Super Awesome Mix

Mixtape Rewind: Joshua Dylan Balis talks about his album We're On Fire

Super Awesome Mix Season 5 Episode 6

In 2022, Matt and Samer were joined by Joshua Dylan Balis to talk about his album 'We're on Fire' and go through a mix of some of his favorites and inspirations.
 
 His mix is here:
 https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1X4iHRTZ9pjJvxGr8A10gN?si=oEZnh0F-TpOHYDu9ijvMkg

  1. Voices - Joshua Ray Walker 
  2. Riga Black - Chuck Johnson
  3. Every time the sun comes up - Sharon Van Etten
  4. Motion picture sound track - Radiohead
  5. Godan Daginn - Sigurd Ros 
  6. May Janes last dance - Tom petty  
  7. Tumble in the wind (version 2) - Jackson C. Frank 
  8. Look at miss Ohio- Gillian Welch
  9. Love - Lana Del Ray 
  10. Boys of summer - Don Henley 
  11. Red Eyes - The War on Drugs 
  12. Girl from north country - Bob Dylan

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Speaker 1:

welcome back to another super awesome mix. My name is matt said home alongside my co-host and co-founder of super awesome mix, sammer abu salalbi Samer. How are we doing today?

Speaker 2:

I'm doing real well, enjoying life, excited to be here. We got another guest on the show today, that's right. It's always a fun thing.

Speaker 1:

Another guest, and this is kind of a first for us. We had Mega Ran on last year and we had featured him on a new music mix, but we kind of knew he was coming on the show at that point before we featured him. Right. This time I found this artist, I found one of his songs. I was like man, I really dig this stuff. Obviously, we don't reach out to every artist we feature on the show. I don't think Weezer needs to hear from us again.

Speaker 2:

No, they do.

Speaker 1:

I think they're good. They keep ignoring our messages.

Speaker 2:

We're going to send them another one.

Speaker 1:

It's going to happen, but I reached out to our guest and he invited him on the show and he agreed to do it. So our guest, without further ado. He's got a new album entitled we're On Fire and, yeah, we invited him on the mix. We're so excited he's about to go on tour, so you're going to get a chance to go out and see him live. But this is Joshua Dylan Bayless. Welcome to Super Awesome Mix.

Speaker 3:

What's up? How are you guys?

Speaker 1:

We're doing great. Thanks so much for joining the show. Like I said, we really just dug your music and threw you on a new music mix and then here you are is this is kind of a first for us awesome.

Speaker 3:

Much more easy to access than weezer, I would say well, for right now okay yeah, we don't know in a few years, you're going to stop returning our emails. Okay, but yeah, yeah, that's the goal. That's the goal right?

Speaker 2:

just be the goal Right, just be one of those Essentially like Instagram accounts managed by like a studio of 500 people, a bunch of interns. You know there's no human behind it. That's the goal.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely not completely replaced by an. Ai version of me Right right.

Speaker 2:

Well, so happy you could be here. It's really exciting. Yeah, we really did like. I love listening to your track and Matt talked a lot about you and it's so cool to have you here. It's great. Thanks for making the time.

Speaker 3:

No, thank you for having me. It's an honor. It's such a cool thing you all have going on. It's exciting to jump in and talk to people about music at any time, so if we can record it and throw it up, all the better the better appreciate that.

Speaker 1:

Um, so, before we get into your mix, I mean you want to take a second talk about this album. Um, I know you released an ep I don't know maybe five, six years ago and now you got a full-length album out. So so maybe just talk for a minute about kind of the development this album and kind of what went into it sure.

Speaker 3:

So, um, I was in a band in dallas and we recorded a full record and then, after like a year and a half of work, we decided not to put it out. So I was in this place where I was kind of devastated, but I had all this material that didn't work for the band that, um, I knew that I needed to make something happen. So I called up the studio in Nashville called Omni Sounds and it's like hey, I've got these songs, they sound, here's some demos and they said this sounds good, come out here and let's try a few tracks out. So came out to Nashville, recorded three songs. I liked the way they sounded and um was excited enough about the experience and was in the right place at the right time, where I was like I'm just gonna move to nashville and um continue to pursue music, but do it out here, um.

