Steve Conte - Guitarist, singer, songwriter, producer and teacher

Steve Conte is the consummate musician - guitarist, singer, songwriter, producer, and teacher. He's toured the world, while playing and writing with some of the most iconic rock stars. On this episode we talk about the making of his record “The Concrete Jangle," how he coaxed Andy Partridge into writing with him, and how we each have six degrees of separation with the Beatles. https://stevecontemusic.com/

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New York native Steve Conte, has been a force in the music industry since his band Company Of Wolves debuted on Mercury Records in 1990. He's sidestepped the mainstream by collaborating with iconic acts like New York Dolls, Willy DeVille, Robert Gordon and Michael Monroe, showcasing his exceptional guitar skills, vocals, and songwriting on albums and tours.  

Signed with Little Steven Van Zandt’s label, Wicked Cool Records, Steve's solo work has been heavily featured on The Underground Garage radio program and on numerous indie stations worldwide.

His 2024 album, "The Concrete Jangle" boasts collaborations with his songwriting hero, Andy Partridge of XTC, with a groove by drummer Prairie Prince of The Tubes, Todd Rundgren & XTC. 

Refusing to be boxed into a single genre, Steve's sound melds Rock 'n Roll, American Soul, Brit-Pop, and Punk. He draws inspiration from diverse icons like David Bowie, Prince and The Beatles, believing in breaking the mold with each record.  

Growing up in a musical family (his mother, a professional jazz singer) Steve supported himself through music school by painting houses - and hasn’t worked at anything but music ever since. 

His versatile musicianship led him to collaborate with legends such as Chuck Berry, Paul Simon, and Eric Burdon, and he's notably contributed to soundtracks for anime series like Cowboy Bebop and Ghost In The Shell, and video games like Sonic and Yakuza.  

Steve has toured the USA and Europe extensively and has a brand new band ready to hit the road in 2025!

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Produced and Edited by Arts and Craft.
Theme Music: Sound Gallery by Dmitry Taras.

Transcript

Andy and his engineer friend come and pick me up in the parking lot of the Arena we head off to his engineer's house where they proceed to play me all this stuff they were working on together amazing like creative spoken word weirdo of avant garde soundtrack stuff yeah we passed a guitar back and we didn't have two guitars but we passed one guitar back and forth between each other and I was like how do you play that song and he was like oh how do you play that and we're watching goofy YouTube videos and laughing our heads off and he bought Subway sandwiches we just got along like we were two old friends 

he is a musician guitarist singer songwriter producer and teacher he has toured the world and written with some of the most iconic rock and roll Stars Steve Conte joins us on our first episode of 2025 

my name is Nancy Magarill I'm a singer songwriter composer performer graphic and web designer and I'm Peter Michael Marino and I'm a writer producer Creator performer and educator we are new york-based artists you may or may not have heard of and we are here to introduce you to other artists you may or may not have heard of 

