Hey, this is Paul Martin. And Ray the Roadie. For the Rock and Roll Chicago podcast.

How you doing, Ray? I'm doing fine. How you doing? Good. Forget about it.

I'm all right. Yeah, no, I'm over here by the jewels. They're down by there.

Not too far. They're from Soldier's Field. Okay, good.

What are you doing over there? I'm looking for some shoes. Okay. Blue suede ones.

We did that. That was last week. No, I'm looking for a couple of weeks.

I'm looking for some concrete shoes. Oh, concrete shoes. Yeah.

I gotta, I gotta, I gotta take care of somebody here. I see. I see.

Is that me? Is it? No, it's not you. It's not you. Done me wrong, man.

All right. Okay, good. It's not me.

Yeah. He's some kind of a wise guy, you know? Yeah. I see.

Yeah. So I'm going to take care of this. That's funny you say that.

Why that? We're talking to the wise guys today. Oh, that's great. I can use them then.

Yeah. They may be able to help you out. They might be able to help me out with my issue that I have.

That's right. That's right. So, so we're talking to the wise guys.

They come from up North, Northbrook, Illinois. Let's see what they have to say for themselves. I think, I think I got some boys up there in that Northbrook, Illinois area there.

I love to come down to the South side though. Yeah, they might come. Yeah.

They might stay up North and then they all don't come down to the South side. I have to find somebody else to take care of your business. I just might have to, you know, there, there is that dividing line, that Madison Avenue thing.

Yes. Yes. So they got to stay in their neck of the woods.

Alrighty. I'm gonna, I gotta, I gotta mix up this, this concrete here. You, you can go ahead and get this thing started.

All right. Let's, let's see what the wise guys had to say. Welcome to the show.

Everyone today, we're talking with the wise guys. How are you guys doing? Hey guys. We're doing great.

All right. Doing great. Good to be here.

Good. Good. So tell us a little bit about the band, how the band gets started, how long has the band been together and, and how'd you get the name? Well, the name was the name was a little bit of a project because we were all just a little bit older and we got together and yeah, we just we had to come up with a name last minute cause we booked a gig, you know, and we said, we're a little bit older.

How about the wise guys? And we, I mean, we went through all kinds of names and so just like last minute and we asked a friend, Stacey and her friend Kelly, Avacola, and they were from a band called Smells Like Dave Grohl. Yeah. Right.

And they said, yes, good. Go with it. So we went with the wise guys for that show and it kind of stuck because we were a little bit older and wiser, you know, a little older.

I don't want to know how they came up with that name for their band though. Smells like teen spirit. We, how we started about four years ago, we had a card game going in a buddy's house and then Lenny decided that he wanted to start playing, learn how to play music.

So instead of playing cards down the street at George's house, they started to just jam. A couple of guys would get together and jam in his basement. And about four or five months later, I found out about it and I go, Hey Lenny, you guys playing music? And he goes, yeah.

He goes, wow, I play guitar. He goes, really? I didn't know you play guitar. I go, yeah, I hack around, you know, you just played cards, right? Yeah.

And so I go, oh, okay. We were, we put, we're putting together a bowling night on a Friday with a bunch of high school guys. And so we said, okay, I'm going to bring my guitar to the bowling alley.

And then afterwards, we go back to Lenny's house and there was about four guitar players, two drummers, a singer. And so we put one of the drummers on bass. They had been working on a few songs at that time, but we really didn't have any songs down.

And all of us were really novices. We were not players. I had never been in a band before.

And little by little, we hammered out the ability to play five or six songs. Well, that was four years ago. And that was wise guys, Mark one, we're now wise guys, Mark six.

So we replaced a couple of guys along the way. And the only fact, the only guys from the original band are Lenny and myself. And we brought in a couple of ringers, the Arrigo brothers and Jim Petty.

And that's who we are now. I see. So you're JT.

I'm JT. You're a guitar player. I'm the guitar player and lead masseuse.

I see. I go around during our shows and give all the pretty girls massages. I see.

At a break or when? With happy ending. I didn't get my rubbing tug yet. Don't get these guys started.

No, no. Oh, please do. Yeah.

So originally this started, all started stem through a card game on Friday nights. We're all friends. We used to play cards Friday night.

And then I built this house in Northbrook. We went from the garage on the street from my house to my house. And so these guys walk in and I got a couple of guitars.

I got a couple of guitars sitting there on the stands and they start grabbing, you know, they grab my guitars, they start playing, they start jamming and stuff. And, you know, so I got a poker room. Now guys are ready to play poker, but everybody's, you know, in the jamming.

Right. So everybody keeps jamming. So now the card game was getting disrupted, disrupted because we kept jamming, you know, so, you know, a couple of weeks later, one of my buddies brings over one of the card players.

