SPEAKER_00 0:14

Welcome to How's Your Stool, the show where we pull up a stool and find out how things are really going. Not just the gigs, not just the music, but what's happening with the amps when the lights get turned off. Because if you ask a musician how they're doing, you'll get one answer. But if you check their stool, you might get the truth. I'm your host, Dave Randall. Today I'm sitting down with Dwayne Dixon. So let's get a stool sample. Hey, greetings, Dwayne. Nice to have you here. It's great to be here, Dave. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02 0:55

My pleasure, brother.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

My pleasure.

SPEAKER_03 0:58

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:59

Um so as I said, we're just gonna have a conversation about music and stuff. I love it. We're gonna look at your stool from both sides. But before we get into it, hey, just like people know you, but you know, where are you from? Where were you born? Where do you live? Where are you going? What are your pronouns? All that all that uh interview kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

Sure. Uh well, I was born in uh in NDG, uh, below the tracks, uh, in the in the unglamorous side, uh, below Upper Luchine, uh, which at the time was uh was a very Italian neighborhood, so uh all my childhood friends were Gino Enzo Franco Johnny Pino Gino, you know, and uh and uh their parents always had great uh gardens and homemade pasta and uh yeah rabbit rabbits and yeah, all kinds of yeah, yeah. Like, you know, uh uh like you know, killing chickens in the backyard for Sunday dinner, the the whole deal. It was it was actually a wonderful place to grow up at the time.

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:58

And then I uh and then I moved to um I moved to Shattig probably when I was uh on the South Shore, probably when I was about uh nine years old or so. And that was those were my formative years. That's where I got into music. I started playing drums at around nine. I wanted to be like my big brother who was in a big brother. Yeah, yeah. I I had a I had a very musical, uh I had a very musical childhood. My dad could play three chords on anything, he wasn't great at it, but he could he could uh you know he could uh he could uh screech out a nice tune on a on a on a fiddle, you know, do some country fiddling, play a little harmonica. He knew three chords on on the guitar, but he was always missing that fourth chord, you know. So but uh it there's always music playing at home, and I I don't ever remember a time before wanting to be a musician or being involved in music somehow. So Shattig, uh yeah, was where I I learned to play guitar. Uh there was not much to do out there. It was a very, very quiet uh uh suburb uh back in the day, you know. Uh so it was either the joke was you either got into sports, uh you got into music, or you got into trouble. Those were the three things to do in Shattugee back in the uh in the mid-70s. So uh yeah, so I lived there and uh then uh back in Montreal I went to uh I went to university uh at Concordia and I studied music there. Okay. So after years in in you know, in and around the the music scene, I actually uh formalized my education. I got uh I took uh theory and composition at uh at Concordia and uh I did four years there. Uh and uh yeah, and then I just went to work. I was you know, I was in my mid-20s by then and I just started working. I worked at Steve's Music Store. Did you down on St. Antoine Street uh in the rental department? I did about a good six, seven years there, which was a great uh great uh a great learning platform uh being in rent networking and networking, yeah, all kinds of things. I I I did a lot of tech work at the beginning of my career because people would come in and rent things. We also we would have Sony Music come in, uh, you know, AM music, and and they would you know rent a bunch of stuff for uh uh a launch, you know, uh and uh I would I would get lots of gigs as a as a sound tech doing that stuff. And Saturday when when the store would close, whatever was left in rentals, I could take home for the weekend and bring back on Monday. As long as it was back at nine o'clock on Monday morning when the doors opened, I I had free reign. So I really that's where I really started to learn how to record and you know and and get get a handle on on sound tech and stuff. Uh I I I'm as I'm as at home in the studio as I am on stage. I just I love the locked away my little mad scientist uh labor laboratory, you know. This is what I Oh I love it here, obviously. This is my room. I feel like I'm at home here. This is great.

SPEAKER_00 4:48

Yeah, and I yeah, I equ same as you. I equally a musician and tech kind of guy. And um so let me uh let's let's uh get into your music. So what's your earliest memory of of music and the impact it had on you? Wow.

SPEAKER_02 5:09

Well, some of the earliest memories of music were parties in our living room uh on Jeward Street in uh in uh in NDG, and my parents used to like to Well, there was a very vibrant uh nightlife, you know, families, cousins, aunts, uncles, they would all get together and uh they wouldn't go out and I mean we were I come from a a poor family, you know. Uh my dad was working class, born in 1930.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

A happy family, you know.

SPEAKER_02 5:37

A happy family, it's true, it's true, it's true. We had everything we needed, but uh, you know, we we didn't go out a lot and and go to, you know, on big vacations, but it was all about, you know, having uh, you know, uh partying around the kitchen table, sort of thing, right? That that was the kind of environment I grew up in. So music was always around. Uh my dad would always pull out the guitar, there was always a piano around, even though nobody really played the piano, but there was always a an upright piano in the living room, which I'd tinker on. And so my my earliest memories were just there was always music on. And Sunday was like our church was was all the albums that he put on, you know, Johnny Cash and San Quentin, Johnny Cash and Wilson Prison, Elvis uh Aloha Hawaii, uh, you know, uh all that stuff. And and that was our church. We would just listen to records all day Sunday.

SPEAKER_00 6:28

That's fantastic. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:30

And I and I and I realized early on that I just I I could remember the words and I could remember the melody, like long before I ever picked up a guitar or anything like that. I really had an affinity to music. And I used to listen to CKGM when I was a little kid. Go and go to sleep at night. That would put me to sleep at night, you know. Uh so yeah, that's wake up to Ralph Lockwood. Yeah. But my earliest memories of live music was my brother Dennis, uh, who's the closest to me in age right now. I'm 61. He's gonna be 75. So he's my closest sibling, and then I have a uh a sister who's one year older than him and a brother who's one year older than her. So three in a row and then 15 years, and then whoops, here comes Dwayne, you know? Yeah, a baby. Yeah, that was uh yeah, uh and and you know what they say about you know being the youngest in the family and also being, you know, the fourth child, I I was right from the get-go, it was the Dwayne show. I was yeah, I was not shy. I was not uh yeah, yeah, I was uh I was the center of attention, you know.

