The Stevenson Ranch Davidians | Matt Connarton Unleashed

0:00 Speaker 1: What a cool sound. I love the vibe on that. That is Stevenson Ranch Davidians. The song is Mythos, and we're going to be speaking with Dwayne Seagraves from the band in just a moment. But welcome, everybody. We have entered our number three Numero Trace of Matt Connerton Unleashed, and we are live from the studios of WMNH 95.3 FM in glorious Manchester, New Hampshire. And of course, you can stream the show from anywhere. Go to mattconnertonunleashed.com for all your live streaming options. social media links, contact info, shows, archives, et cetera, et cetera.

0:33 Speaker 1: But right now, let's go ahead and bring this up. And we've got Dwayne Seagraves with us via Restream. Hi, Dwayne.

0:42 Speaker 2: Hey, how are you doing?

0:43 Speaker 1: Good, good. I love the sound of your band. It's so cool.

0:51 Speaker 2: Well, thank you.

0:52 Speaker 1: Absolutely, absolutely. I was reading that this collective, if we can call it that, actually started in Southern California, is that correct?

1:03 Speaker 2: Yeah, we started there, I don't know, 20 plus years ago, and kind of been doing it since, off and on. We've taken some pretty large breaks here and there, but... Yeah.

1:14 Speaker 1: Okay.

1:14 Speaker 2: We just became active again really two years ago. Oh, wow.

1:18 Speaker 1: Okay. How long was the break between reactivating two years ago and the previous iteration of the band?

1:30 Speaker 2: So basically once COVID hit, that put an end to just about everything. Gotcha. So we just... stayed gone for, I don't know, three, two or three years. Oh, wow.

1:40 Speaker 1: Yeah. Um, yeah, a lot of, a lot of artists, you know, continue to make music in some capacity during that period. But it sounds like you just, I mean, did you do other projects that were more, um, amenable to that, the sort of isolation that was necessary or, or did you just kind of stop completely for a while?

2:00 Speaker 2: We just stopped completely for a while. I mean, we'd done that before we'd taken five year breaks in the past. Oh, wow. 20 years. So, yeah. Yeah. I don't know. It's just one of those things. I can't explain it at all. But, you know, we're back now. We're making music, putting stuff out, and we've got a new record made and it's being mixed. So we're looking forward to doing more in the future here.

2:24 Speaker 1: Oh, fantastic. So I mentioned your roots in Southern California, but you're currently, are you in Hudson Valley, New York? Is that correct?

2:32 Speaker 2: Yeah, we are.

2:33 Speaker 1: Oh, okay. Okay. I've heard a lot about Hudson Valley from a podcast host who speaks of it often. But yeah, I mean, what was the reason for the move?

2:49 Speaker 2: Um, let me see. I think, uh, COVID probably has something to do with that too. You know, being in LA at that time wasn't the greatest thing in the world. Yeah. We decided to go a little more rural and we had visited, uh, you know, Hudson Valley on a previous trip to New York and kind of fell in love immediately and just, uh, yeah, got a house out there and, uh, yeah. So the whole band followed us up basically several years later.

3:14 Speaker 1: Oh, that's amazing. So, um, and in the band, so of course you're the lead vocalist, rhythm guitarist, and you're the songwriter, correct? You write everything or you're the principal songwriter?

3:25 Speaker 2: I do. Yes, sir. Excellent.

3:26 Speaker 1: Excellent.

3:27 Speaker 2: Yep. Yep. Okay.

3:29 Speaker 1: Um, and love, light, beauty, and truth, which we actually played earlier in the show. I, I snuck that in, in the second hour, uh, give kind of give people kind of a preview, but, um, that was, was that originally recorded pre pandemic? And then that's why it didn't come out until recently.

3:49 Speaker 2: Are you talking about mythos?

3:51 Speaker 1: No. Um, love, light, beauty, and truth. Was, was that, was that pre pandemic?

3:56 Speaker 2: Oh, that one. Okay. I'm sorry. You're breaking.

3:59 Speaker 1: Yeah.

3:59 Speaker 2: Yeah. The, all of these songs we're releasing now were, uh, pre pandemic recorded. Oh, wow. Okay. Okay.

4:05 Speaker 1: Interesting.

4:07 Speaker 2: Um, yep. Uh, yeah. Okay.

4:09 Speaker 1: So it's probably, probably feels good to finally get these out into the world because that's obviously, that's a long time.

