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The KBEAR dudes interviewing your favorite artists!
The Artist Interrogations podcast. Hello? Hey. Is this Tim? Yep.
Hey, Tim. It's, Brennan Pete with K Bear 101. How are you doing? Good. How are you?
Doing great. Do you have a couple minutes to chat with me here? Absolutely. Alrighty, man. We're very excited to have you.
February 21st, this upcoming Wednesday at the Hero Arena inside the Mountain America Center in Idaho Falls. Not only you guys, but, you know, Pennywise and the Scratch as well. Now I was I was reading more about it because I know you play more than the guitar. Right? I do.
Yeah. Yeah. You also play, like, the tin whistle, the accordion, the piano, and vocals. When did you start learning the accordion? I started learning the accordion.
So, I was, the drum the drums, I suppose, is, like, my the the main thing that I play. So when I was a kid growing up, all the bands that I played in, I was the drummer. I was playing in this band when I was probably 15. And, the kids whose house we would practice at, there was an accordion there. I had probably a year before become absolutely enamored with the pogues, and it was all I was listening to.
And, so I spotted this accordion and, asked my buddy if I could borrow it. I had noticed that that the whole time I had been going to his house, it had been in the same spot. Nobody had touched it. So he let me take it home, and, I just kinda started playing along to the poke songs, and and, trying to figure a couple things out. And it just kinda went from there.
So unfortunately, my parents had to sit through me trying to figure out a number of weird instruments that I'm sure they didn't love the sound of. But, luckily, it it it paid off in the end, you know. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, to think about probably the worst instrument I would think for somebody to have to sit there and listen all day every day would have to be the bagpipes 100%, you know?
Yeah. I would say probably the bagpipes and the drums. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Especially the drums.
I used to be over myself too. And that I I learned Enter Sandman, and then that was it. Yeah. I, I I would. I wasn't really I wasn't really allowed to play when my parents were home.
So, it was literally like the the second they left for work, I would run down to the basement and just blast away until they got home and start flicking the lights saying shut up. So, I mean, you know a wide variety of accordion, guitar. What what exactly what's what's the tin whistle? I saw that online. I'm like, what is that?
Like, do you actually play that? Yes. So yeah. Yeah. It's like so a lot of most a lot of most of the traditional Irish stuff you'll hear, has tin whistle in it.
People, people often confuse it for, like, a flute or a recorder or something like that. It's it's I suppose it's sort of recorder like in in its looks, but it's, it's just this, you know, tin tube with, you know, variations on, like, a plastic mouthpiece, and it's got 6 holes in it and it's responsible for some of the most beautiful Irish stuff you've ever heard. Wow. That is amazing. I'll have to look look more into that because I I was reading up more about like how you got to be with the Dropkick Murphys and, of course, Wikipedia is reliable as it is.
It said you you joined the band back in 2003. Is that correct? That's correct. Yeah. And you you were, told to sell merchandise in the Warp Tour.
That's what your Wikipedia page had. So I was just I I always love learning the history behind that, how someone joins a band or how the band gets together. But they had you play accordion on a few songs, and then when Warped Tour ended, you went back to college to finish your degree? Yeah. So I was, you know, I was friends with, I was good friends with, a guy who used to play guitar in the band, Mark Arel.
And, he and I used to play music together when he would be home from tour, and he knew that I could play a bunch of weird Irish stuff. And, and so he recommended me to to, join the band there. And I think, and so, yeah, the first thing I did was I sold merch for them on the warped tour and would go and play a song or 2 on accordion or tin whistle or something. And, and then I would run back to the merch tent and sell shirts the rest of the day. And, yeah.
So then after that tour, they already had a guy who was playing mandolin and stuff, so there wasn't a ton of use for me at the time. And, and so I said, alright. I'm gonna go back to school. And and, I was back there for maybe, like, a month, and then the guy that was playing mandolin and stuff left. And so Ken called me when I was at work one day after school and asked me if I want to, join the band full time.
And that was it. That's amazing. I mean, you really think, like, did you ever finish, college at all or you just went with the band and that was it? No. I went no.
Yeah. Much to the chagrin of my parents, I went with the band. I actually recently started thinking about, like, finishing online or something because I really don't have that much further to go before I would get my degree. But, you know, it's alright. And what were you gonna get your degree in?
I was an English major. I mean, to be honest, I probably would have, like, gone back to my high school and, like, taught English and coached basketball or something, you know? It is funny to see, like, what rock stars, were originally planning on doing before they got big. You know, it's, it's very odd to see because I went to the same high school as, like, the Rev and, like, Sinister Gates of Avenged Sevenfold. And I'm always wondering, like, how these rock stars, where would they be now if they weren't, you know, where they are today if they weren't in that band.