He okay. And so he brings over this kit and he sets it up. There's an electronic kit, right? So now we're jamming.

Now we got guitars, we got drums, you know, we're jamming, you know, and now the guys in the card room are like, man, you guys are so frigging loud. He's like, I don't know about this card game, you know? So, but we wanted to keep jamming. So we kept jamming and jamming, you know, next thing you know, these guys are moving my furniture around.

They're getting rid of my couches, you know, and they're making room for the stage and stuff, you know? So I went with it, you know, we were having fun. And then we, we said, Hey, well, somebody said, Hey, you guys want to play out? You guys want to do some gigs, play some gigs? We said, sure. And go back to smells like Dave grill.

They were playing a gig down the street and from us. And we said, and they said, you know, Hey, you guys want to open for us? And we said, sure. We'll play like five, six, seven songs, whatever he said.

Sure. So that was our first gig really. Where was that? Oh, that was at the, uh, that was at a backyard bash, outdoor bash.

It was a really, really good Georgia, Stacey and men's, uh, outdoor bash. It was a really fun event. Lots of people lighting, you know, just on a one acre land, you know, Northbrook, you know, so a couple of weeks after that, where were we? Well, no, no.

Well, that, that was our first gig together. And then we wound up playing at the cubby bear. We wanted to opening for, for smells like Dave grill at the cubby bear.

Okay. Yeah. So we, we got serious.

So this is how we're here today as you know, our average age went from, you know, like upper fifties down to like, you know, mid forties, because some of the guys are really serious about playing. And some of the guys just wanted to have a good time, you know, and we had a couple of guys in a band that just kind of came over on Fridays to have a good time. And, uh, you know, we want, we, some of us wanted to get more serious.

So, and this is, so Lenny, what are you doing in the band? Well, right now I sing in a band. I used to play guitar in a band, but, um, we, we had a falling out with our singer and, uh, we had a lot of guitars in the band. So I said, Hey, you know, I'll give it a shot, you know? So, uh, like Bon Jovi said, give it a shot.

Yeah. But so I gave it a shot and I, I, um, I actually Franco, um, is working with me on vocals with the breathing and all the vocal techniques, vocal exercises. And I have another, um, a female, um, uh, coach, uh, Rachel Williams.

She's really good. If you see our video, she's in our video singing, uh, with us, uh, you know, a couple of shows. But, um, so I really took it serious and I got serious with Franco and Rachel and I, you know, and I want them to do good for the band.

So, yeah, I, um, and I enjoyed, I enjoy singing, doing what I'm doing and these guys are really good players. So together we make a really, really good team, you know, and we're all serious about it. So, so we got Jimmy too.

Jimmy, what do you, what do you do, Jimmy? I play the bass. I'm the new guy. Yeah.

New guy. How new? It's been almost two years now. Okay.

Yeah. But he's really experienced. He's really, really good.

So did you play with someone before this? Um, I've been playing bass for about 45 years. Okay. It's been a little while then.

So, so who have you played with? Anybody we might know? Um, no, no one that stands. I played with Mistaken Identity for like 20 years. Okay.

What bands have you opened for? Um, we opened for Chicago. I've opened for Chicago six times with them. Wow.

And the last time was this last November at the Rialto right here in Chicago. Oh yeah. Right down the street here.

Yep. Pretty cool. It's a cool, cool theater.

Yes it is. So, uh, so you've got some, you get some history behind you. Yeah.

Yeah. I lived in Denver for eight years and I couldn't find a job, but I'm like, well, I play, I play bass. So I ended up playing music to make money and I made more money than my friends that had day jobs, but I did a lot of traveling.

Denver, a good market for that? Back then it was, if you were like in with the agents to get the good rooms, cause there was only like maybe five good rooms right in Denver. Right. So other than that, you had to, you had to travel.

So we played, I played all over Wyoming, Nebraska, all the neighboring States, Utah, New Mexico. I need to think what a new, how about New York? Never played in New York. Been there a million times, but never played there.

So DJ, you must be the drummer, right? I used to lead guitarist. I'm not the drummer of the band, but my brother is. Your brother is.

Yeah. So, so he's not here today, right? No. And his name is, his name is? Chris, Chris Arrigo.

Christopher Michael Arrigo. We don't want to leave him out. That's right.

Dad named us stage names. I'm Daniel James. He's Christopher Michael.

Arrigo is our last name, but so Jim. That's a good Italian name. Yeah.

Arrigo. Here we go. Two R's for rock and roll.

You're right. A-R-R-I-G-O. I actually played bass in the band first.

I started, the neighbors down the street, George and Stacy, I was at a party and George decided to bring me over and he's like, they got a band. And I remember I had a broken, broken foot at the time. I came over to cast on a boot.

