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's it going Ray? I'm doing well. How was your trip? You had a long trip to the studio today.

Yeah, you know I was in Indianapolis for a couple of days this week and I am glad to be back. It don't rain in Indianapolis I hear no, it definitely does. It rained a little bit.

I absolutely love that town though You know, that's that's a place. You've never been in Nashville. He's never been to Nash.

No, I believe that Have you been in Indianapolis? I have been to Indianapolis. Actually, there's a place called the blend cigar lounge that I went to Oh, yeah, fantastic. Well, I was there last night Which is fantastic and then I also stopped in at the Slippery Noodle Oh, yes, I've heard of that because they got a legendary open blues jam there.

So that'd be a great place I wonder if we can get the owner of the Slippery Noodle here That'd be pretty cool because that's a great great thing. Yeah, but he's not from Chicago Indianapolis, yeah, but I think he's got the connections, you know, anyways, what's with this shirt? That was my nickname in college, by the way the Slippery Noodle Well, okay by now everybody knows that it's not just it's not just you and me here Mike No, it isn't know it and if they were above they would they would know that because you can see this shirt from space What the hell is they'll be able to see that? That's We are videoing now, so that's right and the pants actually I didn't wear the pants the pants are actually more than a year You're not wearing pants. I'm not Are we back to the college thing? So who the heck are these guys this is band called onset with a bunch of periods between the letters Onset so it's like an acronym kind of yeah, what the heck does it mean? I don't know, but why don't why don't you tell them Bob? Well onset first of all st.

Elmo's steakhouse in Indianapolis, yes. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely Everybody this is Bob.

Yeah, I'm Bob How are you I started on set out of a condominium I had in Park Ridge about 10 years ago and basically the idea was to start a band with my two sons who play and My wife Dina Her son Kyle he plays guitar so the idea was to start a band call it something But as it turns out the kids wanted nothing to do with dad or being a band with dad so Okay, mr. No pants Onset I just took it out of took it out of the air on set Because I'm a big blues fan and I would frequent blues on Halstead And if you remember their sign it went vertical blues, and it had periods right after it, so I think that's why I Pick that up. I'm just I think we're all just learning this and I've been in the band for about six years Have you played it blues on Halstead at all? I have not you have not I have not Okay, I've only frequented so after the podcast. I'm gonna let you know a couple of locations in a little bit, but I host a blues jam on Sunday nights and the owner of Blues on Halstead, I should say former former owner blues on Halstead Comes out every Sunday, and he hangs out with us and has a blast He just loves music and a whole bit So if you want to come out and meet him and play with him in a little bit that would be awesome It'd be fantastic.

Yeah, absolutely Kingston mines right across the street. Yeah Buddy guys would close that place the old place out the old buddy guys right not the new one But they've been to the new one, but yeah Excellent. Come on in we can just go get in here.

Yeah, right. Don't be shy Brian Lee guitar Brian Dullum I Feel like there's so many people in here. I feel like it's the Rolling Stones There's people backstage just you know in case Keith stop strumming the chords and stuff You got to have another guitar player hanging out.

Yeah, somebody. Yeah, somebody's picking green M&Ms out of the bag or something Yeah, right, so I'll tell you what why don't we go through why don't we start right here? And why don't you introduce each one of yourselves so just so everybody knows who they're looking my name is Mark Lopak and I am the drummer for onset and I have a pretty good musical background come from a He's a drummer, and he's got a musical background Drums are very musical. Everybody thinks it's just boom bash That is so it's very musical Well if you ever listen to ginger baker play he is very musical That when he plays drums, it's actually a little ballet almost a dance sometimes when he plays, but basically Grandfathers played he had seven brothers.

