Coming to you from the studios at the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66, it's the Rock and Roll Chicago Podcast. Hey everybody, it's Ray the Roadie. And this is Hollywood Mike.

How are you doing today? I'm doing good. Just flew in from the West Coast. You just flew in from the West Coast.

Oh yeah, my arm's tired, man. Where were you on the West Coast? Isn't that old? That's pretty Rodney Dangerfield. Yeah, I don't even think that's Rodney Dangerfield.

No, I wasn't on the West Coast. I was on the West End of Joliet for a little while, but... Oh, okay. That's West.

Oh, gotcha. All right. I thought you were out of town like I was out of town.

Yeah, you were in Florida, you dog. Yeah, no, it was for business and... But it's still Florida. Yeah, but you barely see the outside of a hotel room when you're... Yeah, did you have any fun? Do anything special down there? No, not really.

No, no gigs or anything? No. No. All righty.

Well, we got a gig going on tonight here at the beautiful studio at the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66. We got Forever Flannel. Hey guys.

What's up? Who we got here? Let's pretend we're in third grade and we're introducing ourselves for the first time. I'm Brian. Hello, Brian.

Hello. Hello, Brian. It seems more like an AA meeting.

Okay, it could be that too. I'm Brian. I have a problem.

I'm Rick. Hello, Rick. Hello.

Hello, Rick. Hi. Hi, I'm Steve.

Nice to meet you. Hi, Steve. You can actually pull that one like in the middle between you two and you can get really cozy.

Yeah, there you go. We've been through a lot, so it's cool. So here you are, finally.

Long ride down here. Yeah, we come from McHenry, so it's not so bad. I came from work and everyone else probably did the same.

Yeah. That's home with Doug Julen. Who? Doug Julen lives in McHenry.

He's with Poi Dog Pondering. He's one of the co-hosts of the Udall Podcast. He's in Expo 76.

He's in a bunch of bands. Okay. All right.

Did not know that. You got to look them up. All right.

Write that down. All right. So tell us about this forever flannel thing.

Is it something that you guys just always wore flannels and you wanted to keep it going or? Well, we were all in a band before and it started to just kind of break up a little bit. Everyone's going their own separate ways. And I joined another band called Faded Flannel.

And I've always had this deep-rooted love for, like, 90s alternative and grunge. And the band that we were in, we only did some of those songs. So, I mean, I got tied into them.

Then we started flipping some members. I'm like, well, I know a couple of guys that are perfect for the job. Have you found them yet? Yeah, still working on it.

I wouldn't know how to play bass. No, I'm just kidding. We're specifically looking for a drummer.

Yeah. He's terrible. So how long have you guys been together as a forever flannel? Two years.

Two years. But before that, it was many years with Faded Flannel. Like I said, we were all in a band for years prior to this.

And so it's been cumulatively, it's been, I don't know. Twelve. Yeah.

Something like that. So we're not new to playing together. Right.

The three of you. The three of you were all in a band together. You guys all been in the same sandbox together.

Yeah. Me and this guy, we go back close to 20 years and two or three marriages. A couple of kids.

We go back pretty far. We did the whole original band. We're going to be the next Metallica thing.

And that didn't pan out. Having Metallica open for us, they turned us down. I don't know why.

Imagine that. Yeah. We decided, let's try dipping our toes in covers.

And we kind of flopped around a little bit, but then we got it going. And then our drummer and Brian actually go back. Kind of like how me and this guy are.

Him and our drummer, Sean, they go back quite a ways too. Yeah. We've known each other since we were four and we've been in pretty much every band together, including church bands and everything else.

Okay. So, are you looking for a drummer now? You said? No, no, no. We got to give Sean.

We always give him a shot. We got to razzle him up a little bit. So when he hears this, he's like, why are you guys talking about? Okay, Sean, you're safe.

They've handed you the rose. So I'm guessing the whole theme of the flannel thing is basically based out of 90s grunge and 90s rock and the whole thing. Yeah, absolutely.

90s grunge alternative, you know, we kind of expand into the early 2000s a little bit. Just so it's not like we're not pigeonholing ourselves, but it's still the 90s alternative. It's still the grunge aspect.

So it's definitely a lot of fun. Like he said, we all grew up with grunge and alternative music. So here we are covering it now.

