Interviews

TRASH KICKERS: NOTHING BUT BANGERS, AND A WAY OUT SOMEHOW

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Chicago’s four-piece rock-and-rollers have a debut album, a warehouse full of bad smells, and absolutely no intention of behaving themselves.

There are two kinds of rock-and-roll bands in this world. There are bands that want to be rock stars, and there are bands that want to play rock and roll. The first kind spends a lot of time worrying about how it looks, whether the lighting is right, whether the photographs make them look sufficiently dangerous, and whether somebody somewhere has decided they are the next big thing. The second kind gets together in a room that smells like things best left unidentified, plugs in the guitars, turns everything up, and gets on with the business of making noise that means something.

The Trash Kickers, a four-piece outfit from Chicago, seem to belong firmly to the second category. And thank God for that.

Their debut album, Way Out Somehow, is the sort of record that reminds you why rock and roll was never supposed to be a respectable profession in the first place. It is a record built on guitars, friendship, musical instinct, a healthy disregard for conventional wisdom, and the deeply subversive proposition that a band ought to make music people actually want to hear. Not music that somebody’s algorithm has determined will be suitable for your lifestyle. Not music that sounds as if it were assembled by a committee of anxious marketing executives. Songs. Riffs. Hooks. Surprises. A little sweat. Maybe a little blood. And enough life in the proceedings to make you want to turn the damn thing up.

When I sat down with the band for a conversation on Your Tuesday Afternoon Alternative, I was already playing tracks from Way Out Somehow on the radio. I had heard the Replacements in there, some Big Star, the Rolling Stones, and that glorious, somewhat disreputable strain of seventies guitar rock that never needed to ask permission before kicking down the door. What I didn’t hear was a band simply dressing up in its influences and pretending to be somebody else. The Trash Kickers have been listening to their records, all right. They’ve also been paying attention to the business of being alive.

And that makes all the difference.

The Junk Pickers Become the Trash Kickers

Every great rock-and-roll band deserves an origin story that sounds at least a little improbable. The Trash Kickers’ begins with a pile of songs, a Chicago music venue, a few friends, a conversation over drinks, and a great-grandfather who played in a folk trio during the 1930s.

Tyler, the band’s singer, guitarist, and principal songwriter, had spent more than a decade accumulating songs that had never made it onto a record. He wasn’t necessarily dreaming of conquering the world. He wasn’t even planning to start a band. He simply wanted to record the songs, put them somewhere, and have them for himself.

As origin stories go, that’s a refreshing lack of grandiosity.

Tyler already knew Danny through Chicago’s music and nightlife scene, and John was in the same orbit through Lincoln Hall, where the band members worked. The songs began to take shape as the musicians played together, and a project that had started as an archival exercise gradually became something with a pulse of its own.

Then came Stas, the lead guitarist, who entered the picture through the oldest and most reliable recruitment process in rock history: a conversation at a bar about records.

The discussion turned to Big Star, the Replacements, and the Rolling Stones. Tyler played Stas a demo on his phone. Stas offered to play guitar if the opportunity ever arose. The band invited him to rehearsal, and after a couple of hours, the question was essentially settled.

As the guys recalled it, there was “instant chemistry.”

You can’t manufacture that stuff. You can buy equipment, rent rehearsal space, hire a producer, and spend a fortune trying to convince the world that four strangers have some mystical connection. But sometimes four musicians simply discover that they speak the same language, and the rest follows.

The name required a little more deliberation, though not much more dignity. Tyler’s great-grandfather had played in a folk group called The Junk Pickers. The band liked the family connection but apparently felt that “Junk Pickers” had certain sanitary implications they would rather avoid. So junk became trash, pickers became kickers, and the name Trash Kickers was born.

There were two contenders for the final name, and the band settled the matter by rolling a die. Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll has never needed a more elaborate constitution.

A Record Made The Hard Way

The story of Way Out Somehow is, in its own fashion, a small epic of modern working-class music-making. Not the romanticized kind where everybody quits their job, moves into a loft, and spends six months discovering their artistic truth on somebody else’s money. The real kind, where you work, you pay your bills, you try to coordinate four separate lives, and you squeeze the music in wherever it fits.

The Trash Kickers began recording in July 2025 at a practice space and studio in a warehouse on Chicago’s northwest side. Stas’s description of the building was one of my favorite moments in our conversation: it was a beautiful old warehouse that smelled like “bad things.”

That’s the kind of studio description I trust. Give me an old warehouse with questionable ventilation over a sterile room designed to make every musician feel as though they’re being audited by the Department of Professional Sound any day of the week.

The band members had day jobs, different schedules, and the usual adult obligations that make the fantasy of an endlessly available rock-and-roll life look rather ridiculous. Recording began whenever everyone could manage it. Eventually, Sundays became recording days. Then came weeknights. Then the deadline started looming, and Stas took two weeks off work to lock himself in the studio and get the record finished, telling the others to come whenever they could.

They had set a release date before the album was complete. Back in October 2025, May 2026 seemed comfortably distant. Then February arrived, as February tends to do, bringing the unpleasant realization that time is not a suggestion.

The final push became a race against the clock. Sessions stretched late into the night and sometimes toward four in the morning. The band slept on couches under moving blankets, which Stas helpfully described as “very itchy.” The album was finally uploaded to Bandcamp on the night of the release show, and the digital distribution process got its own last-minute adventure.

The band uploaded the record to streaming distributors just two hours before taking the stage. Two hours! The distributors recommend allowing something like two weeks. The result was a staggered release across platforms, compounded by a plagiarism allegation from the distributor involving a Green Day demo.

Because apparently finishing a rock album isn’t sufficiently difficult unless somebody makes you defend it against a ghost of Green Day. But the record got out. Against the calendar, against the schedules, against the itchy blankets and the warehouse air, Way Out Somehow made its way into the world.

