Tag Archives: James Cavern

Trophii Lindsey Pavao and Richie Smith

Finding a Connection: Local Music Vets Lindsey Pavao and Richie Smith Get to Know Each Other Better in Their New Band, Trophii

Trophii was definitely not intentional. The way they tell it, it’s hard to tell whether or not you’re hearing the story of how a musical act formed or how a couple met.

Is there a difference?

Richie Smith has been a mainstay in the Sacramento indie rock scene as a member of popular acts such as Wife and Son, Sunmonks, as well as numerous other local projects. Lindsey Pavao found regional fame and national recognition when she participated in the second season of reality competition show The Voice.

The story goes that, while Smith and Pavao had met previously (a little back and forth messaging on Facebook after they had both participated in a local Radiohead tribute show), the true start to their collaboration was born after Smith’s ex-wife, Mallory, had left her role in the project Life in 24 Frames following their divorce, and Smith needed to fill that vacancy with someone with similar vocal and musical talents.

Mutual friend James Cavern suggested Pavao. Smith says he didn’t think she would be interested.

“He probably said something along the lines of ‘Oh, she’s a flake’ or something,” Pavao said during a phone interview with Submerge, followed with “I flaked on you once,” directly aimed at Smith, and with a tone of playful jabbing.

The project wasn’t immediate. Following their time together in Life in 24 Frames, the two kept in contact, and when Pavao was in need of some assistance for her own project, she reached out to Smith.

“I asked him to help out with my solo record that I was trying to put out. Richie looked me dead in the eye when I showed him the songs that I wanted him to help out with, and he’s like, ‘I’ll do this, but I need to be a part of this whole record. We’re going to do this together,’ and there was something about how confident and how inspired he was to help me,” Pavao said. “About three months later it just became too entangled for it to be just my project. I didn’t even feel comfortable pretending like I was this solo artist anymore because the music wasn’t just mine. We were writing songs together. By the end of the summer we were Trophii.”

A few years ago, they began the recording process in their Sacramento apartment, and on Dec. 6, they will finally have a release show for the album Vitamins and Flowers, the fruits of their recording labor.

While the two have a fairly seasoned resume when it comes to music projects, the self-recording aspect was not exactly one they had a ton of familiarity with from the get-go.

“I’ve done a lot of positive self-recording and arranging. But, for a long time I didn’t have any recording equipment of my own,” Smith said. “Lindsey has some pretty nice gear, and once we started working together, I was able to use some of the stuff that she has, and start the demoing and pre-production process for what is now our first record.”

“I’m self taught,” Pavao added. “I’ve been recording since I was in high school. It’s an ever evolving process.”

When it comes to learning on the job—no matter the field—one has to expect a certain learning curve. For Trophii, the speed bumps were limited and the DIY approach gave them plenty of time to get things done right.

“I think mainly when it comes to parts arrangement, as far as capturing the sounds going in, I’ve been doing recording long enough to know how to achieve certain sounds that I want to get,” said Smith. “I think the arrangement part was tough … a lot of the engineering logistics as far as within the software programs—we recorded in Logic Pro X—was a challenge. Lindsey got Logic Pro X certified, and because she did that, we didn’t have to bring in an engineer to track our stuff.”

“Basically all of that happened within the last two years … She learned the program, I learned based on what she learned, and we did it together,” he said.

Post-production work was taken on by Sacramento legend Robert Cheek, well known for his work with projects such as Band of Horses and Chelsea Wolfe.

While most of the recording of Vitamins and Flowers was done at their leisure in the comforts of their apartment, they did track some acoustic drum arrangements with percussionist Christian Midthun.

“Basically, he was performing slash interpreting drum arrangements that Lindsey and I composed for the record,” Smith said.

The first incarnation of Trophii’s live act was as a six-piece, and Smith and Pavao found that too much to manage, both in regards to scheduling and on stage. Now they’ve cut that down to four members: Smith and Pavao, drummer Midthun and Ryan Tillema on guitar and bass guitar.

“They were the first to be on board with the project a couple of years ago. They’re good friends, and really talented players,” Smith said. “They’re both songwriters themselves, and multi-instrumentalists, and they have a really good understanding as far as songwriting goes and what’s appropriate … they really do a great job of interpreting the parts that we’ve arranged for this project and bring their own flavor to the stuff, which is really exciting for me to hear. They’re very capable.”

One thing that you notice about the record is that there are definitely differences from both Smith and Pavao’s previous sounds. When it comes to Smith, there is the addition of more electronic elements and that “dream pop” aesthetic that is hardly escapable, something not really found in his prior projects. As for Pavao, the work is far more layered, and while her vocals are a clear focal point, they’re far from alone in that sense.

“Our brains see music in different ways, which is cool,” said Smith. “I think it’s always changing … Every time we write a song it’s always different. I will say the more we do write music together, the more we do strike a balance.

“I’ve always kind of been interested in electronic music and electronic elements, and I love a good marriage of electronic music with rock music,” Smith continued. “When it comes to percussion, four of the ten songs had no acoustic drums, so I was left with the question of how to get these songs to move rhythmically, so I ended up programming all of our digital percussion and trying to blend that with shakers and tambourines and other auxiliary percussion instruments.”

