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? I'm doing good. How are you doing, Mike? I'm doing pretty good. That's good.

Who'd you bring us? This week, I brought you Stereo Phi. Stereo Phi. Not to be confused with the Hi-Fi that mom and dad used to have.

You know, I tell that story every single gig about the old Hi-Fi. Do you? I do. Can you tell me again? Story for another time.

Okay. I'm willing to listen. Because this is about Stereo Phi.

I've got nothing but time. Okay, go ahead. Alrighty, so who's joining us today? Let's pretend that it's our first day in school in the sixth grade and you're introducing yourself to the class.

I'm Jeff. I play drums for Stereo Phi. My name is Ben Fosco.

I sing lead vocals. I do rhythm guitar and congas every once in a while, I guess. My name is Brendan English.

I play bass, mainly. Backing vocals. He's the screamer in the band, so.

Screamer? Oh, everybody needs a screamer. That's right. So, where did this... He threw me off when he said Brendan because that's B-Man.

Ah. For sure. My nickname is B-Man.

Okay. Yeah, it took me about a year to learn his name. No joke.

I think our original singer still calls him Brandon. Is it because of a stupid incident? Because that's normally how you get a... I got it and it just stuck. I got it probably when I was just getting out of high school.

Someone just started calling me and everybody around the neighborhood started calling me it and it just stuck. And then I started introducing myself. It's because I'm like, Brendan.

They're like, Brendan? I'm like, B-Man. Just call me B-Man. And they're like, oh, I've heard of you.

Because Brendan was too hard to pronounce. I guess. Is it the public school system we're in? Correct.

You know, you never know. I assumed it was because of his name, but sometimes you get a nickname because you did something stupid. That's right.

You never know. So, where does it all begin? How does Semper... Semper Fi. Wrong line.

Stereo Fi. I'll tell my marine friends out there. I'm going to let Jeff take this one because he started pretty much where we came off.

So, it was 2011, end of 2011, early 2012. And I'd put a post out or something that I was looking to join a band. And Art, who's not here today, he responded to me probably a month later, sent me a text and said, hey, I got this project going on I think you'll like.

And, you know, we need a drummer. Why don't you come and try out? So I did. And it was an original project called Spinning Red.

So we did that for some years. We had a singer named Mark. And when I joined the bass player, Charlie, and Charlie left, we got another bass player.

And then he was around for maybe a year. And then after months of asking this guy to come in. Yeah, me and Jeff met probably 2013, 2012, maybe.

Something like that. And we just met playing shows back. He was in Spinning Red.

I was in a band called Angry Mix Tape. We clicked right away. And then we kept in contact.

Went to bars every once in a while. Did some open mics. And finally, I joined Spinning Red.

We popped off. Spinning Red broke up. We played cover band, starting it off as Stereo Phi.

Probably 2017. Yeah. We became Stereo Phi.

Yep. It was a lot of just me, Art, and Jeff playing by ourselves. Figure out what was going on.

That kind of is how we started. I mean, Ben's the lead vocalist, obviously. But we all take songs.

Unfortunately, yes. We all take songs that we sing a lead on. And whoever, when we come up with a new song, whoever sounds best at it, that's who gets it.

That's a pretty good way to do it. He sounds like shit, but let him sing it. He just wants to sing it.

Yeah, we're not rebuilding the wheel over here. He really wants to play this song. Let's give it to him.

Right. And I don't want to sing it. That's the good thing about playing with these guys is we're all real tight and real close.

There's no egos in the band. There's no, you know, it's what's best for our show and our sound. Right, right.

Mostly cover songs. Yeah. We, you know, with the Spinning Red, when we got a guy named Sean came in after, like he mentioned, it was the three of us for a long time, Art, myself and B-Man.

And we were just fielding the singing, you know, whatever we could sing, we would sing. And then this guy, Sean, came along and a good singer, guitar player. So we added that second guitar with him and kind of just, he knew a bunch of covers already.

So he came in and said, all right, well, we can learn that and let's learn this, this. And that's kind of how it took off. Yeah.

Where are you guys all from? I'm originally from Hoffman Estates. I live in Crystal Lake now. OK.