Speaker 3:

So that started in 2018, 2019 and, uh, the pandemic delayed things, but, but the record's out now. It's called we're On Fire and yeah, I'm not good at describing it personally, but it's all kinds of stuff. There's love songs, there's existential stuff on there. I guess it's indie rock, but yeah, it was a blast to make. And finally, this Friday we're going to get to take it on the road, so I'm excited for that.

Speaker 2:

That's so cool. I love that.

Speaker 3:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Well, congratulations on getting that all together. That's something. Thank you, matt and I are still Matt and I are still working on our album.

Speaker 3:

Are you?

Speaker 2:

It's coming together real badly. I got it.

Speaker 1:

It's not good. Yeah, neither one of us plays an instrument that's that's our biggest hurdle.

Speaker 3:

I think up to this point, yeah, so you just need to use some midi, some garage band loops. Loops are your best there it is.

Speaker 1:

That's right. That's right. Yeah, we're right there on the edge. Uh well, we asked you to kind of bring together a mix of songs that you know maybe inspired you along the way or got you into music, and I think you put together a great one. And the first track here you put Voices by Joshua Ray Walker.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, so he's another dude on my label. Who who is um done so much? I mean, I've remember playing it around with him at the all good cafe like three or four years ago, and I think he just had his Opry debut and played on Fallon, and it's for good reason. This song, voices, is probably my favorite of his. It's one of those that I can put on repeat constantly. It's good lyrical content. The arrangement is so good. There's like this combination between this electric swell guitar and pedal steel. That's awesome. It also has a really unusual structure where half of the hook is this vocal melody.

Speaker 3:

It's not verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus. But your intentions wrap the whole time, and that's always a sign of a good song. For me, it's got to have a really strong melody to do that. Guys like Dylan have really strange structures, but they still make it on the radio because there's power. It's a great song. I think the record came out a year or two ago, but I feel like I've only just fallen in love with this tune, so for the last two or three weeks it's just been on my heavy rotation.

Speaker 1:

So I threw it on the list.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, awesome yeah.

Speaker 1:

This guy's voice was incredible so good. Yeah, I mean, yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, this guy's voice was incredible so good, yeah, yeah, I mean, that was the thing I think that stood out to me the most was, uh, was, yeah, just vocally I was like man, this is, this is really good and it's kind of an upbeat song, although it doesn't necessarily describe a real happy scenario totally right, yeah, it's got that classic rock and roll feel where it is melancholic in its melody but the tempo's up.

Speaker 3:

So you're liking it. You're in love with yourself. Right, right, exactly yeah.

Speaker 2:

I know I had that same thing and you know I say this a lot on the show whenever I start to dive into lyrics a lot more because of this show, and I'm like oh, oh, that's what I've been like, nodding my head to, okay, like that's a little dark, but it's, it's really good, though, totally and I also wrote here is just absolutely beautifully sung. I mean, that's like the big takeaway I had I. I just absolutely loved it. What a great, great voice yeah, the vocals um, that's awesome, great, great first pick.

Speaker 2:

Honestly, yeah, this mix is so good so I'm really excited about this next one. This is one of my favorites that I got introduced to. It was not familiar with this artist, but the track is riga black, riga black by chuck johnson. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3:

So I saw like a review for this track three or four years ago. It might have been pitchforkork. It was a blog and it said that essentially this guy took pedal steel and reintroduced it as the lead instrument. Pedal steel is famously always support. It always adds texture and ambiance and this guy layered two or three pedal steel tracks on top of one another. He approached the instrument the way that a post-rock band like seagrass would, and it's. It's instrumental, but it's like a six or seven minute soundscape. It's more of a composition than anything else. It's classical and the fact that it doesn't repeat itself melodically. It lives and it grows. I've never heard the pedal steel used in this way and it's one of my favorite songs to just drive to. You know, sunset done with work.

