PipemanRadio Interviews Mom Rock at Shaky Knees 2023

0:04 Hey, you love them too? Sure one Why Why up of America. It's time for the Adventures of Pipe Man on w forcy dot com list pompass number one internet radio station. Here's your host, the light Man, M pike Man here on the Adventures Pipeman W fourcy Why Radio and I'm here with our next guest. Are at Shaky Knees. Oh my god, what a great festival. And it's phenomenal havingue you guys here. So I'm gonna let you guys introduce yourself to the listeners. We are Mom Rock, a no phills rock band out of Nashville, Tennessee. Yes, nice, and my name's Curtis. I'm Tara Wilson. I almost thought like Wilson Phillips when you said that that's a new one. Usually I get castaway references. So oh oh that I could see that one that was It was just like the first saint came to my mind. I don't even know why, but it wasn't

1:37 likely. You look like Phillips, you know, or um neighbor, Hi neighbor, the mister Wilson. Yeah, over the over the fence. What shows that that's home improvement? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that was another one that's littleson too. Ooh, that's pretty good. Yea out there for sure. So what I like too is okay, and I forgot it right a second. But on your Facebook, you're about us, do you guys remember what it says on there? Because it was really cool? Oh man, we probably we took Boston by storm. No, it's definitely cooler than that. Yeah, we do it for the moms and the basement gigs.

2:19 That wasn't it. But that's cool too. We see this is fun. Now I'm doing it this way because you're gonna just name all your slogans all at once. We'll just go down, go down the line. Yeah. Oh man, well Rolling Stones twenty twenty two, hot bands, possibly Chicken something like that. Yeah, I love it. I love it, but I really love and I never talk about band names, but I love your band name because everybody talks about dad rock, which I think is kind of stupid. Like I'm a dad okay, Like what the fricking is dad rock? Okay? I listened to it like slip not that's not dad rock, not traditional dad rock? No, you know, so like I'm like, what's dad rock? But then mom rock? Bad? Idea, because that makes more sense. Like Dad's aren't sitting around listening to a certain genre, but I can see, like mom rock, Mom's home doing something and has the music blasting in the background on yeah, dancing in the living room, the kitchen. She's yeah, yeah, it makes so much more sense.

3:27 Thank you. We think so too. I think mom rock should cancel dad rock. Yes, it's already done. I mean it's it's funny you mentioned it, because that is the reason we called ourselves mom Rock, because I was like, well, you know, dad rock is always such a popular phenomenon with like Steely Dan or Paul McCartney, you know, all of the Almond brothers. But yeah, I didn't know one talks about mom rock and we were just like, well, that would be hilarious. You know what's stupid too, Like what you just said. I'm glad you brought up about like Steely Dan and Paul McCartney. That be dead rock, that be like grandpa rock, and I like both. I like both of them, and I am a grandpa. But I mean, like Paul McCartney's what eighty something, Yeah, he's up there, you know, so rock now absolutely, it's Grampa rock now. Like, how many how many dads like millennial dads listen to Steely Dan? Oh god, not many, but I love Steely Dan too. But see, to me, dad rock would mean like millennial dads, not gen X dads or boomer dads. So you know, so it's fair. But mom rock that's for everybody. That's yeah, that's exactly. That's the point. That's the point, that's a go, yeah we are Yeah, the gates are open. We got asked the other week, um if it was a play on kid rock like Kim and I didn't even think of that. I know exactly what you're either. We hadn't either.

