My interview with New Jersey's own (Damn) This Desert Air is now up over at Exploding In Sound.  You can read the interview HERE.

You might remember when I wrote a post back in November about their singer, Craig Cirinelli, for designing the website logo...  

So go check out the interview and let me know what you think! 

-Ty

*Photo Credit: Pete Tabbot

A couple of weeks ago, I did a Skype interview with Billy Mays III about his post-rock instrumental solo project called Soft Words Traverse.  He definitely has a lot to say, but he's letting his music do all the talking.

Come join me and experience: 

Ty:  Billy, could you tell me about what got you into music and how you started playing?  

Ty:   That’s such a cool way to describe it!  There’s a lot people out there that maybe didn’t get to see this musical side of you when you were on television.  You’re not a just guy with a high-profile family that is interested in music.  You’re just as musically passionate as anybody else out there.

 

Billy:  It’s funny that you say that.  Like you said, I do have this “high-profile” family, I guess.  What’s crazy is I have this career path laid out for me if I wanted to take it through my dad and people I’ve met from the show.   That’s fine for my day job.  I work production, but that’s not my passion so I’m kind of dabbling with following what I love to do instead using my name to become the next Billy Mays.  I’m just taking a chance and kind of doing something that’s not so mainstream.  It’s really because I’d rather be homeless and playing music than being rich and famous and not liking what I do.  

 

 

Ty:  I definitely respect that and your passion shows through your latest album, Gently.  It definitely flows together with the order of the tracks,  and it almost feels like a journey through what you’ve kind of gone through this past year.  Is that what you were going for?  

 

 

Billy:  Well, Actually this kind dates back to late 2008.  Let me take you through what happened.  I met a girl in October of 2008 and at this point in 2008, I was planning on moving to Chicago to pursue music because I wanted that big city feel.  This was right around the time when Pitchmen was starting to be filmed.  Nobody really knew what this show was going to be like including the production company.  So I met this girl and probably within a month of dating her, I decided to stay in Florida for a while.  It turns out to be the best decision I ever made because if that didn’t happen, I wouldn’t have been involved in Pitchmen and in the longer run,  I wouldn’t have spent the final year with my dad.  It’s funny how things work out that way.  It really makes me think about the power of love.  It all felt so right even though it was confusing at the time.  

 

 

Back in February,  I was just moving out of my dad’s place, and I was going out on my own with my own apartment.  Two weeks after I moved in, my apartment burned down due to arson.  I lost everything in it including my studio, a custom guitar that my friend made me, all kinds of gear, etc…  My girlfriend and I were in the apartment when it caught on fire so we were definitely lucky to be alive.  I literally was down to the shirt on my back.    I actually called my dad as the place was burning down and he gave me this huge pep talk.  As I was watching this place burn down, he basically said “You’re going to get through this; things like this happen, and what you don’t know is that these rough things will make you stronger on the other side.”  I didn’t really know what he talking about at that time.  

 

 

About 2 or 3 months after that, things started to even out and I got a new place and was writing music again.  This music was really affected by the fire, and was just matching what happened.  So I started recording again, and recorded three songs (To Circle the Drain, Sprawling Certainty, and A Void Does Not Exist) which are actually on this album.  The day I finished To Circle the Drain, which is the third song I did, I was feeling good.  I was like "I finished three songs, and I am on my way into this album."  The next morning is when I got the call and was told that my dad didn’t wake up.  

 

 

I began to panic for about ten minutes because you don’t really know what that means and don’t really know what to do.  It’s really hard to take in, and it’s shocking.  After that, all I could hear in my head was that speech that my dad gave me when my apartment burned down.  It was almost like he was preparing me for his own death, and he didn’t even know that he was preparing me for that.  From that little speech, I became less of a victim than I would have been, and I kind of accepted it right away.  Then I said to myself that now it’s my job to make sure that everyone else is going  to accept it, and we move on  from this; because he made it clear what he would do in this situation which is to rise above it and come out on the other side as a better person.

 

 

Immediately after that, those three songs came to mind and I said, “Things are crazy right now, I’m just going to put these songs out there.”  So I put them on Itunes as a 3 song EP.  There wasn’t much thought that was put into it; all I was thinking was well I might as well release them because I don’t know when or if I’ll record or play music again because I have more important things at hand.  At that point, I was thinking that this album might never happen.  Then after things started calming down, a lot of people had downloaded my EP and I had some fans.  That was just surprising to me because I would have been happy with just one fan.   

