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

How are you doing today, Ray? I'm doing great. How are you doing, Paul? Good. Staying virus-free? Virus-free.

You got it, man. That a boy. That a boy.

You too. Oh, yeah. Make sure you're washing your hands and keeping your distance.

There you go. But you know, you need to shower. Not showering is not a way to keep people away from you.

Really? Yeah, you really need to take a shower. I mean, we are miles apart and I can smell you here. Well, I've been showered at least once a week.

Well, a little bit more than that. A little bit more than that. There's ways to social distance and there's ways not to social distance.

I see. So what do you got going for us this week? This week we're taking a little turn and we're going to take a country turn. Yeehaw! Not like a different country, but yeah, exactly.

Yeah, kind of thing. And we get the band Smoke and Guns, who we're talking to this week. The Smoke and Guns.

Bunch of great guys. Yes, they are. We talk with Artie Speck and Jim Benke and Robert Brose.

And David Nicola wasn't able to join us, but he was there in spirit, I'm sure. And they're a great country band. As a matter of fact, they played my party.

My 60th birthday party, I had them play my party. One of the bands that played my party. I know, I was at that party.

It was a lot of fun. They were the only country band to play though, because you know me, I'm a rock and roll guy, thus the name Rock and Roll Chicago. That's right.

But I do like country music and they do it quite well, I must say. Yes, they do. I've seen them a number of times.

They're really good and a lot of fun. Yes, they are. Yes, they are.

Let's get to it. And we have some fun interviewing them via Zoom. And let's get to it and see what they have to say.

Let's get to that beautiful place in the country. Today we're speaking with Smoking Guns. We've got Artie Speck, Jim Bakke, and Robert Brose.

How are you guys doing today? We're good. Doing well, Paul. Good.

Good to see you guys. Top of the afternoon to you. Yeah, it has been a long time.

Yeah, it has been quite some time. I didn't even know we were still a band, actually. We had a mask on in our picture yesterday.

I saw that. I saw your picture with the blue chip with your mask on. Yeah, that was pretty good.

So how are you guys surviving this COVID-19 thing? Same as every day. I don't know. I mean, you know, it's obviously a bit of a groundhog day situation.

But, you know, just trying to survive like everybody else. It's been tough. Obviously not playing music and hanging out socially and doing that.

But, you know, we're getting by. Like everyone else, we're just doing our thing and getting by. Robert, are you still giving drum lessons? I am.

I'm doing drums and piano online. Virtually? Yep. Yep.

So I don't have my full slate of students that I normally would. But, you know, I've got a handful of them. So it's better than nothing, you know.

So tell us, let's start out in the early days. Tell us how the band got started. Artie, you want to take that one? Yeah.

Man, I started the band in 1997. It was a five-piece band in 1997 with a girl keyboard player. And then it just evolved.

And then she moved. No, she was the girlfriend of the singer. Wait.

She left because she wouldn't appease to his contract that he had signed. Oh, she signed the contract, all right. I bet she did.

Yeah, so we just started playing shows. This is the first time I've gone more than two weeks without playing a show since 1997. Wow.

Wow. It is ridiculous. And then these guys all joined like 2004, 2005, 2006.

Jim was first in 2004. And then David was in 2005, who couldn't be with us today. And Robert in 2006.

You made that sound like David died. No, David didn't die. Who can't be with us today.

Not that we're aware of anyway. You responded. He just smells funny.

It's his fault for not being here. He can't defend himself. Right, he missed out.

Yep. And then we've just been doing this pretty much 100 times a year, shows 100 times a year. We ain't going to get that this year.

So was the band called Smoking Guns back in 97 or whatever? Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, the first name was, we were like a band called Midnight Rider at one point in the very beginning when my brother-in-law. See, my nephew Andy, I don't know if you know Andy, he used to play in a bunch of bands.

Him and I started the band. And then he quit and moved to Nashville because he was going to be a big star. And then my brother-in-law, who wasn't my brother-in-law at the point, joined the band.