So maybe it's me because I'm getting older, but I'm looking at these guys thinking they were like three in 1995. No, no, no, no. Wow.

Okay. Well, I guess it is that I'm getting old. So, so tell us a little bit about your influences then.

Let's see if we can guess your age by the influences and the things that you talk about. Yeah, I like this game. Go ahead, Ricker.

All right. Well, I started playing guitar when I was about 11, 12 years old, really into thrash metal, Metallica, Megadeth, Big Four stuff, Slayer, uh, you know, then kind of got out of it cause I wasn't into alternative and grunge when that was going on. Cause I was a metal head.

And, uh, so, you know, when the early two thousands came around with like the metal core stuff, I really liked and got into that when these guys were looking for a guitar player, I'm like, Hey, you know, I can play. And you know, we, like I said, me and this guy, we go back in bands and I guess what's your favorite metal act then? My favorite? Yeah. I don't know.

There's so many. It's just like, if it's good, it's good. If it's not, it's not.

It's hard to say just one. I, I may, maybe my favorite has been my favorite concert I've been to is this little hole in the wall that we went to. We, we saw a kill switch engage there.

They did the 20th anniversary album and it was just, it was about the size of this room and it was so cool. Yeah. So that's gotta be one of my favorite.

Okay. So how old am I? I'm not there yet. Well, I started very early singing.

Um, my grandma would make me sing in the, in the car, car rides and everything. You know, you are my sunshine and all that good stuff. Anyways, sing that to me because we're getting there.

Baby steps. Maybe you could perform that here in the studio staring at each other's eyes. Oh yeah.

I mean, honestly, I started off like most singers probably, I mean, karaoke and everything, but like, you know, influences were heavy into Alice in Chains, STP, did a Pearl Jam stint a little bit in high school. Uh, out of high school I was huge into Korn. Um, but Alice in Chains is my forever band, you know, Lance Daly.

I even like the new stuff. Yeah. I kind of just stumbled into music.

I mean, I would sing karaoke and they have you up for one song every half hour, hour. I wanted more. My vocals, I knew can just handle, you know, so much more.

So I just wanted to be in a band, you know, and now I can run three, three and a half hours of nonstop. You know, it's fun. Awesome.

Awesome. Last but not least, last but not least. So unlike these guys, uh, I'm more into the punk rock and pop punk, um, slick shoes, MXPX, um, goatee hook, yellow card and that kind of stuff.

Um, but my heart actually rests in country music. Fun fact. There you go.

Um, I love country ever since I was a kid. That's what I grew up on. Um, obviously, you know, you get all your friends are getting into punk rock and everything.

And so I, I did, and obviously I love it, but, um, country is definitely where my heart is and that's a lot of my influence and things that I do. So, okay. Yeah.

We played some country in this band too. Cause I mean, cowboys wear flannels. It's true.

It's a fact it's it's in the Magna Carta. I think it's a prerequisite. Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. So that's, that's my story. All right.

Did you guys didn't all go to high school together or anything? Did you know? No, I'm actually a little bit younger than them. I was going to say you're the youngest from, um, the punk influence that you were into. Yeah.

Yeah. Just from the bands that you were named. So I'm thinking that you guys are ranging somewhere between like 35 and 42.

Am I, am I hitting it right? Um, kinda. Yeah. All right.

Okay. Well, I'll tell you what, why don't you guys play for us and, uh, oh boy, that'll be kind of a telltale thing. Don't even, don't even pretend that everybody gets here and they're like, oh yeah, we're going to bring our guitars.

We're going to play in the studio. And then you say, okay, play in the, I'll go, oh geez, we've never done this before. It's true.

We've never done this before. Um, you don't have to worry about the guitars getting right into the microphones because they're going to get picked up and you don't have to sing right into the microphone. You can kind of back off it a little bit.

The room kind of picks everything up, you know, ambiently. So check two, uh, which one? Uh, I don't care. I'm going to send the horrible English.

Sure. Let's do that. One, two, three, four.

Surprises. Let me know. She cares.

That wasn't the right words to that song. They threw in the porno thing. I know it's when you got a good lady, you got a good lady.

I don't know if that's going to fly in Florida anymore. Oh boy. What's going on in Florida that I don't know about, you know, all those crazy laws now that they're passing down there.