And I remember that night. So I come over and you remember that night? I do. I remember that night because our rehearsals were on Friday nights, right? And people would stop by and we'd had some fun.

And he came by and when he, when he walked in, he just had this smiling on his face and we're jamming. We're having fun. Right.

And, you know, we take a little break. He grabs a guitar and he's got a walking boot on because he had broken his toe or something at work. So he's got this walking boot on.

So he takes his guitar and he's jamming, playing. All of a sudden he takes his walking boot off and boom, he starts playing guitar with his walking boot. I'm like, this guy can play, man.

This guy can play. I was playing slide guitar with my plastic boot. I was pretty lit.

I just try to make these guys laugh. They're all really cool guys. I didn't even meet them yet.

I just started playing with them. Well, I had actually seen you play at the 545 club. George and I went to see you and Chris up in Lincolnshire, Libertyville, Libertyville, Libertyville.

And we also saw you playing on Waukegan Road in Glenview. So I knew who you were and I knew Chris. And here today, they're in a band.

So, you know, small world. Jim actually, we used to play in a band together and we were playing at 545. So I called Lenny and I'm like, hey, man, I said it's such a good time, you know, and he was taking guitar lessons and I started actually teaching him.

He asked me if I could play bass and I'm like, well, I'll give it a shot. And I started actually playing bass in the band. And then fast forward a little bit, I moved on to guitar, my main instrument.

And then I called Jim and Jim actually knew the old drummer. They grew up together and it's just long, a small world, you know? So now he's on bass. My brother, we got our power trio and, you know, Lenny and JT, it's the wise guys now.

How long have you been with them? It seems like yesterday, but it's like three, over three years now. Yeah. It feels like a blink of an eye, you know? I barely, I was like 28 or 27.

It was my golden birthday, I think. I was 27. What are you, 31 now? 31.

30 fun. And yeah, 30 fun. He's 30 fun and your brother Chris is 32? Yep.

Awesome. Did your toe ever heal? It did, it did. But now I'm breaking legs now because every night we play, I'm breaking it.

Well, because he's in the wise guys, he's breaking legs, you know? I got you. Breaking bones too. Yeah.

Yeah. Keep keeping it real. Yeah.

So as a guitar player, what kind of guitar do you play? I play Les Paul's electric guitar. Les Paul's, yeah. I got a... Marshall sounding amp, but we just got new Marshall cabs and play EVH amps.

We just got a Randall from Marty Craven. He's a really sick Kirk Hammett amp. It's got three channels, got a Plexi sound and it's got good tones.

It's like 100 and something watts, so you got to tone it down a little bit at rehearsal. Well, I think Eddie Van Halen was one of your main influences in music, right? Oh yeah, yeah. I got a Schecter guitar for all the whammy stuff, for Eddie Van Halen, you know, for the dive bombs.

Bam. Yeah, Les Paul's, you know, I got a coil tap so I could split it if I want some single coil sounds. Yeah, so when we first approached DJ, we said, hey man, we said, we want you in the band, you know, but we had so many guitars in the band.

I played guitar, JT played guitar. Tommy. Tommy played guitar, Tommy D. And Tommy just retired, by the way.

He's the guy that wears the white tie, if you see our pictures. He's just retired, but he's only 61, but he just retired. But anyhow, so.

Retired from music, right? Yes, just from music. But he still hangs out with the band. He still comes out with us.

He still helps us load in and load out. And actually, we're going to see him tonight. We're going to go out to Sundance Saloon tonight and check out a couple of shows.

So we invited him. We said, hey man, you want to play bass for us? He's like, well, I don't know, man. Let me think about it because, you know, I'm not really sure.

So he calls up a few days later. He goes, yeah, I think I'm going to do it. I think I'm going to do it.

Okay, so cool. So we and him go shopping for a bass guitar, you know, something he likes, you know, and comfortable with. And we picked out a Thunderbird and, you know.

Actually, we have a Thunderbird right here. There you go. That's true.

There you go. Yeah, so now we're playing and we're, you know, and then, you know, as we progressed, you know, we kept changing instruments. You guys remember that? We kept changing instruments.

Where we should be called the musical chairs. I was playing bass. I wound up playing bass on about four songs, right? Because I was playing guitar back then.

I wound up playing bass in four songs. You'd play bass most of the time and we just kept switching off. And Tommy would play some bass, you know, then he'd go back to his guitar.

Everybody had to play bass so I could play the guitar. Exactly. We wanted him playing guitar.

It's a good thing you decided to play bass, otherwise you wouldn't be here playing guitar, right? Right, exactly. Basically, yeah. That's a great, that's a great point.

