love open, like if it's in uh I love drop D tuning, if it's in drop D, I love to play it.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like, well, all of my new album, pretty much all of them, started out in drop D.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: I that's just where I it's where it's my wheelhouse, you know what I mean?
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: And then sometimes I'll and this is weird, like I never used to care about shit like this, but like transcribing them to how you would play them in different ways and in different positions, you know what I mean?
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: Things I never thought about with music and songwriting and songs altogether, you know what I mean?
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: And it's been a completely different process.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: So now when I write songs, I don't know, I feel that I can be more direct and I can say more what of what what I want to say, and yeah, no, it's it's been freeing.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: So today you guys dropped a brand new video.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and you've got a new album coming out as well as a new single, and then you're already in the studio on another album.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about all that, because that's a lot of shit happening all at once, brother.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, so the current status of us is uh we're putting out a new album, which unbelievable, looks flush.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: Nice trying to find it.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: We're putting out a new album, which is gonna be coming out November 19th digitally, and we're going to start our vinyl pre-sale um on our website, which is ponycreekband.com.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna start that on November 1st.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we are doing a very limited press of vinyl.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh when I say that is we're doing a hundred vinyls, right?
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: And it'll never get pressed again.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I'm hoping that uh some people might want this keepsake.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I've heard from a lot of people that do, so I'm excited to do that.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: That was uh I'm all about like bucket list stuff now, if that sounds weird, and it probably makes me old.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_01: You know, but like now, like I'm just I want to do things like the live album, right?
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_01: Right, and like you know, I just kind of want to keep knocking down things that I'm thinking I'm capable of reaching for, right?
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so um that's kind of what Pony Creek has been for me, and really excited about that new video today.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: It don't hurt.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh Eric Post.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he's amazing.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, did you watch it?
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah, yeah.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: That the the animation on that was fantastic, it was super, super, super good.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, very, very talented man.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's unreal.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: Like, so he he also did this the main thing, and I'll give it to you.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'll send a picture of it so you can put it on something.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but it's it's it's fucking bitching, right?
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so uh he's an amazing artist, and I have worked with him, I have him tattooed on my arm.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the dude's a righteous artist, and I've always been a huge fan ever since he did the Icarus album cover originally, uh, for In Good Company.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so I've worked with this guy for a long time, and this project was by far the biggest and broadest and widest.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm kind of excited to actually put it on Facebook on Friday because right now it's being stomped down as much as humanly possible because it's got a link that leads you off of the Facebook platform.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_01: So excited to actually put it on Facebook so it might actually get seen.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, for sure.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: For sure.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I know on Facebook, if that makes sense.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, it totally makes sense.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_00: I I know, I know our whole group of friends has has seen it and uh and and followed along with it today, so that's been really exciting to watch.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: So, what what is the title of the new album?
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: The new album is called Hearsay.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: All right, and the official release date again is November 19th.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: November 19th.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_01: Cool, cool, cool.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: Right before Thanksgiving.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: There you go.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna be you know, our our thing is is we want to get kind of this album going.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: We already have uh some new material that we're working on.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like you mentioned, you said that you noticed that we were in the studio.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: We are uh we just have been working with Jim Holman again at UNO this time, oh wow, which is a different experience for us, which is kind of crazy.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_01: But so he teaches there, and um Jim is a guy that I just trust.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: You find somebody that you like and then you stick with them.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: And the thing is, is me and Jim, we've gone to many different studios, right, to get different sounds, and we've tried many different kits and many different guitars and many different instruments, and that's like that's where I belong, right?
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: Doing that constantly.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: If that would be Jim, I think Jim, it's his personal hell, but me, me, that's where I belong, right?
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_01: I belong in that room, and I say that just to be funny because sometimes Jim feels I look at him and it looks like it's his personal hell.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I guess he could probably say that about me too.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: But it's just like that kind of thing is is is what really I love to do.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so we're already making another small EP, or I don't know.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what it's gonna be.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_01: We'll see.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_01: We have a little bit of time, but I'm excited to first get this out into the world.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: It is literally the coolest thing I've ever done.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, the process that of making this album was one of the coolest things I've done.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's fantastic.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_00: And to all my listeners, I will be sharing this video from the Caught on the Mike Facebook page.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'll share the version that Ryan's sharing from the Pony Creek page today.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: But when it's officially out on Friday, I'll share it again.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: So if you guys want to check it out, the video is phenomenal.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_00: The song is phenomenal, sounds great, looks great.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: I suggest you guys check it out.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: Ryan, your evolutionary process here has been fantastic.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm glad that we finally got to knock this out.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: I think we started talking about doing this back in the spring.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_00: So, what are some final words of wisdom before we call it a call it an episode?
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I just want to say thanks for having me on, man, and uh sitting near and listening me talk, you know.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_01: I just it I think that we went a roundabout way.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of got lost a few times just because, like, I'm not gonna lie, I in the early days partied more than I played.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_01: Like that was as important, you know what I mean?
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: I ran around with that crowd and ran around with back then.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_01: We used to go out four or five nights a week, you know what I mean?
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: Like it was constant, right?
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: And like I'm not there anymore.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'm like, I don't want to leave the house, if at all possible, ever again.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like I'm cool right here, and so like I'm way more of a homebody now.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: I do go out to a lot of local shows.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_01: I like to support a lot of bands here in town, like to support Dan, a lot of other good groups that we get to play with.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a huge fan of Clarence Tilton, which if you're a music fan, listen to them.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: Listen to Sack of Lions, listen to Daniel C and the hometown heroes.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_01: There are really, really good, heartfelt country local bands here in this town that, you know, because they're not from Nashville, probably get overlooked, which stinks, you know what I mean?
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so I would say listen to local music, man.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_01: Well, sir, where where can we find you guys online?
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_01: www.ponycreekband.com.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you should follow us on Facebook, Spotify, Twitter, Instagram.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we usually put out, you know, we're gonna direct upload our video on Friday to all of our other platforms.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: Our new single comes out.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: You can pre-save it on our social media and uh yeah, check it out.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome, man.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for doing the show.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: All right, man.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: I want to thank my friend Ryan for doing the show today.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_00: Find him on all forms of social media by typing in Pony Creek or Pony Creek Band.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: You can find him on Instagram and Facebook.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: Check out their music, great stuff.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: They've got a few videos on YouTube.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_00: Go check them out right now.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: I want to thank you for your continued support of this show, and please find me on all forms of social media: Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or and TikTok.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_00: Search out caught on the mic, and that's M-I-K-E notmic.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_00: Look for me and uh follow me.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_00: If you haven't already, I would also appreciate for a five-star review on the Apple Podcast app.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm always looking for new and exciting guests, so if you might be that person, please shoot me an email for caught on the mic at gmail.com.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: This has been Caught on the Mic with Michael Clark.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_00: I am Michael Clark.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.