And the title couldn’t have been more appropriate. Many of these songs had been around for over a decade. For Tyler, who had never released a record before, the phrase captured something personal about finally finding a path through the years of writing, waiting, revising, and wondering whether any of it would ever amount to something.

A way out, somehow.

There’s a lot of rock and roll in those three words.

The Replacements Are in the Room. So Are the Stones. Nobody’s Calling the Police.

Let’s get one thing straight: influences are not the same thing as imitation. Every musician worth listening to has stolen something, learned something, misunderstood something, and eventually transformed those things into a language of their own. The question is never whether a band has influences. The question is whether it has anything to say with them.

Tyler admits to being the band’s biggest Replacements devotee. As a younger songwriter, he says he “stole whatever tricks” he could from Paul Westerberg. That strikes me as a perfectly honorable education. Westerberg understood that a great rock song could be ragged and melodic, funny and miserable, tuneful and half a step away from falling apart. He knew that the most revealing things often happen when a singer sounds as though he might not quite make it through the next line.

The Trash Kickers also share a deep affection for Thin Lizzy, the Stones, and Big Star. You can hear the attraction to big guitars, chiming melodies, and the kind of rhythm section that understands a song doesn’t have to be played with laboratory precision to have muscle.

Stas brings his own musical history to the proceedings: seventies and eighties punk, nineties alt-country, Uncle Tupelo, Whiskeytown, Wilco, Son Volt, the Buzzcocks, the Sex Pistols, and the Undertones. His assessment of his own guitar playing is wonderfully self-deprecating. He jokes that “every lick” he played on the album is somewhere on an Uncle Tupelo song; he’s simply hiding it really well.

Danny’s bass-playing instincts lean toward the Clash and Paul Simonon, with a fondness for early-2000s indie rock. John brings the sort of drumming Tyler associates with Charlie Watts: not a lot of fuss, just the kind of feel that makes a band move.

What emerges is a record that understands the difference between playing rock and roll and dressing up as a museum exhibit called ROCK AND ROLL, CIRCA 1974.

The Trash Kickers aren’t trying to recreate some vanished golden age. They’re interested in what happens when four people with different musical histories get together and play the same song.

As Tyler explained, he generally brings in a finished song but gives the others room to find their parts. Unless he has something specific in mind, he lets the guitar, bass, and drums develop their own ideas. Sections get moved. Chords change. Arrangements grow in unexpected directions. The object isn’t to protect the songwriter’s original conception from interference. It’s to discover what the song can become.

That kind of openness is rarer than it ought to be. Too many bands confuse leadership with control, and too many songwriters mistake the first version of a song for its final and sacred form.

The Trash Kickers understand that a song is not a fragile heirloom. Sometimes it needs a good kick.

The Wrench in the Works

Here’s where things get particularly interesting. Tyler has a term for the little musical disruptions that keep his songs from becoming predictable. He calls them a “wrench.”

You know the feeling. A song settles into a familiar groove. Your brain starts predicting what comes next. The chorus arrives where you expect it. The guitar fills the space you’ve already mentally reserved for it. And then something shifts. A chord goes somewhere unexpected, a section takes a left turn, or the rhythm throws you just far enough off balance that you have to start listening again.

That’s the wrench.

“Angel,” Tyler says, is practically “the embodiment of a wrench.” The band jokes that it’s the only country song with a bar of 5/4 in it. The odd meter appears right at the beginning, and the listener is left trying to figure out exactly what happened.

Then there are the “tasters,” a term Stas picked up from an interview with Dean Ween. A taster is a small moment that occurs once or twice in a song, just enough to make you stop and think, Wait a minute. What was that? You go back and listen again. The moment works because it doesn’t happen constantly. If everything is a surprise, nothing is surprising.

This is a deceptively sophisticated way of thinking about rock songwriting. It isn’t sophistication for its own sake. Nobody is asking you to bring a calculator to the dance floor. The point is to keep the music alive, to make the listener a participant rather than a passive recipient of a sequence of familiar gestures.

On “Fly or Die,” a song Tyler identifies as a watershed in his development as a songwriter, the arrangement takes a turn roughly two-thirds of the way through. He remembers writing it after a long run of songs he considered unsuccessful and reaching the point where he finally thought he might actually be good at this.

That is a beautiful thing to hear from a songwriter. Not the triumphal proclamation that he has mastered his art, but the recognition that one song has opened a door he hadn’t been able to find before.

And “Come Undone,” the song that supplies the album’s title, has its own history. Tyler originally developed it with Ben Burns, a Chicago musician from his earlier band, the Weekend Lovers. The idea began with Tyler, hungover on his way to work, falling for a woman sitting across from him on a train. He mentioned the experience to Burns, who immediately recognized the possibility and sent him a phone-recorded demo about half an hour later.

The song was eventually carried into the Trash Kickers, where the new lineup made it their own.

A passing attraction on public transportation becomes a song. A song survives one band and finds a home in another. A riff supplied by an earlier collaborator lives on in a new arrangement. This is how rock and roll actually works: not as a neat sequence of intellectual property declarations, but as a long, messy conversation between people, places, memories, and sounds.

Sometimes you meet somebody on a train. Sometimes you meet your next guitar player in a bar. Sometimes the thing you have been carrying around for ten years finally finds the people who can make it work.

Nothing But Bangers

Every band has a philosophy, even if most of them would rather die than admit it. The Trash Kickers’ unofficial motto is admirably concise: “Nothing but bangers.” The meaning is straightforward. If a song doesn’t feel like a hit to the whole band, they move on. Every track has to earn a unanimous stamp of approval. They’re not interested in padding an album with filler just to reach some arbitrary number of songs.