 

After all of that I started slowly settling back into things and was working in production still.  In the past couple of months, it felt almost exactly as before my dad died except there was one thing missing.  It’s funny to me how much my dad is still impacting my life to this day; I never thought he would be in my life this way even though he’s gone.  Before, I was always helping with my dad’s image and talking with his fans, and now it’s only me doing that.  Basically, Sully (Anthony Sullivan) told me that whether I like it or not, "You’re Billy Mays now."  At first, that’s really hard to take because I’m thinking that I don’t know if I can fill those shoes; but then I was thinking that I just want to hold those shoes up and show everyone his shoes; then say that these are the shoes that I’m not trying to fill; I’m trying to make my own shoes and if they can be anything like this pair of shoes, then I’ve succeeded.  

 

 

I’m trying to take that same mentality he had.  He loved what he did, and he was never afraid to help other people in what they wanted to do.  One thing that I Iearned from him is that he believed in abundance,  meaning there’s enough for everyone to go around.  No one needs to fight over everything.  So the more you help someone, the more that people are going to help you.  It’s people helping people.  

 

Long story short, I eventually started recording more and this album sort of just came to me from a different place.  These songs started forming.  I would go into the studio with one riff and four hours later I would have a full song.  That’s basically how it happened.  

 

Ty: Wow… thank you so much for opening up and sharing that amazing story.  Your dad has touched so many people’s lives, and it’s great to see how his impact on you has led to the making of this album.  Were you ever worried about how some people would react to Gently being an instrumental album? 

 

Billy: I know that an instrumental album is not something everyone is into and that’s fine.  I'm not saying that instrumental music is something that everyone should like. Music touches more into what we are.  Music is on some other dimension.  The song titles aren't something that I pulled out of nowhere. A lot of these titles have written poetry that go along with it that come from my blogs on WheresBillyMays.com and my own writing.  That’s why I made an instrumental album.  It’s not because I can't sing or I didn't want to find a singer.  It’s because the music sings to me.

 

 

 

Ty:  I love the way you just worded that because your music definitely sang to me.  Your music truly shows how much music can say without even speaking a word.  When it was over, I wanted more.  

 

Billy:  Thanks man!  One thing about this album is that it’s deliberately arranged.  When I made the song, Yield; it was made to be the first track on the album. I feel like the album takes you on a journey, it takes you to a bunch of different places. As different as the songs are, any order could end up working. There are some themes in this album like at the beginning of the album when you wake up in the morning and your ambitions are running wild. You have to get out there and do something.  The beginning is the inspiration.  The middle it gets a little spacier, a little dreamier, and it’s more flowing.  The end to me is where you face [death].... It gets deep into my head...  The song called "A void does not exist" is about dealing with death and that death is a natural part of life.  Our usual perception about death is that it’s the end, and I don't believe that.  Death is pretty much a rebirth, and anyway you want to take that is fine.  If you feel that your loved one now is dead and they are no longer in your life: that’s just how you are looking at it. I'm taking the stance that my dad left enough of an impression on me to imprint those things in me. For me to say that my dad is gone is insane because everything he did while he was alive is still affecting me and the people he knew.

 

 

Ty: I totally get what you’re saying.  It’s not morbid; you’re showing how your connection with your dad is still there, and I think that can give some readers out there some hope for how they can handle a situation like that.  That’s pretty much all the questions that I have.  Is there anything that you’d like to say for the readers out there?  

 

Billy:  I guess we can end it with saying that the point of all this is that we never know what’s coming at us.  We all have our goals and everything. Just because something happens that makes you think you’re not going to reach your goal doesn’t mean that it’s not going to get you closer to that goal.  That’s what this album is to me.  With all the tragic things that happened to me, I thought that this album was an impossibility. Now, it feels like this album would never have been made without those tragedies.  It’s also about being flexible.  Everyone is dealing with different degrees of change.  Move with life, and flow with it, instead of trying to fight it.  That’s why my music flows like that.  I try to let it all happen naturally.  The way I write my songs is the way I write my life.

 

 

 

I would like to thank Billy Mays III for taking the time to do this interview and for the amazing impact being made through the music of Soft Words Traverse.  I would also like to thank Sug Cain for his help with the interview. 

 

Photo Credits:  Billy Mays III and Sug Cain. 

 

Soft Word Traverse's new album, Gently, is available now on Itunes and Amazon.  

 

Soft Words Traverse Official Website
Soft Words Traverse on Facebook
Soft Words Traverse on Myspace
Soft Words Traverse on Twitter

 

Billy Mays III's Website/Blog
Billy Mays III on Twitter

 

This article is dedicated in memory of Billy Mays.   

There have been many occasions in my life where a band has completely caught me off guard with their talent.  It could be based on an array of factors like an amazing album; good songwriting; creativity and innovation; a great stage presence and live show; a genuine passion for what they do; overcoming adversity; or a number of other factors.  That being said, it’s rare to see a band that has the complete package with all of those amazing qualities, and that’s what caught my eyes and ears when I started getting into this progressive rock band hailing from San Antonio called Nothing More.
 