That's a great point. But, you know, it made me really appreciate bass players more because learning, you know, finger style and playing bass parts actually taught me a lot about, you know, rhythm, sticking up with the drummer, which I actually started playing drums first. Kind of like Alex and Eddie, they both play drums.

And I started playing guitar just because my brother, I could never keep up with on the drums. We used to jam with our dad and I could never beat up my brother on the drums. I can still beat him up though.

I didn't hear anybody say JT played bass. No, he actually never did. He never did.

No, you never did. Must be a reason. You're next.

I think I got my first guitar when I was like 17. You know, in high school. And then I went to this place.

I think it might have been Sounds Music. It was on Milwaukee Avenue in Wheeling. And I bought a Japanese Strat.

And I used to plug that into my stereo and just self-taught. Just got to learn the dexterity. You know, how do you time your both hands and pluck notes and some rudimentary stuff.

I probably picked up a lot of bad habits. But that's all I ever did was sit on the edge of my bed and try to... So you never had a lesson? I never had lessons. I tried to play guitar, you know, learn how to play a little guitar.

My heroes were Richie Blackmore and Tony Iommi and Ted Nugent. And I liked the hard rock, heavy metal. And that was the only guitar I had when I started a jam in Lenny's basement was this Japanese Strat.

I forget the name of it. There's no label or anything on it. And then once we decided that we were going to get serious, I mean, Lenny came.

He called me up one day and goes, hey, what if we play George's party? And I go, are you crazy? Have you heard us? Because we were doing more drinking than anything else, you know, Friday nights. And Lenny's like, no, we really we could do it. And I could tell that he was really wanting to do it.

And I was like, well, I didn't want to go out there and embarrass myself. But I said, OK, I'll do it on one condition that we add a second night of rehearsal a week. And it's going to be Tuesday night.

No booze, no party. This is business. And he said, OK, he called everybody else up and they said, OK, so that we would rehearse twice a week, every week to get ready for this party.

And then he said, well, we're going to do the cubby bear. And I go, are you crazy? Well, after George's party, we we learned a few things. And when we did the cubby bear, we actually pulled it off.

And now I'm thinking, hey, we could do this. You build up some confidence, right? We built up some confidence. And we actually got through all the songs without anybody making a major screw up.

We didn't have to stop in the middle of a song and say, hey, wait a minute, start over. So I'm thinking, hey, we can do this. And so then I went out and I bought a real strat.

I went to Guitar Center. I bought a nice strat. I'm a strat guy.

I love strats. Yeah. And I just love the sound of them and the playability.

And I bought a Marshall. I bought a DSL-40CR combo amp. And I just love the sound of a strat out of a Marshall.

That's always been music to my ears. And and then and then we wanted to play Sweet Child of Mine. I go, I can't.

And DJ's in the band now. He goes, you can't play that on a strat. So so now I'm looking at, you know, Les Paul's and I found a great deal on a Les Paul.

And I bought that. So I have a Les Paul. I got a bunch of.

So now you can play Sweet Child of Mine. I can play Sweet Child of Mine. Yeah.

His Les Paul was $10,000. Mine was $200,000. I wouldn't go that far.

Well, now he switches guitar every song. Well, you have the right sound for the right song. I always wondered why I'd go to the gigs and see guys with racks of guitars.

I go, why do they got so many guitars? Well, now I got to figure it out. You know, he wanted to play Even Flow with the Drop D. But you can't retune your guitar in the middle of a set to play that song. You need a guitar for that song and a floating drum alone.

So, yeah, now I have three guitars. I got the strat. I got the strat for Even Flow.

I got the Les Paul for Sweet Child of Mine, Rolling Stone, some of this, you know. So for the right song, I use the right thing. But I've learned a lot, obviously, playing now for four years with these.

And then Chris is a phenomenal drummer. But in my own opinion, I've never heard a drummer in a cover band that can play drums the way Chris Origo can. He's got a certain beat and a rhythm to him.

And he hits them hard, really hard. I mean, he's a good, good drummer. He's a banger.

I've never heard anybody that was better than him. He's solid, solid. Really solid.

And DJ is one of the top guitar players in the state, if not the United States. This guy is unbelievable. His leads and solos and what he can play.

And Jim Petty is a professional bass player. So, I mean, Lenny and I, we're sitting there playing with these guys. And it's like, you know, it raises our game, too.

I have to keep up with these guys. And I've learned a lot about song structure and all that. And something I always, you know, I grew up in the 70s, late 60s, 70s.

So, I mean, for us, music was everything. We didn't have video games. You were either outside playing baseball or you were listening to music.

I drive down the street now, I never see kids outside. Never see kids outside. So, too much screen time.

That's exactly right. Exactly right. I always say the drummer drives the band.

Drummer's driving the bus. You know, he's in control. And you follow him.