It’s a simple idea, but it takes a certain amount of nerve to follow it. It means accepting that a song you’ve worked on may not be worth keeping. It means recognizing that the hours you spent writing something don’t automatically entitle it to an audience. It means understanding that a record is not a scrapbook of everything you’ve ever done; it’s a collection of the things you believe are worth sharing.

I brought up Guided by Voices’ Bob Pollard during our conversation, and the band’s willingness to work through a pile of ideas before committing to the best ones seemed entirely in keeping with that spirit. The object isn’t to produce a monument to your own productivity. It’s to find the songs that make people want to hear another song.

Stas described the larger philosophy behind Way Out Somehow as “trusting the process.” Trust the development of the songwriter. Trust the band with the material. Trust the recording. Trust the mixing and mastering. Trust the song itself. That last one may be the hardest.

Because making a record requires a songwriter to let go. First you let go of the song as it existed in your head. Then you let your bandmates get their hands on it. Then you record it, listen to it, revise it, and eventually release it into a world where people will hear it in ways you never anticipated.

The Trash Kickers have built that trust into the way they live and work together. They see one another constantly, often outside of rehearsal. Tyler and Danny live close enough to each other that their proximity has become part of the band’s everyday rhythm. The four musicians have developed a shorthand of looks and nods, a private musical language that doesn’t require a committee meeting every time somebody wants to change direction.

Tyler put it beautifully: “If I can’t trust them with my songs, how can I trust them with anything?” That’s the real story behind the record. Beneath the riffs, the jokes, and the last-minute upload panic, there is a band that trusts itself enough to take chances.

And if you want to hear what that sounds like, start with “Come Undone” and “Fly or Die.” Then play the record again. Those tasters aren’t going to find themselves.

Don’t Suck. Have Fun.

If the Trash Kickers’ recording process is an argument for trust, their approach to playing live is an argument for getting out of your own way. I asked the band about their live philosophy. The answer came back in the form of a concise commandment: “Don’t suck. Have fun, and look like you’re having fun.”

I would put that on the wall of every rehearsal space in America. The band isn’t interested in standing perfectly still while delivering an immaculate reproduction of a recording. Given a choice between playing every note flawlessly without moving and throwing themselves into a performance, having a good time, and taking a few chances, they’ll take the latter. They believe the audience is more likely to have fun watching musicians who are actually having fun.

And they mean it. The Trash Kickers say they’ve received that comment from audiences regularly: the band looks as though it’s having a great time. That’s because it is.

When the crowd doesn’t respond, Tyler admits he can get “combative in his head.” Rather than retreating into the performance, he plays harder. The rest of the band responds, and the energy builds. John has even been known to punch parts of his drum kit that don’t have a song written for them.

I admire this sort of thinking. Not because recklessness is inherently virtuous, but because rock and roll loses something essential when musicians become more concerned with avoiding mistakes than creating an experience. The Trash Kickers put it another way: “We’re a band that plays covers; we’re not a cover band.”

That distinction matters. A cover can be a way of paying tribute, testing your own musical instincts, or simply having a good time with a song you love. It doesn’t have to turn the band into a human jukebox. At their release show, the Trash Kickers tackled the Replacements’ “Can’t Hardly Wait” and an Iron Maiden number, a combination that tells you something about their musical appetite.

They don’t seem especially interested in respecting the boundaries between rock tribes. Punk, classic rock, alt-country, power pop, metal: these are different rooms in the same house, and the Trash Kickers are happy to wander around.

They also play every show the same way, whether there are twenty people in the room or two hundred. “20 people or 200 people, we play the exact same way,” they told me.

Think about that for a minute. It is a declaration of independence from the tyranny of audience size, a refusal to let the number of bodies in a room determine the value of what you’re doing. There are always a couple of people near the front who are losing their minds, the band says. That’s enough. And it should be.

Some of the most important nights in the history of rock and roll happened in rooms that were barely full. Some of the best bands in the world spent years playing to audiences small enough to count without removing your shoes. The point is not to pretend that a crowd of two hundred doesn’t feel different from a crowd of twenty. The point is to understand that the obligation to play your heart out doesn’t change.

The Trash Kickers understand the assignment.

Chicago, Dayton, and the Road Ahead

For now, Chicago is home base. The band members know the city’s music and nightlife scene from the inside, not merely as consumers of its cultural mythology. They’ve worked the venues, built friendships, and developed a band out of the everyday connections that make a local scene function.

But a band can’t live forever in its own neighborhood. Eventually, you have to load the gear into a vehicle, drive somewhere unfamiliar, find the venue, figure out where you’re sleeping, and convince a roomful of strangers that the songs you’ve spent years developing deserve their attention.

The Trash Kickers are beginning to do just that.

Their first out-of-town experience in Madison, Wisconsin, apparently went better than expected and “way dumber than expected.” Six people wound up sharing a hotel room, and the band hauled its equipment inside to keep it safe from possible theft out of the van, blocking the window in the process. The arrangements became sufficiently uncomfortable that some of their companions moved to another room the following night.

Now that’s touring. Not the glossy fantasy of backstage champagne and a personal assistant holding your jacket, but a bunch of musicians trying to protect their equipment, get some sleep, and make it to the next gig with their sense of humor intact.

The next stop is Dayton, Ohio.

The Trash Kickers play the Trolley Stop Tavern on Saturday, October 24.

For those of us who spend our days and nights championing independent music, this is exactly the kind of show worth showing up for. Here is a band with a record we believe in, a set built around original songs, and the sort of live philosophy that makes a small club feel like the most important room in the world for an hour or two.

I’ve already got “Come Undone,” “Fly or Die,” and other tracks from Way Out Somehow in rotation on Your Tuesday Afternoon Alternative. I may or may not have entered a few of those songs into the station’s computer more often than strictly necessary, in the hope that the machinery of radio programming will do what machinery so rarely does on its own: give a good band a chance.