They all played instruments my uncle played my dad's brother played my other uncle So naturally since we had a few drummers I looked up to him when I was a kid and naturally I wanted to learn how to play drums and took it upon myself to kind of self-teach myself and And then played you know through different bands and whatnot and over the years and eventually The band that I was in was Circus of Filth for about 20 years, but they really didn't want to do anything I got tired and getting older, and then I found Bob's ad That he had on Craigslist I answered it and we had a little bit in common We both went to Gordon Tech and one of the interesting things was he had a drum set at his house I didn't have to really bring anything so that was a plus and it was almost like you took the bait I took the bait Oh hook line and sinker you got me so I auditioned At the end of the day they were like well We'll call you and I was just like come on I just did I pass the test and you know and they're like yeah, if you want it's yours and six years later here I am so Next I don't have that much to say I'm Mickey I'm Mickey and I get to be the lead vocalist for onset, and I'm very happy about that It's been three years now. I think right that I've been with you guys so correct Yeah, I I'm the lead vocalist and actually I am my kids mom is who I am So we'll talk about that in a little in a little bit talk about it now talk about it now. Who's your kid? Okay, so if anybody knows about the voice My daughter Rachel is on the voice currently now right now currently Mike right now right now, right? Yeah, so she's in the 23rd season her name is Rachel.

You'll see her Monday She did her blind audition last Monday, and she's on team Kelly Wow right now, so yeah, I'm very proud of that and she is one of Micah my other daughter is well. I wore the shirt today. They're the gable girls Looks like gable spelled G EBL But they are the gable girls, and they are playing like crazy right now Mike is just marketing them like crazy But you know it's very cool about Rachel and their older sister Melissa is truly their Biggest fan, so I just want to promote them and onset these guys are like my band of brothers I absolutely love these guys.

Do you guys know that do you guys know that I never tell you that I do love you Did you were you with any other bands prior to these guys Oh, yeah, I actually did some stuff with my brothers We were called mad fact and so we did some classic rock with that and which to me is really cool because onset is is classic rock and it's amazing because I always say and we were saying that on the way here that As long as people keep showing up We'll keep playing we'll keep singing you know and they do they just show up and they have such a good time and they sing All the songs they know all the songs that we do and then there's that younger crowd, too Though that's starting to show up that they know because parents were good And they taught their kids about classic rock right and so They they sing the songs along with us And it's just fun and being up on the stage is my happy place life gets to be kind of serious and stuff like that but Being able to be on the stage with these guys is truly my happy place And we do play the songs that people want to hear Say it again. I said we do play the songs that people want to hear All righty who's next Hello, I'm Brian Dullum. I'm the lead guitarist for onset, and I've been playing with them for about three years now and I did jam in a couple other bands before on set and Woody was in one of the bands and After he left the old band that I was in he came and came a-calling for me a few years later they needed a lead guitarist, so I Showed up and been jamming with him ever since So it's been about three years and everything's good, so having a good time and As long as we're having fun.

I'm having fun, and I'm gonna keep doing it He must be the newest member because they got him shoved all the way back there, and I am I'm low man on the totem pole right the loudest and most obnoxious, so we have to keep him at bay I get it. I get it. You know guitar players tend to be that way he carries all the gear So wait a minute before we skip on you know so my kids and my wife.

They're huge fans of the voice Yeah, um so your daughter has not been on a show yet, or Yeah, she did her blind audition last Monday I think it was and where they yeah on the chairs around in the whole bit so chance the rapper turned right away Which was so cool? It was so cool and Rachel was so thrilled about that and so was I and then at the last second she did an Alanis Morissette song okay at the last second Kelly turned and that was really really hard for Rachel You'll see if you guys look up some of that stuff. You'll see that. It was a really hard decision because I had a chance forever.

You know yeah, well. He's a you know almost almost neighbors You know I saw that on the wall out there. I was like yeah.

He's a Chicago guy. Yeah, and but you know what? Rachel just she was kind of raised on Kelly and that was a hard decision, but she she went with Kelly, okay, so yeah I I needed all the information because I have to tell my wife you know to watch the voice I tend to not watch the voice. I I don't know why I guess don't you're gonna watch It's because we're usually here on Monday night.

It's true. That is true. We're usually here You can record it And what's what's her last name Gable? She's going Gable.

Yes Yes, it's a G EBL, but she's a smart kid because her mom raised her that way And so she is just going with her stage name Which is Rachel Christine because Gable gets kind of really mixed up into about 16 different versions So she's going with Rachel Christine, and it rhymes too much You know Rachel Gable, you know, it's kind of like yeah kind of like Thurman Merman No from from from a bad bad Santa Thurman That's right, so nothing's rubs so next Me again Bob Moore. Yeah, and I started this way back when My upbringing Was a lot of big-band Blues big band big band was always in the house I played in a concert band jazz band and concert band at Gordon Tech in high school I played the trumpet as a matter of fact, so I had I had early musical influence Then and then I just kind of let it go for a while. Then I picked up the guitar self-taught and The rest is history.