The record, now finished and on its way to the hands of their followers, has the feel of a testing ground. While they certainly are proud of their work, Pavao and Smith were getting to know each other like any new relationship. Along with that comes the ability to reflect and perfect—something you are unable to do when you have no history with a person or group.

“I see us as always changing,” said Pavao. “We didn’t have a gameplan with this record. It’s like a whole lot of ideas all crammed into one hour. There are some things we could have done a lot differently, so moving forward we have a strong vision of where we are headed musically.

“I’m learning how to be the writer I want to become,” she added.

However, whether they felt the album was a learning experience, it’s not as if they aren’t proud of the completed project.

“My opinion on what we do aesthetically is that … our sound is evolving,” said Smith. “We’re brand new. We’ve only been running together for the last two years. But, we’re enjoying the process.”

“We’re not fucking apologizing for it, you know what I mean? I think it’s great,” he added.

See Trophii live Dec. 6, 2016, at LowBrau (presented by Le Twist) at their album release party. Doombird will also perform, and the show is FREE. LowBrau is located at 1050 20th St., Sacramento. The show will get underway at 9 p.m. For more on Trophii, go to Facebook.com/trophii. Listen to their album Vitamins and Flowers via the Bandcamp player below.

James Cavern

True-Eyed Soul: James Cavern approaches his music career with the mind of a businessman & the fervor of an athlete

While James Cavern’s status has transitioned over the past few years from “emerging” to “established” in his adopted hometown of Sacramento, the 28-year-old London-born singer-songwriter is more boldly emergent as an artist than ever before. Following a year-long break from music after a 2014 run on NBC’s The Voice, Cavern went back to the drawing board in more ways than one, digging to the core of songcraft, widening his scope in terms of production and moving past a crossroads in his personal life. He explains some of the changes that have come to pass through the title of his latest release, Lost and Found: “It basically deals with feeling a little lost musically and in love for the past two years or so, then centering myself to a better place and feeling more like I’ve been finding my way.”

Cavern does not attempt to conceal the amount of effort in his work, his clear business aspirations or his realist attitudes. For him, the romantic, devil-may-care temperament commonly seen as the typical artistic mode just isn’t an option. There is always a sense of building his brand, of generating interest through novel distribution techniques, of relaying personality into public image with intense focus. Cavern himself is the first to tout his businessman-before musician approach, having only gradually transformed into bohemian purveyor of neo-soul from a fairly lucrative career selling gym memberships. But however integral a role calculation plays in Cavern’s enterprise, it is anything but cold; his eagerness to engage with and uplift other artists on the local scene, whether it be encouraging up-and-comers at local open mics or collaborating with familiar faces like Zyah Belle or Joe Kye (Joseph in the Well), is well known. The restless energy he carries with him from years as an athlete playing soccer finds its expression in countless musical projects both unrealized and accomplished; his Porch Sessions video series of 2012 and last month’s On the Block Party with Soosh*e being two of the latter. Unlike some, however, he realizes that business is the key to turning such projects into reality, and so has thrown himself as wholeheartedly into the process. It can hardly hurt that, Lost and Found, a lean, mean distillation of soul-tinged pop tracks with a running theme, is the most artistically potent statement from Cavern thus far. The On the Block Party release for the EP, which made for one of the more exciting local events of late along the art-centric R Street corridor Cavern calls home, was merely the prelude to an eight-stop tour up and down the West Coast.

In person, Cavern shows little reserve in summing up the points of both pride and disappointment, in his estimation, that have marked his burgeoning career. Both are in the past now, subordinate to the surplus of potential projects that he seems to keep in a meticulously organized mental vault. In our hour of conversation, we run the gamut from how to discover soul through house music, the highs and lows of competition reality shows and the challenge of altering your lifestyle to keep up with your aspirations.

James Cavern

You picked up the guitar around the time you graduated high school. Was there a specific turning point or musical influence that set you down that path for good?
I graduated high school in ‘05 and I bought my first guitar that summer. It was just a hobby, an on-and-off thing. I don’t think that I really got into it until I was 21. That’s when I started really trying to be more proficient. I was working at a gym at the time, which was fun. It’s interesting, because that’s how I identified myself—I was the guy who worked at the gym, who worked out, and played sports, you know? And then I moved to Placerville. I was living with my friend on about three acres, and there was nothing there—no TV, no Internet, nothing. All we had were instruments and dogs. I’m a city boy, through and through, but it was nice for that year to kind of reconnect with nature and having that deeper respect for where things come from. And so through that I discovered needs versus wants and I had moments up there where I had a lot of time to think and find out what really made me happy, and I realized after a while that music was something that really made me happy. After that, work became hard to do, my performance was slipping. Then I made the jump. It was a scary jump because for so long, up until the age of 23 or 24, I fully identified myself as this person and I was beginning to realize that this person didn’t make me happy.