A few days ago, I sat down with singer/drummer Jonny Hawkins, guitarist Mark Vollelunga, bassist Dan Oliver, and touring drummer Devin Travieso in their tour van after their show at the Boiler Room in Denton, Texas.  They filled me in on some amazing stories and experiences including their formation; a laundry list of previous leadsingers; their latest album, The Few Not Fleeting; Jonny playing drums with Dredg; and a tour van that runs on grease. 

Come join me as tygriffin.net takes:

Ty: I’ll start out by asking about the beginnings of the band.  What’s the story behind the formation of Nothing More?

Jonny:  I met Mark at a summer camp and asked him if he wanted to be in a band and he said, No.  [Laughing] Then a few months later, he called and decided that he wanted to do it.  That led to us starting Nothing More and this was when we were in 8th or 9th grade.  

Mark:  Yeah, me and Jonny have been playing together for about 10 years now.  Actually, Jonny and Dan have played together for a long time in a youth band together.  It’s funny because Dan hated our music when we were first starting out.  We didn’t have any “groove”.  [Laughing] It took us living together and becoming friends, then finally we agreed that our music could be improved with some “groove”. 

Ty:  [Laughing] It obviously worked out well.  Dan, tell me about how you became a "groove" bassist? 

Dan: Well I come from a family of musicians and I hated taking piano lessons. So I guess when I started hitting puberty at like 15… I think something about starting to like girls maybe was a gateway into liking music. [Laughing] I was more of a Motocross guy, but luckily the tide changed!

Ty: Very cool.  You guys have gone through multiple singers before Jonny took over the vocals.  What was the problem with all the previous singers?  

Jonny:  It was different in every situation.  We had three other singers on albums before me, but in the totality of the name Nothing More.  Hmm... [Laughing] How many how have we had, Mark?

Mark:  Well, in all, we’ve had about 8 singers with me and Dan.  So everyone of us was a singer in the band until Jonny finally decided he was going to be the singer.  Which is funny, because a long time ago, Jonny had this idea that he wanted to be a singer but he didn’t even try to do it.  [Laughing] We could have skipped all of this, and that would have been a lot easier!

Ty: With the transition of Jonny from drums to vocals, how did Devin come into the mix of Nothing More?  
 

Jonny: We used to do these big home town shows and we used to bring guest artists on stage to jam with us.  I mean at one point we had a trumpet player, a saxophone player, the entire Ronald Reagan High School Drum line,  friend of ours named Drake, who was good at rapping at the time when our music was more partyband-espue, that led to us crossing paths with a band that Devin was playing in.
 

Devin:  This was back when I was in high school and I actually played guitar.  Nothing More is actually the first band that I've played drums in.  I've always played guitar even though drums are my primary strength.  Long story summarized, I went to one of there shows and the power went out.  I asked Jonny if he wanted to do a drum off to kind of entertain people while they fixed the power.  Jonny kinda laughed because he didn't know that I played drums at this point.  So we did that and that's what basically led to us doing the "drumline" like solos.  It was about a year process before I was actually, officially playing for Nothing More. 

Mark:  After Jonny took over on vocals, we were thinking that we needed to find a touring drummer because he can't sing and do drums at the time.  We actually tried do a show like that in LA.  [Laughing]  It wasn't a very good experience unfortunately, so immediately we went to Devin.

Jonny:  Yeah, basically after we did that drum-off, I was like,"Wow, this guy really is good at drums!"  That led to us inviting him to another dueling drum solo where he brought another drumset on stage.

Ty:  Well, the drum solos are definitely one of the many awesome aspects of your live show.  I was completely blown away by the performance tonight, and I can’t wait to see you guys live again.  What’s one of  the coolest experiences you’ve had playing live? 

Mark:  Well, we actually weren’t playing, but we were at a Dredg show at Sanctuary in San Antonio back in 2005 and the singer (Gavin Hayes) came out into the crowd and then the drummer (Dino Campanella) came out into the crowd too.  They rest of the guys asked for a drummer out of the crowd to volunteer and so our whole band was there screaming Jonny! 

Jonny:  I was very timid about it because I worried about whether I was going to mess it up.  So I was basically pushed up there and I played their song “Of the Room”  with them.  It was a very surreal experience.

Ty:  That’s so awesome!  Dredg is one of my biggest influences in music, and "Of the Room"  is one of my favorite songs by them.

Mark:  The funny thing is that the guitarist (Mark Engles) and bassist (Drew Roulette) had never played with another drummer at the time. 

Ty: Wow.  That's crazy!  You guys played the Revelation Generation Festival this summer in New Jersey.  Tell me about that experience.

Mark:  It was really great to get us some national exposure, and there were some great bands there like Emery, Underoath, Flyleaf, The Glorious Unseen, etc..  It was blast!  We hope to do it again next year and maybe play on one of the bigger stages. 