4:51 And then this this person was like, oh, is that like kid rock? And we're like, no, not quite. But he's a disappointment to his mother. So yeah, when a dad rock and a mom rock love each other very much. Yeah, and I can't even see kid rock being related to dead Rock. Oh no, never. Never. He's the one when you're a dad that you tell your kids like, stay away from him, exactly. H I gotta tell you a funny story too. Uh. It wasn't funny as a media person because it kind of pissed me off, But you'll laugh at this Okay, see we're at this festival, Northern Northern Invasion, and we're in the press area and Kid Rocks walking backstage and some jerk off. You know how sometimes at these festivals sometimes there's press people that shouldn't be given a credential. Okay, and this was one of those times. The dude climbed up on a chair, peeled over like Wilson on the on over the fence and started yelling for Kid Rock to do an interview, like, dude, now set up the interview. You don't scream at him backstage, Hey, come over here, do the interview. Yeah, that's unprofessional. I think the dude that did that was a fan of Dad Rock. Yes, yeah, wouldn't put it past him. It's a very dad Rock thing to do, totally. But Mom Rock wouldn't do that.

6:24 No, never responsible, Yeah, cool, dignified, cool, Yeah, we're cool moms. That's right, that's right, and such. So let's tell except for the slogans and everything we got over, let's tell the listeners a little bit about mom rock and what mom rock is. Now. Not genre, but how you as an artist describe your music because I hate genres like you areist get boxed in. Oh ye, they're um, they're candy rock with a little bit of hippie Like. I don't think there's anything more wrong about that. We have a little we have a little candy in there, maybe a little candy, definitely not fruit hippie. I like to say that we're nostalgia rock nice, which, yeah, we have like a lot of eighties influenced David byrne On on the Curtis side, and like also, you know, we grew up in the early two thousands, so a lot of like you know, early two thousands rock like the Killers for one, very goodlining today just some small band playing yeah, those guys whatever. So like we grew up with our dads who listened to dad rock traditional you know, traditionally dad rock stuff. You know, kind of grew up with that sort of like nostalgic you know, influence at least on our not that we were alive, but it's a huge influence growing up. Yeah, So like kind of a mixing pot of like like everybody's nostalgic music taste, and I

7:59 think we have a lot of tinges of like power pop as well in just the way we play and just the energy that's in all of our music. I mean, it's such a big part of our performance and our identity, just being an energetic band and like having having just as much fun hopefully as the audience is having, and playing loud and playing fast and screaming the words. Um yeah, all three of those things you just said, loud, fast, and screaming the words. Now you're speaking my languacause, like, I love all this music here, but I am a thrash metal head. So you just described thrash metal. Yeah, there we go. Yeah, we're we're thrash metal, but it's a thrash without the thrash or the metal.

8:46 That should be your next slogan. We're thrash metal without the thrash ornamental. So we're just a band. I love that because one of the things too, I've done at festivals and so I've had bands make up their own genre because it is so ridiculous nowadays to subgenres and microjones. That's why I was saying whatever I said before I gave a repeat it. It was so ridiculous. But you know, so we've come up with some funny things. So if you were to like make a brand new genre, that's just for your band. What would you name it? I mean, yeah, Wilson.

9:26 Wilson's coined nostalgia rock, just kind of, you know, reminiscent of many eras, but not really copying any one of them. M yeah, I would say Energizer Bunny. I like that Energizer Bunny corp Um. Yeah. No, it's it's because we do have, you know, these kind of pop sensibilities where people will learn the words really quickly and it's very danceable. But we also have there are some if you listen closely, there are some weird, unconventional things that we do. I like that with the Energizer Bunny. He's cool, he's got sunglasses, he looks good, he's like pink, He's got a pink suit, and I'm not afraid to embrace his feminine side and think like us. And he's always going. It's always energetic.

10:13 He's got so much energy. It's fine. You should bring that up, because people call me the Energizer Bunny because I'm like NonStop, like I could. I don't do anybody. In fact, there's times I'll bring like my youngest story, I'll bring her to the festivals with me and she's like, Dad, I don't know how you do this every weekend, Like I'm done. It was half of the first day she was done, and like she's like, I don't know how you do this. I'm like, I don't know how. I don't you know. Yeah, I just keep going. But see now, from everything he just said, I came up with something. It's nostalgic energizer bunny pop core. Yeah, I think I think that's I think that's our next bio. I think there is, Yeah, there is. I love it. Okay, So how was it out here?