The Trash Kickers are also looking ahead to a spring run that, at the time of our conversation, included Cincinnati’s Comet Bar on March 11 and Columbus’s Space Bar on March 12, with additional Midwest dates being explored. The band jokingly referred to it as the “Ohio tour,” which is a fine thing for an Ohioan to hear. Perhaps they’ll become an Ohio band. We could do worse.

But before the spring comes, there’s a Saturday night in Dayton to consider. The Trolley Stop is the kind of place where a band can get close enough to an audience to find out what the songs really do. There are no arena-sized screens to distract you, no elaborate stage production to conceal the musicians, no distance between the people making the noise and the people receiving it.

There’s just the room, the band, and whatever happens when the first chord hits. That is where rock and roll still makes its best argument.

A Way Out Somehow

There is a tendency to talk about rock and roll as though it were a finished historical event, something that happened in the past and now survives as a set of reference points, vintage T-shirts, and reunion tours. We talk about the Stones, the Replacements, Big Star, and Thin Lizzy as if their greatest contribution were to provide a catalog of sounds for later generations to imitate.

But rock and roll isn’t a museum. It’s a living argument about what music can do when people take it seriously without taking themselves too seriously.

The Trash Kickers are part of that argument. They have the records, the influences, the riffs, and the hooks. They also have something harder to manufacture: the willingness to let the music change, the trust to let four people make decisions together, and the determination to keep playing whether twenty people show up or two hundred.

They began with a songwriter who wanted to preserve a decade’s worth of songs. They ended up with a band, a debut album, a release-day scramble involving digital distributors and an alleged Green Day resemblance, and a growing itinerary of clubs beyond Chicago.

Along the way, they learned that the songs became better when they stopped treating them as untouchable objects. They learned to trust the people standing beside them. They learned that a record could take years to arrive and still be worth the wait. And they learned that sometimes the best way to make a song memorable is to put a wrench in it.

Maybe that’s what Way Out Somehow is really about. Not escaping something in the grand, cinematic sense, but finding a way forward through the ordinary complications of life: the jobs, the schedules, the unfinished songs, the doubts, the long nights, the itchy blankets, the records you love and the records you hope to make.

You keep going. You keep playing. You trust your friends. You don’t fill the album with songs you don’t believe in. You don’t wait for a crowd of two hundred before you give everything you’ve got.

And when the moment comes, you turn up the amplifiers and get on with it. The Trash Kickers have a wonderfully uncomplicated motto for all of this: “Nothing but bangers.” Fine by me.

I’ll see you at the Trolley Stop Tavern on Saturday, October 24. Bring your friends. Bring your ears. Bring the kind of enthusiasm that makes a band want to play harder. And if you happen to find yourself standing near the front, losing your mind while the guitars roar and the drums come crashing down, don’t worry about looking cool. The band isn’t. That’s the whole point.

Trash Kickers — Way Out Somehow. Chicago rock and roll, made by four friends who trust one another, refuse to settle for filler, and would rather have a good time than stand still.

Today’s show on Mixcloud

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Dayton’s own American Whale stopped by the YTAA studio for a great conversation about music and songwriting. The show has already aired—and you can catch the whole thing now on Mixcloud. Turn it up and give it a listen!

Lips Speak Louder Means Exactly What It Says

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One of my favorite things about doing Your Tuesday Afternoon Alternative is discovering a band that somehow slipped under my radar and then wondering how on earth that happened.

That was exactly my reaction when a friend pointed me toward Lips Speak Louder.

The Minneapolis-based duo—guitarist and vocalist Rachel Brandsness and drummer Angela Lese—make the kind of rock records that remind you why guitars still matter. Big riffs. Bigger hooks. Songs that are melodic without losing their edge. Their album Consolation Prize has been getting plenty of spins on the show, and after talking with Rachel and Angie over Zoom, I came away even more impressed by the thought and intention behind the music.

Ironically, the band’s name began with another favorite band.

“We’re huge Yeah Yeah Yeahs fans,” they told me. “Lips Speak Louder” comes from a lyric buried inside the song “Soft Shock.” They loved the phrase because it sounded “anthemic,” but over time it took on a deeper meaning.

“It feels like permission to say what you really mean,” Rachel explained.

That philosophy runs through everything the band does.

Rock music, they argue, shouldn’t apologize for existing. It should be loud. Honest. Imperfect. It should refuse to shrink itself to make other people comfortable. “Rock music refuses to be quiet. It’s loud and kind of in your face. You’re saying what you mean, when you mean it, how you mean it.” That isn’t simply a philosophy about music—it’s a philosophy about life.

Angela pointed out that, particularly for women, there is often enormous social pressure to be agreeable and not “take up space.” Playing in Lips Speak Louder became an opportunity to reject that expectation. Angela explained that, particularly for women, there is often enormous social pressure to be agreeable and avoid drawing attention to yourself.

Rachel shared that “I feel like, especially as women, you’re raised to be polite and don’t step on anybody’s toes. Playing and singing is my chance to be loud and take up space.” It’s my chance to be loud and take up space.”

That statement may be the best summary of the band you’ll ever hear.

Of course, the music industry has not always made it easy. Both Rachel and Angie laughed while recounting stories of loading heavy equipment into venues only to have someone ask whether the gear belonged to their boyfriend. They’ve repeatedly encountered audiences and industry professionals who seemed surprised that two women could walk onstage and deliver unapologetically heavy rock music.

Those experiences even inspired the title of Consolation Prize.

The title is more than a clever phrase. It’s a tongue-in-cheek response to years of being passed over simply because they didn’t fit someone else’s expectations of what a rock band should look like. Angie noted that “we named our album Consolation Prize because we can’t tell you how many times we’ve come up short for a gig…just because we were women.”