Yeah. We don't want to get it. We, the show is not political in any way.

Believe me, I got an air when I was there, uh, last week. That was crazy. Yeah.

So this, uh, we are a non-political non-religious show. I think we just proved the non-religious part. Yes.

Only for comedic purposes. That was good guys. Thank you.

That was good. Okay. We'll see you.

No, I'm just joking. Drive down here from where Henry one song. That's it.

So do you guys do any original music at all? No, no, no. I don't ever have any aspirations to do that or just decided a really long time. Like about the only thing we do for as far as original is we'll noodle around, you know, before we play songs or something.

And, but not really. Did you say you did some original stuff years ago? Oh, years and years and years ago. Yeah.

I don't think I'd even remember how to play most of it. What kind of music was that? This is hard rocks, heavy metal, like, you know, things like that. All right.

Like I said, trying to get Metallica to open for us. Right. All right.

Who's the, who's the writer in the group here? Ricker. Yeah. Ricker is the songwriter.

You know, he makes all the licks and you actually had a huge hand in writing lyrics back in the day too. I only wrote a handful of songs. So yeah.

Ricker's the man. And I don't know what you did in Grimley. What's the, what's your band name? What was your band name? That one.

Yeah. I did all the guitar writing and pretty much the solos. I did a lot of the bass recording for past bands.

So I was kind of like did most everything except for the drums. Sean, Sean did the drums. Okay.

All right. On our quest to figure out how old you guys are. Yes.

Yes. Oh, this is a familiar sound right here. I think some people know about this.

So we're going to start right here. We're going to play Yahtzee. Okay.

Okay. Pick a penny. Oh, pick a penny.

Each one of you, each one of you pick a penny. I'll pick one for you, Rick. All right.

Now read the date on the penny and tell us what you were doing, where you were musically during the year on that penny. I got 2017. Okay.

So that's not that that's not too far. No. 2017.

We actually were in our other band called the Renegades. Yeah. The Renegades.

Yeah. So when did the Renegades come in? Was that, was that after Forever Flannel? No, it was more previous, previous, previous. Okay.

All right. And so during, so why did that band break apart? Um, just kind of, I don't know, became for lack of better words, I don't know, stale. We kind of became stagnant with a lot of things that we did.

Um, it really kind of. Everybody was starting to do other bands and kind of, it just, you know, just kind of came to an end. It was the same kind of music time.

No, it was, we would play hip hop, rap, country, rock, um, oldies. We used to do a great cover of a stand by me. We did.

Yeah. It was, it was super cool. So it was, it was mostly in like a pop punk kind of vibe to live to it.

Yeah. Okay. Baby got back.

That was always a hit. We did a heavy cover of Cyndi Lauper's time after time. Yeah.

Wow. Awesome. So it seems like, um, like your current set list would be a lot of the, of like the same genre of music.

Is, is, is that a, a true statement? He's kind of hovering around that nineties. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, we definitely hover around the nineties rock, but we do expand. Okay. So we're, like I said, we don't pigeonhole ourselves and we're stuck with only this amount of songs and we have this amount that we can.

Yeah. You said you do a little bit of country and we do a little bit alternative and beyond. Oh, it said beyond.

It's our loophole, man. I thought that was just fake meat. No, no, we're not alternative.

So you find it, um, do you find it easier or difficult being a band that's kind of known as more of like a nineties rock band then? I mean, there's some bands out there that literally will do, you know, a third or set will be country. A third or set will be pop. A third or set will be maybe the music that they love would be, which would be like a harder rock or something like that.

If the majority of your set list is nineties pop or nineties rock and people kind of, you know, think by the name, are you finding it harder to get bookings easier to get bookings? Easier. Easier. You're finding easier.

Absolutely. And why? You, you read the name and you, if you see the name, you know what you're in for. Basically.

It's so easy for our booking guy to book shows. Um, the owners know what we are as soon as they hear the name, they, they think grunge, you know, but it's, you know, once we tell them that it's nineties alternative, they perk up even more because I mean, some places don't want a night of all grunge music, you know, because there's some fun nineties songs that'll kind of, you know, get the girls dancing and stuff. Right.

Right. Right. You know, cause I mean, the reason I'm asking is because there was a time, probably about 10 years ago, you know, or so where if you said that we were nineties rock, it was harder to get a gig.