Speaker 2:

I could see that, yeah, yeah, I could totally see that this. Of all the tracks on here, this is the one that I was like most tempted and I ended up clicking into their album and just like listening to their album and I it's almost like a. It reminds me of explosions in the sky, but almost with a country vibe to it a little bit, but it's so atmospheric and meditative and it's just beautiful. It is a beautiful composition. Yeah, I thought that was such an interesting track.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, atmospheric country mixed with Explosions in the Sky and the guy's English Psych.

Speaker 2:

Right.

Speaker 3:

It's awesome. Oh wow, yeah, yeah, I like it. Yeah, nice, I like it. Yeah, would not have guessed that.

Speaker 1:

Would not have guessed that. All right, Now track three. You go with Every Time the Sun Comes Up. By Sharon Van Etten.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, have you all heard this song before?

Speaker 2:

No.

Speaker 3:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

I had not no.

Speaker 3:

So Sharon Van Etten. Now I feel like she's huge, which is awesome. She's sort of this institution in the indie world. But the first time I heard this song I was blown away. It's one of those songs with a timeless arrangement. It could have been recorded by Fleetwood Mac. It's timeless. It's like is this country, is this rock, is this indie music? And the lyric is great. The hook she just keeps repeating Every time the sun comes up. I'm in trouble, um which. I'm a sucker for a sad line like that.

Speaker 1:

There's nothing sadder than a brand new day um, no, it was.

Speaker 3:

It's a great song. It's so melodic and I I throw it on repeat all the time. Um, so it's one of my faves. Man, if you haven't heard of her, you should dive into her discography. She's got a weirdly wide range. She'll switch up. That song is from a self-produced record of hers, but her sound can change drastically from album to album because occasionally she'll just pick a new producer and let them run with her songs with their vision. So it's really dynamic. It's cool.

Speaker 1:

What I loved about this song is it's she's not in a hurry at all. She keeps that same cadence throughout and musically and vocally. I just thought that was so interesting because I imagine or maybe you hear artists talk about how, you know, producers will try to speed things up, try to get it under three minutes, you know, make it a radio song and this is like nope, we're going to make this song the way I want to make this song. So not surprised that it was kind of self-produced, because you kind of get that feel just from the rhythm and pace of it.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely.

Speaker 2:

I like your description of that. Yeah, that's like a great one. I especially just love the very, very ending, that she kept the outro where she's laughing and says sorry, my headphones fell off, like I. Just I really appreciate that. You know, it's just like a little bit of humanity mixed in with her recording and she just sounds like she's having a lot of fun recording, so I dig that.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it was such a bold move too. I think it was the single on the record, and she made it the last song on the album, and I'm always like brave, very cool, that's awesome, all right.

Speaker 2:

Well, let's move on ahead.

Speaker 3:

Track four You've got Motion Picture Soundtrack by Radiohead. Yeah, this is a song, so cliche. I love Radiohead. I love Radiohead and I listen to this song all the time. Tom York's vocal is great. They're one of those weird bands where you can never cover their songs because everything they do is completely original. The arrangement on this is weird. He's using that organ. He breaks into that falsetto. It's also the last track on that record. I think it's Kid A right and I love the line. I will see you in the next life is such a cool way for a record to go out. So love that song.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, this was a really cool one. I just thought, like, musically, I just like Tom York's voice kind of, you know is there, and then there's all these things coming in and out of the background, right Like these different instruments and different sounds. I thought that was just so cool, absolutely.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it was like such a haunting track too. I just feel like it was so good I did not know this one and I was actually laughing to myself. I was like I'm really glad I didn't know this during kind of like the dark days of the pandemic, because I would have put this on really extra depressed yeah, because it is. Uh, it's one of those tracks.

Speaker 1:

It's really beautiful though it's not the soundtrack to a rom-com. That's not the motion picture you're referring to here. Not at all.

Speaker 3:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

No, not at all.

Speaker 3:

Not to a film that wants to make money, that's for sure, right.

Speaker 1:

All right, track five. You go international on us here, and I know I'm going to screw this up, which I think is why Sam had me read this one off. Is it Gowan Degin? I have no idea Okay.

Speaker 3:

Perfect, all right.