We kind of changed the band name for a little while, but went back to Smoking Guns when Duncan moved away. And Andy came back to the band before I got hired Jim. The early days are a blur at this point.

I wanted to keep a record the whole time because I think it would have been cool to have a whole history written down of the things you see in the bar and relationships and all that type of stuff. But I'm getting old now. So now I'm lucky to know how long I should cook my tater tots in the air fryer.

It's good to know if you're wearing underwear or not. You're trying to remember that. Oh, I haven't done that in like two months.

It comes back to the thing of not wearing pants right now. So I'll play that again. But I remember Robert's first gig with us.

We played open for Chris Cagle at Last Lab. And there's an infamous picture of him standing next to Chris Cagle's tour bus. He's a short chubby guy.

The bus that made me look fat. It wasn't me. It was Chris Cagle's bus.

And I remember after we were done playing, we were standing by the front door and I was talking smack to everybody that came up to us. And he's like, how do you get away with that? There's something I could add to that story, but we're going to keep this clean. But I truly, I was standing next to Artie and, you know, we're just hanging out listening to Chris Cagle.

And I could not believe the things he was saying and getting away. And to this day, I can't believe the things he gets away with saying. To girls.

They just like laugh and they're like, Oh man. It's the joy of being a musician. I guess.

It still works today too. Yeah, sadly it does. Every weekend for the past.

And usually every Monday and Wednesday too. It doesn't even matter if it's a show anymore. No, I know what Artie's saying about not playing.

I mean, you know, even before joining Smoking Guns, I've been fortunate enough to be doing music my whole life. And I can't, since I started playing professionally, I can't ever remember not playing for what was our last show? March 14th. I drank a shot of hot sauce.

That's right. And I've never had a chance without a shot. Just like, what do I do? It's so bizarre.

So bizarre. Actually, to be honest, guys, I blame the pandemic on us because we have never recorded a song ever. And the week before the pandemic, we go record an original song and then we can never play again.

I mean, coincidence. I don't know. I don't know.

Yeah. Faith says you will never play this song. We should have never done that.

We would be at some dive bar tonight, I think. Well, what's the name of the song that you were doing? I'll Pray For You. There it is.

There you go. Jim, please do, but what was the name of the song? I'll Pray For You. And it's still not done.

Right. Which it could be done, but. So now who wrote that? I did.

And Jim, you've written some other stuff too, haven't you? Yeah, I wrote all the stuff that we play live. And then I'm blessed enough to play with guys that don't mind listening to stuff I write and they play it and they're extremely good at what they do. I'm really lucky for that.

Now, what were you doing before Smoking Guns? I was in a hard rock called Fugitive. Long hair, you know, the Paul Martin kind of stuff. Yeah.

We did what we did. I took a liking to country music a lot. I actually came and seen Smoking Guns with Andy and with Jim Crow and Brent Dunbar and Artie.

And I seen them at a bar in Sycamore called Ski's. That's the first time I ever seen them. And I ended up giving my country CD of my stuff.

I think I gave it to Brent. Yeah, you might have. You didn't give it to me.

I gave it to Brent and I got Artie's number and I must have called him. I don't know. Let's say.

Here we go with this story again. Let's say. And he never answered the phone, never answered the phone.

I mean, never. I don't mean like one time. I mean, never.

Let's keep in mind. This is the time when you only had like 100 minutes on your phone. Okay.

Restaurant in Elgin. Dinner. And someone comes up, another bass player and another band.

Hey, Artie Speck is looking for you from Smoking Guns. I said, the hell he is. I've called him a hundred times.

And that's how I got in the band. And if there wasn't, if my space didn't change, there was a video on there, which I can't find anywhere. I may have it on an old hard drive of Jim's first gig with the band.

It was at Middle Branch Saloon and in Kenosha. And he's got work boots on and a belt buckle. And then Josh, his son was like, no dad.

And then he dressed him. Went to buckle is where he went. That's true.