I switched over to the guitar And Decided to start something and here we are. So all right, that's my story. All right.

Yeah excellent and sparkles spark a silver pants silver no pants Don't don't stand up So my name is Woody and that's it You know, it's a long story, but you know So I'm the talent in the band and I thought you were the I can I've been playing for God, I don't know. I picked up the guitar as an adult. Oh, I'm getting sign language over there 10 20 years not like that But I started playing as an adult and I was actually taking guitar lessons over in stream What a place called good time music great great store over there, and I know that place.

Well, yeah, really Wow Yeah, I I grew up in the Roselle and Schomburg area right off. Yeah park Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and my first girlfriend ever lived in stream would I had to pass that place every single time? Yeah, I was One weekend my wife was working and I said, you know, I think I might go buy a guitar this weekend And I think she said you better not So I did I went bought a guitar at a good time music and it was like a little Ibanez a little practice amp and I think a month's worth of lessons for 99 bucks or something like that right and so started taking lessons there Somewhere along the line the guitar teacher said hey he had a note said join band and it was the band that Brian was in at the time called the unlikely and Met up with him and we played and jammed there at a place in Bartlett and a great lady there Pat was Our bass player.

She's what what hell's Pat now? I mean she was 8384 she was 70 then I mean she was but Tremendous lady, but anyhow, I don't know if I can get into the whole Cabo story just yet. But Well, why not You have to so we're on my wife and I are in vacation in Cabo and on Facebook one of our Friends and Bartlett. I sound like I think they're in Cabo as well.

And so, you know some text messages that kind of stuff Are you here? Yeah, and so, of course, we went to Sammy Hagar's place to meet up in Cabo because we're all there well, it turns out Bob and his wife are With our friends, so we meet him in and at the Cabo Wabo and we're just talking he's like, oh, I'm in a band I'm like, oh, well, I'm in a band three for one drinks Yeah, three for one drinks that that was kind of and we ordered the drinks thinking that we're ordering the the full round of drinks But we just ordered the buy part and then the frequency also came so it was quite the afternoon But yeah, we're going through this kind of the he's like, oh, I'm in a band. I'm in a band What's on your on your list on your playlist? And it's just like song after song and at the time I mean, we're doing like Robin Trower and then Lizzie and some some other kind of Stuff that from cover band perspective isn't necessarily the popular songs out there that people are gonna dance to or whatever and so it was kind of awesome, but you know, we talked for hours and Kind of split ways and then it was probably maybe a year later or something like that. Also and I get a text from him like hey You know us and join the band, you know, and so that's kind of where that started and I guess from there it's Been on set history.

It was a year later after the Cabo Wabo. Yeah. Yeah That's right So so the decision wasn't made over a drunken stupor with tequila There was actually time that passed and it was all thought out and that was a good thing.

Yeah. Well, I guess yeah I mean, I don't know if he had heard me play really but no No, you came to the party at my house one time and saw me play I I did and you were wearing pants in Cabo, which is a plus right? I always wear pants in Cabo Is not in our studios there's cactus down there And crabs don't want to walk into a cactus yeah, yeah, yeah, there's crabs down there, too You don't want to sit on the beach or anything like that. And we have groupies We have groupies with us today.

He's catch looking at him We'll get this video thing down, right? Yeah, we'll get it one day and so who are groupies and did you bring treats I did We have rice krispies, yeah, so you might as well just shout and tell us who you are Congratulations wearing pants though. She's wearing pants I'm Bob's wife. I'm Bob.

Yeah. Okay. Excellent.

Excellent. So tell us about your music. What do you guys do? What do you like to play? rap So here break it break it down for us give us a rap We play classic rock, I mean everything Probably that your your father's know her and liked growing up we cover 70s 80s into the 90s as far as classic rock and we try to Mix it up with what we like to play.