The satisfying part, they admitted, comes after the music starts.

Angie observed the transformation on the faces of the audience: “We can actually watch people’s expressions change. Watching everyone’s eyes turn from a place of doubt to just being super into it—that’s pretty cool.”

Or, as Rachel put it, “If you can win a crowd over by being two females playing rock and roll, that’s a fun feeling.”

The audience goes from skepticism to raised fists, phones in the air, and enthusiastic applause. Few things are more satisfying than dismantling assumptions with a great performance.

Listening to Consolation Prize, one thing immediately stands out: this is an enormous-sounding record. That becomes even more impressive once you realize only two musicians are creating all that sound.

Rachel has developed an ingenious live guitar setup that simultaneously covers guitar and bass parts while Angela’s powerful drumming provides the foundation. Instead of treating the duo format as a limitation, they’ve embraced it as a creative advantage.

“It forced the vocal melodies to have to be better. It forced the songs to be better,” Rachel said.

Without multiple guitars and layers of studio overdubs to hide behind, “there wasn’t going to be a bunch of extra fluff” – the vocal melodies had to become stronger. The riffs had to matter. Every note had to earn its place. It’s a refreshing philosophy in an era when technology can often become a substitute for songwriting.

As we talked about their writing process, another theme emerged. Neither musician seems interested in showing off. They are interested in making great songs. Every note has to matter. Every hook has to earn its place. Rachel noted that “if I have that chorus hook, I feel like I can build whatever I need around that.” Because, as she admitted, “If the chorus doesn’t really anchor it, the song is only ever going to be okay.”

That’s a remarkably disciplined way to think about songwriting.

Rachel usually begins with a chorus because, in her words, if the chorus isn’t memorable, the rest of the song rarely comes together. From there, the pair trade demos back and forth, constantly refining arrangements while giving one another room to contribute new ideas.

What struck me most was the trust between them. Sure, there are disagreements. Different versions get recorded. Feelings occasionally get bruised. But they always arrive at the same destination because they’re pursuing the same goal.

“We both have the same end goal—trying to make a great song.”

That mutual trust is one reason the record sounds so cohesive. Their move from Nashville to Minneapolis also says a great deal about who they are as musicians and performers.

After years of working in one of America’s music capitals, they wanted something different. Nashville is full of extraordinary musicians, they told me, but it has also become crowded, expensive, and increasingly geared toward hired-session work.

The Midwest kept calling them back.

Every tour through Wisconsin, Minnesota, and surrounding states reinforced the same impression: audiences simply love rock music. “The whole region seems thirsty for some rock, so we’re just excited to be here.”

So, they relocated. The gamble appears to be paying off.

The Minneapolis music community has welcomed them warmly, local radio has embraced their songs, and they already feel at home in one of America’s great rock cities.

One observation Rachel made really stuck with me. Independent artists experience time differently from listeners.

While Consolation Prize no longer feels “new” to the band, it is brand new to nearly everyone discovering them for the first time. “To us the songs don’t feel brand new anymore…but to 99.9 percent of the population they’re brand new.” That’s an important reminder that great records never really have an expiration date.

When I asked about working with Emily Wolfe as producer, Rachel immediately emphasized something every artist hopes to find. “She helped us get the sound we wanted but preserve who we are.” Angela added that Wolfe pushed them creatively without changing their identity. The result is a record that feels polished but never sterile.

As Rachel explained, “We wanted it polished enough to sound professional, but we wanted to harness that raw energy.” That may be the single best description of Consolation Prize.

When I asked about favorite songs from Consolation Prize, the answers revealed another side of the record. Angela chose “Handle With Care,” partly because it lets her unleash an extended barrage of double-kick drumming that she had always wanted to play.

Rachel highlighted “Dog Days of Summer” and “Loser,” two emotionally cathartic songs that build from intimate moments into soaring, full-throttle rock anthems.

I understand exactly why.

“Loser” may have become my favorite track on the record. Every time I hear it, I find myself singing along before I even realize I’m doing it. That’s what good songwriting does.

Toward the end of our conversation, I asked about performing live. Their answer wasn’t about gear or logistics. It was about creating an experience. “How can we make it larger than life? How can we create a moment?” That’s exactly what every great rock band should be asking before walking onstage.

I asked the most important question of the afternoon as we neared the end of our conversation: “When are you coming to Dayton?” The answer was encouraging and promising.

Angela actually has family in Kettering, the band is working with a booking agent, and Midwest touring is very much in the plans. I immediately began recommending venues like Blind Bob’s, The Brightside, and South Park Tavern. Hopefully, we’ll see them here sooner rather than later.

If they do make it to Dayton, I’ll probably have a classroom full of University of Dayton students earning extra credit by attending the show. Going to local concerts is the only extra credit assignment I offer students.

After spending an hour talking with Rachel Brandsness and Angela Lese, it became obvious that the name Lips Speak Louder isn’t just clever. It’s a mission statement that encourages all of us to be authentic. Don’t apologize. Write great songs. Turn up the amplifiers. Let the music flow.

Let the music do the speaking.

Dreaming in Layers: Richard Flierl and the Sound of Dotsun Moon

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I conducted this interview several months ago, but its ideas have lingered in ways that feel increasingly relevant with time. Returning to the conversation now, what stands out is not just the detail of Richard Flierl’s creative process, but the clarity of his artistic philosophy—one grounded in patience, emotional honesty, and a refusal to chase immediacy at the expense of depth. In the months since, as musical culture continues to accelerate toward shorter attention spans and algorithmic visibility, his commitment to making music that asks listeners to slow down and “lean in” feels even more quietly defiant. The distance has given the interview a different weight; what first read as reflective now feels almost prescient, capturing a mode of listening and creating that risks becoming increasingly rare.