A little bit up north. Yeah. I'm from Chicago.

Right. All the way. Yeah.

Also myself. Northsiders. Right.

So you guys tend to play over on that side of town or are you playing all over the place? We tend to do better there or in a little Northwest, Southern Mount Prospectus plains. You know. Yeah.

We try to cover just about everywhere. We're not, we're not afraid to play out wherever we need to. Or where the demand is.

How many gigs you guys doing here? We've been on a good roll over the summer. We were having three a month and, you know, twice a month. Now we just had one Saturday.

We got one coming up February 18th. So we're pretty steady. Where's that? Because that's about the time this podcast is going to come out as well.

You might as well do a shameless promotion of yourself. Shameless promotion. Shameless self-promotion.

That's going to be in a bar called Tony D's in Elmwood Park. Tony D's in Elmwood Park. Yeah, it's on Belmont, a little bit East of Cumberland.

Okay. It's actually going to be Jeff's birthday show. So it's.

All right. February 18th. How old? 40.

So people can bring gifts if they'd like to. Yes, they could. That's good.

And Tony D's, by the way, we're looking for sponsors. So we just mentioned your name. So tag, you're it, man.

That's right. Give us a call. What are some of your favorite songs that you like to play or bands that you like to cover? Oh, definitely like Led Zeppelin.

Yeah. Like The Beatles, stuff like that. You know, we do a lot of Pink Floyd.

We do a lot of Floyd. Try to do some Rolling Stones, but I feel like Jeff's not really into it too much. I'm trying to bring the 80s back.

I keep trying to throw some 80s songs in there, but whatever we can do, we can do. Now, I would not have picked you to be the guy to try and bring the 80s back. It's pretty interesting, his selection, because it's really off the cuff.

You really you don't know what to expect when he's throwing songs. So what kind of 80s? I'm thinking Robert Palmer. Wow.

In excess, these are some of my new choices, maybe some Kenny Loggins, so like. No, Messina. Yeah.

So, so, so what were you listening to growing up? What what inspired you the most? My all my sisters, they're all older than me. I'm the accident child, so they're they're much older than me. So I grew up listening to like I grew up watching MTV like that.

There was I had to wake up early to watch my Transformers. So I mean, it was great. It was MTV all day as soon as they woke up.

So it was Poison, Warrant, Billy Idol. I mean, it's all the 80s, ACDC. But when Metallica actually came out with one, I mean, with a video, so it was all.

Hair metal. Hair metal. And isn't that amazing that stuff was called metal back then? Yes.

It's scary when you compare it to today. It's really funny. There was actually two classes.

There was glam metal guys and there was heavy metal guys and that they could not mesh. No, not at all. No.

The stuff that they called metal back in the 80s would be like Matchbox 20 today. You know, it was it was all it was all pop stuff. Oh, yeah.

Super pop. Sewer. But that's that's completely the the bands that you guys listed right now were just completely different and coming up with stuff like In Excess and Robert Palma like that.

Yeah. But that makes sense because you're a bass player and those have, you know, funkier bass lines. Yeah.

Harder bass lines. Right. Right.

Right. What about you? Um, what do you mean? What about me? Well, you can pick whatever it is like you like to talk about. All right.

Well, you know, I'll I'll talk about how I how I got into the band where, you know, before they went through a couple of different front men and then all of a sudden I've known Jeff since high school, since we were about 14 years old. You know, we've but we've never been in a band together until this. We've always played separately.

We've always gone to each other's shows. And then all of a sudden he came to to see me do covers at a small bar in the city on like Lawrence Avenue called Leland Tap. And we're I was in a band called Wireless Waffles.

And for the record, I did not pick the name. I did not pick the name, but I do enjoy the name. Actually, I think that whole bar was about the size of this room that we're in right now.

Yeah, it's it's, you know, the classic city long, narrow bar where it's about six feet wide from the actual cherry top of the bar. Right, right. But 25 feet deep.

Game of sauce during a snowstorm. We thought like, hey, like maybe I'll call this guy one day for or something. Now, do you cover all the Zeppelin stuff? You're you're the Robert Plant in the band.