And if you got a good drummer, that's important. Yeah, that rhythm section is really, really important. You know, I learned that between Jim and Chris, I mean, they really drive the band.

These guys are great, you know, with their solos and guitar. But that rhythm section really helps the vocals, too. Yeah, so I'm definitely learning from these guys.

Well, the better the drummer, the more fun I have. So now, Jim, I see you're wearing a Fender shirt. I'm guessing you as a precision guy, right? Well, I've been playing a Jazz for a while.

And it's funny you say that because I just bought a five string, it's a Precision. Charvel? It's a Charvel with a Precision pickup and a Jazz bass pickup. You get paid by the string? Pretty much.

Gets paid by the G string. But I've been playing five strings for 30 years now. Oh, have you? I really like the extended range.

But I missed the P bass sound. Right. When I was playing, I have a Mike Lull Jazz bass five string that sounds awesome.

I can use it for just about anything except getting a P bass sound. And I kind of wanted to go back to that. So last Tuesday, I found this bass five string with the P bass pickups.

And it's exactly what I was looking for. Yeah, very cool. I played it last night for the first time at practice, and I felt right at home again.

It's nice when it all falls in place like that, huh? Yeah. Our Fridays, he said last night, our Fridays, we have rehearsal every Friday. Unless we have a show on Saturday, then we'll either skip it or maybe we'll do Tuesday.

So every week, we either have a rehearsal or a show. Okay. But sometimes our rehearsals turn into shows because people come by.

We have a really nice setup and sound system. We got lighting. We got a bar.

We got pool table. We got everything. Card table.

You play cards afterwards. We actually don't play cards that much anymore because everybody wants to jam all the time. But people come by to see us.

So sometimes we'll go. So we try to rehearse for a set, for our set list, for our set. And but then people come by, and then we put on a little bit of a show.

You know, let's not play that song. Let's not learn the arrangement to the song tonight. Let's just play, you know, our set.

The stuff we know, right? Let's put on a show tonight. Let's put on a show. So that's what we do.

So we have fun on Fridays, you know, unless we're playing a show. Then we have fun at the show. But yeah, we're having a lot of fun doing it right now.

So where do you get where your show's coming up? We're playing at Edison Park. That's a bigger venue. Edison Park.

I don't know if you guys know Edison Park. Outskirts of Chicago. April 9th.

We're upstairs in the big room. Up here at Park. Yeah.

Actually, it's right down the street from Firewater. Yeah. So which is another good place.

But Edison Park Inn, they call it EPI's. It's upstairs. It's a great place.

And then we got a couple of shows. We got the Farmapalooza. We usually do Northwest Side Reunion.

I don't know if you guys know about that. But that's in July. But we're, you know, it's hard to book some shows because, you know, it's like there's so many, there's this many bands and there's, you know, there's this many venues.

You know what I mean? Well, right now, a lot of people are saying it's hard because they're trying to make up on the lost shows from the last couple of years. They're honoring contracts from last year. Exactly.

And, you know, they're also in a rotation, too. Like, you know, these bands have their foot in the doors with these venues. You know, it's kind of a rotation.

You know, they rotate these bands through. So it's hard to get into some of these places. But we're actually playing some bigger venues and some different venues.

And we're branching out. So we're getting a lot of play. We got over 5000 followers on Facebook, which our Facebook page is the Wise Guys Chicago, the Wise Guys.

So there's a few bands called the Wise Guys. But if you if you type in the Wise Guys Chicago, we'll pop up. OK, we're also on Instagram.

Wise Guys, the band. You know, we have a website. Wise Guys, the band dot com.

But yeah, that's where that's where we're at. So it's all about the Elmer show. Yeah, we just played the Freedom Fest in Elmhurst.

What a what a what a show. Great venue. Great stage sound lighting put on by Brian Mitchell for Freedom One Entertainment.

Just a great venue. We had a lot of fun there. And, you know, there should have been more people there.

But, you know, it's people are just starting to come out of their basements now. You know what I mean? Because, you know, COVID is kind of ending now. And I think I think we're going to start having more fun now.

People are getting more comfortable getting out there, you know, and a little bit looser, a little bit looser. Right. So so hopefully.

Yeah. How did you guys survive COVID? Just rehearsing? Yeah, we did in the beginning. You know what we did in the beginning? We tried to hook up all this stuff and we can do it from each other's house, like virtual stuff.

Yeah, it's not easy. And it's not easy because there was like a lag and this and that. But we kind of did.

We had some fun, you know, right. We had some fun with each other in different houses. But we actually during the lockdown, we played six shows that year.

And a lot of bands didn't play anything. Yeah, right. And so we played six shows that year.