SPEAKER_00 7:29

Well that's great, and that's great they fostered it in you.

SPEAKER_02 7:32

Yeah, and and I have to say that although my dad would give me hell if I asked him for a brand for a new pair of new pair of sneakers I just bought you just six months ago. Meanwhile, they're tattered and torn. You know what 11-year-old boys do to sneakers, right? You went through this, right? Yes. So, you know, just fall apart. Yeah, and and he would give me bloody hell for asking for a new pair of shoes, but uh he like my first guitar was a Fender guitar, and then my first Sirius Electric was a Gibson Electric, and he really, really I guess he saw some talent in me or he saw the passion that I had for music, and he really fostered that. Although, you know, yeah, I I didn't wear the cool clothes at school. Uh I always had a nice guitar and a nice amp and and something to work with, so I'll be forever grateful for that.

SPEAKER_00 8:15

Yeah, that's all you can really ask your parents, right? Just take care of me and let me let me be me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:20

And good for you. Yeah. And I think with the with the connection that he had with music too, um, he he saw how important it was to me because he he was a big music lover.

SPEAKER_00 8:30

Well, yeah, because you guys listened to music around the home and was part of it. I lap bringing was slightly different. My parents were talk radio people. Oh CJD was that played all the time, you know, in the car, driving anywhere was CJD and export a cigarette smoke blowing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:49

Don't open the window. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:52

Right. And and at home, um, the one sort of uh introduction of music uh was my dad was a big fan of the um pipe and drum bands, you know, the that the Highland game kind of kind of thing. So yeah, they they had their Viking stereo, the you know the the huge big wooden concert.

SPEAKER_02 9:16

Yeah, a piece of furniture, yeah, yeah. Take up your whole living room.

SPEAKER_00 9:19

Yeah, and he'd so he'd put on the the pipe and drum music. Anyway, it was it was interesting for me, but he um it was really my older sister and her record collection. Right. And CKGM. Right. I I instantly gravitated to that. So what so your your first instrument was a guitar, your dad's guitar, maybe?

SPEAKER_02 9:41

Yeah, my well, my very first instrument were drums because I wanted to be like my older brother. So my older brother, so yeah, I think I got a little bit off track. So my first experience with live music was my older brother Dennis playing drums in his in a garage band, and they would just play Elvis and C Cr and that kind of stuff. So for me to see three human beings making in a band would would it was they they did a pretty close facsimile of music. They were pretty decent, you know. And uh I was just absolutely fascinated by that. It was like magic. I remember being like three years old and watching them play, like just whoa, like that's magic. It is, yeah. You know, so I I think that was my first. So my my first instrument was drums, and I played that for a couple of years. And then, of course, as a you know, 10, 11-year-old boy, you get a little bit bored. I play, I play around along to my records. I see you got some KISS records up here. I think Kiss Alive. Kiss Alive one, the first one. That that was that I I I went I went nuts on that, on that album. That that album changed my life. That's when I knew what instrument I wanted to play. Yeah, because before Kiss, so I I was 1975, I was 10 years old, and um my friend brings over Kiss Alive, and I just looked at the covers like it was like from another another another planet, and then I opened it up and they had that massive booklet. I'm like, oh my god, that's the guitar player. And then I would listen to it and I'd say, Wow, that's the guitar player, that's a lead guitar player, that's the I for the first time in my life, because I would listen to pop radio, pop radio was very slick. You didn't always understand what the instruments were, it was just you know, like a big sonoric cake with vocals on top, because it was very vocal-oriented, and it was the first time that I said, Oh, that's a guitar riff, and that's oh and then I started like, Man, I want to play guitar, you know, and uh my dad brought home uh uh Fender acoustic guitar, not an expensive one. And uh there's a 17-year-old kid who used to cut our grass, and I was like 11 at the time, yeah, and uh and he cut our grass and he'd come in and and play a few songs on the guitar, but like cool songs like Stairway to Heaven and Wish You Were Here, and so he showed me how to play Stairway to Heaven, he showed me how to play Wish You Were Here, but when I learned the songs, I also learned the words. It was just natural for me that I would learn the words because I I was born on raised in pop music and the vocal was everything. And I and I had a I had a gift for remembering the words to things. So I started playing and singing guitar at around singing and playing guitar simultaneously kind of happened for me as I started learning songs. Well, that's a big jump forward for when you're when you're learning if that comes naturally to you. Yeah, yeah. So I I can play all kinds of crazy rhythms and sing over it because it's it's just the two are are completely connected. I can even sing when I play drums. I used to love Lee Von Helm too. I'd watch the band, I look at Lee Von Helm singing behind the drums. Yeah, I thought he was the coolest dude in the world. And then Don Henley came around and I'm like, look, another guy who sings behind the drums. I used to love it.

SPEAKER_00 12:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:42

So so yeah, singing and playing was always uh something that that came together. Yeah, it's funny.

SPEAKER_00 12:47

I I I play guitar and I sing, is what I call it. And uh and um Yeah, you have a nice natural tenor voice, I think, eh? Oh, not quite struggle to get there, right? But uh I um what was I gonna say about uh oh singing. So yeah, so uh and um you know I picked up bass later on being in a band. There was a bass lying there, as I picked it up and plucked around with it. I cannot sing and play bass at the same. Even if I know the bass line intuitively, yeah it's just like what?

SPEAKER_02 13:20

I can't get the words out. Yeah. Um it's the old rub your tummy, pat your head. Well, yeah, even more so.