They wanted nineties pop. So they wanted somebody that had a female, you know, front person, a male front person, you know, they would, they would even ask, do you have a keyboard in the band or whatever it is. And they were expecting, if there was rock and roll, they were expecting things like train and matchbox 20.

Oh yeah. Right. And it's still true to what you're saying to, you know, to nowadays where they want pop nineties, you know, like there's one club that, um, that books us late in the season because he only wants pop nineties in the heat of the season, which I get it, you know, it's, it's, uh, an outdoor place.

So, I mean, it's just, it's fun, you know, but there's another place that's booking us specifically because we can do that in the middle of the heat in the summertime. And we played the gig last year and it was amazing. So it's like, yeah, we're back on it again.

Right. It's, it's a good thing. The name does speak for itself and it's, it helps a lot.

Cause then you also don't get shoved into a place that, you know, Oh, they're expecting a pop rock band, but we're not a pop rock band, you know, with, if you had a different name or something like that. Right. Right.

What do you, what would you say the, like the average age of your demographic is? How many don't the people that go to your shows? Yes. That kind of depends on where we're at. I mean, the last crowd we were at, I would say probably 30 between thirties and fifties.

Yeah. Okay. I mean, yeah, I could, I could totally see that because, you know, I mean the nineties, you know, yeah.

The 20 year olds nowadays, and I'm not picking on anybody. They're, their attention spans a little bit smaller with, but when it comes to live music, I've kind of noticed not everybody, you know, but because of this, I was going to say, their arms and shoulders get tired because they're looking at the show through a four inch screen. But eventually, you know, I think you start getting older and you start appreciating, you know, music that's played by people and done by people.

But you know, when you're young and partying, you're not paying attention. Right. Yeah.

You know, I've noticed that, you know, the younger crowd, when I say younger crowd, I mean between 21 and 30, that they are starting to go out and listen to other bands, you know, that play music more than just from what their generation would consider to be pop or rock music or whatever. Because I think they're all kind of getting tired of the whole dubstep thing. Right.

Yeah. It's what it's coming. It's what it kind of comes down to.

Well, they're finding out that more than just the computer makes music. Right. There's actually people playing instruments, not just a computer.

Right. Right. Right.

And every time somebody says that, I think of that Family Guy episode where they, you know, they clip away and the Black Eyed Peas walk into a recording studio and one of the guys goes, what's that? And he goes, this is a guitar. And he goes, whoa. I mean, I've had shows where, where my older son and daughter come out and they bring their friends with and stuff.

And, you know, they're 23, 24 and she's 19. So 24 and taking notes. Yeah.

I'm taking notes. Got it. Yeah.

So I mean, they come out, they have a good time. So no, that's good. It's good to see them.

It's good. Who's next with our pennies? What year? Need a reading glasses. Okay.

So we know he's older. We know right there. 1999.

Oh, wow. That's a good, that's a, that's a good year. She had that one.

Man, I was barely out of high school. Did that give it away? A little bit, a little bit. Yeah.

I was pretty sure I was into corn and I wasn't into music, you know, so to speak. So no, cause you were into corn. He just said that.

Oh man. I mean, I thought maybe he was distilling bourbon or something. Performing.

He was just traipsing around a cornfield. That's what it's all about. Trying to get just behind the ears.

Oh, geez. I think we're all showing our age. So what were you doing musically then? Absolutely nothing.

Really? Absolutely nothing. So when did you start playing music? If you were barely out of high school, when did you decide you're going to start singing or whatever? 2004 or five, I think when I started getting drunk at the bars and doing the karaoke thing. Yeah.

But that's when I found you in 2008, I think. Chewy got us hooked up. Yeah, Chewy did from Chain Wax.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So I wasn't doing much in 99. No. No.

Okay. All right. Wow.

Next. That's amazing. 2006.

All right. What age would that put me at? Well, that's what he's guessing. Yeah.

I want to say at that time, I was probably right around going through my first divorce. Okay. And musically, we were doing the original band project and just thinking we were rock stars everywhere we went.

Right. Right. Right.

I don't care if there was four people or 400. We were, you know, we were doing burnouts, man, like Ricky Bobby. You know? Right.

Right. Right. Yeah.

You know, so it's about really all that was going on back then. Right. Okay.