What's fun to play? But what the audience wants to hear and it's been pretty successful. Well, I think there's two ways to look at it I always thought that sir. Well, we're successful But as far as the music we play I think you have to decide do you want to play for yourself? Or do you want to play to the audience? And if you play to yourself, you will find people that like what you like But it seems The longer I'm in this band and the more gigs we play It seems like a lot of the bands that are out there really play the same music Because it's obviously I understand you go to a bar you go to a club Everybody wants to jump up and down Everybody wants to get a little liquored up have a good time and dance and whatnot And the stuff that I would like to play I don't think you could do that You know, so you're forced if you want gigs you have to play a certain type of music and I think we have a good balance of Playing music people can actually dance to and we also are able to throw in maybe some things.

We really like to play I wouldn't say that everything we play I love to play but if we don't play that type of music I don't think I'd be playing out because no one's gonna Hire us and our bookies aren't going to our managers aren't gonna be like hey I have a gig for you when I first started the band We played a little harder music and we weren't getting the gigs that we're getting now So we changed our format a little bit. We changed our singer went from a guy singer to Mickey, which was a vast improvement Nothing against Chris our old singer, but just instead of singing UFO lights out in London You know, we're singing more Pat Benatar And and things of that type of music where people can actually dance to it And it's not as harsh, even though we do kind of like some of the harsher music But it's basically if you want to play there's a format in which you You have to follow And we do but I think honestly if I could I would play definitely different music If we were, you know bigger band more popular and throw in things we really like But I think if you do too much of that, I think you start losing gigs personally. That's just my opinion Yeah, I think the fun part has been is is finding those harder rock Sound I think we all kind of grew up with the harder rock sound.

I mean Led Zeppelin Oh black Sabbath Zeppelin songs now This priest, you know some of this heavy heavier stuff, but to find that there's the danceable music as well I mean and you know, you shook me all night long AC DC maybe overplayed in lots of ways But I'm my goodness you play that song and you know, the waitstaff the bartender everybody still singing along I mean you could play that song three times in a row and they'll just they'll just keep on going along It's nice to have that I think Mickey brings that balance with with heart I mean hearts always been that hard rock, but yet musicianship Part, you know that comes along so and a little more suffrage, too I never thought I'd be playing music like that, even though it is quite enjoyable, right? No, and Mickey does such a fantastic job of singing it. Yeah For me, I was just gonna say like, you know I'm probably a little bit more heavier in terms of what I Liked as a kid and growing up and that kind of stuff But playing on stage when you're playing something the the goose bumps happen when you're playing something It's going good and you look out and everybody's enjoying themselves and you're just going. Wow.

This is so cool Everybody's dancing having fun people in the back or singing Like I said the waitstaff singing along, you know that kind of stuff That's when you kind of get that, you know the hair on in kind of because it's all about energy Yeah, I mean we played enough gigs where it's completely dead and we're all looking at each other going There's this one gig just one gig Okay But when you have a gig and it's going and it's going good and you can feel the energy From the audience and you can tell that they're into it. I mean it only makes you play better It really energizes the band on top of it, you know, so for sure, right? So I could see, you know The reason for playing certain types of music because you want to feed off that, you know If the audience isn't getting into it, it's really difficult for us to get into it, right? And it's a fun exercise to go through to find those songs, right? And so You know Leonard Skinner, yes, we don't Alabama right and we're doing fan favorite play the radio all the time, you know They will they will I'm just gonna let them go to talk you cannot play enough Bon Jovi though Yeah, that's one I don't really like but that's a whole nother story there's a big Bon Jovi fan behind you The groupies aren't happy right and she looks exactly like every woman that comes up and asks to play Bon Jovi We can make a bumper sticker so so so what is the happy medium, you know is your as you're choosing your music and You want to satisfy both your creative and musical needs and the creative and or I should say the musical needs of the people that Are listening to you listening to you. What is the happy medium? Well, I find that at work Like if I'm listening to ninety four point seven or ninety seven point one We joke around the shop because just about every single song we play Right is on those stations and around the shop and like hey, it's an onset song so then when some of the guys at the shop are like Do you guys just listen to the radio station and then pick your songs from the station? And I never thought about that and I'm like, yeah, I guess we do, you know I mean if it's good enough to be played on the radio, it's good enough for us to play in a bar, right? I think it's just guitar heavy, you know, you can in and that was kind of I think we had that discussion like there's there's heavier music that is still Popular music when I say popular like almost pop music, you know, but it's still guitar heavy It's still rock and roll.