SPEAKER_00 13:26

But with guitar, it's such a rhythmic thing, whereas bass, you're on the notes and you're listening to the drummer, right? Whereas on the guitar, I always refer to it as window dressing. You just just play. So you you were started singing and and playing, and and did you what was what was the first songs you learned on your guitar?

SPEAKER_02 13:46

Yeah, well, Stairway to Heaven. Yeah. Yeah, which took me a long time because that was my first song, right? Yeah. But I I I could remember it. I I could remember making music out of the guitar almost immediately. Sure, I you know, you'd flub notes and your fingers are not strong enough to but I would remember the patterns and I was like, wow, okay. And I just worked on Stairway to Heaven and Wish You Were Here. Wish You Were Here, which was a lot easier, right? Because uh it's just this G and C and D and A minor and all that. So that was okay. So those were the first two, and then uh and then after that it was uh I when I was uh twelve years old, I met these I met my two guys that would be really uh influential in my life musically, which was uh my buddy Scott and my friend Rob. These two guys played guitar together, and they and they had a friend, Ken, who uh who played drums, and and I would go over to their jams, and I played drums at the time, just starting on guitar, and Ken was that much better than me on guitar. And I remember 25, 30 years later, I found a Polaroid at my friend's house of the three of us in this basement. So I would play the first two songs on drums, and then Ken would get on, and that was it for me after that. I didn't play anymore because you know they didn't want to downgrade back to me after Ken was on the drums. So there's a picture of me sitting on the couch with my arms crossed, a little 12-year-old Dwayne, all disappointed, right? But it was it was that day that I said, That's it, I'm switching the guitar, I'm gonna be a pure guitar player. And then from there I started jamming with these guys with somebody else on drums, and and I I joined a band with Scott, my first band at 13 years old. Uh we were playing all the now. Is this an NDG or is this in Shadow Gee? Shadige, yeah, yeah, because uh nothing happened. I was too young in in NDG. Still, everything happened when I moved to Shadow Gee because there was nothing to do. I lived, didn't have friends there. I was the new kid. Yeah, but I met these two guys and we had music in common. So uh I joined Scott's band, which was called Fury. Yeah, we had we had uh his mother made uh white t-shirts uh with Fury written across, and and I had a white Les Paul copy and blonde hair, and my hair was very blonde back then because I was still a kid, right? Right, and Scott would play uh a black strat, and he had dark hair, you know, so we were like the the compliment. Black was so cheesy. But it was funny, and we would play things like uh oh, I don't know, uh Ted Nugent Sticks, Sticks was huge. Uh you had somebody who could sing Sticks? Was that you? Yeah, I could I could sing some of the Stix songs like Sweet Man and Blue and all that stuff. It was my voice has always been very pliable. Uh I I'm uh even though I'm a I'm a baritone naturally, I can I can sing like ACDC and Led Zeppelin and stuff like that. It was just uh um yeah, it just came naturally. I guess because I've been singing my whole life. I just I didn't I didn't become an adult and then start singing because your voice kind of forms, right? I was always twisting my voice.

SPEAKER_00 16:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:38

And I could scream. I I realized I I could scream. We used to do Revolution by the Beatles. Yes, yes. I would be the guy who would do that screaming. I could do it over and over and over and not wreck my voice. Well, there's the thing. Yeah, don't wreck your voice. Don't wreck your voice. So that was my first, and we we would literally, I was too young to drive, right? I was 13 years old, I'd literally go to parties around Shattagee with my little red wagon with my guitar and my amplifier. And we would make uh we would make uh we would go to Canadian Tire and we bought a big panel with all these like clock clock light switches, and we had a whole bunch of boxes of of colored uh floodlights and so we would stay. Yeah, we would we would we would uh you know we would uh uh bribe our friends to sit behind the the board and do the lights for a few beers, you know, kind of thing. And uh not that I was drinking beer, I was 13. 13, yeah, of course not. No, no, no. Boys and girls. So that was the that was the beginning of my of my career. So immediately I was just playing in front of people at every chance I I got, and uh that probably lasted uh a couple of years, which from 13 to 15 it seems like forever. And then and and then I moved and then I moved back to Montreal because my dad was not in good health, and we need to be close to uh a hospital because he was his health was failing. And um and I just continued on, just continued on playing. I never stopped and I'd always you know getting bands, and I we had a little uh flat in Verdun and I had a little place with a with a you know drum kit and and like my dad was always very, very generous with his gear, uh, you know, so we I was always well stocked and and I played and I just you know took it upon myself to seek out the right, you know, guitar teacher, and I looked for years to try to find something because I wanted to play lead guitar. I didn't just want to play songs, I wanted to learn how to solo. I wanted to so it took me a while and I and I found the right guy and uh I went uh I remember it was in um it was called the Guitar Study Center in Westmount, uh on the corner of Sherbrooke and like Victoria, and it was uh upstairs and I I took my first guitar lesson and this guy showed me uh well he showed me how the guitar worked. You know the caged the caged system, you know, like all how all the the the the uh uh how how all the uh shapes of the scales hook up from one end of the neck to the other, and it was like a light bulb went on, and I said, Oh my god, this is the key to the kingdom. Yes. And three months later I was teaching guitar at that school that I was but I was in my I was in my early twenties by the time, so I had already had like ten years of experience, ten years of practical playing, and then all of a sudden somebody took the blinders off, you know, with this newfound information, and then I said, Well, I'm definitely going for a career in music now, and I and that's when I that's when I said, Well, then I better go back to school. And it was about a year after that that I enrolled in Concordia in the back then it was a fine arts department with a specialty in music. Were you able to keep uh performing?

SPEAKER_00 19:40

Were you performing at that point?

SPEAKER_02 19:41

Yeah, yeah, I was performing, not not like as a as a pro, but there was lots of shows being on, you know, uh so this is like the early 80s, I think. Yeah, mid mid to late eighties. Mid to late 80s, yeah. And uh so I I I did my um audition in Concordia on classical guitar. I taught myself a little piece by Johann Sebastian Bach and I wrote a piece.