And so you guys have been together a while. So tell me a little bit about, you know, I think you guys have told us about your favorite gig. Tell us about your worst gig when everything just kind of went terribly wrong.

And how did you handle it to turn that around? Oh, yes. He's got it. I think he's got one.

Oh my gosh. All right. So it was probably one of the first bands I was ever in.

Of course, that's going to be terrible when it's your first band. We, uh, I think we had a total of three practices under our belt writing original music. Nice three practices.

And we're like, let's do a show. So we did a show, um, except for the show was in the basement that we practiced in. Um, we invited people the day before, uh, we had people that came, um, actually filled the basement.

I was pleasantly surprised because no one has ever heard of us. And, uh, um, we were running a karaoke machine for vocals. I was using a Royce drum set or no, there was a Walmart drum set at that point.

Cause I was the drummer for that band. Um, our guitarists were using micro amps. So the sound was amazing.

Like the little pig nose amps or whatever. I don't even know. I, it was, it was so terrible that I don't even think you could hear guitars or bass or anything.

You've heard the drums. Um, no vocals. Cause like I said, it was coming out of a single karaoke machine.

Um, and we played for 15 minutes and then we stopped because we forgot everything, everything. And people got up, they left and like, that's, that's it. That's it.

And so everyone went outside and we're congregating on the driveway. Oh my gosh. This is so embarrassing.

I love it. They're like, yeah, you guys were good. I was like, really, really? I was really young.

And they're like, yeah. And then they turned around and left. I was like, Oh, okay.

That's cool. And then, uh, we talked to someone who had been in a band for a while. They're like, yeah, you guys, you guys got potential.

And that's pretty much all I got out of them. Hey, you know what? At least they didn't yell and throw things at you. No, no, we were so terrible that I think they spared us from any, any other humility.

They throw your own guitar at you. Yeah, it was, it was terrible. So that's the, that's the worst one.

Wow. It haunts me to this day. Hey Rick, cherry bombs, cherry bombs up North.

Oh, we got so drunk on cherry bombs. You know, you, you dip them in Everclear and the bar was giving them out like candy. And Ricker and me got so drunk.

He broke a string, strung his guitar with the wrong string. Yeah. We were playing this bar and it had an L shaped pool table in there.

Is that Ryan's ballroom? Yeah. Ryan's ballroom with, with Via Noctis. Oh my God.

Oh God. Where's this located? Appleton. Appleton.

Yeah. We were up there and we played, we were getting so hammered and well, that's all you do in Apple. Yeah.

And I was playing a seven string at the time and I replaced it with the wrong string. So I tune it, get ready to play this song. And it took me a while to do it because I was hammered.

I gotta change the string again. It was bad. Yeah.

That was a good one. I was on the bar singing with my wireless mic and I go to step off the bar and it was one of those swivel stools. That was a good one.

I hit the floor, kept singing, limped back to the stage and that's where I stayed. And then I went and cooked a Kentucky fried chicken on an iron and made the gravy in a coffee pot. Like I said, we did some wild stuff.

That's rock and roll man. I don't know if that would be a bad gig or a fun gig. Oh, it was fun.

We had a lot of fun back then. Yeah. I, I, I'm trying to think that that sounds like that should be a movie.

We should do a biopic now and feature that gig. Another. So I was going to tell that one, but you, you, you beat me to it.

But the one I got was we were playing a show in Harvard when you were out of for grand say vagrancy. And, uh, we had this other singer and he had this girlfriend and she was, uh, let's just say we didn't really get it. Nobody really got along with her.

We'll just leave it there. There's some polarity that goes with her, but you know, we'll just leave it there. And so, uh, other band that was playing with us had a, a female singer in the band and she was, she was good looking Jody.

So anyway, she comes up and she's singing a song with us. I'm sorry. We've skipped over a story.

So she comes up and sings with us. And the, the girlfriend of our singer starts like saying something or doing something to her or trying to pull the microphone from her or something jealous. And Jody's mom comes up and kind of just tugs her hair a little bit like, Hey, that's my daughter.

Stop. You know, just, this is a music show. Like, you know, there's no need for this.

Girlfriend says something to the singer, singer says something back. And next thing you know, Jody jumps off the stage and they start fighting and pulling hair out. And I was like, Oh my God, this is crazy.