Totally. Yeah. So I was reading more about this because, I was hearing a lot about this Woody Guthrie person. Of course, I'm not all that knowledgeable in the punk rock field and, there I was hearing Ken talk about in previous interviews and listening and reading about your guys' album, This Machine Still Kills Fascists based off of what Woody Guthrie had to say way back when. Were all of you inspired by Woody or was it Ken specifically?
No. I mean, I think everybody I think, you know, I can't imagine an American musician who hasn't been some way inspired by him. I mean, if, you know, he's one of those people where, like, we learn his songs when we're kids and we don't even know what they are. You know, this land is your land, that that type of stuff. So, you know, he's just as far as music history, especially in American folk, he's he's very important.
Alright. Yeah. And then something that I'm sure you get quite a lot if you're heavily into sports like hockey, for instance, it must be so incredibly cool to hear I'm shipping up to Boston being played at, like, these big games. Is it weird to have that song be written, you know, and then years later, it's considered what I would think somewhat of like a sports anthem? Yeah.
That is crazy. You know, I come from a big Notre Dame family. And, so when Notre Dame started using shipping and the boys are back and stuff, that was that's how my family knew that that, it was all good, that I'd left school to join the band. There's always an added pressure to musicians for sure. Yeah.
Of course. But, but it is it is very surreal, you know, to be at a Celtics game or something like that and here shipping up to Boston over the the loud speakers. It's crazy. Yeah. I am it's it's nuts because I had a buddy growing up in I grew up in Southern California, and my my friend was obsessed with the Anaheim Ducks.
And I would go with him to to games and, of course, Pennywise, BroHim was their goal song. So I've always wondered that about Oh, yeah. Bands who have, like, these songs that I I wouldn't necessarily think would be, you know, were written as, like, oh, this is gonna be played at Boston Celtics games in the future. Like, how how that comes to be, you know? It's pretty wild.
Yeah. It's yeah. It's very interesting. I I mean, I I I can't imagine every anybody ever intends to to write a song that I mean, obviously, there's some there are songs, like, written for teams and stuff. But in the case of, you know, shipping them to Boston or, like, you know, the White Stripes song there, like, there's no way that that was written being, like, well, this is gonna be played in a stadium.
You know, like so it's it's crazy the the songs that that eventually sort of come around to be, big sports anthems like that. And it's, it's pretty wild. I mean, you guys are on this, Saint Patrick's Day tour. And, my another question I had was that does does the crowd get rowdier and rowdier as we get closer to Saint Patrick's Day? Like, I'm sure the crowd is going to be intense in Boston because you guys have a stream of dates there, and I think you actually performed there on Saint Patrick's Day.
Correct. Yeah. You know, we're we're fortunate in that. It seems that whatever time of year we're in somebody's town, that is Saint Patrick's Day for them. But you're absolutely right.
I mean, as we get closer to the middle of March, you can certainly feel, you know, people's green T shirts coming out, in droves And, and maybe they're getting slightly looser than they would. But, you know, we're we're very lucky in that. Our our fans seem to, treat all the shows that they go to of ours like it is Saint Patrick's Day anyways. Yeah. I mean, it's here in East Idaho, a lot of people who grew up here and are still here, they often have to go to Boise, which is 4 hours away.
Salt Lake City, 3 hours away. So we have this venue, of course, that you guys are gonna be at now and it's fairly new. I think it was just completed last year. And last year, there was a string of rock and metal shows like Falling in Reverse. Tool even came to Idaho Falls which, of course, that's a huge huge deal.
But you guys are like the 1st rock show of 2024. So I'm thinking that this show is going to be not only packed, but also the crowd is going to be so happy for you guys because, you know, the winter here, wasn't necessarily all that bad this year. But the winter months can get like grim for some people and then they're just looking forward to the spring summer time of the next year because that's when they get all they can get out of the house, go to all these great shows and so, yeah, we're very excited to have you guys, The Scratch, Pennywise And I've it's funny because the Scratch, I've never heard of, and I've I've been listening to their stuff, and it's it's quite a lot of fun. I mean, they're straight out of Dublin, aren't they? Yes.
And the holy cow. Are they good? And they're doing, like, a totally different thing with the Irish thing. It's so refreshing and fun to watch, and they're such great guys. Yeah.
We were so excited to have them, out with us. They're such a pleasure to watch every night. People need to make sure they get to the show to see them. Yeah. Yeah.
Definitely. It's it's gonna be a great show, and people could still buy tickets, of course, at ticketmaster.com. And, I just wanna say thank you, Tim, for joining me briefly today. I really do appreciate this and, all that. Absolutely.
My pleasure. I hope everyone, comes out and has a great time. The artist's interrogations podcast is a production of Riverbend Media Group. For more information or to contact the show, visit riverbendmediagroup.com.