Speaker 1:

You can't even correct me.

Speaker 3:

It translates to good morning. I know that. Good morning, yeah.

Speaker 1:

It translates to good morning, and it's Sigur Rós.

Speaker 3:

Awesome. Well, you're already educating me. So yeah, this band.

Speaker 3:

if anybody's new to Sigur Rós I don't know if that's how it's pronounced, that's how I read it in my mind yeah they are, this post-rock band from Iceland, and they make up their own words. They speak in some form of tongues which the lead singer, jonsi, calls hopelandic, which is wild, very easy to make fun of, but I love it. So the language most of these lyrics. They're not even real words, which you wouldn't know because he sings with this Icelandic accent. You assume it's another language. It's not, and I think his philosophy behind that whole movement is just that it leaves more room for the listener to impose their meaning on the track whenever they're listening to.

Speaker 3:

But this was a song. I'd never heard music like this before, and when I was nine or 10 years old, my dad gave me his old iPod and it was preloaded and I remember taking the train from Plano, texas like 30 minutes south, to Dallas. My mom would drop me off, my dad would pick me up and I'd spend the weekends with him and I just have clearly these distinct memories of being like 10 years old, hearing this weird song with words I don't understand, looking out the window like my head on the glass. It was just one of those tracks. I love the acoustic melody. It's so pretty and they don't really even have a genre.

Speaker 2:

I've never really heard music like what they make, so it's cool oh, I I'm like so happy you just described how you listen to them, because my notes literally here is like I feel like I should be floating 15 feet off the ground or flying in a plane looking out the window like I think that's exactly like the mood that that they bring with all of their tracks.

Speaker 2:

Um, and yeah, I just feel like it's like a soundtrack song, you know, if you just kind of like, like you said, I think you impose your own kind of like vision to it, and I think that that's what makes their music so beautiful. So for me, yeah, I'm just imagining myself, like you know, walking along and and maybe it's like a sad part of, but there's like a little bit bit of hope in it, like I just think that they bridge that line so well. It's a really beautiful track. I love them, me too. Nice, all right. Well, let's go to someone who I think most people are going to be very familiar with, a little group called Tom Petty, and you've got Mary Jane's Last Dance.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I had to. I wanted to pick some classics, some formative stuff, like when I was in fourth grade I was given this box set of Tom Petty anthology through the years and this was this man I'd never heard of in my life and I put these songs on repeat and there, obviously, it was just hit after hit after hit. And I put these songs on repeat and there, obviously, it was just hit after hit after hit. And I think if I had to name one song that was the most repeated through my life, when I was a kid I was obsessed with Mary Jane's Last Dance. Every road trip ad nauseum, I could put this song on for hours on end and listen to the riff and I loved it. It's good old-fashioned rock and roll, so it's a classic. Everybody knows this song is one of their biggest hits in the 80s, but it's just probably seeped into my subconscious in ways I don't even understand. I love the song yeah, this was a.

Speaker 1:

This is a great one. It was great to see this one on here. Tom Petty so good, so many great songs. But yeah, this was a. This is a great one. It was great to see this one on here. Uh, tom petty's so good, so many great songs. But, yeah, this one definitely a standout. It also had a really notable music video that I kind of forgot about until I was kind of searching around, because kim basinger's in it and like she's, she's a dead woman in this video and tom petty's like running a morgue and this is the dead woman that comes to him, and so it's a really, really kind of a cool video that got some notoriety. I remember I'm a little older than you, so I think I was like in high school when that came out, but I mean, yeah, it was, that's a good one, great pick.

Speaker 3:

Awesome, yeah, I forgot about that. That video. They're like Tom Petty.