Ty: Sweet!  That would definitely help with the exposure.  I love the underwater photos that Taylor Gahm did for The Few Not Fleeting album artwork.  How did that idea come about? 

Jonny:  When we told him about the album being a little bit darker and edgier, he had the idea to use an underwater camera and to have me looking "Ghostly" on the cover.  We're very happy how it came out!

Ty:  I am too!  It definitely fits the attitude of the album.  You guys recently launched TheFewNotFleeting.com.  It’s set up like a storybook that goes through every single aspect and detail of what went into making your album.  What sparked you guys to create this site? 

Mark:  With this album, every song was more personal and we put more work in every aspect than we ever had before.  A lot of times in a 3 or 4 minute song, people don’t see everything behind it.  These were so important to us and we wanted to relate to people.  Basically, well, this is actually a lyric from Thrice, but “every scar is a bridge to someone’s heart.” 

Ty:  That’s a great way to put it.  I've gone through the site, and it definitely showed so much about you guys that I did not know before. The story behind your song, “Gone”' literally brought me to tears, and I couldn’t believe how much you guys are pouring your hearts out on the site.  It’s amazing that you guys would go to this extent to show how much this album means to you.  I wish more bands were like that.
 

Jonny:  Thanks man!  I feel like we should give a lot of credit to Paco Estrada (former leadsinger of SouthFM) .  He did a lot of the pre-production on our album and he shaped a lot of our songs.  We were actually inspired by a SouthFM album called Swallowing the Pill where he did something very similar by putting a lot of the behind the scenes stories about the album on a website called Swallowingthepill.com.  I remember going to that website and feeling very inspired personally like you’re saying you have been with our stories behind Gone, Fat Kid, and Salem.  We decided to take that a step further by going a little bit more in depth by having all of our perspectives on each song.

Ty:  Well, I’m looking forward to finding the stories behind the rest of the songs as you get them updated.  I guess all I have left to ask is if there any new developments in the world of Nothing More that you would like to announce?  What’s in store for 2010?
 

Mark:  Well, Dan was able to convert our tour van into running on waste vegetable oil and actually be green.  As well it saves us a TON of money because gas is our biggest expense. 

Jonny:  Oh, if anyone out there reading this interview has grease, WE WANT IT!  If you work at a restaurant, we will give you a hug, a CD, a t-shirt, or whatever!

Mark:  For 2010, we plan to get ourselves more out there nationally, especially with this grease thing.  We’re more of a regional band and we’re hoping to develop the markets on the east and west coast.  We’ll just see what happens.*   

When I started writing the closer to this article, I realized that somebody had written it for me without even knowing it.  This is a direct quote from an email from Nothing More’s manager, Ron Travieso, and it definitely sums up what this band is all about:

“You know I’ve had the privilege this year of being part of the lives of four young men, not only from a musical stand point, but getting to know them on a deep and personal level. One of the many things that has stood out from these four individual’s is their humbleness and humility. And if I had to pick one experience that exemplifies that, it was during their last stop here in San Antonio, TX.

One of the bands that was on the line up was actually scheduled to play at a earlier time slot, but complained that they felt the need to be on at a later time. The guys in Nothing More gracious hosts that they are agreed to meet this bands demands….granted be careful what you ask for ! Nothing More played to almost 400 people in attendance that night, the band that was handed them a headlining slot ? well I counted about 25 after it was all said and done…

Ty, these are four great guys, I can’t say enough good things about them…and of course I’m a little bias because one of the members is my son. But to see what they have gone through over the course of this year, they definitely have the drive and most importantly the passion to make their mark on the music scene. The words “Believe without question” have been ingrained in my head from the beginning of this year, and will soon be tattooed on my body as a constant reminder…where would we be if we didn’t believe in those things that we are passionate about.”

I would like to thank Jonny Hawkins, Mark Vollelunga, Dan Oliver, and Devin Travieso from Nothing More for taking the time to do this interview and for making the amazing music that they put their hearts and souls into.  I’d also like to thank Ron Travieso for all of his help in setting up this interview and Dan Goldin with Exploding In Sound for all of his help with tygriffin.net. 
 

The Few Not Fleeting is available now on itunes.

Nothing More Official Website
Nothing More on Facebook
Nothing More on Myspace
Nothing More on Twitter

Last week, I got the opportunity to interview one of my favorite bands, Here Holy Spain, and I did the article for none other than ExplodingInSound.com, my favorite music blog!  The interview was posted today, and you can read it at this link or by clicking on the photo below.  Wes, the leadsinger, has been one of my good friends since I moved to the Dallas area after college.

It was a great experience for me, and I really appreciate Wes, Erica, and Rob from Here Holy Spain and Dan Goldin from Exploding In Sound for everything.  So go check out the interview, and let me know what you think! 

-Ty