I was telling Nancy earlier wow so we're talking to Steve Conte legendary Steve Conte and he's going to be bringing up all these bands and names of things I do not know and Nancy's like well just say you know hey I work in comedy I I don't know that so I'm going to start in the conversation we just had Nancy said something I said oh you're basically Marne Nixon Steve do you know who Marne Nixon is um I didn't know Cynthia Nixon you don't know Marne Nixon no well this is the thing I was wondering what is the last musical you went to see um the last musical I went to see was uh Like Water for Elephants or something water Not Like Water for Chocolate But Water for Elephants what brought you to that show I took my son someone actually generously gave me two great tickets cuz they couldn't attend good friend of mine and uh I took my kid my 15 so great he loved it and he's an aspiring actor so you know he thought it was amazing and I thought it was amazing too gosh you're like keeping the Showbiz family thing going yeah I'm kind of shocked that you have a kid in the businessing your family did he not learn anything did he not learn anything he's not gonna be a singer or songwriter like me like I thought he was going to be because he was writing at seven years old he was writing these great tunes and we made all kinds of demos but he's kind of drifted into the musical theater world yeah but you don't know if he's not going to do that how old is he seven you said right well I mean he's he's been making up songs since he was you know since he could talk really since he was like four you know but like cute little things but like real songs you know when he was about seven I mean he would come up with a verse and then I would write the chorus you never you never said to him uh you know when I was your age I was already playing drums and then I taught myself guitar I'm giving a little bit of your bio by not it's a non-didactic way to share your information who was Marty Nixon that is the question though the listeners are dying to know Marne Nixon is the singing voice voice for people like Natalie Wood in Westside Story and uh what's her face in not breakfast at Tiffany is the other one I could have done night oh Audrey he Audrey heern and and others and I didn't know that yeah Lear something new she just didn't really do a whole lot of like Broadway musicals and stuff because she was just the person who could sound like other people have you done that uh have you done that thing where you're uming kind of yeah like coming up with different voices and things even even for like I know you did anime and stuff like that did you ever let your voice I mean basically with those kind of things it's they just hire me as if it's a song session you know I go in and I I learn the song and I go in and I sing it on the mic it's not like looking at dialogue and trying to mouth you know I haven't done that but have you ever in somebody else's voice you mean have they ever has anyone ever asked me to sound like anyone else no have you ever been the voice for someone else someone else was lipsyncing to you no no no I haven't done that when I was doing uh commercials I I was I did a bunch of uh for a couple years after my band company wolves got dropped for mercury records um was like oh what am I going to do why I got no money and somebody uh said Hey Man U you know you got a great Rock voice uh you should you know try and sing us some commercials so I would go into these sessions and up in the corner of the lyric it would have a note like for what they wanted the singer to sound like it would say like you know Counting Crows Spin Doctors a point of reference kind of want you know I wouldn't have imitate the guy but I couldn't stray too far I couldn't be doing James Brown in other words if I was you know supposed to be Chris Baron um and then when I did the anime stuff I remember uh yok okano the composer saying to me once I was being too emotive when I was singing and and she was like no she doesn't speak very good English she said no make more cold like Sting that's actually really good direction yeah and I was like oh I don't know if Sting would like this too much I was trying to think uh it was Jason Paige one of our guests on this illustrious oh of course all right so he he did the um if you've got heartburn indigestion diarrhea and I I believe he wrote it and sang it yes yeah I know Jason we were doing commercials around the same time around that same time period I maybe I met him through you Nancy I don't remember possibly and Russ Irwin yeah yeah I probably you know you've made it when when the um the advertising agency is you know calls and says like we need we need someone who sounds like Steve Conte we need a Steve Conte type and you're like that's that's literally me do you get that okay I have here here's the the career of a New York Studio singer in five steps yes who the hell is Steve Conte it might be less than five steps hold on I'll count I'll count them after sorry we're not known for counting who the hell is Steve KY get me Steve Conte get me a young Steve Conte who the hell is Steve Conte and by the way that was four steps that's