There is a particular kind of indie music that never really leaves the people who discover it. It is not music designed for stadiums, algorithms, or fifteen-second clips floating through social media feeds. It belongs instead to late-night drives, college radio broadcasts, old record stores, and solitary moments when somebody puts on headphones and disappears into sound. The music of Dotsun Moon exists squarely within that tradition.

Dotsun Moon is the Buffalo-based project and brainchild of multi-instrumentalist Richard Flierl. Active since 2011, the project creates dream-laden shoegaze, atmospheric indie rock, and synth-inflected dream pop, with Flierl gradually evolving from producer into a one-man band handling nearly all instrumentation and vocals himself.

In a long and thoughtful interview, Richard described a creative life shaped by post-punk, dream pop, shoegaze, synth-pop, comics, cinema, and decades of obsessive listening. What emerged most clearly was not simply a catalog of influences, but a philosophy of music rooted in curiosity, emotional honesty, and the belief that songs can become deeply personal companions for listeners.

I initially framed Dotsun Moon’s sound through the lens of The Cure and New Order, hearing “eighties influences” and “synth-rock hybrid bands” in the music. Richard agreed while explaining that the newest record, Tiger, intentionally pushes further toward guitars and dream-pop textures. “I thought I wanted to make a shoegaze album,” he explained, “but honestly, this is more dream pop.”

For Richard, the distinction mattered. Shoegaze, in his telling, is not merely a label but a dense sonic architecture associated with bands like My Bloody Valentine. “I didn’t come up with an all-encompassing washing-machine guitar sound,” he admitted modestly, though the influence remains audible in the buried vocals and layered guitars throughout the record.

What makes Dotsun Moon compelling is the way these influences are filtered through lived experience rather than nostalgia. Richard recalled how the project originally began with just himself and a friend performing alongside prerecorded tracks because they lacked a full band. “We were like, what can we do? We don’t have a drummer,” he said. “If you have to wait for a band, you’ll never play out sometimes.” The comment captures something central to independent music culture: creativity often emerges through limitation rather than abundance.

That DIY sensibility still shapes the project. Richard spoke warmly about collaborating with producer Doug White at Watchmen Studios in Lockport. White, who had worked with punk, metal, and dream-pop bands alike, became a crucial creative partner. “Some of those songs I went in half done,” Richard explained, “and we walked out with them finished in a day.” Rather than imposing commercial polish, the process sounded exploratory and collaborative. Guitar parts evolved spontaneously. Songs changed shape organically. “You just don’t know what you’re gonna come up with,” he said.

The interview became especially fascinating whenever it turned toward songwriting itself. Richard repeatedly rejected romantic myths about composition arriving fully formed through sudden inspiration. Most songs begin with loops, keyboard parts, rhythms, or melodic fragments. “Keyboard is just so good to me,” he explained. He often improvises lyrics over music before fully understanding what the song is emotionally about.

That process is evident in “Bring Love,” which emerged almost unconsciously from a painful relationship experience. One lyric — “We’ll talk sometime when the future is not around” — reflected his emotional uncertainty entering a relationship involving children. “You should go into a relationship with excitement and love,” he admitted, “and I went in with apprehension and fear.” Other imagery came from a trip to Japan, where standing above a sudden ocean drop became metaphorically linked to emotional vulnerability and risk.

The songs rarely function as literal confessions; feelings dissolve into atmosphere and texture, producing something closer to dream logic than diary writing.

That emotional ambiguity becomes central on Tiger, particularly on “Never Had a Heart.” Richard described wanting the opening guitar line to feel “like yelling and punching forward,” while producer Doug White pushed for drums that felt enormous and physical. Richard enthusiastically described experimenting with layered loops and drum software: “The drums were really powerful. Doug loves powerful drums, and I like it too, a lot.”

Yet beneath the aggressive sonic architecture lies an unexpectedly warm song. Richard pointed to Roads by Portishead as an inspiration for that tension between melancholy and intimacy. He described hearing the lyric “Nobody loves me like you do” and realizing that what initially sounds mournful is actually deeply intimate. That realization shaped “Never Had a Heart,” particularly the line “Heaven never had a heart like yours.”

“This person has just got the most warm-hearted person in the world,” Richard explained. “So to have a positive message like that, but have it with a real punch — that’s how that came.”

The song gradually reveals itself not as despair, but as gratitude and emotional rescue:

“All the troubles you’ve ever known gripping you tight by the throat — a love that you’ve never known before.”“It’s like this person’s just saving you from these negatives,” Richard said.

That layered emotional quality extends into the album’s production philosophy. Richard resisted the contemporary tendency to push vocals aggressively to the foreground. Referencing bands like Slowdive, he described wanting listeners to “kind of listen” and “lean in a little bit.” Vocals on Tiger function as another texture within the mix rather than its center.

Our conversation drifted into compression, loudness wars, and the production legacy of Nevermind by Nirvana. Richard argued that many modern productions sacrifice dynamic range in pursuit of impact. Instead, he admires records where arrangements retain depth and space. “A well-made song is powerful,” he insisted, regardless of whether the vocals dominate the mix.

That emphasis on songcraft runs throughout Tiger. Richard spoke admiringly about seventies arrangements, sophisticated chord structures, and lush harmonies, citing influences ranging from Barry Manilow to yacht rock. “Inspiration can come from anywhere,” he said while discussing studying Manilow chord changes through sheet music archives. It is a refreshingly unpretentious approach in a musical culture often obsessed with “acceptable” influences.