SPEAKER_01 20:05

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 20:06

Because now I now I think I know how music works. So I wrote a piece, but of course my the thankfully it was the guitar teacher and the composition teacher who were my my adjudicers, uh you know, adjudicating my my uh my um application yeah, yeah, my audition. So they saw that although I didn't know what I was doing, that I had uh a good raw talent and understanding of music.

SPEAKER_00 20:34

Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:34

So I got in, but I got in so low that I had to do music one hundred for non-musicians, right? Like because I I didn't know it, like you know, I I wrote out my score of my of my little uh classical guitar creation, but of course all the stems were on the wrong side, and I I didn't really know what I was doing, but but uh it was enough to get me in, and and that started, and then I stopped playing guitar altogether, and I switched to uh piano and I took four years of piano lessons because I wanted to learn to read scores. I wanted to write for piano and voice and oboe and clarinet, and you know, I I I fancied myself a little mini Mozart or something like that, you know. I wanted to learn all that stuff. So I did four years of of and I didn't play at all. I just completely, completely uh engrossed myself in in my studies. And I went from somebody who absolutely hated high school and just scraped by by the skin of his teeth within within one year, I was like in the top of my class, you know. I was like I loved it, I loved it. Yeah, you know, and the teacher would say, Okay, next next uh class we're gonna talk about this, and I'd go straight to the library and I and then so I was always ahead of the curve on that, and I just I loved music theory like uh so many people don't. I just I I really loved it. I hated math because I didn't understand what mathematics was about. I didn't like the way that it was taught because I thought, well, what am I gonna do? Use log algorithms and logarithms and so I didn't care about it. Uh but when I when I got into music theory, it was it was its own form of mathematics, but I'm like, wow, I'm all over this stuff. Yeah. I loved it. I loved it because it was explaining art kind of, and I was just wow. Yeah. You know? Um, yeah, that's just me. I just like to know how things work. I'm super curious about, you know, I'm the kid who would take apart his his transistor radio to see how it worked and then not be able to put it back together. Yeah. Yeah, I got in trouble for doing that a few times, but but that's that's kind of how how my brain works. So I I really enjoyed that whole process.

SPEAKER_00 22:41

Well, yeah, that really prepares you for the future. You can um, you know, when you know how stuff works and fits together, there's a there's a rationale to it, there's a logic to it, and it's not just magic. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 22:54

Or you're not just doing something by rote because someone said do it this way. Right? Well, why do you do it that way afterwards? Yeah. Oh man, when I was three years old, I probably asked why on every single answer that my parents would give me. I must have been really, really uh, yeah, a pain in the butt. I have a granddaughter like you who asks a lot of questions and we encourage it.

SPEAKER_00 23:13

Yeah, of course.

SPEAKER_02 23:14

Well, that's their their that's their brains uh forming, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:18

Um Was there a specific moment that pushed you toward your current genre or style? Like, I tell me I'm wrong, but but uh if somebody asked me, someone who's never seen you, I'd say, well, there's blues uh and some country in there as well. So you know, let us know if that's where you're where you feel you're at.

SPEAKER_02 23:45

Yeah, yeah, certainly. Well, country was something that I grew up with. Like uh, you know, all the the outlaw country guys, uh Waylon Jennings, uh Johnny Cash, uh Willie Nelson, Chris Christofferson, um, that stuff was always uh was always on at home. So that would and you know, Tammy Wynette, George Jones. Yeah, George Jones. So like I was raised on country music, so when the 90s came around and there was that second wave of it, it was just it's like, oh yeah, okay. So he turned the drums up a little bit, they turned the guitar up a little bit, but it's basically the same thing. So, you know, I I was digging Dwight Yoakum and all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh I I loved uh and and I absolutely adored that song my song. We're playing our song, babe.

SPEAKER_00 24:30

Well, have a listen to it now. I wasn't paying attention, but uh MELOD Playing by Rockin' Band.

unknown 24:40

Come on and take it.

SPEAKER_00 24:41

Just to say, when I mix it, I could have moved it, but it's just free form, so that's okay. It's alright. We're good.

SPEAKER_03 24:57

When I was a young boy, I listened to the radio, waiting for my favorite song Riding in the back seat, even with my feet, and I want it all west and tall stage much at on the DM my best friend everything.

SPEAKER_00 25:34

How long ago did you record this?

SPEAKER_03 25:37

Uh actually five years.

SPEAKER_02 25:44

I know I die. It was April April 2020. It was during the lockdown. Yeah, yeah. This was my third. I need to do something. Stuck it locked. Yeah, I feel like that's a country country twenty to uh yeah, it's a really it was like a a tip of a hat to those 75 and like drift away or have you know don't be great stuff like that. By this time it was laid fairly well into it. And it seemed like every every day there was uh there was more and more bad news coming out of it. And I just and this was I think six songs that I did I said I have to do something. So once a week, I would write a song, and uh I'd write a song, I completely produced it. I I played all the instruments, mixed it, get it ready. That was my week's work. And you did this the mixing at home? Yeah, recorded everything, everything, everything at home. Yeah. Sounds amazing! Thank you, thank you, I appreciate that. And uh that was my therapy my therapy. So after so many weeks of just bad news and bad news, I said, man, there's a time where life was simpler. And I said, well, what's the what's the one of the most simple, beautiful pleasures in the world? Is this a person just falling in love with the tune that they hear on the radio gets so um so innocent. And it really felt like at that time we were losing our innocence as a society. This was a turning point, things will never be the same after this point. Even though we've kind of returned to normal.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

Little did we know what was coming. Right?

SPEAKER_02 27:40

Yeah! That was only the beginning, oh my god. Yeah. So this is my tip of the hat to those, you know, those 70s uh pop anthems that I grew up listening to on CKGM.