11:03 They are playing in the rain? Well, okay, so speaking of the rain, we finished our set and we walked off stage and in that instant it started raining. A yeah, we we missed it. By you brought the storm. Yeah, we literally brought the storm. So every you can tell everyone that we brought the storm to Shaky Knees. Sorry, I brought shaky knee by storm. We shook the knees. We shook the knees thunderously. He was a great show. I mean we we had a fourth member who came on literally last week to start learning all the stuff. It was. He wasn't kid rock, but he is the youngest out of all of us, so he is kind. Yeah, but he learned everything in a week. Uh, And we were all pretty nervous, but we got up there, we banged it out, and we just felt so good about it. It was one of our favorite shows to date, I mean, hands down. Yeah. I love hearing that because you know, you know, some festivals are good, some are bad. This is a great festival.

12:07 So hearing bands and how they feel about it, you know, getting often like if you had fun, it was a good festival, you know, because there's some as you know, you'll go and there'd be a ship show and like the sound sucks and this happens, and that happens. Ye. I was at a nine inch n nail show at a festival. I thought Trent Resider was going to lose his shit. Oh no, because of exactly that. Like there were his power went out like two times. It was raining, you know, and then it was the humidity because it was in Florida, and it was like I thought he was gonna lose it.

12:48 He actually kept his composure very well. It's impressive, yeah, but it is frustrating if you're an artist and shit goes wrong and when you have weather like this, shit can go wrong. Yep, exactly. So uh what after this? How do you atop this? If this is the best that so far, I know, we have a lot to live up to. We have some we have some plans this summer. We are next week we're heading up to Sanford, North Carolina, and we're doing a small IndieFest Caroline Indie Fest is what it's called. Nice. After that, we're heading up to Toronto in June for first Canadian show. We're doing UM the Festival North by Northeast, which is an affiliated Yeah, very clever naming UM. And that's our first Canadian show. And Curtis is from Vancouver, so I think that'll opposite coasts, but you know, same same country, same nation.

13:37 My parents are going to be there, so we're pretty stoked. Nice we're here. My parents are here today. See I love hearing that too. So because there's different types of parents, yes, yes, there are. There's the parents are like, uh, get a real job, ye ye, don't follow your dreams blah blah blah blah blah. And then there's the ones that are like just total momagers. Yeah, we're very lucky to not have complete momagers, and you know, we're very lucky to all three have the good kinds of parents, I think, and that the max ros going to the ones that are like totally pumped, like my kids playing you know.

14:18 Yeah you could you get to hear Wilson's parents screaming the words to every song. It was awesome. I love that. My kids would be so embarrassed if that was me doing that, maybe like, dad, stop it. That's great, you know. Uh so yeah, I mean you guys do rock mom, thank you rock, We try rocks. That's your next slogan, mom, rock rock rocks. So how do people connect to you guys on socials, on the web and all that good stuff, and most importantly buy merch, which I like that merch right there. Okay, yeah, let's describe what he's wearing. So it's your classic baseball tea, but with a little it's a jersey. Yeah yeah, baseball. Yeah, that's true. That baseball tea is slightly different. See he's showing a feminine side by calling it a tea instead of a jersey. Right, yeah, we're not afraid of that. But he's got he's got on this this jersey and instead of you know, your average team name. We've replaced it with mom Rock and it is this classic black and white look. And we we used to have these like pinstriped. Um, they're kind of like cream sickles.