That's a true story. So Robert, Robert, I know you, like you said, you teach, but I know you come from Cleveland. You're a Browns fan.

I'm sorry to hear that. But, but now how long have you been in Chicago? I moved up here from Nashville in 1997. I spent five years living down in Nashville and then moved up here.

Yeah. So, and at that time I was still working in Nashville. So I'd fly back and forth and until I kind of got.

Established here in Chicago. And then once that happened, I've just been working up here ever since. So I called him a bunch of times too, just so you know.

That is true. I think we talked once though. Yeah.

Yeah. Right. But yeah, at that time I was doing a different project.

It was like an original power pop band called the Jujubees. And so I was involved with that. And then I forget where I saw an ass country drummer.

Answered that audition. The guys were like, Hey, if you want the job, it's yours. And like I already said, I've been with them ever since.

So yeah, 2006 sounds about right. Is country drumming any different than rock and roll drumming? Nowadays, the line is more blurred. You know, there are a lot of country songs that, you know, if you took the pedal steel out and just recorded it with three piece band, be a rock and roll song.

Gun stuff sounds like Doobie Brothers stuff though. That's the. We need more hand claps in our song.

So I can do that. I can trigger those. That's not a problem.

Yeah. But water. The good thing about playing in smoking guns, that's a lot of fun.

Drum wise is that we're, you know, just a three piece band. So there's a lot of space to fill because, you know, country songs, you've got, you know, your acoustic guitar, your keyboards, fiddle, maybe the pedal steel. There's a lot more instrumentation going on, but just being a three piece frees us up, you know, to kind of play a little bit more than, you know, normally you would if you were playing it with a full band.

And so that's fun from a musical standpoint. So tell us about David. David, who's that here? And where did David come from? David, David answered my ad on, I think it was Chicago musicians.com back before like Craigslist.

There was, I'm pretty sure it was like, there was classified ad for musicians. He had an ad on Craigslist for chance encounters. Yeah.

You can't get those anymore. They took all that good stuff over there. David was David called me.

My number was in there and he said, I want to join your band. So you were looking for a guitarist. Yeah.

Cause Brent, the guy that was playing guitar was moving to Texas because his, he got married and his wife got, worked for Starbucks doing software for their systems. She runs a drive-thru. She makes the mocha loco choker things.

So he, so he he answered the ad said, I want to join the band. So I'm like, all right. You know, and he's had a thick accent.

He was probably, I'm not sure when David came, but the U S but this was 2005. And I was thinking, all right, here, I sent him the song list and I used to Andy, my nephew, we had a three piece band. We did for a little while called raggedy band.

And Andy playing the cheeseburger in paradise restaurants. When there was one at Downers Grove and displays and Algonquin, I think. So David calls back after two weeks.

He's like, I learned the songs and I was like, it's been like two weeks. There's no way I know the songs. So I'm like, well, I'm playing in a three piece band at cheese burn paradise.

Come jam with us. You know, we'll pay you the tip money. Cause there was always tip money.

He was a three piece band. So he comes out in place and he knew all the songs. And I was like, you're hired.

We push pause now because now, now, 15 years later, we asked him to look at the song. We can learn 40 songs. Once he can't learn one song.

Well, that's because he was, there was what do you call it? He had, um, inspiration. No, not inspiration, but he needed a gig. Yeah.

Inspired. And the motivation, motivation. Yeah.

That's it. So that David is from Croatia, right? Uh, uh, Czech Republic, Czech Republic. And, and, uh, but, but he's a great guitar player.

I mean, obviously, uh, uh, is, is country a big thing over there? I mean, did he, well, when he told me that when he joined the band, when, when I first talked to him, he said he used to play in, uh, uh, in a band in the Canary Islands where they played country music. I guess he traveled a little bit while playing when he was younger. I see.

And he, he was, in the Canary Islands at a band and new country songs and just kind of rolled with it. You know, I don't know. I mean, I can't answer for him.