SPEAKER_01 27:53

You know?

SPEAKER_02 27:54

But yeah, definitely there's a little bit of country in everything I do, I think. It's part of my DNA.

SPEAKER_00 28:01

Maybe it's the harmonies, uh, yeah. I don't hear a telecaster in there, so it's not like real country.

SPEAKER_02 28:07

No, no, exactly. Yeah, the drums are a little bit rock and roll, too.

SPEAKER_03 28:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:17

So this is definitely not blues anyway. It is not. But I love playing bass too. Like I listened to the bass line too on this. Bass is really important. You gotta get that right.

SPEAKER_00 28:40

Did you play the drums on this track as well? Wow. I'm a utility drummer. I can I can put a simple beat, but then I get a real drummer. Well, that was fantastic. Well, thank you so much, folks. That's that was called Soul Song, and I think that's available on your website. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:59

If you go to DwayneDixon.com, there's some music there. Uh, I've got my stuff uh up on Bandcamp. So going back to the the question that you asked just before the song started, um blues, country. But you know, I studied classical music in in school. Um I'm also an old metalhead from the 80s, you know. The holy trinity for me back in the day was uh was uh Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, and motorhead, right? That was the Holy Trinity. Um also, you know, I I I mean I loved uh I I like all kinds of music, and I guess it one of the biggest challenges that I've had in my career so far is to be able to pigeonhole myself into one style because it's I I I mean I have unreleased songs that are in a reggae form. I have other unreleased songs that are that are that are like hip-hop, you know? Like I just like if I get a good idea and I like it, I'll just I'll go with it. But that's what songwriters do, right? Um so yeah, I I it was sometime in my it was 200 ten. I I had done ten years in an original act. Uh it was called it's called Top Johnny, and we played kind of modern hard rock, classic rock, a little bit of metal in there, uh a little bit of pop, and I I hammered away at that uh for ten years. And uh it was a really tough slug. It's really hard to break into the music business, and it was also at the time where you know, just as as I was getting to my first serious original uh project, uh Napster and all that stuff came in. So kind of like the bottom fell out of the of the music business, you know. Uh and then now we're in streaming and all that stuff. So uh here I am, I find myself in my mid-40s, and what am I gonna do now? And I'm thinking to myself, like I was pretty naive even in my 40s. I thought, well, now I'm an old man, I can't play rock anymore. So I love blues too. Blues is another one of my you know my my early childhood loves, uh BB King and all that stuff. I just and and you know, um all the British invasion, Led Zeppelin. Yeah, Led Zeppelin was a huge influence on me. Jimmy Page.

SPEAKER_00 31:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:14

Uh, you know, so I said, Well, I could do some blues. So I I made my first blues record in 2013, and it was uh, you know, I was very much into Stevie Ray Vaughn and stuff like that. But you can hear, you know, Jeff Healy in there, and you can hear all kinds of other stuff, and you and and you can hear some rockabilly influences too, because I thought, well, that's it, I'm just an old man now, so I'm just gonna play blues, right? So I did that for the last uh you know ten years or so. I I put out uh I put out uh three blues albums uh called Black Satin Blues in 2013, Working Man Blues in See, that's the thing about blues, everything's gotta be called blues, right? And then I did Betting on a Gambling Man uh in uh 2019. And that was the last kind of blues album I did, and I and it got more country tinged as I was continuing. Like Betting on a Gambling Man has got some some country twinge in there for sure. Um and then during the pandemic I wrote 14 Days in a Whole, which was eight digital songs that I I never printed them or anything, but it and they're very different than my albums because I was just saying, you know, who knows when the world will open up again. I'm just writing the music I feel like. Uh I'm writing what comes to me, what's inspiration. I would just lock myself away uh all week in my in my uh studio and force myself to come out with a mixed tune by the end of the week to to release and just you know to have something to do. So do you listen to a lot of music like on the radio or Spotify?

SPEAKER_00 32:45

I don't know you don't, okay. I don't good point. I don't because I was gonna ask do Do outside influences very much so factor in like very much so because I'm definitely like I'll be listening, I'll have a Spotify playlist or radio in the car, although I don't listen to much radio. Um and I'll hear something and go, Oh, I want to write a song like that, you know? And it's like, no, it's not me for one thing. I'll just enjoy that. So so you especially when you're in the midst of writing these songs, you must try to tune out.

SPEAKER_02 33:17

Well, what I hate about writing songs is that when you write a song and then you show it to your buddy and they go, Oh, that sounds just like this song. You're like, What? Oh, damn, you're right. I was unconsciously uh, you know, channeling this uh I love that song. I'd like I'd like to write one like that, right? And that's exactly what and then you oh I gotta scrap it. But then sometimes you go back to that, you know, a couple years later and you go, Oh, but there is this one part in there that's its own thing. Yeah, and then sometimes you know a new song will come out of that. But yeah, my my big challenge is that I'm such a music lover of so many different varieties that you know, for a while it was Black Sabbath, and then after Black Sabbath it was Stevie Ray Vaughn, and then after Stevie Ray Vaughn, it was Hart. I I fell in love with Hart. I just I would listen to Hart like non-stop and and you know, and then it was uh Ronnie James Dio, you know, Rainbow or or Deep Purple or or something like that. Oh, I love Richie Blackburn. Oh man, like I think Rainbow is such an underrated, like especially him with Cozy Powell and and Ronnie James Dio, who who is probably my favorite singer of all time. Uh, you know, speaking of of somebody who who went through changes too, he started off as a duo op guy, right? Did he, yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like late 50s, early 60s, he was singing doo-wop music. Yeah, he's an Italian boy, right? I mean, all good all good Italian boys in the early 60s would sing doo-ops. From New Jersey, yeah. From New Jersey, right? And and then he turned and then you know, I I didn't know about Elf or anything, but I had I had heard him for the first time in his well, his newer incarnation uh in Rainbow. Like Man on the Silver Mountain. I was like, what is this? Oh my god. Then Rainbow Rising and then Kill the King. Like those like I I I I I have a little gym in my in my basement downstairs, and that that's if I do listen to music, most of the time I listen to podcasts, but when I do listen to music, it's usually me and Ronnie James Dio going to slay the dragon. You know, that's that's my workout routine, you know. Oh that's great. Yeah, so I'm all over the place. So that's that's what's tough is I like so many kinds of music. When I say, what am I gonna what kind of music am I gonna put out? It's it's almost like a I feel like it's like a ball and chain to have a uh a genre tied to you because people are expecting this, and then that's not I got that in the blues uh a a little bit too, you know, is that because I I'm as uh I'm too rock and roll to be blues because a lot of my blues has rock influences, and the the blues purists say, Well, he's not really blues, he's more of a rock guy with blues licks, you know? And then the rock guys are like, yeah, but I kind of like the blues he does, you know, because it's it's up tempo and it's so you know, I I I'm always I always have a foot in one other camp, you know, and so it it's it's been really tough to stick to one style.