It still has that vibe. I think that music it spans different generations Yeah, I mean opposed if you were just gonna play Black Sabbath, it's pretty much your dad's music Yeah No, I mean I work at Waterford High School and I'll tell you what in the weight room those kids they all got our songs They got Bon Jovi playing they got Pat Benatar. I mean, they know all the songs that we do That's what they want to work out to so we do we cross generational lines, right? It's higher It's higher energy.

Yeah, and they're singing about something other than some depressing Thing that's going on in their lives, right? We have this conversation. I don't want to I don't want to beat a dead horse here I really don't I want to kind of breeze over this but we have this conversation in every single podcast interview about how the younger generation today is Tired of the computer-generated music that they're hearing and dubstep And you've got 17 18 year old Teenagers that are listening to things like mop the hoopoe and Survivor and REO Speedwagon and things like that And it's just it blows my mind every time. Yeah, I hear it.

So, how are you received? when you go to a club and The clientele is obviously between the ages of 21 and 31. How are you guys perceived? Well, this is kind of our gauge. You know what when when we show up there We keep them we if they're there if they're there when we start we keep them to the end I don't care what age they are.

They're just having a good time. Everybody feeds off of each other So I I look at that as being on set success right there is if you can keep those guys no matter what age they are if we can keep those 60 year olds past 930. We have done our job.

Yeah. Yeah Yeah, no kidding It's amazing and the response we get from college kids who are up against the stage, you know Wave, you know just on the stage and it's incredible which goes back to your point kids these days Want something different and you know, my two boys Austin and Evan 30 ish years old ACDC UFO that kind of thing and yeah, it has a lot to do with raising them, but then Yeah, but you know, here's the thing. This is what I think about.

We are the live music generation, right? I mean we had great music, but we also did it live. We were the local band generation I grew up right in a little town called Honey Creek right down the road from Alpine Valley and You know, they had all that live music and stuff and I think the kids these days don't have so much of that And that is such a good feeling It's a natural high when you go see live music and you can sing along to those songs That's just a natural high and I think that they appreciate that that we have passed that down to them because there is no other Generation, you know, we are the one and you're correct and we play completely live. We have no processors no Painfully obvious at times, right? I mean, it's a hundred percent live and rock and roll I mean, that's the way we are brought up.

That's the way we put it out there So, you know and it's in it's it I wouldn't call it painfully obvious because I think one of the things that are attracting the younger younger people to older rock and roll music is the way it was recorded and It's a human performance, which is never going to be perfect. Yeah, so when you go to A performance where you've got two two keyboard players and a drummer Right and every sound that you're hearing is being produced digitally by a keyboard and there are no mistakes and there's no Improvisation going on. Mm-hmm.

It becomes very sterile true I will never forget the first rock concert that I ever took my son to he was about 14 or 15 years old and we went and saw Shinedown and Godsmack and And up into that point he had been listening to all the hip-hop stuff that his friends were throwing at him and gosh Drove me insane Hearing this music as a guitar player and vocalist hearing this come out of his bedroom And when he came to me one day and said I want to go and see this band in concert and his mind was blown He was blown away. He's like there's a drummer and two guitar players and What's that big guitar right there? That's the bass guitar. That's that That you hear through That does that it's the soul that's the soul that they feel when they come there Like I said, that's that natural high that they just feel that there's something about that.

It just makes music alive, right? Right. So what's your favorite song? What's the what's the banner song? The one the one song that everybody wants you to you guys to play You know what if I can jump I was thinking about this or exact figured this might be a question right and and Oddly enough, I did metal health is a song quiet right? Oh shit. I gotta hear that do it acoustically.