The same openness extends to artists like Electric Light Orchestra, whose orchestral pop textures Richard deeply admires. In many ways, Dotsun Moon reflects a generation of listeners less interested in rigid genre tribalism than emotional resonance, drawing equally from post-punk melancholy, dream-pop atmosphere, synth experimentation, indie rock structure, and classic pop craftsmanship without feeling nostalgic or revivalist.

The album’s sequencing also reflects a cinematic sensibility. Richard described “Piano Trailer Melody 4” as an intentional dividing point — almost like flipping from side one to side two on vinyl. The abrupt transition from “Never Had a Heart” into the sparse piano instrumental creates a moment of deliberate disorientation.

That cinematic impulse surfaced repeatedly during our conversation, especially when Richard discussed Mercury Rev and their album All Is Dream. Hearing its opening track, he said, felt like watching “a John Ford western” unfold onscreen. Songs, for him, should create visual and emotional space rather than simply deliver hooks.

That same sensibility shapes the album artwork. Richard credited artist Doc Smith, working under the name Orb, with creating the cover image featuring a woman holding a tiger lily flower — a subtle visual pun connected to the album title Tiger. Richard admitted the title itself was intentionally playful, inspired partly by albums like Crocodiles and partly by comic-book references, especially Mary Jane Watson’s famous “Face it, Tiger…” line from Spider-Man comics.

The conversation frequently drifted into comic books, revealing another important aspect of Richard’s worldview. We bonded over the emotional resonance of eighties-era Marvel Comics storytelling, particularly The Uncanny X-Men and the outsider identities embedded within mutant narratives. Richard described how those books shaped him emotionally as a young reader. Like many listeners drawn toward dream pop and shoegaze, he gravitated toward stories about alienation, identity, and belonging.

Importantly, though, Tiger ultimately resists despair. Even its saddest moments remain grounded in warmth, connection, and endurance. “Give Up the Tears,” despite its title, is explicitly about release and emotional survival. “It’s about feeling good,” Richard said. “It’s about letting that hurt go.” He described the song as an invitation to briefly escape despair long enough to appreciate moments of peace — whether “at the beach” or simply “for the duration of a song.”

The one major exception, Richard admitted, may be “Winter Street,” which he described bluntly as “definitely a song about hurting.” Yet even there, the pain feels observational rather than performative — less spectacle than memory.

Perhaps the most moving moment of the interview came when Richard explained why he makes music at all. As a teenager, he discovered Heaven Up Here by Echo & the Bunnymen almost accidentally. Initially uncertain about the album, he gradually fell in love with its atmosphere, sequencing, and guitar work. That experience permanently shaped his artistic ambitions.

“Because that had that effect on me,” he said, “I wanted to create music that would do the same thing for someone else.”

It is an extraordinarily simple statement, but it explains nearly everything about Dotsun Moon’s music. Beneath the guitars, haze, and layered textures lies a fundamentally human desire: to create songs that matter deeply to strangers.

In an era increasingly dominated by disposable digital noise, that aspiration feels both old-fashioned and quietly radical.

Full Interview with Irish Musician David Howley

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On January 31st, Dr. J interviewed Irish musician, singer, and songwriter David Howley is appearing at the Sears Recital Hall at the University of Dayton on March 13, 2025. David will be joined by special guests Kiana June Weber and Caitlin Leahy.

David Howley is an award-winning folk artist from Ireland, blending traditional Irish music with modern folk. Founder of Billboard World #1 band We Banjo 3, Known for his soulful vocals and evocative storytelling, David’s solo work continues to captivate audiences with a rich, emotionally resonant sound. Kiana June Weber fuses classical chops with American and Irish folk music, she has played massive stages worldwide, recorded four Billboard #1 albums with Gaelic Storm, and brought the fiddle to Come From Away. Caitlin Leahy is a lifetime member of Milwaukee’s “Leahy Luck” and Bodhran player extraordinaire. 

‘Every Moment’ Does Not Wait

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Yesterday, Nick Kizirnis joined Dr. J in the studio to discuss his latest record “Every Moment.” While Nick has been on the show before, it is still an exciting event for him to join us.

Nick Kizirnis, a name not unfamiliar to the echelons of the Dayton community rock and roll enthusiasts, has etched his mark in local music as a Dayton, Ohio-based musician, guitarist, and songwriter. With a career spanning several decades, Kizirnis has seamlessly blended his prowess as a guitarist with his innate talent for crafting compelling compositions, earning him a dedicated following and critical acclaim within the Dayton music community.

Born and raised in the vibrant musical landscape of Dayton, Ohio, Kizirnis was exposed to an array of musical genres from a young age. Inspired by the likes of Guided By Voices, Brainiac, and The Breeders, he embarked on his musical journey, honing his skills on the guitar and immersing himself in the rich tapestry of rock music across its many varied forms and styles.

Kizirnis’ musical odyssey gained momentum in the late 1980s when he co-founded the surf-rock band, The Mulchmen, alongside Greg Spence and Brian Hogarth. The Mulchmen quickly garnered attention for their infectious surf rock melodies, sweeping compositions, and electrifying live performances, establishing Kizirnis as a formidable force in the realm of rock music.

As a guitarist, Kizirnis’ virtuosity knows no bounds. His distinctive playing style, characterized by intricate riffs, blistering solos, and melodic phrasings, captivates audiences and fellow musicians alike, earning him admiration and respect within the music community. Whether unleashing thunderous power chords or delicately weaving nuanced melodies, Kizirnis’ guitar work serves as the sonic backbone of his musical endeavors, infusing each composition with depth, emotion, and vitality.

Beyond his prowess as a guitarist, Kizirnis’ songwriting prowess shines brightly, imbuing his music with poignant lyricism, infectious hooks, and irresistible charm. Drawing inspiration from personal experiences, introspection, and the human condition, his songs resonate on a deeply emotional level, offering listeners a glimpse into his innermost thoughts and feelings. From anthemic rockers to introspective ballads, Kizirnis’ songwriting versatility knows no bounds, showcasing his ability to craft timeless compositions that endure the test of time.