SPEAKER_00 36:12

Well I was gonna ask you, like, in play blues when you're you're writing songs for an album of your blues stylings, it's uh it must be tough to to create something new and original within a song because there's blues is is a live uh art form. It's meant for improvisation. So when you're writing a song, uh some woman's gonna be bad to you, or you just got fired, yeah, and then go from there. Yeah. Uh so that I would think that would be a little more challenging than opening up to the whole palette of musical forms that you can use.

SPEAKER_02 36:49

What's what's funny um is that I I learned this my first year in in composition. The very first uh composition uh assignment that we had was to make a song only using the names of countries. So I said, wow, what a limitation. And and you know, so you would say, I don't know, uh France, France, France, and then someone would else would come in and say, Italy, Italy, Italy, France, France, and then you know, yeah, so it would really limited what you had to work with. And I always liked I immediately got it. I said, Oh, by putting those limitations on you, it forces you to be more creative. Because when you have the whole palette of it's like it's almost like, oh, I could go anywhere. Oh, where do I go? Yeah, well, there you go. Yeah, but what I'm saying, you know, like okay, well, I'm gonna limit it to this. I'm gonna, you know, uh for me, once I have once I have the tempo in my head, once I know what the beat of the of the song is, that's when I really start creating. And I find the more limitations I put on it, the more creative you have to be to come up with something good in that limited scheme. So writing these disposable pop hit songs, you know, it's it's harder than it looks because what's it to steal uh uh a line from uh Spinal Tap, you know, it's a fine line between clever and stupid. So, you know, like a like a really simple song, like like you know, like Wild Thing, you know, it's literally three chords. It's so simple. All right, try to write something like Wild Thing and and you know make it make it actually work where people wanna want to listen to it and and sing along to it and not laugh at it, you know.

SPEAKER_00 38:32

That could be said about the sex pistols as well, or the remands. Yeah, yeah. Do you uh do you do your writing alone or do you collaborate with other people?

SPEAKER_02 38:46

I started out all of my early writing was always collaborative. Well, my very first writing was all instrumental. I didn't want to write lyrics as much as I was a singer, but I really identified as a guitar player at that point and a composer. And even to this day, I can write music until all day long. But the second that you put words to it, suddenly your idea, your motivation, everything becomes concrete. You know, I'm singing about this, and then it's to avoid all the cliches that come along with with you know singing about that. You heard so many songs about that, because there's very few there's very few subjects. It's Love Lost, it's you're singing about or you're singing about a historical event, or it's a protest song, or it's a but there's very few actual uh categories that songs fit in, especially if you in a in a pop format. So the hardest thing for me is is applying lyrics to something because then you're you're making a statement, whereas music is it's metaphysical. You can just listen to music and and and your mind will go wherever it wants to go, you know?

SPEAKER_00 39:53

I remember having that debate with somebody that felt that every song had to have a explicit meaning, and I'm like, I don't think that's really true. I've I've Oh I was just listening to one of my old favorite bands, Rage Against the Machine, and it was killing in the name of it. There's like three lines in the whole thing, and they just repeat, but it it's such a powerful song. So brilliant. It's not it's the words don't even carry it, it's just the the intensity of the song. So that's a whole other and and this person I was discussing this with would would dramatically disagree and call it a failed song, and I'm sorry, it's not a sort of thing. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 40:31

Yeah, I'd say there's probably about 30 million people worldwide that would uh that would uh yeah that would contest that.

SPEAKER_00 40:39

So yeah, I mean I'm I uh I'm not a prolific songwriter, and everything I write I tend to keep to myself because I end up after listening to it a couple times think it's just stupid.

SPEAKER_02 40:50

We're our own worst critics.

SPEAKER_00 40:52

Especially as you mentioned, when it comes to lyrics. Like music, it's it's all kind of there. You just gotta pick the quick the key and the chords and the you know you can build a lot around that, but lyrics is like, okay, I gotta be really smart about how I want I know what the idea is, but and um yeah, that's usually where I I fall down, is is I'm not I just don't trust my lyrics. I I I did, but you'll never hear it from me. I did try Chat GPT. I asked a song I was working on, I said spit out some lyrics based on this, this, and it did. I'm like, oh Jesus, it's good.

SPEAKER_02 41:32

It's good, it's better than I did. And he did it in six seconds. I mean, you know, there's And you could ask him for endless variations on it, right?

SPEAKER_00 41:41

I can see why it's a problem in the in the real world, but it was uh it taught me to buckle down. Um I've always found that reading uh is is helps build your your vocabulary, your your view of the world.

SPEAKER_02 41:58

Also subjects or or or a line that you read, it's like whoa, why didn't I think of that?