How did you come to discover soul music in particular?
My sister was a huge music junkie during the Britpop era with Oasis, Blur and the Verve. So I listened to a lot of that stuff, and right before I moved to this country, U.K. garage music was extremely popular—that’s kind of like drum ‘n’ bass, hip-hop influenced stuff. But what really intrigued me in those songs were the hooks and the bridges. They were all sung by R&B singers and all samples of older songs. I discovered a lot of music through the samples and it sent me down the road of R&B, soul—Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder. That helped me find my voice in terms of what I loved the most stylistically.

How did last month’s On the Block Party come to be? Can we expect similar events in the future?
I think Dave Chappelle’s Block Party inspired this one. He basically was at the pinnacle of his career and had a ton of money and was able to put a show together with all of his favorite artists that inspired him, and now it’s a legendary event. That was a big inspiration for what I wanted to do on a very small scale. But one day I hope to put something on of greater magnitude. I’ve always had a dream of Old Sac being like a mini-SXSW. As far as the R Street Corridor goes, there’s going to be another block party in May—The R Street Block Party and Maker’s Mart, which is awesome. They did one last year, and this time they’re going to increase the number of blocks involved. As far as me, I’ve always been interested in putting on an event like a soccer tournament of sorts. I’m actually in talks right now with Sac Republic and Cal Fit to close down that street and have a street tournament. I don’t know if a lot of people know this, but I’m a huge soccer fan. Before I became a musician I wanted to pursue soccer. I was well on my way down that road, and my love for the sport has never gone away. I sang the anthem for a Sac Republic game recently and afterwards when I was in the store, I bought a soccer ball, and I just thought, “I really miss playing.” I’d really like to throw a soccer event for a cause. I’m talking with several nonprofits about it now.

What can you tell us about the scale of the new EP?
Compared to the previous EP, which I don’t really have available anymore, you can tell a little bit that it’s all over the place. If you listen to it, you can tell that I’m an artist still trying to figure out where I fit in. From playing my first open mic at the Fox and Goose to playing on The Voice, this EP covers my ups and downs of those four years. It’s the product of my having taken a year off, really just woodshedding, in the loft trying to write these songs and being purposeful about the lyrics and what they were saying. I was listening to tons of artists trying to figure out what speaks to me, lyrically. I realized that the ones that speak to me most are the ones that are straightforward and blunt. I’m not a whimsical writer. I’m going to just tell you straight up what my mood is in a song. The songs express pretty clearly what I was feeling this past year—I went through a breakup. It’s my most personal release, for sure. Stylistically, there’s a range, because I incorporated some electronic/digital sounds and beats, things I wasn’t open to back in the day, when I wanted raw instruments and nothing else. This EP has a nice blend of the two.

In hindsight, how do you feel about your experience on The Voice? Did it leave a bad taste in your mouth?
No. When I went on to that show, I didn’t take it as seriously as I should have. I never really was into those shows, was always the guy that was like “all those people are so fake” or “they don’t deserve it.” It wasn’t until I was on that show, living in a hotel with 120 other contestants—really, the most interesting, well rounded group of people I’ve met—that my perspective changed. To be sitting next to Celine Dion’s vocal director at a meeting and be considered on the same level as her is profound. The whole experience was extremely encouraging and discouraging at the same time, every emotion you could think of. Seeing the industry for what it is was kind of a turn off, but having the sales background that I do, it was easy for me to be like “well, of course that’s how it is.” To be a product, when you pursue a career in music on that level, that’s what you are. I understand that. I accept that. I understand that when I go out in public, and when I go play at shows, people are looking at me and the way I act and what I say and what I do is an immediate representation of what I stand for and my product. So my job, especially after The Voice, was asking myself, “Where do I fit in? What’s my brand? Sure I can sing, but so can a million other people. How can I stand out?” It really just boils down to the way you look, your story, your message. Although it was a really eye-opening thing, seeing that shitty side of it, I wouldn’t have traded it in for anything, because it’s double-edged. I saw both the good and bad. If anything, it just prepared me even more and it helped me rid myself of some delusions.

James Cavern headlines the opening night of this year’s Concerts in the Park series on Friday, May 6, 2016 in Sacramento’s Cesar Chavez Plaza (9th and J Streets). Also performing is Tessa Evans, Current Personae and DJ Epik. Admission is free and the show starts at 5 p.m. Find more info and this year’s full CIP schedule at GoDowntownSac.com.

James Cavern-L-Submerge-Mag-Cover

Heartbreak Time Machine

Songwriter Jeremiah Jacobs’ circuitous route to forming The Heartbreak Time Machine

The Places You’ll Go

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own, and you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go.” – Dr. Seuss

Jeremiah Jacobs had a plan. In the early to mid-‘00s, he was convinced he knew the direction his life was going to take. His career in film and television music composition wasn’t taking off the way he had envisioned. He saw others around him succeeding in ways he was unable. As the saying goes, his best laid plans went awry, and the vision of his future was in flux. However, instead of giving up, Jacobs changed his direction.

“At some point I just walked up to the cliff and I jumped off, and it turned out I had wings,” said Jacobs during a recent interview over the phone with Submerge.

In the present, Jacobs and his now three-man operation The Heartbreak Time Machine are in the process of promoting their debut release—dubbed The5/12EP—as well as spending time in the studio putting the finishing touches on a full-length slated for release some time in 2016. The project’s current lineup features veteran Sacramento musicians Mikey “LP” Sessions (guitar) and Seth Edward (drums).