Yes, yes, I try to be there's there's you can I mean, you can't be Robert Plant. Right. You could only hope to be close to Robert Plant.

Idolize. Yeah, yeah. No, because Robert Plant is that that's that's a hard thing right there.

It's a very hard thing. Yeah, difficult to do. Not many people can.

And, you know, we we we don't play a lot of the songs we do. But some of the songs we put our own spin on and, you know, we jam it out how we want to jam it out and still serve the song, obviously. But, you know.

Yeah, if we don't feel we're going to do the song justice, we're not going to do it. We're not going to come out and butcher your favorite songs. Right.

And I've told him to sing like Ben. You don't have to sing like Robert Plant. Sing like Ben.

Yeah, yeah. Just make make it your own. That's what we do.

And it tends to work out pretty well. Yeah, well, that's good. That's good.

It seems like you guys have a pretty eclectic set list. What are some of the other bands that you cover? People go to your show. Where are they going to see? Well, thanks to B, they're going to see Walk Like an Egyptian from the Bengals.

And it's, you know, some song to play. Tell me about that. Great song to play.

Lots of fun. Which goes over very well. Oh, yeah.

Like people, you'd be surprised at the reaction you get to that song. Yeah. Like, it's very weird when you hear a band do Walk Like Egyptian by the Bengals.

And then later on, we're going to do War Pigs. Right. By Black Sabbath.

You know, and people just it's a curveball. But, you know, we do it well. And like I said, we're not going to try and butcher it.

Yeah, I don't think I've ever heard anybody do Walk Like an Egyptian. It's one of those songs that nobody wants to try. No, no.

That's why I wanted to do it. I'm like, I don't think I've heard it in bars. I've heard I've heard it in while I was working.

I'm like, dude, nobody's going to expect a cover band, especially a bunch of guys doing it. Like, I'm not going to expect it. When he suggested it, I was very disappointed in him.

And then when we played it, he totally redeemed himself. But it's amazing, you know, because some of those songs have shock value. You know, I saw a cover band play.

I Can't Go For That by Hall & Oates. And I saw how so now we cover in the band that I'm in. And that's the one song that gets people up off the barstools.

They could be sitting dormant for a first hour. And then they hear that Hall & Oates song and bam, everybody's dancing. We do a version of Crazy from Narls Barkley.

Right. Very bluesy. And when it starts out on the guitar and everything, nobody knows what it's going to until he starts singing the song.

And Art actually does lead vocals on that one. Okay. And until he starts singing the song, nobody even has any idea what it is.

And you'll see people's reaction when he comes in with a, you know, I remember when and people are like, what? Wow. I actually do know that one. Does he sing it in that key or in that octave? Does he make it totally his own? He makes it his own.

Right. It's in key dropped. Okay.

Yeah. We drop our guitar. We drop the scale on the guitar to match his vocals.

Nice. Yeah. We give them the crutches to sing it.

Yeah. Okay, great. Well, you know, where can people find the music? Because I'm sitting here listening to what you guys are saying.

And I'm thinking, geez, I wish we had something right here that we could play. Where can they find the music online? The best we have now is our YouTube channel. You know, look up Stereo Phi on YouTube.

We have a select few videos on there. Hoping we had more very soon. We have been recording.

We bought a nice, expensive camera to record our shows. Really good sound quality. And we have lots of footage to go through.

And we're going to start cutting up the shows and putting out more songs, you know, more present on YouTube. It's just finding the time to sit there and edit all the video. It's me finding the time to train.

Is there any original material anybody working on? Or have you talked about it? You know, we've talked about it before. We've actually played some original songs where I played some of their Spin Red original songs. They played some of the ones from the band that I was in.

And we tried recording some of it. But with the way that it seems the scene is with original music, it's really hard to get out there. And when you do, you're playing to the other bands that are in the lineup for your show.

You know, that or the bartender or the bartenders. Midnight. Yeah, it's hard to gather people from, you know, where I'm 42 years old.

It's hard to grab my friends to go out to shows. Like, hey, we're going on at midnight. And we play in Chicago.

I'm like, great. Have fun. As much as I would love to do more original music and just have the time to write it.