Oh, I don't know This is a challenge right here if you do that acoustically right here, let me tell you I think I have to hear that acoustically. I don't think anybody's ever done metal And I started playing it one one one night at an onset practice and for whatever reason we just ended up picking it up And I'm thinking I don't know if this will go over or whatever But honest to God every the best songs we do every gig people go nuts for that song And I'm just like wow and it it hits a chord and it is kind of cool It is the song that we introduced the band and right and Brian and I get a little bit of a tiff going and you know The lead guitarist and lead singer kind of the REO Speedwagon 157 Riverside Avenue thing that we do so and we do it coming out of marks drum solo, right? Yes, we got we come out of rock and roll into a solo my drum solo and then out of that I go into metal health, but if you watch videos Of us playing and you know, we record most of our events, but it seems by when we hit metal health It's like it's shift to second gear already You know, I mean as far as like the energy from the crowd even us playing you could tell it's different a better difference You know, okay. Stop talking play metal health.

I want to hear this Oh challenge Come on you you will make my day. I drove all the way from Indianapolis to hear this You are you ready Metal health acoustic version. That is how do we say that it down south here? Is it acoustic or acoustic? What is it? Like a coupon I love see as though as the host of an open jam I love to just throw people to the fire.

And yeah, I see that now. It's not one of the ones we practiced Michael I brought you cookies and stuff like that. And then you throw metal help at us.

All right now do this I might even sing at which I love All right, let's see what happens. Okay I'm an axe grinder pile driver Mama says that I never never mind her got no brains. I'm insane She just says that I'm one big pain Oh Frustrated outdated.

I really wanna be overrated I'm not a loser and I ain't no weeper Right on guitar All right, this is where we're gonna introduce the onset boys right now we have mr. Mark Lopak on the on the cajon He usually has a way bigger set than he brought today. But I hope we're talking about his drums It's it's not it's how you use it, right? Listen to him go All right. We got mr. Shiny.

No pants over there. We got woody here as one of the In what is our word Bob what's our in in incessant Rhythm over there, right Dina All right, and that low end that low end right there. You feel that is mr. Robert Moore over there on the bass And then my partner in crime over here.

Mr. Brian doll and we'll figure it out. We always do don't we Brian? That's right There we go There you We're all mental man, it's Tonight boys, that's my that's my British accent right there. Woody.

How do you like that? Do it in a British accent That might possibly have been my favorite in-studio performance That brought me back to my 1975 Buick Buick LeSabre Cruising around my girlfriend, you know big old boat listening to that song Tape deck, man We thought we might do acoustic that was the last one What you guys were planning on playing that's that's exactly what this podcast is about You know shock people We are basically we wanted to feature Mickey Who I can't say enough of I mean, she's the the perfect leader lead singer and she will Take over An audience and just fantastic just fantastic. I agree So so what's been that what's been the so far what's been the toughest thing about being a band, you know You guys came together said the incessant drama It's like being married to four other people. It's like in America a second marriage with four other people.

Hey and Kind of like being Mormon. Yeah But there's got to be there's got to be more to it to it though, I mean You know what? These are my band of brothers. I'm telling you They're like family God just brings people together and we have no drama.

We help each other We have individual drama with families and just regular life stuff, but really together I don't know. I hate to speak for you guys, but you guys are my happy place. No, I mean What's what happened here This this is the happy place for you out in TV land and radio land you can't see this but I Accidentally cut my thumb.

They take what they can Accidentally I cut my thumb badly so The work that I do I have to keep it clean. So I wrapped it and it's been wrapped for a few weeks and So the sixth member is mr. Happy thumb so Every day I change the dressing and then I put a new face on it and it's usually a happy face And the guys think it's kind of funny. So it's kind of like our mascot at this.

What's the Iron Maiden guy? That's our guy Iron Maidens. Yeah, he's got really cool. He's got Eddie and we have a happy face on my thumb There is a there's a dirty joke in there somewhere Is dragging equipment out at the end of the night, you know, especially when we've done our own sound you're dragging subwoofers out Oh, yeah, but all that kind of stuff.

You're like, I just can't move anymore. But But it's always fun, you know up until that point, right? Right. Well, you know, I play in a band with You know, there's nine of us on stage and years and then we've got our we've got a sound engineer That is a regular member of the band and we bring everything around and I tell people all the time, you know We bring a stage that accommodates nine people, right, you know, I'll play for free But you got to pay me $2,000 to haul all this crap around That's what you're paying for.