4:16 Speaker 2: Um, It does. It does. Now, at the time, you know, we didn't really shelve them necessarily because of COVID. We shelved them because I wasn't really thrilled with what we had done at the time, which, you know, is kind of strange. But because now I absolutely love them. So that just kind of tells you what a little distance and perspective does sometimes with music. So, yeah, it's kind of a weird situation, but we're happy to be putting them out now. People seem to be liking them and That's great.

4:47 Speaker 1: Absolutely. I listened to, well, you know, you sent us a few things and then I listened to some on Bandcamp as well. And no, it's just such a cool sound. I do have to ask you, it's also a cool name. I do have to ask you about the name and not everyone obviously will know the reference, especially, you know, some of the young people out there might not know the reference, but can you tell us about the name Stevenson Ranch Davidians?

5:13 Speaker 2: Yes. So it is technically the Stevenson Ranch Davidians. I like to clarify that. Gotcha. Because some people leave the the off on posters and stuff like that.

5:21 Speaker 1: Okay.

5:22 Speaker 2: It's just better with the. The name came, so we actually lived in a town called Stevenson Ranch. It's north of LA, off the five up there in Santa Clarita Valley. And at the time, this was like probably... 2006, seven, uh, we were kind of really into the Brian Jonestown massacre, who I'm sure you've heard of. Yes. And, or maybe, yes. So, you know, the drummer in the band was an Uber fan and he, we were trying to come up with a name, could not think of anything. He comes up with this. I immediately said, no, that's crazy.

5:55 Speaker 2: That's too close to the Jonestown massacre, you know, and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. And they're like, okay, fine, fine. But we just went another month, man, trying to think of something, couldn't think of anything. And finally, it's just like, fine, let's just do this. We'll consider it an homage to the BJM. At least we're not copying their sound like all the other BJM clone bands are doing. So I was like, fine, whatever. But now it's stuck, and now I love it, and people seem to really like the name.

6:21 Speaker 2: It's a little hard to remember. you know, but whatever. Yeah, no, it works.

6:26 Speaker 1: It absolutely works. You know, part of the trick, too, of choosing a name, and I'm not telling you anything you don't know, but I always say you want to try to find something that somebody else isn't going to already have because it really sucks if you choose a name and you run with it and you're releasing music under this name and so forth.

6:44 Speaker 2: Yeah.

6:44 Speaker 1: And then you find out down the line, somebody else is using it. And, you know, it's, it's just, it's good to pick something original and clever that nobody else is going to have. And you've obviously done that. And I think that's great.

6:55 Speaker 2: Absolutely.

6:56 Speaker 1: Yeah.

6:57 Speaker 2: Yeah.

6:57 Speaker 1: And it's, it's just, it's so cool. Now, now Jessica is your, she's what your partner in the group, right? Because you and Jessica, you're the core of the band. Is that correct? Yeah.

7:10 Speaker 2: We're the two remaining original members.

7:13 Speaker 1: Okay, okay. Now, did the other members stay in California? The other original members, I should say?

7:23 Speaker 2: Well, we've had a few members in and out, not unlike the Brian Jonestown Massacre. We've gone through more than our share of drummers and lead guitar players, stuff like that. But the two longest standing members, aside from Jessica and myself, are Sarah and Misha. And they've been in the band for, I don't know, four or five years now. Oh, good. Yeah, they came out from, they were in Austin, actually. We were spread out for a while doing the band thing, too, which is crazy and kind of hard, expensive.

7:55 Speaker 2: But so they're there now, too. They're in the Hudson Valley and makes things a lot easier. And we have like a rotating lead guitar player, basically, slash pedal steel players that we kind of rotate depending on where we're going and who's available. Okay.

8:10 Speaker 1: Okay. Uh, no, that's excellent. And, you know, it gives you some, some flexibility too, obviously. Um, so you're in terms of the new music that you're working on now, did you say you've already started recording or you're going to be recording soon for a new album?

8:26 Speaker 2: No, we actually, in March of, God, I think it was last year now, we went to Shangri-La in Malibu. That's Rick Rubin's studio. We didn't work with Rick, but we were fortunate enough to get in there with a producer and we made what we think is the best thing we've ever done. We did that in like 10 days. It was all recorded live. Amazing experience. But a lot of drama surrounded that record. We had a lot of drama with people. and band members, and we've done two mixes of the record practically, so we're working on getting the third one done now, and we're looking for a label to properly release it.

9:06 Speaker 1: Okay, so it will be out. It's, you know, drama not withstanding.

9:10 Speaker 2: It'll be out.

9:11 Speaker 1: Yeah, that's good.

9:12 Speaker 2: Yeah, we're looking probably summer of next year. Okay, okay.

9:17 Speaker 1: And then, did you guys, did you go on tour Europe? Have you done some European dates?