It's, you know, we're all adults with lives. We don't. This isn't the full time thing.

It's hard to find the time for everybody. And even though we try to do it, at least we have time to practice and get together once a week, regardless. Right, right, right.

So tell us about the gig that went horribly wrong. And how'd you overcome it? Which one was that? Well, it's one of the biker ones. Oh, because we saw those wrinkly biker boobs.

I wish I could have that. That was the charity show that we did. Yes, it actually was.

It's a charity show. You can't expect good boobs at a charity show. The show was good.

It's just I wish I didn't see those boobs. Yeah, and we got cut off very early. I think we did about two thirds of our show.

Because the sound girl didn't want to stay or something. Yeah, that's right. She had prior engagements, apparently.

Wow. It was an early, it was an afternoon show because they went out on a bike run. And then we started playing.

I think it was, it was like four o'clock or something. Yeah, it was early. Yeah, well, it was summer too.

But I think it was like four or five o'clock we hit the stage. And at eight thirty, nine o'clock, we took a set break. And the owner was sitting there, you know, buddy of ours, the owner of the bar.

And I went up, hey, Nick, you want us to do another set or what? Everybody seems to be hanging around. You say, hey, get up. And she, hey, I got to go.

And I'm like, OK, well, everyone's on fire. Talk about the single person could be in the buzzkill for the entire crowd. Yeah, no kidding.

Wow. And so this was this was just like a like a poker run or a charity run or something like that. Yeah, something like a birthday or something.

Father's Day or something like it was a memorial for somebody. That's what it was. Yeah, that's what it was.

So, hey, you turned it around because you probably just hang out and had a couple of beers. And yeah, but the worst show that I could remember, and it was it was even before he was in the band. It was spinning red.

Yeah, we don't touch that. It was spinning red. And I believe it was my first gig with the band.

And we were playing at Sylvie's Lounge in the city. I forget exactly where it is right now. I believe it might be on Irving Park, but don't quote me on it.

And we're playing and the bass player, Charlie, knocked in the arts guitar, knocked him out of tune. He didn't have his tuner or the battery died in his tuner pedal. So instead of taking a minute there.

That's why you always plug it in, boys and girls out there. The bass player started tuning to him. So now everybody's out.

And I'm back there playing drums. It's my first show. I just learned all these songs that these guys wrote.

And I'm back there like, hey, I'm doing a damn good job. You know, this is great. I'm remembering all this stuff.

And afterwards, I'm like, oh, that was good. And they're like, what were you listening to? I'm like, I don't know, man, but I thought it was good. So where are you at? Yeah.

So you didn't realize that you guys were a jazz band. Yeah. Here's a tuning no one's ever heard of.

Right. All right. So let's flip it around.

That's the worst. What's the best show you guys have played together as a band? Together as a band. But he got me three of us.

I'm going to do that show we play on Saturday. It was it was pretty epic. Yeah.

I mean, that was a great show. That was pretty epic. And I put it up against the cubby bear.

The cubby bear was amazing show. But before Ben was in the band, I think you guys are stupid because I was proud. I wasn't in the band, but I saw it.

And I'm like, OK, yeah, we had a great time. But it's the cubby bear guy. Yeah, that was a great that was an amazing probably five of us.

We played eight to nine songs and five, five to six of them. The crowd sang like we did. Sean would start singing.

And then the crowd just I've never seen so many faces in the crowd. It was just the light. The lights were bouncing off them.

They were jumping. It was it was pretty amazing. We were we were on right when the Cubs game came out.

So like all the Cubs game just rushed into the cubby bear. And it was. No, that was the Foo Fighters.

It was before the Foo Fighters show the night before Foo Fighters. And they had there were four bands. We went on second.

That was about prime slot. But wasn't the Cubs playing across? No, they were playing out of town because they had the stage set up for Foo Fighters. What was all the blue shirts I saw that just rushed in when we came in? Probably the acid you took.

But no, that show was amazing. But on Saturday, we played Richie's Lounge in Schiller Park and small place. But it was packed.