The EP features performances by a number of well-known and respected Sacramento musicians including drummer/producer Dave Jensen and guitarists Art Padilla of Hero’s Last Mission, Michael Gregory of The Michael Gregory Band and Michael Roe of The 77s.

The path that lead Jacobs to The Heartbreak Time Machine started in his career as a composer for film and television. As mentioned earlier, in the mid-‘00s, he had begun to show promise as an up-and-coming artist in that area, providing music for the award-winning independent film American Yearbook about two kids planning a Columbine-like attack on their high school, as well as documentaries Do As I Say and Not as Good as You: The Myth of the Middle Class School.

In addition, Jacobs has done work on projects he refers to as “industrials,” such as animated features NASA produces to be presented to Congress.

But at some point, Jacobs started to see a pattern in the industry in which he was working so hard to succeed: “Somewhere around 2009 I was out looking for work in the advertising world—and film because I loved and still kind of like doing that—and what I found out is that the people getting the bulk of work were all performing musicians,” said Jacobs. “They all had bands, and I sat back and thought about it for a second and I realized the reason these guys are writing compelling jingles and compelling film soundtracks … is that all of them either have a passion for performing, or they have in the past.

“I took a step back and said if I am going to continue to write better music for film and TV and I’m going to be a contender, I need some street cred, so I had better take my music out to the people and see what’s real.”

And that’s exactly what he did.

Initially, Jacobs tested the waters by contributing his talents to existing projects. The Heartbreak Time Machine is his eighth group. But of all of his former projects, this is the first he has fronted. Previous acts he has worked with include James Cavern, Autumn Sky and Clemon Charles.

“It’s a little bit of ego, a little bit of wanting to put your own thing out there,” said Jacobs of his decision to move from the background to the foreground in the performing arena. “I felt like—and I hate to use this cliché—I hadn’t been expressing myself fully in the projects I had been a part of.

“I’m mostly a producer, that’s my background. I’m an engineer and a producer by trade. I’m really brand new to being a performing artist and taking my own material into the wild, so to speak. The production side is old school to me, almost simple compared to asking people to come to shows. It’s such a different proposition.”

At the very start of the interview, Jacobs mentioned he was fighting through pre-show nerves prior to a performance scheduled for that night. When asked about how he has dealt with being the primary focus on stage, he simply responded, “I don’t know if I have dealt with it.

“Even in this interview, I can’t imagine I’m coming across as a ‘seasoned interviewee.’ My experience has been the backing guy … a hired gun,” said Jacobs. “That’s pretty much the case with everyone I’ve played with. I’ve just been in the band, helping craft the act a little bit, but I’ve never had to be fully accountable for the creative end, and ultimately the economic consequences of it, and this is the first time where my name, my songs, and everything are on [the line], and if people choose not to buy it, they are not buying me.”

As of now, this is quite literal. Copies of The5/12EP have been available since November 2015. The EP is made up of a collection of singles recorded since the inception of The Heartbreak Time Machine. Jacobs explained that the process, while quite different than the experience he is presently having recording the band’s full length debut, was special in its own right.

“We recorded it in a number of places. It’s kind of like a series of singles that were produced one-by-one as I was building my team over the last couple of years,” Jacobs explained. “The first one we actually recorded was ‘The Great Big Book,’ and we recorded that at Pinnacle College with Dave Jensen, and then we mixed that at Weston House … The rest of the songs, I think they were recorded and mixed at Weston House as well. The only exception would have been ‘Make it Through’, which was recorded in my bedroom. So was ‘My Heart Belongs to You,’ and ‘This Song is For You’ I think I recorded at Studio Z.

“One of the things I liked about doing singles one at a time is you really get to craft them all, and you put all your focus on putting it together and really getting the production right,” he continued. “I think the singles really sound different and they really do reflect a really different period of time and perspective and artistic approach, and they really sound different. There is part of that that I really like. Like an iTunes on shuffle kind of sound. But, having done five songs in the studio one right after the other, they definitely all sound like they came from the same place. I struggle with that occasionally. Sometimes people want the thing to be complete, like they want it to all come together … at the same time wanting to create something a little more compelling; like a different sound in the same record. It’s a weird balance to strike.”

Another thing that is significant for both The5/12EP as well as for The Heartbreak Time Machine itself, is that it stands as a record of the project’s development. Until recently, the singles consisted of Jacobs and a variety of guest musicians. The band’s lineup now solidified as a three piece, The/512EP can serve as a placeholder for a time when Jacobs was trying to find his footing, and ultimately, found it.

And of course, if he ever wants to revisit those days down the road, the EP can also serve as a personal Time Machine—hopefully sans the heartbreak. Only time will tell.

“I’m obsessed about what the future holds,” said Jacobs, “It’s probably the thing that occupies the most of my brain space every day.”

The Hearbreak Time Machine’s EP release show is on Jan. 20, 2016 at Powerhouse Pub in Folsom. You can also catch them again on Jan. 31, 2016 at Old Ironsides in Sacramento, and on Feb. 13, 2016 at Bar 101 in Roseville. Visit Facebook.com/heartbreaktimemachine for more information on how to order their new EP.