Throughout his illustrious career, Kizirnis has released a plethora of solo albums, each offering a unique sonic tapestry that reflects his artistic evolution and creative vision. From his debut solo effort, “Into the Loud” to atmospheric noir of “The Distance,” to the acoustic guitar and cello album “Quiet Signals” to the most recent release “Every Moment” Kizirnis’ discography serves as a testament to his unwavering commitment to his craft and his relentless pursuit of music that captivates the listener.

In addition to his solo endeavors, Kizirnis has collaborated with a diverse array of artists and musicians, further expanding his musical horizons and pushing the boundaries of his creativity. Whether lending his guitar prowess to recording sessions or sharing the stage with fellow luminaries, Kizirnis’ collaborative spirit and passion for music are evident in every endeavor he undertakes.

Beyond his contributions to the world of music, Kizirnis remains deeply rooted in his hometown of Dayton, Ohio, where he continues to inspire aspiring musicians and foster a vibrant musical community. Through his involvement in local music festivals, events, and educational initiatives, Kizirnis pays homage to his musical roots while paving the way for future generations of artists to thrive.

Nick Kizirnis stands as a testament to the enduring power of music to inspire, uplift, and unite. As a musician, guitarist, songwriter, and singer, he has left an indelible mark on the world of local rock music, captivating audiences with his unparalleled talent, boundless creativity, and unwavering passion. Whether shredding on stage, penning heartfelt lyrics, or mentoring aspiring musicians, Kizirnis’ dedication to his craft and his love for music shines brightly, illuminating the path for generations of musicians and music fans for years to come.

Nick is playing Blind Rage Records tomorrow, Thursday, May 2nd to celebrate the release of “Every Moment” which is out the next day, Friday, May 3rd everywhere you can get music.

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All images and pictures used with permission of the artist.

Tamar Berk Interview

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Dr. J spoke with Tamar Berk in the evening on Wednesday, May 11, 2022 for Your Tuesday Afternoon Alternative. Tamar spoke about the powerful new record Start at The End, her music career, songwriting and her approach to recording and producing her music.

Tamar shared some compelling insights as a songwriter in this interview! Anyone interested in the subject should explore her thoughts on the subject. Tamar was honest and remarkably introspective about how pain can be transformed into art through music. It was a real pleasure to speak with her about the music that she has made in her various music projects (Starball, Countdown, Pynnacles and Paradise to name a few). And it was a singular joy to talk to her about the exciting music that she has made in the past few years under her own name with The Restless Dreams of Youth (2021) and Start At The End (2022).

If you do not know these records, we highly recommend that you explore them. Tamar’s songs evokes The Spinanes/Rebecca Gates and Liz Phair but the musical space she surveys does not end there. She uses a variety of musical ideas to create a sound that paints with a rich pallet of color and texture. The music is infectious, passionate, personal and introspective in an adventure that leads the listener into a communal rather than singular experience. Start At The End is one of our favorite records of the year!

You can listen to Tamar’s music anywhere you stream but we recommend buying her excellent music at Bandcamp!

You can contact Tamar through her social media https://twitter.com/TamarBerk

Youtube

Instagram.com

For a complete list of her social media and music: https://ffm.bio/tamarberkmusic

YTAA Interview with 7000Apart

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Creating heartfelt melodies that probe deep subjects with a touch of vulnerability and a reminder of the promise of positivity is a tonic in these challenging times. 7000Apart – Jon Kresin and Amelie Eiding – is a band with a love story right out of a movie! In 2012, Amelie journeyed from Stockholm, Sweeden to attend high school in Green Bay, Wisconsin. And in music theory class, they met, became friends and overtime that friendship grew into a love that transcended the 7,000 kilometer distance when Amelie returned home.

After three years of managing a long distance relationship, Jon and Amelie married in Sweden and then returned to the United States. In 2019, they released their first record We Are More. Work on their second album, Feel Your Feelings, is already underway with Nashville-based songwriter and producer FEMKE.

Dr. J caught up with the band while they are on tour via zoom.

7000Apart are coming to Dayton on May 15, 2022 to play Blind Bob’s with Mike Bankhead and K.Carter! Dr. J interviewed the band over Zoom while they are on their May Tour! We spoke about how they got started, how they approach writing and making music and their plans for their next record. Learn more about them on their social media: twitter spotify instagram facebook and for a full list of their media and music check out their linktree.

And do not forget to go see them on tour!

Listen to the Interview on the YTAA Mixcloud Page!

YTAA Past Guests: Neo-American Pioneers

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Neo American Pioneers visited Your Tuesday Afternoon Alternative on August 14, 2018! The band joined us for an interview and were kind enough to play a few songs for us! Happy to report that they are hard at work on a new record!

Interview Part 2 with Charlie & Amanda

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It was a real pleasure to talk with Charlie and Amanda about their music! The new record ‘The King & Queen of Dayton Country‘ is available this Saturday! You can follow them on Facebook! Their CD release is happening this Saturday at the Yellow Cab Tavern. Check the Yellow Cab Tavern’s page for information regarding the social distancing requirements and policies.

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Interview with Charlie & Amanda Part 1!

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Part one of our interview with Charlie & Amanda Jackson about their new record, ‘The King & Queen of Dayton Country,’ recording, songwriting and their approach to music. We can consider this record to be a powerful return to a classic country duet sound that has been missing for quite some time. Check out their Facebook page! You can find their music on bandcamp! They are playing a safe outdoor show at the Yellow Cab Tavern on Saturday! Please check the Yellow Cab Tavern’s page regarding their policies for a social distancing outdoor show!

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