I mean, if a rock band had contacted him and he learned those songs, he might be a rock player. You know, it was more of a way to make some income. I would assume.

He's very, very, very, very versatile. He can play a lot of stuff. Right.

Oh yeah. He's a, he's a phenomenal guitarist. I, I know, uh, just from conversation we've had and, and music he's played in the past, I know he's heavily in, uh, by bluegrass.

You know, he's, he's really into, into that as well. David's father was a guitar builder. um, David just grew up around guitars.

I mean, David knows a lot about guitars. He's a great player. Yeah, he is.

Yeah. Yeah. I know he's, uh, he's, he played a couple of times, uh, uh, with JP and the cats and a couple of different bands and, and, uh, just fit in.

He's got a good ear, you know, got a great ear for it. Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah. Like Jim said, he's, he's very versatile. He can play, he can play a lot of stuff and he can play it all very well.

It's not like he's complimenting anyone particular style or something like that. Yeah. Sometimes without even, you know, really, really knowing the songs and getting together without playing, we have a big, uh, sometimes thing, uh, one of our chicks is just hung in the middle, uh, to something else.

You know, if, if I hear it or Artie hears it and we'll just start playing something, sometimes it works, sometimes it don't, but David usually can pick up whatever it is and just, uh, wing it. Same with Robert. Robert can, uh, you know, wing it just with a different drum beat.

So that's kind of cool. Yeah. I think one of the things that's, you know, nice about playing with band is that, um, everyone is open to pretty much trying anything, you know, we might not know it, but we'll try it, you know, and, and everyone is real, uh, open that way as far as, you know, okay, we're, we're taking the detour now, you know, and, and no one has a problem with that.

Robert doesn't like the detours because they take too long. Well, that's true. Yeah.

If you, you know, if you can get somewhere and, uh, you know, it takes you, uh, two miles to get there, or you can get there and take the long, it takes you 10 miles to get there. Yeah. Sometimes, you know, you always find a way to kind of make it work and get back to, you know, where we were.

Right. So I, I've heard you guys take detours and, uh, do some rock and roll as well. Well, yeah, many times, many times.

I know I was watching a live feed one day and I requested, I think it was sweet emotion. You guys played it. One of my infamous live feeds from the top of the subwoofer.

That's right. During that live feed did already pose for the camera at all. I do it all the time.

Oh yeah. Yeah. So you guys said you have some, uh, original material.

Yes, we do. Uh, have you ever recorded it before? Any of that, or is it out there? Yeah. Um, well, I mean, we do, we do as strong as I am.

That's that's recorded like with me and and other stuff before I don't know if already don't we have a we have live versions of recorded stuff, but I have I have a ton of unmixed live stuff that I've been I've recorded on my computer like through the mixer like you know individual track like tracks, you know, like multi-tracked but I don't have the equipment to mix it down because anything I have here sucks, you know, like to where you can hear it good enough to make it, you know, any of it could be used because it's like crystal clear, you know, like the recording is but it's a matter of mixing and mastering it to get it. I need somebody to do that for us. I've I've probably got some recordings of you guys that have recorded on flash drives through the board of blue chip to I got I got at least 10 or 12 shows that I've multi-tracked that I just have stored on a hard drive that I mess around with here and there but without the correct studio speakers and that type of stuff you mix it and then you go put it in your car and you're like, oh my God, you know, the guitar is super loud, but it didn't sound like that in the headphones or in the Bluetooth speaker that I was using.

I have my I have my general music speakers right here. Where'd you get those? I can't I don't know where I got it, but I acquired them somehow. I have some I'm off the back of a truck.

Yeah. No, I bought my dinner off the back of a truck yesterday. I saw that.

They're actually pretty good. They're not bad at all. Everybody's saying they're bad.

They weren't bad at all. Now you got lucky. You cook them.

Well, I didn't buy I saw the whole thing that they're trying to sell with the T-bones and everything. I said, I just want those. I marinated them and we're changing the subject.