And it was remember, we got like four or five inches of snow that night. We thought we'd be playing to the bartender. Like we really thought it was going to be a bartender and the one local that is dedicated to that bar.

Yeah, we thought and like probably 50 people showed up. It was I mean, it was it was amazing. And they were they were begging for more music.

We played 45 minutes more than we're supposed to. I think we did four or five on course. Yeah.

Wow. And what was nice there? They had it kind of felt like a like a real concert. You know, they had a little staircase behind the stage and you go down and there's a private party room that no one was using.

So that was kind of our our green room. And I mean, after the last song, we ran down there and they're up there yelling still and everything. And we're we're sitting down there talking about what the hell are we going to play? We just, you know, think of the songs we got.

Think of the songs we got. What songs do we have? And we got these ones. We can do three more.

We ran upstairs. And as they run up the stairs, they start cheering like it was. Yeah, it was pretty concert like.

Pull off the three more. Then then we were done. Went back downstairs.

The crowd was cheering. Then the owners, I think we can get them to do a couple more. OK, so then we started really digging and pulling out stuff we probably haven't played in over a year.

Did the owner have his hands in his pocket when he was saying, I think we can get him to play? Yeah, yeah. Oh, there were shots flying around. I thought somebody handed me the check during the show.

Yeah, but it was a song request and it was a terrible song. You know, it was the weirdest thing is I'm watching this. There was the waitress.

Someone must have wrote it down and handed it to her. And I'm watching this happen. And I'm thinking, is she trying to give him his bar table? He's in the middle of singing a song.

I don't think that much. I thought he was giving you money. That's what I thought.

I thought it was the paycheck for the show. I was like, we got paid. We're not going to wait.

What was the song request? Gin Blossom's Jealousy. Yeah. When you when you hear what we're what we're playing and somebody comes up with it, I'm like, what what show are you just at? Were you in this bar for the last three hours? Because I don't think you were.

Well, you should have made it your own. Come on. I don't even know.

I wouldn't even know where to start. You know, I've played that song probably a thousand times. And really? Oh, yeah.

And it does go over extremely well. It goes over very well. Yeah, it goes over very well.

Yeah. Maybe we'll look into that. We try to do songs.

We try to pick our songs based on the crowd appeal. Not to hit, but you don't want to play the songs that every cover band in a bar is playing. You know, you go see one.

You've seen them all. We try to pick a little more obscure, but not so obscure that people go out and smoke a cigarette when you play. We do pigs from Pink Floyd.

We do there's there's a night lady. Oh, really? Wow. There's there's been setlist we've written.

And as we play, I'm like, we'll scratch this next song. We'll put that on the next one. Let's do that.

Let's like we've changed setlist in the middle just because the crowd. Yeah, in the middle of the crowd, you look at the next song. You know, it's the wrong time to play that.

Well, you have to. It's not a setlist. It's it's a it's a suggestion.

Yes, right. You call out audibles and everything. I'd ask for like Captain and Tennille.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. If it's friends of mine, I'll I'll give some kind of off the wall request.

I hear Captain and Tennille is the new free bird. The Pina Colada song. What's that called? Is it called the Rupert Holmes? Yeah, that's escape.

It's called escape. That's what I tried pulling it off in a previous cover band. I'm going to let you know it does not go over well.

I believe it's called Pina Colada Berg. Pina Colada Berg. All right.

Well, so what about a little bit of your background before you all you guys all got together before Stereo 5 was come to fruition? What were you guys doing? Where are you playing? Before Spinning Red, I was in Angry Mixtape. It was just a 90s cover band that started off in 2010, I would say. We just wanted to play 90s grunge, just strictly 90s music.

So we were thinking name of the name is you make a mixtape. That's what it was big in the 90s was making tapes of everything you heard on the radio. So we call ourselves Angry Mixtape because we played strictly just heavy grunge music.

And before that, I was in a punk band, several punk bands that I mean, I couldn't even give you the names of them. But I started playing bass when I was 17. I asked my parents for years for a guitar, but they didn't think I had a devotion to music.

So I never got it. They know me. Oh, yeah.

You saw me. Look at me now, dad. Bring me up a hockey stick.