9:22 Speaker 2: Yes. Yeah, absolutely. Well, pre-COVID, we went out two years in a row for about four and five weeks at a time. And we toured all of Central and Eastern Europe, which was the time of our lives. Amazing. We're going to be getting, yeah, we'll get back there, you know, probably this coming spring. We're looking to get back over there. Focus on the UK because it's just a jump, hop, skip and a jump across from New York, you know. Um, it's closer than going to the West coast, which we're also doing the West coast thing with a band called elephant stone in January.

9:57 Speaker 1: Oh, excellent.

9:58 Speaker 2: Like four or five days, four. five dates over there. So, yeah, we got things brewing.

10:03 Speaker 1: You do. You do. Absolutely. Absolutely. And then the singles that you've been releasing, are these going to, will these just remain as singles or mythos?

10:14 Speaker 2: No. Yeah. We're going to put those into a release. We're going to have probably seven or eight songs. I guess we're going to call it an album. People don't like EPs as much as they like albums. So we're going to call it an album. It'll be seven or eight songs. This collection that was all recorded, you know, 2018 and shelved for various reasons. And so that'll come out fairly, I think, maybe February, January, February.

10:42 Speaker 1: Oh, not long at all. Oh, that's great.

10:44 Speaker 2: Okay. Yeah, if we can get it together. I mean, we're kind of slow moving with some things. But at the latest this spring, we're going to put something out and we're going to do a good PR push for it. And just we're trying to get momentum going, trying to keep it going leading up to the Shangri-La session release. Yeah.

11:03 Speaker 1: Yeah no that's that's amazing fantastic uh well we look forward to that i'm curious too about those european shows that you did were the because you know i almost wouldn't expect your sound i mean i i associate it again you know southern california in terms of your origin made perfect sense to me uh when i was listening to your music but were you surprised at all at how well received i mean obviously you did a lot of dates over there were you surprised by how well received uh your music is in europe.

11:34 Speaker 2: No, not really. Not really, man. I was really kind of surprised specifically, but the Eastern Europe, I'd never even been to Eastern Europe. Well, I have once, I guess, Slovenia, but just on a vacation. They are just all about it there. There's this really interesting vibe in that part of the world that's still, I think it's kind of like left over from like you know, the communist, the Soviet era, which wasn't, didn't end that long ago. Right. Some of those countries, you know, they were like Soviet satellites.

12:07 Speaker 2: And so they're just basically starving for like Western stuff, I think. And it was really amazing. I met some of the most wonderful, receptive, warm people there and just great, great fans and lovers of the music. So we want to get back there for sure.

12:24 Speaker 1: No doubt. Oh, that's fantastic.

12:26 Speaker 2: Good, good.

12:26 Speaker 1: Well, in a moment, we're going to play, you know, we'll close out our conversation with High Time. This is another one of these great tracks that you sent us. And I do want to encourage people, too, all the music is available on Bandcamp. And, you know, I'm a big proponent of Bandcamp. I love Bandcamp. And something that people don't necessarily realize, and I'm always saying, is when you get your music from Bandcamp, you get a higher quality file than, you know, say you're just streaming it on YouTube or something.

12:52 Speaker 1: So, um, I think it's great that your stuff is on there. And I, I did listen to all the tracks that are available on band camp and, uh, no, I just think you have such a cool sound. So I'm really, I'm really glad you were able to join us today.

13:02 Speaker 2: Uh, Dwayne, um, I appreciate that opportunity, man. Thank you.

13:06 Speaker 1: Absolutely. Absolutely. So we're going to play this track high time in a moment at the end of our conversation. But, um, Dwayne, where should people go online? Where's the best place? Cause you got a lot going on. Where's the best place to go online to keep up with everything that the Stevenson ranch Davidians are up to?

13:22 Speaker 2: I guess I would say Instagram, probably. Yeah, we do have a website and it's pretty well updated, but Most of the latest news and stuff is going to be there. And plus, you know, we want to get our follower account up. So let's send people there.

13:38 Speaker 1: Absolutely. That is very important in the modern music industry. That is for sure.

13:42 Speaker 2: It is. Yes, it is.

13:45 Speaker 1: Well, very good. And well, it sounds like you got new stuff coming too. So we'll have to have you back on the show soon. But Dwayne Seagraves from, of course, the Stevenson Ranch Davidians. Thank you so much for joining us today, my friend.

13:57 Speaker 2: Thank you, man. I appreciate it. All right. You got it.

13:59 Speaker 1: Take care.

14:00 Speaker 2: Bye-bye.