SPEAKER_00 42:03

Well, I I actually on my phone I have a a note the notes app there and it happens a couple times a day, and it's like this is an interesting notion. Uh I'll enter it in there. I don't know what I'm gonna do with it, or maybe nothing, but I've gotta have like 300 of these little one-liners like to expand on some that's that's kind of one of the tricks I use.

SPEAKER_02 42:25

Speaking speaking of chat GPT, um so I I tried out uh Suno, which is a uh AI, AI uh studio. It's a virtual studio, AI studio. So I know there's a lot of people out there who are non-musicians who and my friend um the the owner of uh Duffy's and uh The Atlantic, Ron Edwards, uh his dad in 1965 wrote some poems that were supposed to be country tunes. Okay, you know, like Drowning in a Sea of Booze and uh she you know, uh You broke my heart for the last time. So and and he said he sent these to his son who kept them in like a registered mail, you know, the po the the so-called poor man's uh copyright. And uh so he popped these into uh he popped the lyrics into uh Suno uh and came up with like some really convincing, like decent songs on it. I'm like, wow, that's pretty cool. So I I said I don't wanna let AI write the songs for me. So I dug into my archives because I've been writing songs since the mid-80s. Excuse me. And I found a couple of tunes that I know I won't release that that were that were not perfect songs, but they they were little shining gems of that time of in my writing. And I popped the demo that I made on my Fostex X15, right? Sounds pretty cruddy. And there's all these adjustments that you can put, so you can say, okay, I want you to stay really true to the melody and the chords, because I wrote in the whole song. I pop it in there and I say cover. And it says, okay, it analyzes a song. Okay, this is a uh uh let's say an alternative rock song up tempo in the key of V with uh guitars and it creates its own prompt and then boom it shoots out two like 45 seconds later, you got two new versions of your song. Oh my gosh, yeah. It's it was unbelievable because it was like as if I took that song and got into the studio with Mutt Lang and and suddenly had like these big produced drums and guitars, and they still don't have Lee guitar, still sounds a little bit synthetic. Yeah. Um, although I'm using the pro version, I'm using their latest, you know. I wanted to do this as an experiment. And you can download these things into stems, so like now I'm taking all my old songs that I know will never be released. Like I have some songs that are like pop dance songs, like I was into prints too. I love prints. So I said, I'm gonna write, what would prints do? Right. So I write a song like that, and it sounds really crappy on my four track, but I put that four track into Suno and suddenly I get this fully produced track, and I'm like, oh okay, hey, I like what they did there on that part. So I would like cut this part from that version and that part from that version. I'm listening to, and I'm going, holy crap, that took me one hour. And I have something that sounds like a record. It's it's mind-boggling. I could, it's like crack cocaine for music, it's like cocaine for music, it's so addictive, and you could just spend your nights doing this, prompting this thing, even if you're a non-musician. Yes, and you go down this crazy rabbit hole. But hey, now it's time to do something different, right? Because Suno or or Chat GPT, it can sample all the music that's out there and it can mishmash things together, but it can't create something new. So there's still lots of new music to be created, and that's what keeps that's what keeps me heartened, you know. That's why I'm not depressed about this. I just think I'm actually kind of excited because I'll write a new song and then I'll pop it into Suno, and this is the way I'm gonna use it later on. I'm gonna say, put some strings to this. Sure. Make it sound like it was recorded in Abbey Studio, Abbey Road Studio, like by the London uh Philharmonic. Yeah, you know, and add a string section. I want it to go like this, and I just add in the melodies, and this 30 seconds later, this thing will pop out whatever I want. Horns. You want an orchestra, you want strings, you want whatever. You know, so I'm I'm gonna experiment a little bit more as a production studio. Yeah, use uh Suno.

SPEAKER_00 46:42

Yeah, I I thought AI to help with recordings like for mastering and stuff. Uh it's very good at that. Yeah, that's what I figure. I mean, mastering is I guess it it is an art, but um it's a it's a necessary evil, you know, after listening to or recording a track and all that, and then you gotta sit and listen to it over and over and over. Yeah, and then you finally go, Oh, I hate this song. But another thing about AI is a good thing.

SPEAKER_02 47:09

And you lose you lose your perspective on it because you're so involved in it that you can't hear it anymore.

SPEAKER_00 47:14

Exactly. Yeah. Uh the other little thing that I've noticed, no, I haven't tried any of the music ones, but um, so what I've learned about about the using uh uh commercial AI anyway is they're based on models. Everything they know has been gathered and it builds models. So as an example, I was trying to create an image of a Jimi Hendrix-like character, um, which it did no problem. But it was playing guitar right-handed. And I said, no, no, it's gotta be left-handed. But then it it just put it like inverted the image, so he's playing left-handed, but it's a left-handed guitar. And I said, no, no, no, make it a right-handed guitar. I had You'd fight with that for two hours. I spent like an hour explaining, it's funny in the way it explained to it. No, that's not it. And it goes, I know what you mean. But it it actually told me our models, a model doesn't know it it can't do wrong. It can't do wrong, it can't yeah, it can't do that fuzzy logic that I'm asking it to do, basically. So that's just something to be on on the lookout for as we get into it.

SPEAKER_02 48:29

Well, it still has its limitations, but I'm telling you, in another one or two versions, it's gonna be scary good. It's gonna be scary. I'm I'm daily, I'm sent stuff by friends. Oh, the the the latest one was uh Michael Bennett. I don't know if you've seen this guy. Yeah, he's uh he looks like he's about mid-70s, he's got a big Jesus beard and long hair, and he sings like these really, really soulful kind of soul rock ballads. And I go over to my buddy's place and he says, Dwayne, have you ever heard of this guy? And I'm I'm looking at him, and it's like as if he's playing on uh America's Got Talent. He's on that stage. Okay, okay, okay. Simon Cow's crying, Sophia Vargas crying, they're all and all the judges are crying. I'm like, wait a minute. I look at his hands and I'm like, he's not playing that guitar, but his voice was so good. Yeah. And I said, and I said to my friend, I said, Steve, that's uh that's AI. He goes, What?