15:30 Like we had this cream and red striped and it was very like vintage. This is a little more sleek, a little more modern. Um. But yeah, So this and many more items can be found on our website, mom rock official dot com. So we have those jerseys, we have some t shirts, tote bags, hats, um, anything you could possibly need for a baseball game. And yes, I'm wearing one of our Is it lame to wear your own merch? I don't know. You're your own you're your own biggest cheerleader as well, you're not wearing the merch. Why should anybody else exactly? So, yeah we are, and that's why that's why we're at the jerseys on stage where you know we're a part of this team. You can be a part of the team. You just get a jersey, you can join us. But yeah, that can be found on our website and all of our socials are mom Rock Official, except TikTok, which is Momrock TikTok, which we just did because it rhymed, oh TikTok, so I know, that's what's your wildest TikTok you've done so far. So Curtis had this TikTok where he wasn't it wasn't even meant to be. It's not really that wild, but he um he was inhaling some helium because we had an old birthday balloon lying around and he was singing Whitney Houston's I Want to Dance with somebody, but his voice would get progressively higher as he inhaled more helium. So I slightly filmed it and I put it on our TikTok and it has maybe two hundred fifty thousand views nice at this point, so just completely random. I feel like the more that we try at TikTok, the less successful they are, Isn't it every time we wing it or just like post a video and don't pay attention to it end up doing well.

17:00 So we got to stop trying. That's the main message. I think that I'm trying one hundred percent. Listen. I could testify to that because my daughter's boyfriend, who knew nothing about social media, started at TikTok and within one month got one hundred and sixty thousand followers. Wow, you know what he was you know what he was doing, solving Rubis cubes. Wow. Like I would never in a million years, in two thousand twenty three think that people would want to watch TikTok's of somebody solving a Rubik's cube. Yeah. Yeah, audience for everything totally what people love. People love watching people.

17:44 It's just it's just the ultimate people watching. Oh, one hundred percent. That's why I do it. I'm a people watcher. And then I don't have to drive to the club and watch people act like idiots. I just go on my phone and watch tiktom Yeah, you know, I can laugh at him right at home. Oh man, so wild story? You got a wild story from from doing these shows that you want to share? Oh my gosh, there's gotta be I do have a fun story. Oh I like fun stories. We on our last tour, we were opening for this great band called The Collection, and we were playing in there in their hometown in North Carolina, and it was like this fantastic h venue that had been put up in like an old abandoned just like it's like an old textile militant Saxophaha, North Carolina, which is in the middle of nowhere, but it's great venue, like huge venue, and they're like from there, so they have a like huge fan base. There's they're like five hundred something people.

18:42 There's incredible show, like fantastic, Like everything was completely flawless up until like the very last song. And then in the intro of the last song, I look up from the drums and I see Curtis like running towards me, like he's gonna, like, you know, jump up on the on the drum riser. And I looked back down at whatever I was doing, and then like I look back up and Curtis isn't on the drum riser in front of me. I looked to my right and Curtis's feet or at my eye level, and he's like nose down behind his amp like behind the risers, and like guitar is completely gone. He's literally upside down like his feet or stick. It's like it was a bit like we planned it, and it was like at first I was like, well, we just gotta keep going, and then like I looked over and he was still there. I was like, is he okay? Like we have to stop but eventually he hopped up and made it back to the mic for like the like very second that the first verse started. So it was like it all worked out fine, and I think people just thought it was funny once they figured out that it wasn't a bit and it was in fact an accident. Yeah, it was fortunate he wasn't hurt, because it looked a lot worse than it was.

19:49 I thought I would have like broken something or bruised something. But I got up and I was like, man, I feel like a million bucks. I think that's exactly what I needed. That that was your motivation for the rest of the show right there. It was. It was. It was the biggest show we played on the tour. Like there were like four to five hundred people there who watched me just eat shit behind my amp Like it was hilarious. Nice. So you get it out of the way. So when we do shows like this, you're and the clear, Yeah, exactly exactly. You gotta make the mistakes earlier. So you know what I call that. I call that mom Rock. We would also call that mom rocks. There. It is all right, folks, make sure that you check out mom Rock, buy their merch or you can't listen to my show anymore because artists only survive on merch nowadays. It's true, true, yeah, and uh, you know it's cool merch, so you might as well buy it. And uh hey, thanks for being here at Shaking Yeas, and thanks for being on the Adventures of Payman. Thank you so much for having Thank you for listening to the Adventures of Pyman. I'm dumb. Bu for CUI Radio.