the arc the fifth step is no phone call there's just no there's no Outreach that's the fifth step so let's tell everybody who the hell is Steve Conte oh give a little bit about who you are what you do for the people that don't know you well let me ask you this how many uh where where's your listenership extend to all over the world is it a worldwide thing it is a worldwide thing we are international we're not you know we're not limiting ourselves to just the United States okay well not that people would actually some people probably know me better in Europe and Japan than they know me here good good because you know you know what happens here with the radio and all that stuff and rock and roll and and good music in general anyway I'm Steve KY I am a singer a songwriter a guitar player musician a producer I teach sometimes and um I've been doing it since I was uh well you've done your research 7even years old picked up drums a few years later picked up a Guitar I was a drummer after I heard the Beatles revolver I wanted to be Ringo another Beatles person there has to be a Beatles reference in every episode yeah it's just standard yeah with people of a certain age may I say and of a certain gender maybe yeah mostly girls don't like the Beatles not like they were screaming for the Beatles no no no no girl musicians girl musicians are not as obsessed with the Beatles as male musicians are Joanie and Joanie and Tori and Carol King who you also worked with Carol and I didn't know you worked with Carol King uh I played chains with Carol King o her her song that the Beatles covered yeah we always come back right back to the Beatles we're like now three degrees away from the actual Beatles I Am one degree from a beetle oh and how is that well well I'm derailing this uh your last question a little bit but we can come back to it if you remember what it was we're in no rush this is what the whole podcast is just bouncing around Brian Ray and I have a a band a band and who is Brian Ray Brian Ray is Paul MC he's a guitar player okay he's been playing guitar with Paul for 15 or 20 years now we are both on little Steven van an's record label wiked coola records we both uh we heard each other's songs on the Underground garage radio station where stepen plays us both and uh he reached out to me and he really liked my stuff and I heard his stuff and I liked his and he said we should do something so we co-wrote a song that was the bside of one of his singles and then we said hey let's start a project because we both love all the same kind of music and um now we have a project called the Earls of Babylon oh I like that name yeah we released our first single my little Frankenstein right around Halloween and um the be it's a vinyl well it's also you know on the all the streaming sites but it's a we have limited edition um monster green vinyl oh I was going to say it has to be color right it's color VL 7 inch uh and the BS side is a cover of High ho silver lining the Jeff Beck 1966 sing wow what made you choose that because Jeff had just died and we wanted to make a tribute to him and it's more of a pop song you know I mean he's kind of known for either really heavy blue stuff with Rod Stewart or his Jazzy sort of instrumental so this was like a pop Mickey Mo if you're hip to that producer he no produced a lot of those bands from England around mid-60s so anyway that's my Brian Ray story and that puts me one degree of separation from a beetle oh yeah and um and also oh no hold on hold on I am hold on hold on I am on a record with Ringo oh what color is that record um I on and not just like I'm on one song in the album and he's another we are on the same track whoa me on guitar and Ringo on drums on Mark Rivera's record so now I'm going to tell you my one degree of separation so years ago I was house sitting on 81st in Riverside and I was working at the Hard Rock Cafe at the time oh my God we heard some very high-profile kids were coming in to stay in in the city and they needed people to take them around or something like that and it was Ringo's Sun oh and we ended up all hanging out and they came over and we all got high and all the [ __ ] in this apartment on 81st in Riverside taking out of binoculars and looking at people having sex on the rooftops that was my degree of separation I don't know how many deg I guess that's one degree right well because it was starky Jason starky is who it was uh that's Z Zack starky is it Zach starky well was it the drummer Zach who plays with the who I thought got son maybe he's got another son I don't know I've met Zach as well so it might have been Zach and Ringo's son son Ringo's son isach whose son were you talking about starky is Ringo's son yeah right I thought you said it was someone else who Z Zack starky I'm pretty sure it was Ringo's son yeah but his name is Zach starky Ringo's last name is starky not yes yes I literally didn't put that together till right now good job yeah no I knew that is that's why you confused me I thought you said somebody else you're high I thought you said it was somebody else's actually I'm high but I should be high God editing this one is going to be fun but my connection uh