And I'm like, oh, I thought it was guitar. Do you think you're going to spend the rest of your life playing music and fooling around? Look at me now, dad. So I finally got a job when I was 15.

Bought a bass when I was like 17. Started messing around. I didn't take lessons.

I'm all self-taught. I didn't actually start learning the guitar. And so I met Art.

Art taught me the neck, taught me where all the keys are, where chords were. I mean, it was 10 times musician I was when I joined Spinning Red or before I joined Spinning Red, like it was I can't even explain this. And now if I play with a different bass player, it's weird.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, 10 years I've been playing with this guy, so we know each other in and out when we're playing.

And he knows when I'm about to screw up. I know when he's about to screw up, we cover for each other, you know, and I play with other people. I'm looking at him like, oh, yeah, it's not be over there, you know, playing with playing with different drummers.

It's different because everyone's got a different it's almost relationship wise when you have a drummer is because I'm always listening to him, always counting on him. You know, just somebody at the door. Santa.

And if he's not on, I know he's not on. I'm carrying it and he'll look at me and I'm like, yeah, that's you. And the same with me, you know, it's we gather each other well, but when we play with other drummers, you know, they tend to be cocky and think that you're the one who's off.

Should the rest of us leave the room? I could. That's my buddy, man. So are you a singer first or a guitarist first? I would definitely say I'm a guitarist first.

OK, even even though I'm not well versed in the guitar, I'm strictly rhythm. He doesn't want to make it cry or sing. I don't want to make it cry or sing.

No, but but that that's where I came from as I was always a rhythm guy doing backup vocals in the previous projects. I was in a couple just random bands like called Purple Monkey Dishwasher. Yeah, great.

He said he didn't think of the wireless waffles, but I'm starting to think. I didn't think of that one. I didn't think of the common thread.

I mean, there's definitely a thread there. Yes. Oh, yeah, it's the it's the inspiration.

But, you know, like I was always reliant on another lead singer and they tend to always double as the lead guitarist. And at some point, like I think they have too much power in the band. So, you know what they say goes, and I don't want to be like in a band that's I don't want to be in Ben Fosco and the others.

You know, I want to be in a band. We're all together. We're all doing the thing.

So at one point I was like, you know what? Screw it. I want to sing it myself. And then, you know, I went into a couple original projects called Avocado Llama and 13 Stellas.

I'm J.D. Power and he's the associate. Yes, right. You know, so when they actually brought me in, I was like, well, you know, guys, I don't feel I'm a true lead singer.

I feel like I'm part of a band. I'm more rhythm guitar that just so happens to sing lead. You don't you don't need that ego in order to just disrupt things that way.

That's why we are you paying attention? I'm listening. Are you writing this down? Mike, please. I'm listening.

He must not be a good singer because that's exactly right. If you want mediocrity, I'm right here. Every time he shows up at practice, you can see the look on his face like, man, I'm surprised I'm still here.

I definitely get the imposter syndrome. You know, I'm I'm actually like three kids in a trench coat. Yeah.

Next. Just because you're quiet doesn't mean you're going to pass you by. We did anybody, huh? I'm sorry.

Did you say he's the quiet one? That's because the activity is underway here. But yeah, we won't talk about that. Um, so I started playing drums, probably, I'd say, around 10 years old.

I actually saw the movie song remains the same. And at about nine, eight or nine, and I saw John Bonham solo. And I was like, yeah, I want to do it.

You know, I watched him do. I'm like, that's what I want to do. And here I am 30 years later, and I still can't do it.

But no, I've been in lots and lots of different bands growing up. And just I love to play. And honestly, that's, you know, I wish that I was making a living at it.

I wish that it was my thing, but it's not like that anymore. It's how it used to be. I think I always say there's no more rock stars.

Dave Grohl's the last one. And I've been in and out of lots of different original projects, cover projects, you name it. And once I started playing with Spinning Red and Art, and he's such a great musician that he's trained.

He's, you know, schooled. And he pushes you. I mean, he really does.

He don't let you get by. If you're playing something just okay, he doesn't let you get by. He'll stop the middle of the song and tell you what you're doing.