Three minutes on each side in the pan and then nine minutes in the oven. They were medium rare. They were perfect.

That's cool. So you said you were recording a song when this all started. You guys planning on coming out with the CD or something? Well, the thought is my thought is I think singles as we go, because nobody buys CDs anymore.

I guess you could sell them at your shows. But then again, you can also make you can make downloadable cards you can sell at your shows, you know, because by the time you get like a whole CD done, put all that money into it. I'd rather just release a song on Spotify and iTunes and all that type of stuff as you go along.

You know, because if you went and recorded a song a month, that'd be and you wanted eight songs on a CD, it would take eight months, you know, but people could hear the songs that you're making as you go. And then I guess you could print them all into a CD when you're done. But why hold on to it? You know, like, you know, unless you got the equipment at your house and we all go to somebody and do it, you know, it's like if we get one finished, let's just put it out there immediately.

Right. The cool thing about it is, is our original stuff, people really like and we get a lot of requests for it. It shows we get.

Bishop is a perfect example. We get people who we sing the songs along with us. And that's kind of cool.

Yeah. And see, yeah, and a lot of like what we could put on a CD, there's probably seven songs we could put on a CD immediately. But it's a it's a time of getting together.

Well, who knows what happens after this is all over. See, I work way too much like during the week and stuff and got kids and all that type of stuff. And there's just not enough hours in the day to spend all nights in studios.

You know what I mean? Right. You know, there's a day job and then you get home from the day job and you got to go to your night job. And then it's like this hamster wheel, which now I'm on a different hamster wheel.

Wake up around to get high and drink till 4 a.m. Wake up at 2 and then do his own live feed on Facebook. That's right. Yeah.

Those are interesting. And then everybody know we're doing tonight. So what? So, Jim, strong as I am, what was what was the other one that you play a blue chip? I can't remember the name of it.

We do drive in. We do carry on driving and carry on. Then the new one is I'll pray for you.

We once in a while throw in an old an old original of mine called Time is on My Side. Phenomenal at learning stuff, you know, like that stuff. I've got your CD around here somewhere.

You use it as a coaster. I do. I do.

But I seem to have misplaced it right now. I can't remember where exactly it's at. The first one or the second one? Yeah.

Which one you got? Well, you gave me a cassette. Go figure. I don't know.

It was a track, wasn't it? It was a cassette. But the same guy that took six days to get Zoom on his phone gave me a surprise me. Did the 8-track come with a matchbook? It came with a 1974 Plymouth satellite.

Now that you got Zoom working, you should work on Venmo. I know I got PayPal, right? You have PayPal? I do. Oh, my God.

Can you send me that money, Omi? No. I think at this point you owe me money. I do? So how many shows have you guys canceled so far? I think it's around nine.

Well, including this month, it might be up to 11. And then, like, I just got cancellation notice for the Park District next month. I haven't heard that Bartlett Fest is canceled yet.

But Gilbert's Fest was canceled this month. River Fest was canceled. I don't know.

River Fest was canceled. Really? Geez, I didn't know that. We were supposed to play a Thirsty Thursday thing that they do in downtown Dundee.

That was canceled this month. If we want any shows, we're going to have to try to get, once we can go outside, which hopefully is soon, hopefully people have some parties and want a band. Because there's still possibilities to play backyards and that type of stuff.

Well, even the rest of this year, I think, is pretty much kind of going to be a wash. Because even festivals, if they have a festival, they're going to limit the number of people, which means they're going to limit your pay. And so it almost seems like this year is going to be a washout.

Well, that's my concern with the bars. The bars have been closed. They don't have any money to pay a band.

And the restaurants, too. And it's like, oh, well, you can open at 50% capacity. They might as well stay closed, because they can't survive on 50% capacity.

I mean, I know one of the places I work, their rent is $10,000 a month. And they've been closed since March 14th. March was their last show there.

Come another three months, they're not going to be $50,000 in debt to the landlord. They're just going to close the doors and bankrupt it, bankrupt the LLC. And it's going to happen all over the place.