California Grown • Tyler Rich on Making His Way from Yuba City to Music City


For as much love as California generally gets across mainstream America’s storied music anthology—see Wikipedia’s long list of songs about the Golden State—it still seems to be surprisingly underrepresented in one genre that is so familiar here: Country.

Try and name at least four famous country singers (past or present) that you know for a fact are from California, or that at least sing and write songs portraying California. If you’re a real hardcore fan, you might have come up with Gary Allan (La Mirada), Jon Pardi (Dixon) and the Haggard family (Oildale and Bakersfield), or perhaps a few other old-timers sprinkled in the mix. Shoot, maybe you even know about Brett Young of the Orange County area, who’s fairly new on the country music circuit himself and branding his sound as California country.

Still, though, we’re clearly missing a few too many ambassadors in a state where a lot of folks—especially up here in Nor Cal—identify as country girls or boys at heart. Until now, that is.

While Jon Pardi might have Solano County covered in the California country world, a fresh voice has recently risen in Nashville, hailing from Yuba City—just a stone’s throw away from Sacramento.

Tyler Rich, who released his first four-track EP in August to chart-topping success on iTunes, is the latest country music offering with California roots and a soft spot for his hometown stomping grounds. After making a life-changing move across the nation to Music City this past April, Rich says his career has been snowballing with unimaginable good fortune, with everything falling into place just the right way.

It was only a few weeks ago that Rich was added on as an opener for country music superstar Dustin Lynch’s national “Hell of a Night” tour, which is set to kick off Nov. 14, 2015, and extend through early the part of 2016 (more dates to be announced soon). He’s also opening for Pardi at an Ace of Spades show on Oct. 10, 2015, and plans to be making media appearances in the area on and off during the last few weeks leading up to this fall’s performance run.

We were able to catch Rich on the phone late one night and ended up talking about everything from his latest EP to his newfound success in Nashville, how social media has helped him breakthrough in a cutthroat industry and, of course, what it was like growing up country in California.

Seeing how things have been going really well for you out there in Nashville, why do you think you’ve been so successful as a breakout artist? What’s your secret?
My social media helped out a lot … from Instagram to Snapchat to Twitter and Facebook. As it was growing, I started getting booked for bigger shows. When people see that—the growing online presence—they see it, I guess, as a good thing to trust. Dustin Lynch actually discovered me a few months ago on Instagram; then he sent me to some meetings … I mean, I guess if it wasn’t for Instagram, he wouldn’t have ever found me. And I would probably still be hanging out and doing nothing.

Do you think artists that are trying to break out need to be on their social media game?
Oh, I don’t think so. I know so. I mean, I’ve sat in meetings where … I stress it to my friends in the industry like so much. One of my really good friends in Sacramento—James Cavern—he and I talk about the social media game all the time. We just talk about how important it is, because it really is … I’ve been in meetings in Nashville now where I hear publishers, managers, booking agents and other artists talking about, “Oh hey, have you checked this person out?” And they’re like, “Yeah, his stats suck. What’s next?” They move on. I swear to God, it’s within seconds. “His stats are horrible. Who else do you got?”

Kind of like ESPN analysts commenting on potential draft picks.
No, that’s what it is. And if you’re super, super, super talented and you don’t have that presence—or you’re not building—then you can have a career as a songwriter. Or luckily break through somehow independently. But I don’t know, man. It’s just crazy. Mine has grown dramatically in the past four months … It’s crazy. You get in the mentality of like, “I’ve got 38K followers. This is awesome!” But then when you actually think about it: that is 38K humans. 38K people with a story, with a life, with a job, with a family. Those are 38K individual souls that hit follow, for some reason. I don’t know why, but thank you.

I know you have a new song out called “California Grown” that’s been getting some radio play recently. Can you talk about that song a little bit?
Yeah, “Cali Grown” is actually the only song in probably a year and a half that I’ve written by myself, 100 percent. Everything else is always like co-writes and collaborations with different producers and different songwriters. And [for] “Cali Grown,” I was sitting at my house in L.A., and I had just released my single “Radio.” I don’t remember who I was talking to, but I was talking to somebody. And they were like, “Yeah, you’re from California and you seem country. It just doesn’t make any sense.” There’s a line in the song: “California is just palm trees, beaches and celebrities.” And that’s just the mentality that everybody has—and rightfully so, because that’s how it’s portrayed in pop culture. But I was saying, “People don’t understand what California really is.” I mean, I’ve driven up and down California from Sacramento to L.A. at least a hundred times. And each time it’s equally boring because you’re just driving through farms—there’s no cell service, there’s nothing. And when you turn on the radio—I was driving through the Bakersfield area—the only radio stations that were coming in were Spanish stations and country stations. And that’s when I got the idea for that second verse, talking about Bakersfield and all that. But I don’t know, it was one of fastest songs I’d ever written—it came out in about a half an hour.