and it's hard to quantify but it's it does it does fit I can be I can be part of this gang is I think I told you might might have told you this Nancy that I went to see my friend Leanne best who's in the show on Broadway called the hills of California and Leanne best's uncle is Pete best so I just bested Ringo Star actually I just bested bested Ringo okay that's all I'm going to you're rad bested R so Steve so let's also talk about your new record that you're working on okay we'll skip right from my 7-year-old drummer self to my yeah we don't need years in between right don't worry we'll get years many many miles 40 almost 40 Years in New York City you have a Wikipedia page we'll just send people to that on the on the episode yeah right they have my wrong birthday but anyway that's and I'm sticking that's my story I'm scking to it deliberate did you edit that or I didn't touch it no that's I think you can't uh edit your own wikkipedia page they make other people you hire people to do that well I you can hire people but I think if you do it yourself because I have tried they won't let you because you know you could make up your own [ __ ] true well that is where the world's heading anyway I'm sure plenty of politicians do yeah right yeah don't worry we can be nonlinear just tell us about this record like how do you decide to make a like I'm not a mus like I I don't do what you do so I would not know and I'm assuming some listeners also would not know like how do you just decide we're going to make a record is it going to have a theme is there going to be what style of music is it going to be artwork what color is the vinyl going to be I mean how long is it going to take who's in charge of this thing what is your process how do you do this okay well I can tell you some are easier than others this one was once I got the idea it all came together pretty quickly and my idea was one of my favorite bands in the world is XTC and the main songwriter Andy Partridge is always been one of my songwriting Heroes and um I mean he's up for me and for many others he's right up there with lenon McCartney Townsen Castello you know he's that good he's a genius brilliant The Melodies the lyrics the arrangements the instrumentation the ideas he's just insanely creative and a few years ago I became friends well 10 years ago maybe I became friends with Steve Lily white producer 15 years ago and we met at a party and we became really fast friends and we remained friends ever since he would give me great quotes on my albums and I subbed for him on his DJ uh at East Village radio and we did all kinds of stuff together one day we're chatting on Twitter and uh because he moved I think he's he's English but he moved to um where does he live now Indonesia somewhere Jakarta does he have room for all of us yeah you never know right you might have to do that we were chatting and I mentioned Andy and XTC and he's like oh you know Andy's on Twitter right you know we could rope him into this conversation and next thing I knew he's like brings Andy in and the three of us are chatting back and forth and Andy knows who I am because my ex guitar repairman when I found out the guy was making a um a guitar for Andy I'm sorry let me turn my phone off I I'm I'm stuck with ex guitar repair man I just I love that like that's a that character needs to be in a sitcom somewhere well he's a he's a luier and repairman but he I found out he was making a guitar for Andy talking about skipping around here going back to 2003 and I said I can't believe you're working with Andy you have to give him this record and my brother and I had just made the KY bleed together album which you might remember Nancy Y and we gave that to him and word came back this is pre you know social media and all that and so he didn't have a way of contacting me but word came back that he really liked it skip forward to 2010 or 14 whatever it was I'm chatting with Andy now now on uh Twitter on an app that we're not I'm going to bleep out on on X yeah on yeah hopefully you're not on anymore but that's another conversation yeah I haven't been able to quite get off of it yet I'm trying I'm trying to make all my people follow me yeah it's hard N I know I know but they got to follow me to threads and blue sky and as soon as my numbers get up to where they were set yourself up I hear I hear you and so many other people you know haven't left either that I interact with all the time and they're not on the other SES anyway and he says to me we're typing you know pleasantries back and forth and he goes you you stole my dream job I went what what are you talking about guitar player in the New York Dolls I went what this you know balding you know uh bespectacled you know kind of Punchy Englishman I love him to death I'm not saying anything bad about him but I just couldn't picture him being in the New York Dolls and uh but apparently it was before DC was a real band um they had like a couple of uh pre- incarnations of of the band and he had really long hair and so he told me this whole story about how we sent David Johansson a love letter like I you know I want to be your your man I'm gonna call myself Lord Andrew