Because you imagine a restaurant, oh, we can only have 25% capacity right now. Then why not just keep doing curbside? Because now you've got to pay more employees. You've got to keep lights on.

Because a lot of these places, like P.F. Chang's, I go there a lot, and Cheesecake Factory. Now, Cheesecake Factory, you don't go in. But P.F. Chang's, you still have to go in.

There's no lights on or anything in there. There's people in the kitchen, and there's somebody up in front, and nothing else going on. If that place opened with 25% capacity, they'd have to bring in more workers, still not making enough money to pay the rent.

It's like it doesn't make any sense. They've taken away everything fun in our lives while this virus has. Keep taking your vitamins, vitamin C, vitamin D. Flintstone vitamins.

Yeah, well, you get it all from Flintstones. I take vitamin T. It's called tequila. Tequila.

Oh, I thought you said vitamin P. I take vitamin J.B. So, not vitamin Jim Banky. There you go. Thank you.

Like Artie was saying, the hard part's going to be, well, one, you know, the bars and restaurants scene, that's going to be the last thing that's going to, you know, get opened up, obviously, because of being indoors in the close proximity. They're going to have to make sure everything's under the ideal conditions to even open in the first place. And then, like Artie said, once they do, you know, how are you going to make it if you can only have, you know, if you're a 200-seat venue and you can only have 75 people in there? It's going to be tough for a long time to come.

On a good note, though, my voice is nice and rested. Yeah. For me, anyway.

So, speaking of that, can you go in the studio and do your vocal parts? Or where were you recording at, first of all? What's it called? LL something, right? L and L. Isn't it Larry Criss? Yeah, Larry Criss. His studio in Elgin, L and L. Oh, okay. Yeah, that's where we were.

We recorded most of I'll Pray for You, and then we also got drum tracks for two more songs. I forget. Drive-In? Oh, yeah.

Drive-In and Carry On. Yeah. So, we've got the drum tracks for those two.

So, you know, we can start whenever the time is right again. Paul, you're going to love this song, I'll Pray for You. It's way different than anything we've ever done before.

Yeah? Yeah, it's rocking. I mean, it's really, really rocking. It sounds like it could be, like, a church hymn or something.

We're going Christian. That's what we're doing. We're going Christian.

It's where the money's at. It won't change my behavior, but it's where the money's at. Yeah.

It's rocking. You'll like it, man. It's got a cool drive to it.

All right. That's cool. It definitely rocks.

It's more of a, again, like, you know, you were talking earlier, Paul, about, you know, the difference between rock drumming and country drumming. Well, this one is definitely, you know, more of a rock song played by a country band, you know. But it works really well.

It's a great song, it really is. So speaking of drumming, what kind of gear do you play through, Robert? Yeah, I bought this starter kit at Target. You green.

Now, my main kit is a Yamaha recording custom. It's, gosh, let me see. I bought that kit back in 93 or four when I was living down in Nashville.

I've added to it over the years. So now I've got multiple kits. I could turn it into a, you know, monster metal kit if I wanted to, or I can turn it into a little bebop kit and play it as a four piece.

So that's my main thing. All kinds of different cymbals. Way too many, that's probably healthy to have, but can't help myself.

Then I've got a couple other kits, an old Ludwig kit, an old Gretsch kit. But my go-to is recording customs. Are you sponsored by anybody? No.

I used to have an endorsement with a drum head company, Aquarian. But I don't have that anymore, and so I'm not, no. So, Jim, what kind of gear are you playing with? He sings through a microphone.

I sing through a microphone. Just a wireless Shure. What is it, Artie, a Beta 58? A Beta 58.

Yeah. My second one, Artie just bought this one for me, and I'm making payments on it. So, Jim, when you write a song, what do you do? Do you come with the words? Do you come with the melody? Or do you play it on guitar a little bit? Well, I come up with the words with the melody.