I wanted to ask about your new EP, Valerie. Can you tell me what’s behind that name? Just curious.
You know, I’ve done a lot of interviews in the past like month since the CD came out, and you’re the first person to actually ask me what it is. So I’ve been waiting for this question … When I was in my early 20s, I had a guitar get broken on a flight. And United Airlines offered me a $100 travel voucher for my broken guitar. I had some shows coming up, and this was before GoFundMe or Kickstarter or anything like that was even alive; none of those companies existed … My guitar was broken, I had shows coming up that week, I had no money and I needed a guitar. So I posted online on MySpace. I was like, “Hey, you know, my guitar broke,” with a picture of it in two pieces. I was like, “I’m accepting donations from my fans. A dollar, 50 cents, five dollars, you know, whatever you can spare. I appreciate it.” And then my family and everybody started donating. I put my address, people would send checks; I used Paypal for automatic transfers and stuff. Then there was a fan of mine from the East Coast I had never met before. And I got a letter in the mail that was like a page long about how much she loved my music, and how much she wished I’d come to the East Coast and tour, and apologizing, saying that she wished it was more, and that she couldn’t send me a check sooner and had to wait until she got paid, and that she was going to try to send more the next time she got paid. She was like a 16-year-old girl in high school named Valerie, and she sent me a hundred bucks. And the guitar I went and bought the next day, I named Valerie. And it is the same Taylor acoustic that I still have. I mean, I’ve got a few now. But that guitar, Valerie, is the one I wrote all those songs on that CD with and the one I recorded the guitar with on that CD. And since it’s an acoustic—well, it’s produced a little bit—but since it’s ultimately an acoustic CD, I figured it kind of fit perfectly to call it Valerie.

That’s a helluva story.
Yeah. But the sad part, though, is that I have no idea who she is now.

So what was it like growing up in Yuba City? Was it what people would typically call country?
Yuba City is very, very country—especially the little towns outside of Yuba City, like Sutter and all that. It’s very Varsity Blues out there, if you know that reference. Football is everything, everybody’s got the big trucks. I mean, Yuba City technically is a big town; it’s a big farming city. I think there’s like 80,000 residents, but you see the same 1,000 people every day. I don’t know where all the other 79,000 are hiding. But it was like growing up in a small, country farming town that had the necessities you needed. It was like a little big town, which is a country band, and kind of cheesy to say. But that’s kind of what it is.

How often would you come down to Sacramento back when you were living there?
Musically?

Socially and musically, I guess.
Well, I mean, in high school we used to—as soon as we could drive—we’d come down to Sacramento to go to shows all the time. Punk rock shows, and just anything we could see at the Boardwalk or Arco Arena or Memorial Auditorium or anything like that. And we’d drive up to Chico and watch shows all the time, too. On Saturdays and Sundays, we’d take trips to Arden—just about an hour from each city—and just go to the mall. We’d go to Guitar Center, and we would call going to Guitar Center going to church. Like, “What’d you guys do?” “Oh, I went to church!” You know? And all the guys would start playing music with all my buddies. We’d go and sit at Guitar Center for like five hours and just play guitars … Yeah, so I mean, it was cool living in a tiny town outside of a big town like Sacramento.

Right on. Anything else you wanted to mention?
This Jon Pardi show is gonna be a freakin’ party. Come out to the Jon Pardi show on Oct. 10 to see what Nor Cal is offering country in the entertainment world. ‘Cause we’re the only two representing it in Nashville right now. So we’d love to see everybody there.

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The Mowgli’s

Pop-Rock Buzz Band The Mowgli’s Live at Sacramento State for Only $15! • Oct. 1, 2015

The Mowgli’s are a Southern California-based, seven-piece pop-rock band with the sort of buzz that most record label execs would sell their soul for. When they first hit the scene in 2013 with the release of their debut album Waiting for the Dawn (which hit #4 on the Billboard Heatseekers Chart and produced the mega-hit single “San Francisco”), their catchy sound and message of positivity and love resounded with audiences worldwide. Opportunities started knocking down the door and The Mowgli’s soon found themselves on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Conan, as well as crushing their own headlining tours and wowing massive crowds at major festivals like Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza and Bumbershoot. Their sophomore album, Kids In Love, was released earlier this year and the single “I’m Good” has a whopping 16 million streams on Spotify, proving their early success wasn’t a fluke. Luckily for Sacramentans, The Mowgli’s are making their way through town for a not-to-be-missed show at Sacramento State’s University Union Ballroom on Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015. Tickets are a straight up steal at just $15 for the general public (students pay just $10 in advance, $12 at the door). This all-ages show kicks off at 7:30 p.m. and will feature opening sets by locals James Cavern as well as The Tipsy Hustlers. Visit Sacstateunique.com for a link to buy tickets or call UNIQUE Program’s line at (916) 278-3928 for more information. You can also snag tickets in person at the ASI Student Shop on the 3rd floor of The University Union.