The next year we played a whole ton of shows, you know, and, you know, last year we played a lot of shows also. But yeah, it was, you know, COVID kind of locked everybody down. But it was kind of good for me because I actually got to work on my vocals a lot with Franco, my vocal coach Franco, and then with Rachel, Rachel Williams.

So I kind of like brought my game up a little bit. You know, I put a lot of time in a lot of lessons, a lot of breathing exercises, you know, vocal exercises and things like that, you know. And actually, I learned how to take vocal naps.

You guys know what a vocal nap is? No. Vocal nap is, you know, when you have a show coming up and you're, you know, you're getting kind of tired. I'm not going to talk for an hour.

OK, I'm going to take a vocal nap, you know, you know, things like that. But yeah. So yeah, that's basically how it went through COVID.

Yeah. So you guys went from playing, starting out four years ago, where we're playing four or five songs, opening up for Smells Like Dave Grohl to doing three hours now, so. Yeah, yeah.

So what kind of material are you doing? Well, we do anything from, you know, Guns N' Roses, Pearl Jam. We'll do Gin Blossoms. You know, what am I forgetting? Jimi Hendrix, Neil Young.

Van Halen. Van Halen for sure, man. Oh, we love Van Halen.

That was one of my thing. My Van Halen was one of my favorite bands. Aerosmith is one of my favorite bands growing up.

We're Grand Funk Railroads. Yeah, yep. Grand Funk.

What else do we do? And this was kind of hard for me, you know, taking over as, you know, on vocals because I had to learn all these songs. So what kind of helped me in during COVID is I got to study my butt off and learn all the lyrics to all these songs. I had to learn 35 songs like that, you know what I mean? And I probably know 50 right now that we do.

But, you know, I had to play them over and over. I had to write them down, you know, but yeah, it was. You didn't use a monitor for you? No, no, I've never used a monitor.

I've seen a couple of guys do that and I'm like, what are you looking at? And then I figured out, oh, yeah, they're looking at the lyrics. It's just cheating as far as I'm concerned. Yeah.

Because a good vocalist will be able to edlib some words in there and you never realize it. Yeah. Am I wrong, Franco? We also built some chemistry too.

Like I could screw up a verse or a song. We don't stop and turn around and look at each other. We just keep going.

You guys will never know if we screwed something up. We built up some good chemistry over the years. Yeah, so.

Well, that's important. That's important. I mean, playing together, the more you play together, obviously, the tighter you get.

Yes, yeah, yeah. We had our first or second vocalist, lead singer. He would stop and turn around and look and say, what are you doing? Like during a show.

It was like, you know, we had to put a stop to that. Yeah, so. Yeah, you don't want to bring any more attention to it.

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah.

So, yeah, we've built up some good chemistry. Just follow the drummer on the bus. That's right.

There you go. As I said, he's driving the bus, right? Yeah, and Jim, he's the wheels. You can call him.

I actually started out as a drummer myself, my musical background. When I was a youngster, I always wanted to play drums and I played in a school band. I played drums in a school band.

But then I gravitated towards guitar when I got older. I always wanted to play like acoustic guitar in a campfire. You know what I mean? That was like, that'd be awesome for me to do.

But I didn't buy a guitar until like 20 years ago. Then I bought a couple of Strats, you know, for my kids to play. And, you know, they were so involved in sports and stuff that they didn't have much time to play.

So I played more guitar than they did. But yeah, my. You wanted to go to waste, right? So, you know.

Now, you don't know how many guitars I have now. I just built up my own guitar, actually. But yeah, I built a badass Les Paul.

We call it the Lenny Paul. Yeah, nice. Yeah.

It's awesome. It's chromed out. Yeah.

Yeah. G.J. loves to play it. To me, my guitar.

Was it a kit you put together? Yeah, I bought the kit from Solo Guitars out of Canada. It comes in a box, you know, and it comes with the, you know, with the guitar neck and, you know, the guitar body. The guitar body, you can buy it finished or unfinished.

You know, I bought it finished because, you know, it's just too hard to to finish it, you know, get that right finish. But I wired it and everything. And then I put the whole thing together and I played it and sounded great, right? And then I say, you know what? I want to put some Seymour Duncan Les or Seth lovers in it.

So I put I upgraded my pickups because Seymour Duncan Seth lovers. And the thing sounds great. And I bought the Gibson Les Paul toggle switch with a wiring.

And the thing sounds great, man. It really does. No problems with the neck.

No, you know, you know what? I took it and I got it. I got a little setup on it. And the guy said, man, I barely needs a setup.

That's great. Yeah. And you got some nice NYXL 1052 strings on there.

Yeah. The frets are great on that. I wasn't expecting the frets to be that good.

Yeah. That thing's got a great look to it, too. I've thought about it and I know some guys who have done that.