Like these two girls were just kicking the crap out of each other. And so the next, we left all our gear there and everything overnight because it was great in town. We went to go pick it up and we went back there.

It looked like the old K Corral, man, which is black and blonde hair, just like tumbleweed blowing around all over the floor, filled the Jagermeister and booze and stuff. It was, it was a fun, it was crazy. So all this stuff was going on while you guys were on stage playing.

Yeah. You guys, this band. No, no, this was a, this was God, at least 10 years ago, probably not this time.

So their hair has grown back. Yeah. Their hair grew back.

Okay. All right. Yeah.

And just so that, you know, bar owners know that they don't bring that or incite that No, I regret not being there because both chicks were kind of hot. So it was one of those fights between girls that nobody broke up. They were just like, keep, let them go.

What are you doing? It did finally get broken up, but boy, it was, it was, I mean, there was a lot of Jody. Jody was considerably shorter and smaller than her, but man, that girl could hold her own. She was throwing them hard.

It was something to see. See now you guys don't do an original music, but that would be one to write a song about. Right.

Right. Right. Definitely.

It sounds like a country song. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. That definitely could be. Yeah.

So among all of you guys, is there a certain single song that you guys like to do on stage? That's a real favorite. Recently for me, it's one headlight. Yeah.

Yeah. Right now. That's kind of one of our favorites to play on there.

You know, that song is just, I mean, it just kind of sleeps when you listen to it, but it is fun to perform. It really is. It's a very fun one to perform.

No, we're not going to play it. Cause I don't have scales. Well, what can you play for us? Interstate.

Do I do one? Do interstate. All right. I don't sing on this.

So there we go. You're on my course, bro. I've been playing bass for the band for a little bit, so I haven't really done much with this song.

So we're going to give it a go anyway. Oh, that's right. Because you are looking for a bass player.

Not looking for one. It's we're just looking to fill a temp spot. Oh, okay.

Yes. Okay. Yes.

One, two, three, four. One of my favorite songs. Yes, it is.

That is one of my favorite songs. I've always done very nicely. Always been an STP fan.

Thank you. It's one of my favorites that we do. I was, I was actually in Madison, Wisconsin, and I can't remember the year we could look it up because it was the penny.

It was the year. Well, it was it was well, it was it was the year that Scott passed away. And I was I was driving around the University of Wisconsin campus.

I was actually on campus for business that day, and I had no idea that STP was in town. And I saw these giant tour buses outside the arena, and I thought to myself, well, there must be a basketball game or a hockey game, you know, something like something like that going on. It never dawned on me for one second that Stone Temple Pilots was playing the arena there in Madison, Wisconsin.

And the next day I'm driving home and I hear that Scott had passed away. They found him in his tour bus and they were supposed to be playing the arena in Madison, Wisconsin. And I was and and they said about the time of death.

And I and I thought back to when I drove past there, I was like, you know what? He was probably laying in his bus as I drove right past that bus. No way. Yeah.

Yeah. And I got in a chill. Yeah, it was really weird because I mean, it was literally like within 30 minutes, they said, you know, they estimated his time of death.

And it was it was literally within it was about 30 minutes after they said they expected that he had expired. I think we need to bring you in for some questions. Yeah.

Or or or at least some therapy, because because that's the second time in my life I found out about the death of an of like an idol the next day. And I had like laid literally laid eyes on him the night before I was. I saw Stevie Ray Vaughan the night that he died.

Oh, wow. Yeah. An alpine or no kid.

And then the next day when he died at the world. Yeah. And I was driving.

I was a student at the College of DuPage and I was driving to school the next morning and I used to listen to B-96, Eddie and Jobo. Oh, boy. And they were playing.

They were playing songs on the radio that they normally wouldn't play on that station at all. You know, they weren't playing the pump up the jam and Ace of Base and all that stuff. Right.

And they were playing Stevie Ray Vaughan stuff and stuff that he'd recorded on. And, you know, it's, you know, what is it, the David Bowie song? Let's Dance that he played on in the whole bit. And then finally they said, we're playing this in memory of Stevie Ray Vaughan, who passed away in the wee hours in the morning in a helicopter crash.

And I was like, no shit. So it's like the second time in my life that's happened. So.

So what's going to happen to us after this? You guys taking a helicopter home? Not now. I don't know. We we've established during the early 40s.