And I mean, it comes sometimes. He'll get you mad. Yeah, you get mad, you know, and we love each other.

And we'll say mean shit to each other during rehearsal. And then we laugh and have a beer afterwards. Like, yeah, I know I was messing it up and it was making me mad.

And then you saying something, making me more mad, you know. But he's so talented that like during the breaks, he's playing Mozart or like Bach on the keyboard. Yeah, really? Wow.

Yeah. Well, there's always one person that's basically the unofficial musical director of every band. Yeah, yeah.

It's usually pretty easy to spot when you're watching. You just know which guy is running the whole show. And he, you know, he drives us all.

He drives us all to be better. And, you know, in the 10 years, 11, 12, almost now that I've been playing with him, I look back at some of the stuff I did, even our early album that we recorded. And I listen to myself play now.

And I listen to what I played on there. And I think, man, I wish I could have that back and redo it now. Because it would be so much better, you know, and just in playing with people that push you to be better, you know.

You don't want to be the guy that nobody's pushing you. And as professional as he is, and he detests you, we hold him to a standard too. I'll throw jams at him.

You know, we played Moby Dick. Hey, man, work on those little guitar fills because you screwed him up last time. And he gets mad.

He's like, no, I didn't. Yeah, but it's all I like. He's defending how he plays Kashmir too.

Yeah, yeah. You can't, you can't tell a theory guy that he made a mistake. I like to poke at him because he likes to poke at us too.

So it's all, you know, it's all the love in the band. I mean, I don't think we've ever had a single where we left mad at each other or we were mad at each other or drama or nothing. It's just all, I'd say we were aggravated, but never like, it's more like, God, it's only because he knows I could do it.

Yeah, it's nothing, it's nothing personal. He's trying to make you better. You know what? And it reflects on our show and it reflects.

It makes you practice more. It makes it, that's all he wants. He just wants it because I don't want it either.

He's like, you don't want to go out there and play like shit, do you? And I'm like, I don't. All right. And no matter what you say, everybody's got a little bit of an ego.

Yeah. Somebody bruises it a little bit and we get pissed. Exactly.

Yeah. Musicians have to have an ego. It's like I said, I'm already mad at myself.

And then you're, you're, you're telling me what I already know that I'm doing wrong. And now I'm more mad, you know? Right. Just cry.

Yeah. That'd freak him out. You know, I've, I've tried that and he has no sympathy.

Curl up in a ball on the floor and just, you know, I don't like that. No. What are you crying now? Had to pick him up.

Let's go crying in music. So, uh, so for this year, um, and you know, you guys all have day jobs, you know, as, as a lot of successful bands in the area, you know, do, they're not making their living doing this. And you guys are definitely at that, at that point in your lives where you're not relying on this, you know, you're not looking to get famous, I guess, is the, is the, is the, is the best way to put it.

Although I, if I was relying on this for a living, I'd be living in your bushes, man. I mean, that's you. That's that rough.

That's that Russell. Yeah, that's what I'm talking all the time. That tent is quality cardboard.

That's right. That's right. So, so that being said though, what, um, what would have to happen for 2023? What are you looking to happen in 2023 for you guys to say, Hey, this was a successful year and we took a step forward this year.

I would, I would say playing festivals. I'd like to get into some festivals or even start playing up north by my house. Yeah, definitely.

Definitely a change in venue, a graduation from what we're doing right now. Even though we love the places that we're playing, the crowds are great. You know, the, the, the owners are taking care of us, but we want to just kind of step up to that next level if we can.

All right. Yeah. Yeah.

That's, that was going to be my answer to, we want to, we kind of want to get into these street fests and we want to get into, you know, Chicago. There's one every other weekend. They just, they just make up reasons to have them at this point.

It's a hot dog fest. My shoes are red fest and whatever they got, you know, a day fest, pierogi fest. Pierogi fest draws people like Guy Fieri to the city.

And that means something. Hey, I played pierogi fest. That's a great festival to play.

That's in my, isn't that in my, uh, in Jefferson park? That's my old neighborhood. Oh, well, actually I played a pierogi fest in Hammond, Indiana. Oh, they do have a big one out in Whiting, Indiana.