And but I was worried about the neck, you know, neck not being the right feel or something for it. Yeah, this one actually feels like like a old Gibson baseball bat. It's like 60s neck.

Yeah. Yeah. I guess it's more of a vintage style, actually, guitar.

You know, if you think about it, but it's got the bolt on neck, you know, and I think sounds great, man, with the pickups. It's got some hot pickups. I love it.

Yeah, I want one. I'm going to have to build my own now. You want that one? I want that one, but I can't have it.

Yeah. Well, it's ours, right? It's the Wise Guys. It's ours.

Yeah, we we we actually have like, you know, we're the Wise Guys, right? But if anybody were to leave the band, it's OK. Somebody would come in because we have the Wise Guys have all the equipment we have. We actually have two sets of equipment.

We have one for our rehearsal studio, and that stays there. It stays there. Then we have a travel.

We have a trailer full of the same exact gear, equipment, amps, everything identical. So, you know, for our shows, our live shows. Yeah.

It's way better than running up and down the stairs. Yeah, we don't we don't carry stuff in and out of the rehearsal studio. Except for your guitar, right? Exactly.

Except for the guitar. And Jim's four basses. I'm spoiled now because I used to have to haul every piece of equipment and PA gear.

So you had a PA, too? Oh, man, we we got everything. We got subwoofers. We got we got everything.

We got we got three PA's. We have different size PA's. We do for whatever venue you want.

But yeah, we got a lot. You should see our our setup, our lighting system. We got a nice lighting system because I really feel that, you know, you got to put on a show, OK? You know, I know you're there to entertain.

You're there to entertain. The music is a lot of it. But again, you have to put on a show.

You have to look good. You know, and I tell these guys, hey, guys, you guys got to look good on stage. You know, you got to, you know, watch your carbs.

You know, you got. Yeah, you do. You got to you got to got to work out a little bit.

I like to work out myself. But, you know, I tell the guys, you guys got to look good for the stage because we're putting on a show. I lost 30 pounds already.

Why are you pointing at DJ? DJ is doing good. DJ is doing good. Yeah.

Congratulations, DJ. Yeah, good job. Yeah.

And then you got Franco. Franco. Look at Franco.

He's fucking badass. Look at him. So he's our he's our designer, our designer to make us good.

Well, Franco, he's got the theatrics about him, you know, and he he comes over and he none of you guys got to do this. You got to do that. You got to show more of this, show more of that.

And Franco is like more theatrical because he's in opera, you know. So Franco helps us a lot with that part of it. Yeah.

So, Franco, how long have you been doing opera? I've been doing opera for about 40 years. I started in rock and roll. My fact I played with Jim when I was 17.

I think we played a gig together and I was 14. He was 14. And yeah, I wanted to be a I wanted to I wanted to be a rock star and I wanted to be Robert Plant and and didn't know anything about physiology or, you know, vocal quality.

And, you know, I'm singing falsetto most of the time. So I went in, I back, you know, remember phone books. I just opened it up and found voice teachers back then.

And I just found a guy. His name is Carl Lorenz. He's a wonderful voice teacher up in Hoffman Estates.

And he used to sing with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Schulte. And he said, you know, I hear something. If I taught you a few classical things, would you do it? I kind of fell into it.

And then I really loved it. But I never stopped loving rock and roll. And, you know, so I know we're of very similar generations.

So, you know, I saw Zeppelin and when they were here and the old stadium and all the great Chicago bands off Broadway a million times, your band several times, cheap trick thousands of times. And, you know, I always have that. And so when Lenny came by and asked and the drummer before Chris was also a friend of mine who was playing with the Wise Guys and he goes, you know, Lenny, Lenny might want to switch over to vocalist.

Would you teach him? And I said, yeah, sure, if he'll if he'll follow my technique, you know, because, you know, I have a very I'm very technical driven. So I didn't want. But Lenny is really a hard worker.

And I have to say from where he was two years ago to now is it's like climbing Everest. He he really took it seriously. And we we rehearse.

We have a lesson every week. He's got another voice teacher that he studies with. So he's getting, you know, good different points of view.

But from an opera, I was like, you guys got to you got to put on a show. I mean, it's a rock show, right? You can't just be guys in T-shirts and, you know, you're every shoes nailed to the floor. I can't have your shoes nailed to the floor.

You know, we can't, you know, I remember Plant and Deep Purple and these guys, they embody the emotional side of of these songs. And and I'm, you know, and Lenny, he he's in the he's in the concrete business. I said, Lenny, you have a great business, but you can't be Lenny, the concrete guy and Lenny, the rock star.

You have to find that that part of you that that makes you want to get up on stage and open your soul and and get emotional with these. And then he put this band together and, you know, DJ Jim and JT and Chris, too. I mean, they they they effing bring it, you know, and Lenny, Lenny has started to see a different side of his personality.