I mean, it could happen at any time after the age of 40. Have you established that yet? You're still like, you're still guessing. You still have to make your guess.

I'm thinking 42, 42 and 39. They're nodding their heads in the negatives. All right.

Are you ready for the reveal? I'm close. Yeah. What's the reveal? Forty five.

Forty five. OK. All right.

Barely. Yeah. Now they're all lying to me.

Forty four. Forty four. OK.

Forty. OK. So I wasn't too far.

So when you guys came in, we were talking a little bit and you mentioned something about the reason you're looking for a bass player. Well, we're not looking for a bass player. I mean, I'm sorry.

Temporary. Yeah. Our guy is always going to have his job as long as he is able to.

And we hope that he recovers. Three weeks ago, our bass player, Adam. I'm not going to even begin to touch his last name because I can't pronounce it.

He was up in Iowa. We can try. He was up in Iowa vacationing with his wife and there was a tornado and he didn't have shelter.

Oh, wow. He didn't have shelter. So he's laid up in the ICU with this and that.

I'm sorry, he finally got out of the ICU like yesterday. You know, he's been in there for like three weeks. And yeah, we.

He's got a long road to recovery. You know, he's our brother. I mean, yeah, he's he's always going to have his job.

Super, super nice guy. I couldn't couldn't have happened to one of the most genuinely nice people that, you know, always ready to give whatever he's got to you. Adam.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Try to pronounce his last name.

Can you pronounce that? Sulejmani. Sulejmani. You kind of you kind of went with Sulejmani.

Yeah. You know, that's what I would have said. Actually, I'm thinking the J is silent.

Is it Sulejmani? Maybe. Maybe. We're sorry to Adam and family.

If you hear this, we're terrible people. But so you got a difficult name. How long how long are you going to need somebody to fill in for? Indefinite.

Yeah, I mean, yeah, honestly, we as a band members haven't even talked to him yet. Oh, wow. OK.

Yeah, he's because he's he's in the fight of his life or what? Yeah, right, right, right. Is there anything going on to help him out in his family? There is a GoFundMe. There is a GoFundMe, which has been amazing.

You know, we announce it and promote it as much as we can. And we've raised probably twenty three grand so far. At least the family has.

Yeah, we you know. So what's the what's the GoFundMe called? So is it just his name? I think it's just his name right here. So it is it is GoFundMe.

His name is Adam A.D.A.M. And I'm going to spell his last name. It's S U L E J M A N I. And you can go and you can donate to the GoFundMe to help this guy out. Yeah, man.

It sounds like he's he's going through a tough time right now. So Chicagoland musicians, I don't you know, we've got listeners around the world, actually. If you want to send a send some money his way to help out a fellow musician, by all means, please do that.

Last venue we played, they actually donated 10 percent of all the proceeds. Yeah, between 8 and 10 p.m. Yeah, yeah. And if you want to go to our website, sorry, our Facebook, you'll find the link there, you know, as well during some of the posts.

So you can always go there if you and your Facebook is our Facebook is forever flannel band. Yeah. And we have a YouTube channel as well.

OK, no website, no website yet. Actually, you know, in the midst of Adam was bugging you about that. You got to get out of that now.

Before his accident, I was tasked with creating the website and I haven't got around to it. My laptop crashed. I'm going to throw every excuse in the book on this one.

I'm right there with you. I've got a website that's been out there for three years that I haven't done a darn thing because I'm a computer idiot. You know, so where are the majority of your gigs located? Like, are they all up north around McHenry or are you all over the place? Yeah, McHenry area, McHenry County.

We play the Broken Ore this Friday. It's in Port Barrington. We're actually with a creed tribute band, which is kind of cool.

Did you say cream? Creed. Creed would be cool, though. Yeah, no kidding.

No, I was just I was saying that because I mean, and we can and we can talk about it offline. I know quite a few bass players. And if we can just let everybody here know that, you know, you play up north, you know, the northern burbs.

And if they're a bass player, they can reach out to you. You know, if they're looking for a temporary gig or something. Yeah, sometimes they go to Apple.

It's been a long time since we've been there. What was I'm sorry, a little story. What was great touring as a garage band? Heavy metal going up to Green Bay.