English he had the sort so we uh we continued chatting on Twitter for a while I think we got to the private message stage and then uh he wrote me a note one day I don't know how he knew this I might have made an announcement that Michael Monroe the guy I play with now was going to be on tour with Alice Cooper and we were going to play in Swindon where he's from in England Swindon is sort of like I don't know how to compare it uh to a town here it's like uh you know you know the office the English version of the slow you know slow yeah so it's kind of like that it's kind of like a nothing what is the what is our version of that is um yeah we do have one wherever wherever the office is in uh in the St

yeah but uh he but he writes he and yes I mean that's why they had so many problems getting taken seriously because uh no real musicians ever came from Swindon before you know it was always London or Manchester or Birmingham you know but he says I hear you're playing my [ __ ] hole town oh I'll buy you lunch and I was like screenshot immediately any part by me lunch and uh I went we were doing the tour and I went to uh this is a really long story I'm sorry all right no it's great it's very interesting we do the soundrack Andy and his engineer friend come and pick me up in the parking lot of the Arena we head off to his engineers's house where they proceed to play me all this stuff they're working on together amazing like creative spoken word weirdo of aard soundtrack stuff oh you know that's so my thing yeah we pass a guitar back and we didn't have two guitars but we passed one guitar back and forth between each other and I was like how do you play that song and he was like oh how do you play that L and we're watching goofy YouTube videos and laughing our heads off and he bought Subway sandwiches and we just got along like we were two old friends and so and let me just also interject you are a phenomenal guitarist wow see he brought a guitar to the part he's just there he's surrounded I hope you like my blinding riff um monster yeah but and then after just to finish how great this day was the uh you know we had this great time they dropped me back off at the arena I play my show with Monroe and then Alice Cooper plays and Alice invites me up on stage to do school my God like hello this is your day that was one of the greatest musical days of my life right so I'm thinking about this it's uh I do an album called bronx's cheer uh in 2021 right in the middle of the damn pandemic I did that album for little Stephen it's a really great album I was so proud of it and I got to play one gig because of the pandemic we played the album release show at the cut room in New York and then shut down so I was like this next record's got really got to be something special I don't know how I'm going to top that record right and uh isn't that the question every artist asks after every project is yeah and I was like wait a minute and and I thought let me just ask him if he'll write a single because the first thing I did with wicked cool records that's Steven's label was I did a single my song was give me give me Rock Away I did that in like 2017 and then I put it on the bronch cheer album later 3 years later but I thought we were just going to do another single right just two songs so I figured I'll come up with a bside but let me see if I can get Andy to just write the single with me so I wrote him an email and uh we've been emailing each other once in a while I said Andy um would you like to write my next look cool record single with me and I had been listening to all these interviews on YouTube and different places where he's he had this album called my failed songwriting career because he had written so many songs with with other artists who their managers their labels thought it would be great to write with Partridge because he's such a brilliant song writer but a lot of these people never recorded the songs and I was hearing these interviews where he was so disheartened by this and uh I said I'm going to I'm going to make it different for him you know and so and he said well so I when I wrote him that he rent well Steve you know I sort of swore off writing with other people wow oh but it's but it's not a no and I went yes so I ran I ran back to my studio and I like created this really cool like Beetle XTC psychedelic sounding track and um I sent it and Melodies and violins and all kinds of cool stuff and I sent it to him and he was like that's great but it sounds too finished why don't we start something from scratch oh that's beautiful I was like yes right it's not really collaboration if you've already done almost everything yeah well you know I mean he could have wrote lyrics or a melody or something you know would have been 50/50 but um he goes we'll do a zoom so I used my wife's computer I have this lame 40 minute you know free Zoom but she has the she's a teacher so she has like you can go for hours you know so we did a two-hour zoom and we wrote instead of one song we wrote four songs Jesus in two hours I mean we didn't we didn't finish them start finish but we had the germ uh like title Melody Verse Chorus of four songs pretty much and um I went away and uh did demos of them I added Bridges I added second verses uh I added outro you know and when you say you did demos were you doing full tracks like drums bass guitar everything yeah yeah you know my home studio here I'm talking to you on my home studio right now actually it's a Macbook Pro I have Apollo twin and Apollo twin uh Mike PRI two channel great universal audio thing I got all my well not all my guitars but I have Acoustics and electrics here but I use logic Protools and I have loops and exactly what I have yeah it's not the record but you know it sounds really good so yeah I I did demos of these songs and would send them to him and he would send me his comments back and then i' tweak and we did that with the four songs and I sent them to uh little stevenh and little Steven is so busy between me Springsteen the radio station the teaching Foundation that he has the you know TV films all this stuff he either didn't have time to listen or didn't like it I thought I I thought well let's just be safe let me just assume he didn't like it and and not that he was just too busy to listen so I said they give me a good excuse to go back to Andy and say we need more right oh a SL so I said yeah Andy I'm not sure that uh little Stephen is um vibing on these songs you know I said let's put on our like more psychedelic Garage Band hats because that's you know Stephen's all into you know if you ever seen his band he everybody's got like these swirly psychedelic shirts and the girls have afro and big bell bottoms and you know it's it's all about 60s psychedelia and XTC had done an album called Dukes of Stratosphere where they basically created the sound of records from 1967 and I said let's put our Duke's hat on write something else and we came up with four more songs actually to each session we each brought one song in so that we weren't just sitting there going what do but when you say you brought a song in or you had a song we brought an idea you know but like what like give me like what is like an like I have an idea for a song that kind of is in the vibe of blah blah blah song or it's like I have an idea about a song about like uh missing someone no here's here's the idea that can I can I play something right I came to him with this piece of a song that I had for like literally 20 years I loved the chorus I could never come up with a verse uh my brother John and I had a band called crown jewels we tried to play in that band yeah and we uh could never get a verse that I like and I said if anyone can solve this problem it'll be Andy so I played in this I went this is what I got Andy Fourth of July 4th of

