RYAN MONTBLEAU BAND

In the current musical landscape, it seems there is very little room for bands without infectious four minute singles or MTV-friendly gimmicks or a show on the Disney Channel. Rock and Roll, and its many eclectic sub genres, has seemingly taken a back seat to novelty and Pro Tools-crafted bubblegum pop. However, this doesn’t mean there aren’t stellar bands out there who ignore the climate and soldier on with their own brands of textured musical weaponry, prepared to stay the course no matter the weather. Ryan Montbleau, and his fantastic band of players, is one such example.

Emerging from the Boston area, Ryan Montbleau has slowly risen from a solo performer who earned his stripes in Coffee houses and small folk clubs in the area to a rising star on the “Jam Band” circuit, playing an average of 200 shows a year across all parts of the country, including the legendary “Gathering of the Vibes” festival. His current band, featuring primarily Ryan on acoustic/electric guitar and lead vocals, Jason Cohen on keyboards, Laurence Scudder on Viola/backing vocals, James Cohen on Drums and Matt Gianarros on Upright and Electric bass is at times an exercise in frenetic bluegrass/jazz fusion, and the next a warm and familiar moment of the best singer/songwriter flavors you’ve sampled in a while. Toss in a little comedy and you have the makings of one very engaging act that’s in complete control of their audience for their often three hour plus set.

I had a chance to speak with Ryan the other day, about music, the Red Sox and, well, Goats.

SW: Hey Ryan, it’s good to talk with you…and I suppose the most important question I can ask you, being from Boston is, when do you think David Ortiz is going to hit his first homerun?

RM: (Laughs) Uh...today, I hope! Yeah, I don’t know, that’s a statistical freak right there or something. Ya know, he’s hitting OK and he’ll snap out of it. Sometimes in baseball you just hit these weird streaks…but I am liking the way the team is playing, 5-0 against the Yankees.

SW: Yes, I agree with you there! Not a bad start…so on to music here. Let me ask you, in listening to your recorded works there are a lot of different genres and styles represented and blended together, so would you say there is a particular band or influence that’s inspired you the most?

RM: Well I could say for me particularly, I have always loved Martin Sexton, and also Deb Talan, who’s now in The Weepies. Those are more like, singer/songwriter influences…but growing up I listened to, well my two favorite bands were AC/DC and New Edition. So it’s like this kinda bluesy guitar driven stuff and then this R&B vocal thing, and where I have gone from there is up to me I guess. In terms of the rest of the guys, there are some that are classically trained and have jazz degrees and some that just love Hip Hop and Afro beat…really all over the map.

SW: You know I had a friend out in Seattle actually describe your sound as “Jason Mraz infused with Dave Matthews on Peyote”. I don’t really agree, but, what are your thoughts?

RM: Well, I like the peyote reference. (Laughs). Not that I’ve ever done that! I mean, people can attempt to pigeonhole it anyway thay want if it helps them, though I don’t really agree with it. I mean, sometimes they see and hear the Instrumentation and hear the name “Ryan Montbleau Band” and… we have a fiddle player and then automatically lump us into the Dave Matthews Band thing. I don’t mind Dave Matthews but it’s not something we’re trying to emulate at all. I really think with our band, someone needs to listen to more material to paint the whole picture.

SW: You and the band are definitely in the “Road Warrior” category, playing a ton of shows a year and essentially doing all your own travel arrangements, etc. Do you guys enjoy that or do you long for a day where that frantic pace sows down a little bit?

RM: We’re always going to hit the road and tour, but we’d like to get to a point where we don’t kick the hell out of ourselves quite as much as we’ve been doing. I mean, we do about 200 shows a year out of a van-we’re completely independent with no funding-and you know there’s a lot of bands that do that and it’s great but it’s also challenging. We’re starting to get to a point where we’re seeing it come to fruition though, after these hard years of touring…and in just a few days this part of the tour will end and we’ll just be sticking to the Northeast just for weekends. Then it’s back on the road in a couple months to hit other parts of the country…but it’s nice to have built up to a point where we can do that comfortably.