I play guitar, but I'm not good at it. I play piano, but I'm not real good at it. But, I mean, I know how I want the song, and I know I definitely can sing the melody to them, and I can fake it, but not very good, you know.

But, you know, they obviously work. The songs are pretty strong. I think everybody likes them.

They're simple. I'm a real simple musician. It's usually three chords.

It's pretty cold for late September The autumn wind is creeping in Summer sun's packed up, it's long gone And there's a whole lot of leaving going on My strong point is my lyrics. I'm pretty good at lyrics, I think. For You has a really, really cool lyrical content.

It started out, and I don't want to bring any names into it, but it started out where it was going to be an angry song, and then my wife told me that I don't write angry songs, that I should write something positive. Aw, 1-4-3. There you go.

There you go. What's 1-4-3? It's I love you in text code. Oh, I see.

Where does that come from? I don't have any idea. Oh, come on now. Robert, where did 1-4-3 come from? Well, I'm not going to name any names, but it was someone in Artie's life at one point.

And that's our ongoing joke on stage, 1-4-3. Yeah, it's old at this point. We love you, Artie.

It's been more like, no, never mind. We love you. All good.

The offspring are here, so I'm going to just say never mind. And what do you call your offspring? Thing one and thing two. There you go.

What about you, Artie? Well, I know David plays the Telecaster, right? Yes. What about you, Artie? I play that Schecter bass with the inlays of the girls. Yeah, the naked girls right there.

That's the only reason I play that bass. Just like the ones on the mudflaps of the trucks, right? Exactly. I got four P-Bass specials over here and a jazz bass, but I just play that one because it's light and it doesn't bother my shoulder.

Yeah, very good. I mean, you do it enough, it gets like, ugh. And then my amp's like a trainer amp that I bought at Modern Music.

It's only like a 300-watt amp, but you don't need much more than that. I used to have like a 410 or a 412. And carrying that around, no, I don't need to do that anymore.

This ain't 1978. The smaller, the better. Just put it in your ears, you're fine.

Leave it up to the sound man to take care of it. Yeah, trust the sound guy. We know a really good sound guy.

Do you? Yeah, we miss him though. We ain't got to play with him in years. Yeah, I miss you guys too.

I think you guys were the last band that I mixed at Blue Chip. Did we end up getting wasted that night? I think so. Yeah, we did, didn't we? Because I stayed overnight and I left the next morning and on my way home is when I got fired.

That's sincere, boy. We miss you a lot there. I mean, they have a good sound man now with Brian.

Yeah. But definitely miss you. But there's nobody to drink with until 3 in the morning, so I don't even stay there anymore.

You don't get a room or anything anymore? No. No, well, not since the divorce because I got the kids and Megan's got to go to school. If I don't come home and make sure she gets on the bus, she ain't getting on the bus.

She ain't going to sleep until 2 in the afternoon. Daddy, I missed the bus. It's 1 o'clock.

Well, you're not home yet from Blue Chip. I'm at the Crab's Table. Don't call again.

I can't answer the phone while I'm at the Crab's Table. It's frowned upon. Yes.

That's funny. So socially, where can people find you guys? Smokingguns.net. Also on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. Smoking without a G and with a G in guns, right? Yeah, S-M-O-K-I-N-G-U-N-Z.net. And Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and all the others.

Yeah, all the social media, iTunes, Spotify. I already said my show at that, right? What? You're the master of social media. I am.

I'll be on Facebook Live tonight. If anybody wants to drink with me, you can join the Zoom meeting on the computer. The show starts at 11, so I know some of you all go to bed by then.

It's a late one, yeah. There's a lot of shows on tonight. Well, that's why you wait until late.

Because all these people that do their acoustic shows at 6 and 7 o'clock, when we get back to work, are you even going to be able to stay up after 10? I mean, well, come join my acoustic show at 6 o'clock. It's like, dude, I'm delivering pizzas working at 6 o'clock. We could all get together today on my back deck and do a show.

We should. Come on over. I mean, maybe next Saturday when it's 70 outside.