[Music]

July and that's all I had but to me that was a really good start and sounds like an example of bringing in a song I get that sounds cool but that's all I had that's not a song that's but something that Sparks that's how you collaborate that's how it works and immediately as soon as I played that he went oh I know where the verse should go and he was completely right I never would thought of this it really dead simple that's BR it was like under my nose the whole time and I saw you know and he went well should do this for the verse I'm liberated I'm so and [Music] high knocking in your well I added I added some of those tweet The Melodies a little bit but yeah he um he knew to go it's in D that he knew to go to the G chord for the verse and I was like damn why did I think of that but now let me ask you a question are we going to be able to play this on the on the episode without paying royalties I don't well it's my record but we'll talk about it the master the master is owned by little stepen we're not playing my record I'm just playing it live we have to talk about it no you can play that that's I mean I can oh anybody can play anything on you know I mean these people get signed off of YouTube by doing cover version I was going to say you know what we're doing really is education so totally it falls under s what we're doing is news we're doing news so it falls under yeah yeah so that's really wonderful what a great I mean imagine all of the songs we all have in our little in our boxes that we haven't finished we just need to send them to Andy Partridge that's really the bottom line oh I'm hoping I'm hoping we can still do more but actually you know five of the uh so I'm skipping around here so wait where are you with the record right now are you still working on the record with him or is it is that record done that record's been out oh the record with Andy Partridge oh yeah the the concrete jangle oh okay that song that I just played you Fourth of July was the first single but that came out last summer so that came out not uh let's see did that come out wait I thought you were working with him right now on a new record the my last record is when I wor okay I mean it's my current record got you know it's the 2024 record okay right it came out May 30th 2024 but I started releasing singles in June of 2023 and my first single Fourth of July came out just in time for the Fourth of July hey so you guys did this all during the pandemic no but he's in England I'm in the Bronx so you know as well do it by Zoom but um no we it was 2022 okay yeah and I started recording yeah I think I started recording in Fall 2022 yeah and then I had at least finished the first single by early 2023 I was still like mixing the rest of the album because I had some time to do that and then we would release uh a single every couple of months so I did Fourth of July in the summer then I did shoot a girl with no name in the fall and then shoot out the stars and so you like uh I don't know if you've heard these songs from the underground garage but you check the record know you scheduled this you you the label does that yeah la does that but are you do the label is also booking your gigs as well you're no that's you yeah unfortunately well are you also touring well how how is it working with you touring because right now are you you're playing with Michael Monroe right now right past 14 years I'm making it work I actually can't remember I remember when I was living in Paris I think you were playing with Willie DeVille I have such a great memory of you from Paris do you remember us being on the top of the Eiffel Tower with it lightning yes I do that was so great we were I remember the the cafe AR theast right beore the artist and then the Lizard Lounge the mar those were the two venues I was playing out B I was on a tour break from I was on a tour break from Willie deil Willie DeVille then yeah you know I make it all work but wait a minute now we're getting far away can can from what I don't even know where I'm G to pull it back to the record just so we can complete talking about the record so yes concrete jangle the concrete jangle is my most recent album came out um in May May of 2024 right so the full album and that one has side a it came out on vinyl orange vinyl oh oh yes and um side a are five kti Partridge songs so I finished five uh we finished six songs so I have three um no I have two more waiting to be finished for my next album so I have I basically I have three songs left over wow from the session oh that but we finished five songs um and they just it wasn't like I was trying to frontload the album and put all the you know I don't even know if they're the best songs but they just it the album seemed to flow that way with the five Partridge co-writes on S A and then the all 100% kti songs on side B but you know I knew that I had to really bring my aame and bring my most IC beety you know because this guy is yeah you know that kind of level you know and I mean I'd been making kind of rough and tough rock and roll records but I kind of feel like you've always bring your aame I don't feel like you ever I do cheat this one no no no but I mean but stylistically you know I think it's the really kind of the first album that I've done I think people were surprised like whoa you do that too um like very um melodic beat stuff I so I knew I had to pick five of my songs that went with the five Partridge songs so so you asked how I put an album together I knew number one I wanted to write with Partridge I thought it was just going to be one song it ended up being five so I'm like well there's the core of the album right there these five songs so now I got to pick five songs of my own that go with that so let me pick the most like psychedelic beety melodic you know nothing that sounds like the New York Dolls or you know the stones or you know nothing bluesy um because I you know I made tons of Records like that so that's how I chose the songs and then you know to make the whole package complete then you know you're not going to name it uh you know the dirt or something you know it's got to be something uh kind of not psychedelic but uh evocative of the songs on it right so I had a list of song of album titles you know I went through no no no no no the concrete jangle oh it's like the concrete jungle but it's jangly like jangly pop guitar pop music right so of course tons of uh Publications have not read very well and's no album the concrete jungle I would never call an album The jle it's so Bal and like obvious right you people are obvious read and thank you for having me on your show it's an a not a u so you know I so I picked the name the concrete jangle and I was like okay jangly Pop I mean it's still rougher than jangle pop but um I love that jangle it's such a great jangle yeah I don't really have any you know usually you associate that with Rick and bockers and 12 strings don't you Pete every day practically by the way let's tell everybody let's tell everybody what a rickenbacher is Oh Oh I thought everyone knew a Rick and Bacher rickenbacher is actually a a German was originally made in Germany and the Beatles y there they are again bastard used Rick and ERS in their early days and actually throughout the career but when they played in Germany at the star club that where they famously started before they uh you know came back to England and became the Beatles Because they the silver Beatles at first and they backed this guy Tony Sheridan and there's a whole don't don't get me started on be history documentaries that don't worry we won't they got the they got the they got these German guitars and Paul still plays the Hoffner bass Hoffner is a German brother plays I actually associate That Bass with John because he used to he played that on one of my records he loves McCarney too um and uh John got the rickenbacher and um it's a it's a just a great sounding um electric guitar that is not like big and tough like a like a heavy metal guitar you know like Jimmy like a Les Paul that Jimmy pige used or you know it's kind ofc I mean you can play like open chords you know