SW: I haven’t got the sense that you or the band are overly political, but I did notice on your website some connections to Head Count and Rock the Earth and I was wondering if you feel that bands, especially as part of the jam band scene you’re linked with, have an obligation or responsibility to be activists or take political stands?

RM: Well, I think they’re in a great position to do so but I wouldn’t say they all have a responsibility to. I like Michael Franti’s (Michael Franti & Spearhead) answer to that question, which was ‘The responsibility of the artist is to make great art’…and if you’re doing that you’re at least somehow reflecting the reality of what’s going on. I know that’s kind of a broad interpretation but if you’re really seeing what’s going on in the world it’s going to come out in your art somehow, whether you’re saying ‘Hey, let’s end this war’ or you’re just painting a dark picture of things in a song; you’re going to be reflective. You know, again, I think the responsibility is just to make good art but then again when you’re in front of these crowds and you hold a microphone you are in a good position to spread a message. I mean, I have a couple more political songs that I do and I like to kind of just let them speak for themselves.

SW: You’ll be at the Gathering of The Vibes again this year here in Bridgeport, CT this July and also Esker Point on June 25, which we’re all looking forward to. Do you enjoy playing the bigger shows and festivals, or is your first love still the intimate club setting?

RM: Well, we do so many different kinds of gigs, and we love them, but it depends really, as it’s up to the audience. You can be playing at a small club in front of three people and if those three people are really into it you can have a lot of fun. That being said, playing in front of thousands of people at the Vibes is always a nice one! (Laughs) That’s really a special one for us too, as this is our fifth year at the Vibes and probably the biggest festival that we do and we sorta feel like part of the family there, as they keep having us back and took us in when we had no business being at that event at all. It’s one that’s close to our hearts for sure, and one that we stay for the whole weekend and checkout the other bands, etc. As for the Esker point show, I mean, CT has always been great for us as we used to rock Sully’s in Hartford and we built up a lot of good friends there (in CT) but I mean that Esker Point show is like one of the most fun gigs I’ve ever played…you have little kids, old people, spinning hippies and sorority girls and whoever else all just chilling out on the beach and getting down. It’s great.

SW: So when can we expect some new Ryan Montbleau Music?

RM: Well I just finished a string of solo shows at some good venues in the Northeast and we got some really good recordings of that material and my plan is to release “Stages-Vol II” from these recordings (a follow up to his solo acoustic effort “Stages” from 2003) sometime in September. The band and I will be recording over the summer and into the fall for a new full band release that should be out early next year.

SW: So I noticed in your promo pic there is a Goat featured prominently above the band and I wondered if there was any significance to the little creature, or…?

RM: (Laughs) Yeah, that’s ‘Dave the Goat’! We record our albums on a little farm called Applehead Recording and it’s right next to Woodstock, NY, beautiful place, great location to record. We can walk around in between takes and there’s Llamas and chickens, pigs and a cow, some goats and ya know one time when we were doing a photo shoot Dave just kinda popped his head up and, uhh, well that’s Dave. I think we actually put a bigger shot of him in the “One Fine Color” album if I recall.

SW: That’s funny. Hey, I want to thank you for spending some time talking with me today and I really look forward to seeing you at the Esker Point show on June 25th!

RM: Cool man, no problem and thank you.

A couple nights after this interview I had the pleasure of being added to Ryan’s guest list for his show in Fairfield CT at the Fairfield Theater Company, which is a wonderful place to see a band perform. I brought along my buddy Nicole, who had never heard any of his music, and my experience with it was rather limited as well. In all the years I have been covering bands, attending concerts, etc I don’t think I have ever had as good a time as I did at this stellar performance. Ryan and his band played three plus hours, in two sets plus an encore, of incredible, eclectic and diverse music that just captivated me and the rest of the audience. Do yourself a favor and beg, borrow or steal to see this exceptional performer as soon as possible, at the Esker Point show in Groton or the Gathering of the Vibes in Bridgeport…you will NOT be disappointed!