Midtown’s Newest Country/Rock Bar Goldfield Trading Post Set to Open Aug. 1, 2014

Set in the building that used to house Hamburger Patties at the corner of 17th and J streets, Goldfield Trading Post, Midtown Sacramento’s newest country/rock bar and music venue, is scheduled to host their grand opening the weekend of Aug. 1 and 2, 2014. The building, which has quite a bit of history behind it, is no stranger to live music. A long time ago it used to be Sam’s Hof Brau, a restaurant and bar by day that hosted live blues bands at night. Now in its newest incarnation, Goldfield will be opened and operated by a tried-and-true local team of business owners including Eric Rushing and Bret Bair from two of Sacto’s most successful music venues (Ace of Spades and Assembly), as well as Tyler and Melissa Williams of the popular Midtown barbecue joint Tank House. If there was ever a team that could transform that old funky space into a new successful venue/restaurant/bar, it’s definitely this group! On Friday, Aug. 1, 2014, Goldfield will host a live performance by Joey Hyde (this is a Jon Pardi afterparty, who is playing Ace that same night) and on Saturday, Aug. 2, 2014 they will have Deejay Silver (this one will be a Brad Paisley afterparty, who is playing Sleep Train Amphitheatre earlier that night). Both those shows are free, 21-and-over and get underway at 10 p.m. After those big parties on the grand opening weekend, you can look forward to regular happenings at Goldfield like their open mic nights on Mondays hosted by James Cavern, free line dancing lessons on Tuesdays hosted by Sarah Stokes, beer pong tourneys on Wednesdays and live country band karaoke on Thursdays. Welcome to the hood, Goldfield. We can’t wait to belly up to your bar! To learn more, visit Goldfieldtradingpost.com or Facebook.com/goldfieldtradingpost

LOCAL BAND ZUHG IS THROWING A MUSIC FEST IN DOWNIEVILLE OCT. 18 – 20, 2013

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Local jam band extraordinaire ZuhG is taking their annual music festival on the road this year. ZuhGFest 2013 will go down from Oct. 18 – 20, 2013 along the scenic North Yuba River, right next to a little town called Downieville, Calif. off Highway 49 at the Sierra Shangri-La Resort. “My family has been going to Shangri-La for decades every year for a week’s vacation,” ZuhG frontman Bryan Nichols explained to Submerge. “They’ve been going probably 40-plus years, and I’ve never missed a year since I’ve been born.” New caretakers took over the resort a couple years ago and really liked Nichols’ band, so naturally he talked them into letting him throw a music festival there. Nichols and his buddy, Franco, went to work booking a shit-ton of awesome Sacramento bands that were down for the trip—mixed with a healthy dose of touring bands—for what is going to be an incredible three days of music in a beautiful, remote location. Local faves like Massive Delicious, James Cavern, Justin Farren, Island of Black and White, EGG and many others will join musical forces with Jelly Bread, Mark Sexton Band, and Crush from Reno; Red Rose from Wisconsin, The Sunrise Review from West Virginia, Glimpse Trio from the Bay Area, Pine Street Ramblers from Nevada City and Stable Hands from the Central Valley. Day passes are $20, but if you’re up for making an adventure out of it, weekend passes are only $40 for all three days. Zuhgfest.com has plenty of options listed for places to crash within a few miles of the fest, as well as links to buy tickets, learn more about the performing artists, shuttle services and more. To learn more about the resort hosting the fest, visit Sierrashangrila.com.

ALBUM RELEASE SEASON IS STARTING TO HEAT UP FOR REGIONAL BANDS

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If there is one trend we’ve noticed about the local music scene from running Submerge, it’s that not a lot of local bands release new work in the winter months. Sure there are exceptions here and there, but for one reason or another it’s mostly a fair-weather thing. That’s why we’re stoked that spring and summer are knocking at the door, because that is when we get to hear all that good stuff that our immense pool of local talent has been working on. Here are just a few notable regional bands that have new music coming out in the next month or so. If you’ve got something to add to this list, shoot us an email to info@submergemag.com and get it on our radar. James Cavern’s The Pilot EP comes out on March 29, and you can see him at the brand new venue Assembly on that same night; Keep It from the Cops, a folk-punk project from local musician Zac Rosier, has an EP release show on April 5 at Midtown Village Café; also on April 5, DoomBird will play an EP release show at Townhouse for their new release Cygnus; Sister Crayon, who technically live in Oakland now, but still remain a local band in our hearts, has a new EP called Cynic that comes out April 16 on Fake Four Inc.; also on April 16, X’ed Out by Tera Melos will be available via Sargent House; and finally, local “Ramones-inspired horror-punk” trio The Moans have a new 15-track album, they will celebrate at their release party on April 17 at Where House.

James Cavern’s Live CD Release at Old I – July 6, 2012

A lot of musicians try to create an organic live sound on their studio albums. But there is one local Sacramento artist who is going the extra mile to capture that true sound. On Friday, July 6 at Old Ironsides, James Cavern will record his live show and everyone present will receive a free copy of the freshly recorded tracks at the end of the night. He will record at least 15 tracks and play in three different musical styles that he has perfected over the years, including: a solo acoustic set, a two-piece electric guitar and drum set, and live hip-hop from The Ricky James Project. If that isn’t enough to get you out to the show, it will be hosted by comedian Carlos Rodriguez to add a little bit of humor to the live tracks. To add more spice to the night, Queen of Arts Tattoo and Piercing will be present to offer discounts on your next piercing or tattoo. Don’t miss out on a unique opportunity to be a part of a live recording with James Cavern at Old Ironsides (1901 10th Street, Sacramento) on Friday, July 6, 2012 at 8 p.m. Cover is just $8 at the door. Learn more about him at http://jamescavern.com/.