yeah and it um so that's a Rick and berer so I knew I had to um you know make the artwork reflect that and so you know the cover you asked about artwork um the cover I me even have one around here if you haven't seen it can I walk away from the thing for a minute um where'd he go I know Nancy where everybody Steve Cony has left the room Elvis has left the building all that was left of him is a shake tambourine so it's so jangly that's tambourine made appearance on the record you know I'm working a Christmas gig now and um I have to hear that uh Paul McCartney song a wonderful Christmas I heard it so many times and I was like how come this guy is trying to sound like Paul McCartney then like during one of my breaks I looked it up and I was like that's actually Paul like he wrote that it's so bad I just want to say the record I hate Christmas music and it's not because I'm a Jew I just hate it it's like everywhere you're not I mean you're that's like saying I have to admit something my name is Nancy like everyone already assumes you hate Christmas music no I don't listen I hope so wish could show it's like a so yeah it's like a tattoo inspired I'd say and it's there's a guitar with like the cityscape uh I don't know if it's a specific City or it's different uh it's different Landmark buildings from different cities is that what's happening well I had done an album a couple years ago called Steve kti NYC and um my art director came up with a very similar cover like this but it said Steve K and then this Banner here it's at NYC and I wanted to do remember how the band Chicago used to use the same lettering for every the cover of every album but they'd put it you know Chicago on a piece of wood or be a Chicago like melting colors or be Chicago on a chrome thing let let me let me do a theme thing and like you know do a similar album cover but make it fit this and that will look great on a T-shirt and a jacket hello uh oh we lost them again we lost I guess I'm gonna have to edit all of this out yeah that's those are nice yeah looking good merch merch well that's how artist merch I got merch we got merch let's talk briefly because I don't want to keep you too much longer but I want to talk I got time but I don't for editing purposes Believe it or not we do other things besides of this podcast Steve but I do want to say because this is a this is an example of let's talk about where profits have gone now you have to sell merch and your vinyl records because streaming has taken away so much of the songwriting income right so I just said it yeah I mean you know you can get a million streams on Spotify and make 100 bucks it's insane so yeah what I do is you know I can buy these records for I mean luckily there's a big research in vinyl well I don't know how big it is but there has been you know hipsters by vinyl especially colored vinyl and they collected and and so do people who like rock music yeah uh or maybe dance I don't know who who get who buys them but there are record stores you know if you go to rough trade you know and there's one in near Radio City there's one downtown I think or in Brooklyn um you know they have marah Carey records I you know but um that's shocking actually you have Mariah Carey records no

even Mariah Cary marah put makes I knew that she she's popular during this time Nancy probably one of your favorite Christmas Christmas okay so Nail's on the truck board for you um no actually I think she has a gorgeous voice I just hate the song I'm over it yeah yeah I know um I'm over it where was it what was I saying oh streaming BL merch so what I do is um you know we CDs and um um vinyl vinyl and um I buy them from the label at my artist price and then I I sell them to my fans through band camp Oh that's which where sell stuff and I sign them to give them even more value for people that want that I don't sell them unsigned if they want them unsigned you can go to Amazon and get them you know but this way I can you know make as much as I the maximum amount that I can make uh that's how we musicians pay our rent these days you know right we sell you know we buy T-shirts for whatever the cost of that is and you know I mean it's insane what t-shirts cost at shows I mean I still sell mine for like 25 bucks but you go to a stone show they're like 50 60 70 you know and I'm just going to say listen this is a great t-shirt definitely worth buying it is it's a really nice looking t-shirt yeah the uh the design is like the new I they're kind of New York City buildings but not really I wanted did not make it it's Urban make it nondescript it's Urban concrete it's concrete concrete yeah concrete jangle that's why I wanted to do that and instead of my Les Paul Jr and rats and skulls that I had in my in my NYC album I traded it for roses and a tambourine and a rick Ander guitar and some pot leaves and uh that's cool nicer things you know more psychedelic things sounds like a great winter record for people to be listening to absolutely in this they'll be hearing this in you know a few weeks and it will be winter oh yeah stay inside and have a nice glass of wine if you indulge in BBE and um yeah spin it uh since it is winter and since most people will be trapped inside at this point um just like well most people in the East Coast or or in the north oh yeah the people in the west coast are out exercising Florida where I uh down in Florida there out Brazil Brazil