Speaker 1:

They bridge that gap from pre-video to you must have a video on MTV days. So good for them. Yeah, and he did so many unique videos during that time for someone who is not you know, uh, not someone who's you know necessarily camera ready, right, totally so, but he did a lot of great work with that. Yeah, um, all right, your next track you picked tumble in the wind, version two by jackson c frank.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, um, I honestly I think I was on a spotify radio playlist when this song came on, and jackson c frank is one of those guys who who wrote a couple hits that were recorded by other artists. Um, if he used big in the 60s or 70s, I'm not sure that he ever had massive personal success, but there are a lot of songwriters that point to his material and talk about how influential he is. This track, I'm not sure of the origins. It sounds like a portable tape player or something from the 70s or 80s and it's a demo, more or less. But there's a spirit to it that we could be in the studio now trying to find all these digital plugins to recreate that analog sound. I love it.

Speaker 3:

Some of the lyrics are understandable, some of them aren't, but you know it's this timeless folk song where he's singing, I, I, I seem to tumble in the wind. I wait for it to begin. Times are hard. The money just won't come through. I'd be alone if not for you Something like that Classic, but this is one of those songs. That's another road tripper for me. I can put it on repeat and it puts me in a mood where I don't want to answer any phone calls it's just a good one.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, oh, I love that description.

Speaker 2:

It's a good one. Yeah, oh, I love that description. Yeah, I felt the same way. I was reminded I feel like it could have made like a Wes Anderson film, you know like it could have. It has that kind of vibe to it. But I just felt, yeah, it was like a really soft, like love song. Basically it slowed me down, it just made me want to breathe and relax into my chair and just be comforted by like his beautiful guitar play and his voice. It's like barely coming up over the guitar and and I think the quality or the lack of quality, whichever direction you want to go like, actually really adds to the track. Like it's, it's really beautiful, um, and and that's rare, right, because I think if you try to do that today, people would just be like what is this? Like? What am I?

Speaker 2:

listening to, but it works so well here. It's amazing.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, absolutely yeah.

Speaker 2:

Awesome, all right, well, track eight, you've got look at miss Ohio by Jillian Welch.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, another song with a really interesting lyric. It's, there's this character, it's clearly this beautiful young woman. She's miss Ohio and she doesn't want to settle down, and it's simple. I think the lyric is oh me, oh my-o, look at Miss Ohio running around with her rag top down. Oh me, oh my-o, look at Miss Ohio. I want to do good, but not right now. So she's on top of the world. She's this beautiful woman. She's got her adulations. The last thing she wants to do is settle down. There's like a verse about her mother handing her, giving her, a wedding dress, and she just, she just wants to ride around in her convertible. It's simple. I love the melody. It's like everything I love about folk music, where the arrangement couldn't be more simple, but it sounds so big. I love this song.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's a great song. I love it. You know it's a good good description of kind of you know expectations, people have expectations of you, but you kind of want to go your own way. So I think this is a great I don't know just a really, like you said, simply written song, but just really delivers a great message. So, yeah, I thought this was a great one. All right.

Speaker 3:

Track nine You've got love by Lana Del Rey. Yeah, pop, so she's a pop star. But yeah, right, she's a pop star, but she's the indie dark queen. I guess this is like my favorite song from her. I love her stuff. I think her melodies are so original. She's, you know, unique in the mainstream. I think she's not just all sex all the time or all whatever all the time, which is great there's a place for that. But I love this song. It's sort of telling a coming-of-age tale. But I love the song. It's sort of telling a coming-of-age tale. You get all dressed up to go nowhere. In particular, it's such a feeling that I remember from high school. Oh my, gosh.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that was the lyric I called out here too. Isn't that so good? It's like it's Friday night.

Speaker 3:

You just want the miracle, the mysterious thing to happen to you. It's friday night, you go out and you're imagining you make eye contact with that person that you've been waiting for, or whatever and generally you're in it with a bad hangover and the most time you're 30, you're like, yeah, right uh, spot on.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, no, I. I really enjoyed this track and I love her voice. Like I just can always spot it in a mix, right. I was listening to this on my computer, you know, preparing notes for this and my girlfriend like two, you know like a room down over her is like, is that Lana Del Rey? And it's like, yeah, it is Right, because you can just immediately spot her voice. It's so unique and beautiful. I've always loved that about her music. But yeah, I love that line you get ready, you get all dressed up to go nowhere in particular, back to work or the coffee shop doesn't matter Totally, because it's enough.