Green Bay was so good. And we were in a guitar center and we get stopped by those fans. Remember the dime bag tattoo on his back? Yeah, I decided to remember us all bands.

I just said we were just ran just picked a guitar center, you know, and it had been a couple of days because we were we played Green Bay and then we drove out to Eau Claire and played out there and then we stopped somewhere else. And then we came back to Green Bay. So this is days later.

It wasn't that. And we stopped at a guitar center. I was trying on a Paul Reed Smith.

That was beautiful was and started playing one of our riffs. And as these kids around the corner come like you, you're the guitar player from vagrancy. I'm like, yeah, like you're the one with a dime bag tattoo on your back.

Yeah, I was like, all right, cool. So it neutered Hooters in every every track on that stuff. So you got any shows coming up besides it's broken or.

Oh yeah, we're at base camp in Lyle on May 27th. That's not too far away. No, it's coming up.

I think our first temporary bass player will be playing that show with us. We have a guy coming out tomorrow to join our rehearsal. His name is Galen.

He's a really good dude so far. OK, hopefully, because I suck at bass. It's only four strings.

It's two less, man. He's doing a good job so far. You know, it's a different animal.

Yeah, but he used to play bass for us. Not this kind of bass. Oh yeah.

Yeah, the next bass player is doing a stand up bass. Really? I know a few of those guys. They're a band of the bone, man.

They take this very serious. Yeah, yeah. All righty, guys.

Well, how about taking us out with one more song? Oh boy. Oh shit. Yeah, we got an encore, Steve.

An encore. Don't you guys? You just said you have like 100 of them, right? Come on. Yeah.

And make sure you return those pennies. All right. This will be kind of weird.

Yeah. Those britches, when they make you glance My whole soul begins to break her down She remembers britches, burns you to the ground I have become the cul-de-sac to this world I have become the cul-de-sac to my truth Too heavy, too light, too bright, too white Too early, too right to dare to lie Cul-de-sac Too rich and too poor, she's one of the less and one of the more The bitter taste is cumbersome, Lord, yeah No, no, no Lord, yeah Lord There is a balance between two worlds One with a narrow head across Godless of balance, life has become cumbersome Too heavy, too light, too bright, too white Too early, too right to dare to lie Cul-de-sac Too rich and too poor, she's one of the less and one of the more The bitter taste is cumbersome, Lord, yeah No, no, no No, no, no, yeah No, no, no, no, yeah Your life has become cumbersome Very nice Thank you Thank you Guess what we forgot? Oh, hey It's better than crickets It doesn't sound like a boo Oh, there you go That's like I Dream of Jeannie sort of stuff right there I'll take it It won't stop now Well, guys, thanks a lot That was awesome Thank you Thank you Very good Thanks for coming down I know we got a long ride down here But we appreciate it No problem Sounded really good We appreciate it This is great Yeah, 90s rock Go out and see these guys 90s alternative 90s alternative It's the alternative to 90s What is alternative to 90s? 80s And with that, we're out of here See you guys Thank you Excuse me I got to go on Amazon for a second here I'm going to finish this I'm buying a flannel shirt You can just go down the street to Walmart and get a flannel shirt Just, you know, I'm lazy Buy me Yeah That's it Don't be that guy that wears a flannel shirt to forever flannel It's coming between 2 and 5 a.m. It's amazing how quickly I can get this But no, hey, I'd wear my flannel to their show These guys, they're good Yeah, no, they are good I like their vocal harmonies and everything You tell they put some time into that Yeah And then, you know, there's a lot of music I like in alternatively 90s You know what? I like alternative 90s music Yeah, absolutely Maybe we should go and see those guys together, huh? We should Sounds like they got a lot of dates coming up So, yeah, we got a big summer coming, man There's gonna be a lot of bands to see A lot of bands out there We promise everybody Yeah We have to do it Get out and go see them Definitely Especially the outside festivals and the whole bit Hopefully, we'll have some good weather this year And they're coming up real quick All right So, thanks once again for listening Coming to you from the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66 in beautiful downtown Joliet, Illinois This is Ray the Roadie signing off till next week Later The Rock and Roll Chicago Podcast is edited by Paul Martin Theme song courtesy of MNR Rush The Rock and Roll Chicago Podcast does not own the rights to any of the music heard on the show The music is used to promote the guests that are featured