That's really what it is So when so when people come to me and say well, you know, we only want you for two hours How much does that cost $2,000 because I'm still setting up this stuff precisely and taking this stuff down Yeah, you want me to play for two hours? That's six hours around that. Yeah Absolutely, yeah, cuz I mean some of these gigs by the time you get home, it's still clock in the morning Oh, yeah, and that's not even unloading your car. Well, you know, that's like it stays into the next morning.

I'll unload it Yeah, the people that come to see you they show up you're going on at 8 o'clock, right? I realize you've been there since 2 or 3 o'clock setting all this. Oh, absolutely I'll check in there. They just walk in everything set up you go up and play and then they're done the place closes and you're Right and the audience just assumes you have roadies, right? You do you do you're looking at Are the ones that say hey, you know, there's a there's a 3 a.m. Bar down the street We're all going there right now.

Why don't you join us? Yeah. Well 3 a.m. Is in about 45 minutes I'm still gonna be putting this shit in the truck That's that's the way it goes. That's that's the way it is.

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, so you guys seem like you have a lot of fun What's your what's your favorite gig? What would what tell us about your favorite gig? Well for me Everyone's got a bucket list.

So one of the gigs I wanted to play was Retro on Roscoe in the city, Chicago I've been I've been going down there for you know, 15 years plus So it's a wonderful fest. It's like a mini taste of Chicago if nobody knows about it So they have three band stages one on either end and they have the band stage in the middle in the middle band stage Is the most I think it's the hottest band stage because technically you are right by the food And you were right by the liquor tent. So it gets you really I'm like, you know, it gets the biggest crowd The West 10 is the dead zone and that's the that's for the newbies and we played there last year So we had the dead zone But we did pretty good getting people to come down and listen to us and we kept them the East Stage is a you know big stage and that's a pretty good stage But that middle stage if you're lucky to get on that stage, that's where you want to be But for years I've listened to bands and I've seen fantastic bands I've seen bands that are okay, and I've seen some lousy bands.

And when I see lousy bands, I'm like damn We're better than those guys. Like how did these guys get this gig? So I did some investigating and I pestered this poor lady who books the bands Marella I probably pestered her almost every day for three months nicely and She was so sweet. She actually gave us a gig and for that gig being on a professional Stage professional sound system outside At a fest and that was like one of the really first ones I've done at that level for me That was that was fantastic.

I thought because we recorded it but because of the sound guy and the professional equipment I mean we sounded fantastic. I always I always say You could have a fantastic band and you can have a lousy Sound system and they sound crappy right and you could take a crappy band and have a fantastic sound system and they sound Awesome, so we were fortunate that the sound guy that day was fantastic made a sound excellent. We all played well I think again the energy just being there So for me, I think that's that's the height right of gigs that we've done We've done a lot of good gigs, but for me that was the best right? That was good.

Yeah, so I'm wondering Brian. Yeah What what's the question? Is there is there a story involved in this no, you just do we want to include Brian I kind of like the first of all Brian Do you have any smiley faces on appendages over there that we need to know about? No, we're good. Okay.

All right That was fun Outside at a bar a dirty hoagie was that the name of the place? Mm-hmm. The place was called the dirty ho Yeah, there's a it's a Biker bar that I saw in Wisconsin Yeah, that was cool I have to say that was really cool you tell them what that was awesome so we go if there's a small place in small venue, but they were having a What do you call it a bar pub crawl kind of thing? We're right buses of people dressed as elves and Santa were going around and here they come, you know We're playing and it was literally buses and here they come and it was it was a great time And they had a lot of fun. We had a lot of fun I was playing on the bar almost got chopped it chopped in half by our ceiling fan You know that kind of so it was just you know, just lots of lots of fun, but you to me That's the best gigs I mean You always like a gig where you got a big stage you can move around a little bit that kind of stuff and sometimes you're Like I can't move but usually it's the audience, you know, though the ones that were the audience are just responding That's the ones that are it's always that yes.

Yeah. Yeah, so So, you know before I made you guys take a left turn into mental health we asked you what was your favorite song I'm sure you guys had something that you had rehearsed for today Acoustically, why don't you throw one of those down for us? Let's hear it We have a couple of audience participation songs that we like to do. So one of them is Melissa Etheridge I'm the only one and then the other one is what's up? By a few people have done that one But um, I don't know which one yeah for not blind which one do you guys have Ray which one do you want to hear Do you know both of those? Melissa Etheridge.