Speaker 3:

She's good.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, she's great.

Speaker 3:

Her lyrics are so good and so simple and she's somebody who's just in love with the world and life and she's able to put that yearning, that unquenchable thirst for experience into her music. She does that better than so many people. I love it.

Speaker 2:

Nice, all right home stretch here, track 10. You've got just a great track here Boys of Summer by Don Henley.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. So this song I grew up hearing my entire life. Everybody has. But I think about a month ago I feel like I heard it for the first time and I love when that happens, like I remember that happened for me with dylan. I was like who is this weirdo? And then I was 17 and I was like oh, oh, it's God this melody is so good.

Speaker 3:

I had no idea so I did some research on it. The guitar player for Tom Petty I can't remember his name is the one who wrote this guitar part. It was a demo and Jimmy Iovine was looking for tracks for Don Henley. Don Henley liked the melody, took it back to his place, wrote the entire song and it's got a spirit to it. That's amazing. It's also got a really strange structure where there's a giant guitar solo in the middle of a song which is hard.

Speaker 3:

Its song has to be good to get away with, especially a pop song with defying that, that pop structure. But the composition it's rock and roll and it's a catchy melody. But the harmonies are so rich and so deep, um, I think it's easy to write it off. But especially when you listen to the outro, there's this there's a guitar riff that's that's harmonizing with the synthesizer and you don't even know what's happening but it's taking you somewhere. It's just it's a really good song. Um, it's up tempo. I feel like the same way that running up that hill. I think that's that case. Kate bush song is having another moment with stranger things. It yeah with stranger things.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, this song could be re-recorded in a modern context.

Speaker 3:

Hill, I think that Kate Bush song is having another moment with Stranger Things. Yeah, with Stranger Things. Yeah, this song could be re-recorded in a modern context and be just as big as it ever was. It's got the synths. They just need to be updated. It's got the lyric, it's got the melody. Yeah, I love this track.

Speaker 1:

All right, you got Red Eyes by the War on Drugs.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, so there's a theme, I guess, that I didn't really even pick up on. This guy is a guy who found a way to sort of revive that 80s synth rock and roll sound and he did it in a modern context. And when I first heard this song I was like, is this a band from the 70s or 80s? It sounds like he could have toured with don henley or tom petty, but at the same time it's got this modern flair and melodically, um. I remember the first time I heard the song I fell in love with this band. I fell in love with this record. Red eyes is so good.

Speaker 3:

There's a slow build to this guitar riff which is really the hook. It's not even so much. It's not even so much the vocal melody as it is the riff. I think it hits at like 130 or 145. He makes you wait for it, but it's just good, old-fashioned rock and roll. He's got the best tone guitar-wise of anyone around right now. If you look at his pedalboard or watch his interviews, he's got like 150 pedals in front of him at any given time and he's constantly changing everything. I mean you could never recreate it.

Speaker 1:

I love this guy, I love this track this was uh, you know, I think putting it right next to the boys of summer like really made that connection to the 80s for me, like so hearing these back to back I was like, wow, and, and the war on drugs was a band and maybe they were on a mix last year on an episode or or I just kind of stumbled upon them last year. But I I really kind of started listening to them about a year ago and I really like their stuff. But I never really made that connection until they were back to back here with Don Henley and that's when I was like, oh my gosh, this has got such such a cool 80s sound. That's sort of updated.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it reminds me of a combination between Bruce Springsteen and Arcade Fire. They've got this big anthemic thing, but they've got that backbeat 80s rock thing going too. So I like these guys.

Speaker 1:

Samer that sounds like it would be the perfect band for us. I feel like that's. I know I'm a big springsteen fan. Sammer loves arcade fire I think, we finally found the uh, the venn diagram sort of here that that will work right, yeah, that's, that's the overlap.

Speaker 2:

That's so exciting. What a big moment for us here. I love that. Um, all right. Well, here's another artist I'm, I'm certain would also be in that venn diagram. Uh, we've mentioned him a couple times already in talking today, but bob dylan and you got his track.