In the Blood

Jesi Naomi finishes up her first album with The Trippers

For Jesi Naomi, energy is everything. If you focus your energy on the things you desire, and release that energy out into the world, you will attract the things you want in life.

So once she had her mind set on playing music back in 2009, she took some advice from her aunt. She began telling everyone she knew that she was going to become a musician.

Next thing you know, the singer/songwriter was singing ballads at Capitol Garage. Then she met local indie band Bell Boys at Fox and Goose downtown during an open mic night, and they helped her learn the tricks of self-promotion. Later she met local jam band ZuhG, of which she is now a member.

When Naomi is playing solo, ZuhG members JR Halliday, Bryan Nichols and Kevin Martinez comprise her backup band, altogether as Jesi Naomi and the Trippers. In March she will go on a two-month “For the Love of Music” tour, performing both in ZuhG and as a solo artist.

Two years into the music scene, the 24-year-old is now preparing for Jesi Naomi and the Trippers’ debut album, Earplay, to be released in January.

Earplay is seven tracks of blues and soul combined with psychedelic nuances and djembe, saxophone and ukulele thrown into the mix. It was recorded in the span of around three months by Joe Johnston at Pus Cavern.

The album opens with “Kosen Rufu,” which is the title of both the intro and outro tracks. It is also a guiding theme of the album. Broadly defined, it is world peace through individual happiness, a concept stemming from Buddhism. As a practicing Nichiren Buddhist, this concept is paramount for Naomi.

“[Kosen Rufu] is world peace by making each person have their individual peace,” she explains.

Certainly this applies to the song “Change Train,” which Naomi wrote for her mother, who was an alcoholic.

Her mother’s attention was constantly split between her children and the bottle, and Naomi remembers thinking, “If I write this song, I want her to find her change train. If I sing this song as many times as I can, she’ll get better.”

A year later, after performing the song show after show, her mom told her she had gone sober.

Though school had never been Naomi’s thing, it is what brought the Chico, Calif., native here to Sacramento. Naomi thought she was going to make music videos for a living. She was enrolled at Sacramento State as a media/marketing major.

Yet reading, comprehension, spelling, memorizing was the sort of thing she felt detached from. Whenever she hit a burn out point, she would think to herself, “Forget this. I’m gonna go paint.” Up to this point, painting had been her artistic release.

But somewhere along the way she discovered the pianos in the music rooms at school. Then a guy by the name of Richard Martin started listening in on her practicing piano and pushed her to learn scales.

“That’s where it all started,” she remembers. “I just needed a little direction.”

That Christmas her younger brother taught her how to play the guitar, something she thought she would never be able to do, mostly because the thought of memorization intimidated her. But memory is just a muscle, she can now say with confidence, and what’s more important than memorization is feeling the music. And she has come to realize that she’s got music coursing through her veins.

“Music is in my blood,” she says earnestly.

You could say Naomi is following in her father’s footsteps. He played drums in a band called Pole Cats back in the day and went on tour when she was still in her mother’s belly. Though he’s no longer in a band, he played drums on the track “Hold Me Nice” on Earplay. It is the first song Naomi ever wrote, back when she was learning how to play piano.

She often catches people by surprise when she reminds them that it’s only been two years since she started playing music.

“There’s no better way to learn than to just get thrown into the deep end and hope to swim,” she laughs.

Yet when she is performing it is as though she’s been a musician on a stage all her life, as though that is where she is meant to be. She wields a sense of confidence and power that is hard to come by in a performer.

Offstage Naomi is warm and easygoing. Sitting in the practice space behind the ZuhG Life store, she sips on Earl Grey tea and speaks effortlessly about her music in a conversation that lasts a good 45 minutes. She wears an enchanting smile on her face and responds coolly in a bluesy tone.

Make no mistake that this is a woman with self-respect.

In a way, Naomi says, women have it easier in the music world because they are more marketable. The notion is that they just have to look good.

“That in turn makes it harder for a woman to really put out her true soul,” she says.

“I’m not going to go up there and wear some skanky outfit and not know what I’m singing,” she continues. “I want the music to shine, that’s pure beauty to me.”

Still, she’s been approached by the occasional creep for the wrong reasons.

There was one, she recalls, who made himself out to be the big-time producer who would get her work noticed.

“I thought I was going in to make a demo tape, [but] it wasn’t like that,” she says. “Thank God my mom raised me to know about those kinds of things.”

She went her separate way, with her mind in one place. It’s all for the love of music.

And despite the few exceptions, Naomi says she’s received a wealth of support from her male colleagues.

“I feel like I get a lot of respect being a [female musician], especially if I respect myself,” she says.

If that is the energy Naomi puts out into the universe, certainly that’s what she’ll receive.

Jesi Naomi and the Trippers will be putting forth positive energy at Marilyn’s on K Jan. 7, 2012 when they celebrate the release of Earplay, a seven-song EP. There will be a $10 cover, which will include a copy of the CD. Also playing will be Brad Relf, The Bell Boys, James Cavern and Monkey Flower. Show starts at 8 p.m.