Let's do it. I mean, and then run the camera. Do it.

There are some bands doing that. So are we going to do a jam in your backyard next Saturday or what? Let's do it. We can do it in the garage.

I can just turn the heat on. Well, no, outside is better. Because then we're not all cooped in the same garage.

It's outside. Let's do it. Is your neighbors going to get mad? Nope.

We're all good to go in that regards. All right, guys. Well, thank you very much for doing this.

Appreciate it. Yeah, thank you. Thank you very much.

Good seeing you all. Thanks for having me. Yeah, our pleasure.

We'll see you at my house next Saturday. Yeah. You guys can find out.

I'm up here from Pontiac. Ray, where are you at? Frankfurt? Frankfurt. Frankfurt.

It's not that far. Come on out. I'm kind of hungry.

Frankfurt is making you hungry. Yeah, and a hot dog. There you go.

Hey, I made tips yesterday. This is the first time I've had cash in my pocket in months. Nice.

No kidding. Pay for my microphone, will you? I did. Okay.

And I'll pay it again this month, too. Thank you, Dad. You're welcome.

Son. Tell me son. Son.

Thank you guys for having us, man. Very much. All right.

Good seeing you guys. Thanks. Take care, guys.

You know what? You've got about four minutes of usable material out of this whole hour. Yeah. It'd be a lot of editing.

I better send a lot of tracks. Someone explain to me how to turn the Zoom off. No, you leave it on all day so we can see how your day goes.

Yeah. Turn it off. Paul signs out.

Everybody goes off. Yep. All right, you guys.

I'll see you. Love you all. Thank you.

Bye. Bye. Well, that was Smoking Guns.

Some fun guys there, aren't they? You got me kicking up my heels. You kicking your boots everywhere? Your boots, your cowboy boots? I got my boots on. I'm going to get my Stetson out, and I'm going to boot scoot and boogie.

How do you like my cowboy hat? I like that. Where'd you get that? Were you in Texas? No. No.

Because all my exes live in Texas. That's right, you guys. Be careful.

Actually, my nephew can say that. But, yeah, a bunch of good guys, man. Some great stories.

Really funny guys. And I think we even got a recipe. Yeah, I think we got something out of it.

Yeah. So we'll have to try cooking that up today. I just bought some steaks or something off the back of a truck or something.

I don't know what. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It fell off of the back of a truck, yeah.

Yeah. Maybe. But, yeah, that was a good time with them guys.

Great show. Hopefully they can get out soon and start playing. I know just like everybody else, they're missing it.

Yes, they are. Yes, they are. Unfortunately, they can't get out there and play right now.

But maybe they'll do that thing on Saturday, playing Jim's backyard. You never know. You never know.

But otherwise, there is something that people can do, though, during this pandemic and quarantine. What is that? They can visit the Illinois Rock and Roll Museum on Route 66 online and sign up to be a charter member. Yes, they can.

They're still taking charter memberships. It goes to help the museum. Museum's coming along quite nicely, I understand, hopefully opening this late summer, early fall.

So it's a great place to support them. And isn't there something they do for us every Monday? They do. They play one of our podcasts on the Road to Rock radio, which you can get at roadtorock.net. Okay.

I always get that confused. Roadtorock.net. And you can find our podcast. They play one of our podcasts at 6 p.m. every Monday night.

Every single Monday. And if it's not Monday night, you can still listen to it because they feature nothing but Illinois-grown music. That's right.

Great station. And you can also listen to any of our podcasts. You can go back and listen to any of our podcasts.

Just go to our website at rockandrollchicago.net. Or rockandrollchicago.com. We got them both. Either one. And you'll find all our past podcasts there, and you can listen to any number of celebrities that we've spoken with.

That's right. That's right. And make sure you check us out every Tuesday for somebody new.

So we'll see you next Tuesday, folks. Thanks for listening, and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you.

Be safe out there. We'll see you soon. Bye.

Bye. Bye.