Speaker 3:

Girl from north country yep, yes, um, I love bob dylan. Everybody does. How could you not? He's a strange enigma. This song is a classic. It's a folk song. It's him and his acoustic guitar. There's no greater test of metal for a track than if a man could sit alone in front of a microphone and play it one time, and it can last 40 or 50 years.

Speaker 3:

Good description of that yeah it's amazing right, like it's so incredible to think about yeah, it's like this guy was there for two minutes and 30 seconds and said sounds good and walked out and 50 years later, everyone's still like what an incredible song. Yeah, this guy is yeah, I'm like I've never known that sort of effortlessness. I'm like I can't trust a song that's ready until I've bled out on the floor and blast shouted everyone around me. Now I know it's ready.

Speaker 1:

We all have our process. We all have our process. Yeah, that's mine. It's highly toxic.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it's a good song. It's a melancholic tune. I think there's a theme. I like those songs a lot. What he does really well with heartbreak songs that I try to rip, not only for my music but my life, is there's always this tone of acceptance. It could be a really sad moment, it could be a, it could be, um, it could be heartbreak, but there's always this sense of peace behind it all, which is almost like this god's eye view, this detached thing where, yes, this is happening and yes, it's okay. He's never melodramatic. Um, that's where I think the real it almost makes it sadder. The acceptance almost gives it more power. You're not like I miss you, babe, and I'm up all night crying. It's like that's what you're like, okay, but um, he finds, he finds a way to, to, to be detached and still have affection for this person where things went south. It's a great song.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean he really is. I think in that way, you know, not just his lyrics, but everything about him is like he is like a poet on the human, just human nature, right, like I think everything about his music and I think that's why it has such staying power is exactly what you're saying. It's like it is a view on just what it is to be a person and like all the various things that we struggle with and all the things that he's sung about and how he does it. And it is amazing, I absolutely I loved this song. I wasn't as familiar with this one as some of the other of his other many, many, many tracks, um, but I just I listened to this one and I just again kind of sank into my chair and just felt, just felt it speaking to me, right, like I think that that it just cuts right through everything and you're like, oh wow, oh wow. You know, like that's like always my reaction with some of his music, so absolutely, well, there you have it, folks.

Speaker 1:

Another super awesome mix for your collection, okay, this one provided by our special guest, joshua Dillon Bayless. Josh, tell everyone where they can find you and find information about your tour.

Speaker 3:

Yes, so I'm on every platform except for TikTok. I've got it started but I haven't started making anything yet. So that's our goal for this tour is to get the band familiar, introduce the world, the band to the world on TikTok, but I'm everywhere else. The music is everywhere that you can stream music. I'm more active on Instagram than anywhere else, so if you want to hop on Instagram and see, we'll keep things updated there.

Speaker 3:

We're doing another run in July, but those dates are still being set. But we are on tour across the state starting Friday, and I posted about it on my Instagram. I don't have all the exact dates memorized, but I know that the initial run we're going straight to DC where we're playing a Sofar in Roslyn that night, and then we're doing a radio spot in Jersey the next morning, and then we've got two shows in New York Saturday and Sunday, and then we've got this long haul from New York to Columbus, to Kansas City, to Denver, york, to Columbus, to Kansas City, to Denver, um, and then we're going from Denver to LA, la to Salt Lake, fort Worth, dallas, and that will be there by June. 22nd, 23rd, 24th is our Dallas run, and then we're wow, we're ending in Nashville. So it's gonna be a. There's going to be a lot of time on the road.

Speaker 1:

That's awesome. That sounds great. Like we said, we love the album. It's called we're On Fire, so definitely check it out, stream it and then check out those tour dates and go out and see them. Congratulations on the album and thanks for coming on the show.

Speaker 3:

It's been a pleasure. You guys are great to talk to. It's such a relief to talk about music other than my own.

Speaker 2:

It's been a blast. Well, come on back anytime, we're happy to have you yeah.

Speaker 1:

Thanks again and for the listeners out there, check us out at super awesome mix on Instagram and we'll get to work on our next Super Awesome Mix. So, for Josh and Samer, this is Matt and we'll see you next time. Peace.

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