SPEAKER_00 49:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 49:25

I said, Yeah, that that whole character is and then of course Rick Bietto just released something a little while ago. Uh his his stat was that 41% of all new music coming out on Spotify right now is AI created. Oh, yes, which is mind-boggling. It's mind-boggling. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:44

Well, which makes sense because he he I watched another of his episodes and he uh talked about um like took a contemporary top chart song right now, and uh you listen to it. There's a lot there's a lot of parts to it, but he said there's over 200 tracks to this song, and I'm thinking, what? 200? Like how do you keep track of that? Yeah. Yeah. So I guess uh AI can definitely help in that area. But he's not a big fan of the of well, he's not a big fan of Spotify already. I love watching his reviews. Yeah, yeah. Um well uh let's let's let's get to what you're up to. You're um you're gigging, you're like the busiest musician I know. You like what five, six nights a week at least?

SPEAKER_02 50:29

Well, I I slowed down. I I try to keep it to three or four maximum because I I have other things that I'm doing right now. I I'm I I also have uh I'm I'm gonna reboot a uh a YouTube channel for guitar, uh Double D's Rock School. I have a few uh uh I have a few uh videos out there now and uh it's uh they're getting some traction. I have about a million views overall on my uh on my uh on my channel. So I'm uh I'm seeing that as a as uh like my summer project is to because I started this thing without having like a guitar method. Yeah. So I'm putting together my guitar method now, and this summer I'm gonna reboot my uh Double D's Rock School on uh YouTube and I will have my guitar method to sell uh to sell to share. I it's not you know it's uh it's about making money, but I don't expect to be rich on this. I just I really love sharing my passion for music with other people.

SPEAKER_00 51:28

Well, at a million views, you must be monetizing this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 51:32

It's monetized, it's it's it's pretty cool. Uh it's it's not uh I'm not making any big money. I mean, of course, uh all my investment in the you know, I I buy a $10,000 laptop and uh you know and studio lights and cameras and all, so I'm I'm still in the hole, but uh it's a very promising uh thing, you know, and if I and if I have actually something to promote on my channel, whereas I was just doing one-off videos hoping to get views, and then I said, Wow, I don't really like the idea of chasing a new video topic every week, hoping that I get the views. I want to write, I want to do videos that I'm passionate about. I want to I want to do things that I think are important, and uh if it works, it works, and if it doesn't, it doesn't, you know. But uh yeah, so I I'm working on that and I'm writing some new music too. And I don't know what it is yet. I don't know what kind of music it's gonna be yet. It might be blues, but um my next album that's coming out is gonna be a solo album. I I work a lot, I do a lot of solo shows and I work with loopers a lot. Okay. I don't know, I don't think you've I don't think I don't know if you've seen my my looper show, but I have like an electronic drum pad and I have a guitar and I have a so I like I create I do the one-man band thing, you know, kind of like uh Are you doing that tonight? Yeah, I'm doing that tonight at Biggs uh at Biggs.

SPEAKER_00 52:47

And I pop over.

SPEAKER_02 52:48

Yeah, yeah. So it's fun. So I I'm working so what what I'm doing now is when I'm gigging in the in the bars and the stuff like that. I mean I'll throw some of my own songs in there, but I'm writing songs that are gonna be made specifically for that format where I could exploit that. So yeah, so that's uh that's what I'm working on. And I'm got a lot of a lot of shows coming up. Uh playing at uh Montremblanc Blues uh in July, uh playing uh at uh music uh a music festival in Morrisburg uh in August. I'm playing at uh another blues festival in Becancourt, Moulin, gin and blues, uh also late July. Uh lots of stuff.

SPEAKER_00 53:29

And then I'm do you do all your own booking?

SPEAKER_02 53:31

Uh I have uh I have uh a booker who uh books uh a lot of the blues stuff. Okay. Uh it's Brian Slack. Brian Slack is uh he's very well connected. He's the guy in blues in uh and I also work with uh most of the time I work with uh Montreal Talent Agency. Oh, and May 22nd I'll be playing on the F1 stage on Crescent downtown Montreal for uh yeah, Friday, Friday, May 22nd. I'll be playing there. They're having a classic rock night, so I'm I'm gonna be opening up for a Bon Jovi tribute band.

SPEAKER_00 54:04

What a nice opportunity.

SPEAKER_02 54:05

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that's thanks to uh thanks to uh to Ron Langois at uh at uh Montreal Talent Agency. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:13

Um I was gonna say, I uh you are you playing at the Ottawa Blues Festival?

SPEAKER_02 54:18

No, I've never played. I've never played the Ottawa Blues Festival. And there's there's not much blues happening there. There's not. No, there's not. It's not a blues festival anymore.

SPEAKER_00 54:25

Coincidentally, on the closing, I was just looking at the the itinerary and the closing night, and I was oh, Paulo Stante's got himself a place at the stage. Yeah. Good for him. Good for him. I was happy to hear that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because he is he's definitely the a blues guy, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:40

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's like right up the uh, you know, Robin Trower, Johnny Winter, uh Stevie Ray stuff. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:47

Well, that signals our time to slow it down here. Dwayne, thanks very much.

SPEAKER_02 54:51

It was an absolute pleasure, David.

SPEAKER_00 54:52

We'll do this again. I hope so. I hope so. All right. Take care, good luck, and we'll see you tonight. We'll see you out there. Well, all right, that's a wrap. Huge thanks to Dwayne Dixon for pulling up a stool and hanging out. If you like what you heard, go check him out. Support local music, go to a show, buy some merch, make some noise. Before we go, one last check-in. How's your stool? I'm Dave Randall, this is How's Your Stool, and we'll catch you next time. This has been Abandoned Monterey Production.