Yeah Mark's playing Melissa Etheridge This is just one of those everybody kind of grooves to you know, I don't know Dina you guys which one you guys have the Audience participation song with ya. Okay. I think they should sing back up to yeah They know this I'll do it Yes, I know he's got sit on his drum, yeah, it's hard to play sit on his thumb Why do you think the face is so happy We have a name for that thing mr. Happy mr. Happy So we're doing You started Oh We could do stranglehold These baby, can't you see my mind's a burning hell I Got razors and ripping and tearing and stripping my heart as well Tonight you told me that you wait for something new Some other woman is looking like something that might be good for you Go on and hold her till the screaming is gone Go on believer I Please baby, can't you see I'm trying to explain I've been there before and I'm locking the door and I'm not going back again Her eyes and arms and skin won't make it go away You wake up tomorrow and wrestle with sorrow that holds you down today Go on and hold her till the screaming is gone Go on believer Brian on guitar Everybody's on guitar Go on and hold her till the screaming is gone Go on believer when she tells you Nothing's wrong Yeah, I'm only one all right I had one job.

I had one job one job one job. So how do people find you if they want to go out and see you? guys Or if they want to avoid places that you're playing at It works both ways You know, it's crowd-pleasing regardless of which direction they go in it real Onset rocks calm so website and then we're also on Facebook. I don't know Oh period and period Yeah onset Rocks calm and you can get to Facebook from there.

So is it spelled out Oh period and No periods except for the you know, the dot-com partner, of course Absolutely But yeah, hope you don't come out check us out I Think it's a everybody have a good time. Yeah, that was great. And if Anyone does come out? There's usually a free beer koozies Sunglasses And you can also buy a t-shirt for I think $10 if you choose to so you can get some Going home presents if you come out and see us and and we got some sunglasses and koozies for you guys Yes, I was hoping awesome No, they're legal you'll have to find that out I asked you some cookies not brownies So We always forget to ask this so This is going to come out a few weeks from now Were you guys playing say sometime around the end of April? You got any dates around here in the Saturday April 15th, we're playing up in Island Lake.

It's site outs. We're opening for you. Yeah, we're opening for a all-girl band Serendipity.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. Oh, they're incredible. I think they're actually scheduled aren't they? I'll have to check I think I think I think I got a notice saying that the serendipity scheduled the podcast Yeah, that's interesting.

Yeah, and then we're at April 29th on a Saturday. We're at Galati's in Cary, Illinois, and We have a great time there. So yeah, excellent.

Those are the April 8th Just to mention that May 29th actual Memorial Day. I think it is right that the bunker in Waterford, Wisconsin. Oh, wow That's a Monday, but it's interesting play we played there last year.

They have a cannon they set it off, you know, not the Shells or anything Well, thanks for coming out guys you had a long drive down here not as long as Mike today but You guys have a lot of fun, yeah, thank you Ray and thank you Mike and thank you for having us and we had we had A blast our blood's been a lot of fun. Thank you. Thanks.

All right. Well, there you have it That's Oh period and period s period e period T on set on sets on set They look like a bunch of fun people. I think I don't think I've I don't think I've laughed so much during the podcast interview with those guys know and metal health Acoustically Exactly.

No, I bet you nobody's ever done that Never never and you know in driving back from Indianapolis today. I needed to unwind. I don't think that was the unwind There you go.

That was it right there. They did it for you. So go out and see those guys definitely see them There are a lot of fun just you can hear, you know, I'm talking and stuff.

They're real great together and they're They like to have fun and they're doing this for you guys. Absolutely. I think their chemistry on stage has got to be Fantastic excellent from the way they were talking here in the studio.

We definitely got to get out and see them sometime this summer No, I'm with you. But as always thanks for joining us every week on the rock and roll Chicago podcast Make sure you tune in next week. Tell your friends like us on Facebook if there's something you Honest to somebody who wants to interview or something.

Let us know drop me a email at ray at rock and roll net and We'll see what we could do for you, but until then we'll see you guys next week The rock and roll Chicago podcast is edited by Paul Martin theme song courtesy of M&R 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