Something like that. Official one. That was huge.

Yeah. Huge festival. We played that too.

And it's, it's awesome. So who does your booking? Or do you use somebody? We have a few promoters that we use. A couple of promoters.

And then, um, Jeff, you know, being the social butterfly that he is, knows a couple. I noticed his wings. Yeah.

They kind of bulge out of his jacket. Uh, yeah. Uh, we go through United talent.

We get a lot of shows through United talent. Uh, Daniel Labelle. Um, I can't think of what he calls his, uh.

Oh yeah. I know him. Yeah.

Yeah. Uh, I can't think of what he calls. I can't remember his organization, but I get emails from him every once in a while.

Yeah. Yeah. Uh, we got a few guys like that.

And just, uh, we know different, you know, we just reach out to bar owners too. And why you got anybody we'll talk later. Yeah.

In the alley. Yeah. So where can everybody find you? You're the, you're the webmaster.

Apparently I tried. They can find us on Facebook. We also have the YouTube page.

We're going to start getting Instagram up soon. You know, but as, as we play more shows, we're going to build more content, you know, try to get out there more and do more recordings. We've actually done.

Uh, one, one recording of a parody song that got to be played on the drive. Oh, wow. For Sherman and tingles in the morning, you know, one of the, one of their little cue wins or something for the 805 805 game.

Yeah. Yeah. Right.

I've heard her name on the, on the radio. Once I've been working up, it's been playing, I've heard, you know, stereo five. So, and then they played the song.

I didn't realize. So we mentioned the drive. Uh, if anybody from the drive is listening to this podcast, the rock and roll Chicago podcast is looking for sponsors.

Yes, we are. Please contact Ray's ready. That's right.

Immediately. Alrighty guys. Well, thanks a lot for coming out.

That was a lot of fun. I appreciate you guys. A lot of success.

This is a great museum. You guys got here. I was looking around before we sat down.

It's a lot of neat stuff. Yep. So our survivors are, uh, yeah, survivors down there.

Yeah. The deal of it's, if it's not bolted down, you can take it with, right. I don't think so.

We'll have to ask, uh, Ron Romero, the founder and CEO of them. I saw him lurking around here in a trench coat. So you know what I mean? That mess.

So if you pick it up, he'll tell you, he'll leap out at you. He's the shadows, right? That's just so I can flash people. What are you talking about? I don't know if you went back and saw it, but my favorite piece over there is, uh, Terry Cass telecaster from Chicago.

Oh, really? Yeah. I didn't see it. Go back and go back there and take a look at it.

It's at the front nominal. See, I'll take you back to the Blackhawk telecasters back there. I, I have to come in and look at it, you know, and just kind of put my hand on the glass like that.

Once a week, every time we come in, you can literally feel it. I understand. He was telling us Rick Nielsen was here and, uh, and, uh, Jim Peter, computer, Carl, Jim Reese, a whole bunch of guys are here for the, uh, installation of Gigantar, the sign that's outside.

That's amazing. That's pretty cool. That's pretty awesome.

Very cool. Custom made. All right, guys.

Well, good luck in the upcoming season. Thank you very much. Thanks a lot, guys.

Take care. And that was stereo five. See, I didn't screw up and say Semper Fi again.

No, you didn't. You know, that was, uh, that was very surprising, very refreshing. Their set list sounds like the kind of band that I would enjoy seeing if I was out at a bar someplace.

And I think if I really requested, they would do Captain and Tennille. They would do it. I think they would.

They would figure out something like that. Quite an eclectic selection. Yeah, absolutely.

It's, uh, pretty interesting. And apparently they have a following people like that stuff. Yeah.

And they played some pretty decent places too. So definitely. So get out there and see them guys.

It's stereo five. You find them somewhere out around the Chicago area. Probably looks like predominantly up north though, but, uh, take a ride sometime.

So otherwise we're going to see you guys, uh, next week with another episode of the Rock and Roll Chicago podcast. I believe our next guest next week is Grace and John. Grace and John.

Yes. They'll be joining us for interviews. So, uh, tune in next week and check them out until then.

Keep on rocking. And thanks for listening. 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.