And I said, make sure you take care of your wife, because once you're up on stage and those girls start getting up there, you don't get in trouble. Make sure you take her on a nice vacation. That's for sure.

Yeah, and I do. Yeah. Why am I not surprised that somebody in the wise guys is in the concrete business? Well, you know, we kind of we kind of make cement shoes.

Yeah, as you say, make any shoes. Yeah, I did the all sizes. I had I had a guy come into shop one day in the office, you know, and he says he owed some money.

Right. So I grab a tape measure off the counter because we sold tape measures and all that, you know, and I and I and I bend down, bend over and I and I'm measuring his shoes. Right.

His feet. And he says, what are you doing? I says, I'm measuring your feet. I said, because if you don't pay your damn bill, I'm going to make you some concrete shoes.

Yeah, that's actually a true story. But yeah, but yeah, so so music business is way better than the concrete business. I'll tell you that.

We're having fun. Yeah. So so we can find you on Facebook and at Wise Guys, the band on the website.

Yeah, Wise Guys, the band on an Instagram and Wise Guys, the band dot com, you know, and then, you know, Wise Guys, the Wise Guys, Chicago, because there's a few other bands, you know, I mean, the Wise Guys, there's one in New Orleans. There's one in, I think, Indiana. There might be another one.

And then there's us, you know, but we're better than them. Of course, you're from Chicago. That's right.

That's right. Are you all Italian? Well, pretty much. I think I think I have a little Italian in me.

I think Italian, Irish, Italian, Irish, Italian, Irish. I'm half Italian, half German. Oh, German.

OK, I have a little German in me, too, actually, if you go if you go back a little further. But yeah, but the reason the Wise Guys came, like I said, You're the real Wise Guys. We're the real Wise Guys.

Yeah, but it's because we were older, you know what I mean? We're going to be playing a lot of shows and we're trying to actually, you know, break into some of these difficult venues to break into, you know what I mean? Yeah. So look for us. We just did a nice show.

You can see we have a nice video that we played at our last show. It's on our website. You know, it's on our Facebook page, too.

So we'll be sure to check that out. Yep, definitely. Thanks, guys, for joining us today.

Thanks for having us. And I know you made a long trip from Northbrook. Oh, don't worry.

It only took us like this guy. This guy. I'm not kidding you.

He had the Range Rover up to 110 miles an hour. It felt like we were going 30. Yeah, I think he rides nice.

All righty, guys. We'll see you out and about somewhere in the summer. Sounds good.

Make sure you check out the Wise Guys. Yes, for sure. Rock and roll.

Thanks for having us. Thank you. Thank you.

So that was the Wise Guys. Wines probably could help you with your situation. They just might.

I can't believe he's got his own concrete business. Yeah, Lenny's got his own concrete business, and he can maybe help you out with those shoes you're trying to fit. That's right.

You know, I'm into import and export myself. I see. A lot of people don't know that about me.

What are you importing? You wouldn't want to know. Never mind. Never mind.

Forget about it. Forget about it. It's beneath you.

I see. Speaking of beneath, no, no, never mind. Never mind.

So that was good talking to them, guys. Yes, it was. Yes, it was.

Very entertaining. And my kinds of people. That's right.

That's right. Very, very cool. Very cool band.

They got great sound. Nice. They do some good material.

Got some good musicians in there. Yes, they do. Yes, they do.

And it sounds like it's going to be fun to go see. So go check them out, people. It's as soon as you can.

Go to their website, Wise Guys Band. Dot com. Dot com, right.

Or Wise Guys and Facebook. Wise Guys Band, I believe, on Facebook. Or is it Wise Guys Chicago? Wise Guys Chicago on Facebook.

Wise Guys Band dot com. Wise Guys Band on Instagram. That's right.

That kind of rhymed there. That's right. I'm kind of like a poet, you know.

My feet are long, fellows, too. I bet they are. So once again, coming to you live or recorded from the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66 in beautiful downtown Joliet.

Visit them at roadtorock.org and sign up today to be a charter member. OK, I will. I'll do that.

You better have. You should have done it a long time ago. I've already done it.

I've already done it a long time ago. OK. We're just talking to Andy from the Rock and Roll Museum.

That's right. He's one of the board of directors. He's here today doing some work.

And he's very knowledgeable about the history of music. Very. And he was working on a wall.

And I went up and asked him, I said, you was putting somebody inside that wall that you're covering up there? He said, no. No, he said, don't be a wise guy. That's right.

He said, no wise guys here. So wise guys have left the building. They sure have.

So thanks for listening, everybody. We'll see you soon. Talk to you next week.

Bye bye.