we're so huge all right anyway um so take us to like where's like a place that you played that like the people there like you would just always want to go back there because those people just have a thing about them that you just don't find anywhere else take us on a little a little Global trip of a place or two well there's some that you would be very surprised about good and there's some that you we're controversial all of a sudden Japan Japan is insane I imagine they really appreciate all types of American music yeah and they and they come to your hotel and they hang around the lobby and wait for you to get up and come downstairs for breakfast and they're there hello Steve every day they have new photos of you they take photos if you play their two nights in a row they take photos of you go get them developed overnight or in in one hour actually somebody they have a like went to a one hour photo got them veled and blown up and then brought them to my hotel to sign when I just got home from the gig and I'm wearing the same clothes and they got the photo wow Steve please sign my photo and then they give you gifts you know I come home with tons of like gifts I sometimes I end up giving them to my kids because they're like cutie toys you know like yeah Japanese people love those things cute things so so they're and they're so enthusiastic uh complete opposite of Chinese audiences who are um told to stay seated by armed policemen with sticks that will hit you if you stand up yeah um we played there with the New York dolls that was insane um but so Japan is great Germany they're insane like they just love they go crazy uh Italy too Spain too um but the place You' be really surprised about is Boise idah no I would not be surprised by that who who would ever think one of the maybe the craziest New York dollar show we ever played was in Boise that does not surprise me at all I maybe it's because there's nothing to do there but you know you would think oh mountains and horses and you know potatoes special event maybe maybe it's maybe they're just all farmers and farmer mentality we went to a bar there there was gun commercials on the TV you know and but they were like in a in a you know a crazy Artful freaky weirdo kind of way you know which I never expected from Idaho people but um thank you I think there's all kinds of people everywhere well the reason I'm surprised about that is because you know what we usually say with B like New York Dolls and Michael Monroe who was in Hanoi Rocks with these kind of glammy Punky androgynous bands like we go over big on the coasts yeah and in the middle of the country more conservative thinking type working type people nothing wrong with that but uh you know it's mainly you know we play New York Boston you know La Seattle you know and in the the middle of the country there's this you know there's Chicago there's Minneapolis but I never expected that from Idaho I thought it Farm country you know I think they're I think it's everywhere I think they're finding you those people that are looking for bands like you are they're going to find you that's what that's what makes the world go around I think that's why it's such an interesting time right now because there really are a lot of great people out there and I think it's just a you know there's a lot trying to polarize us but there's more potentially that makes us all come together and music is a good good way to do that well I think that there's something interesting in that your music your the your your style of music and your music are the kinds of things that are written to be celebrated right they're they're meant to make you feel and move and you know they're not meant to make you chill out and go to sleep necessarily right uh and what what what the Arts is cool at I guess and this is a good example of that is that you are bringing this thing to people who do not normally have that type of outlet they don't have a place to just jump up and down and be wild and and um you know dress like they're 20 years younger and you know just have a just drink out of a plastic cup and no lyrics you know uh I think that has something to do with why Boise Idaho would be so surprisingly great that they don't but this venue that they're playing at has bands coming in there all the time yeah it's not that they don't have this where they it was surprising it was surprising that the New York Dolph Drew such a big and crazy crowd uh of people that like that kind of music and that you know you don't go see the New York Dolls if you don't know who they are right you know they're genderbending you know guys from the 70s who were probably 50 and 60 years old um at that time which was 20 10 or I left the band 2010 so I was in the band 2004 so 2010 that that gig was probably 2008 so um it'd be interesting to see what would what it would be like now well I you know people always contact me online they go Steve when are you gonna come play you know with your band in you know fill in the blank California or uh Florida or and I go well it's really expensive to tour you know if I could only you know afford to get transport and bunch of guys are willing to get in a van for a couple of weeks and you I have great band but they all they have day jobs and I don't how long they can leave their day jobs for we're kind of Weekend Warriors at this point you know like we go we play Friday Saturday and um and they work all week um so you know it's tough to get out there and besides we just played Boston we played uh Westchester we played the city of course working it's such a different landscape now and it's also being older it's harder to to do all the stuff that hell no man I'm I'm doing it all you know well you are well I'm trying but you also make money in a lot of different ways so the funny thing is I bought a van a minivan yeah like years like six years ago and I thought you know if we if we buy a because we move we left Manhattan and we moved to the Bronx and we need a car so um I was like but we're not going to get you know some like you know small car some fordo sedan or something we're going to get a van so I can tour with it and I just had these visions of like okay we're going to pack the van we're you know go up to Canada play Buffalo and Toronto you know how many gigs I've done out of town in the past six years since I've had this van three I I said it I called it maybe four but uh yeah you know but that's cuz I have kiddos you know and they to go to soccer practice and theater practice is and it's a balance yeah I'm just glad that I finally know someone in New York with a

van get any ideas thank you hey thanks for checking us out links to today's guest can be found in the show notes don't forget to subscribe like us rate US and tell all your friends about arts and craft