A Musical Life

Jason Smith is a founding member of the Oklahoma City-based band Traindodge and plays bass in the band Rainbows Are Free as well. Traindodge has released albums such as Time Will Never Know Your Name, I Am Forever, and On A Lake of Dead Trees.

Dan Dixon is a founding member of Atlanta, Georgia’s PLS PLS and is a producer and recording engineer who operates his own studio. PLS PLS’s latest release is Everything That’s Left. Dixon has also recently overseen the reissue of several recordings from his previous band, Dropsonic, in addition to a rarities collection titled The Best of the Rest. “PLS PLS’s music is often trying to find the balance between making you bob your head and singalong while, also, lyrically, bumming you out entirely. Production is a huge part of the songwriting process for us because I’m often writing songs by myself in the studio. So, any sounds that I get on a demo or as I’m creating an idea, usually end up on the actual final recording and they inform what anybody else plays as they come into the picture later. They inform anything else that I come up with that follows it. So, every sound and part is forced to interlock with what came before it instead of everybody playing at one time, sort of conforming

Andre LaFosse is based in Los Angeles, California. His albums include Normalized, Pivot To Video: Six-String Mixtape Volume 2 and, with Ross Garren, the soundtrack to the film Malacostraca .

Chris Schlarb is a musician based in Long Beach, California. He owns and operates BIG EGO Studios and BIG EGO Records. His latest release with Psychic Temple is Houses of the Holy , a double LP, which features guest appearances from the Chicago Underground Trio, The Dream Syndicate, Xololanxinxo, and Cherry Glazerr. He recorded this segment of “A Musical Life” direct to tape.

Chris Opperman is a New Jersey-based musician and composer.

Renée LoBue is a Montclair, New Jersey-based singer and songwriter who is a member of the band Elk City as well as having recently launched a side project called Flowers Of America (FOA). Additionally, she is a collage and visual artist. “The best part of singing, for me, has always been engaging in possibility. Going beyond what I can see directly in front of me. Always immersing myself in what I like to think of as another realm. It’s a way of re-creating my story, re-creating the space. The worlds of visual art and music are always intersecting for me. Beyond being a singer-songwriter, I’m also a collage artist and I also make videos. Those mediums are always vying for my attention. I’m always immersing myself in one form, giving that some of my time, and then feeling the need to shapeshift back into something else. For me, collage is visual music. Working with video art is just another extension. They will always be connected. Whenever I’m working on one artform, I’m always

Jon Regen is a New York City-based singer-songwriter whose latest album, Higher Ground, was released in 2019.

Candice Sullivan is a classically trained vocalist who fronts Candice and the Business Casual. "I grew up in the classical field. From age seven until about 18, I sang in operas only. I moved to Wichita with my family and was singing Aretha Franklin and thought, 'I can sing something other than classical.' That's really where it started.

Keo is a Wichita-based multi-instrumentalist and songwriter. She is a member of the band Keo and Them.

Sontia Ware is a Wichita-based singer-songwriter and gospel vocalist.

Dan Overholt is a Wichita-based musician and educator.

Colby Dean Runyan performs under the name Moon Lagoon. His at work on a new album, This Results In Escapism.

Drew J. Howard is a composer and bassist based in Wichita, Kansas. He had performed in church ensembles and rock groups such as Stratus, Captain Carl’s Tuesday Nite Blues Band, Empire Falls and Let Us Be Lions, which later became Black Box Warning. He records under the name Dru Lo Nadir.

Logan Bush is a co-founding member of Kill Vargas, in which he plays drums. The band’s latest release is 2019’s Laugh It Off. “When we started playing together, in Kill Vargas, it was on the Guitar Hero game. I was playing the Guitar Hero drums and it just kind of stayed that way. When we would record music, I’d be on the woodblock and snare because that’s all I had at the time, when we were really young. Eventually, one Christmas, my parents got me a drum set. “We just have a genuine passion for playing music with each other. Even if we weren’t touring or playing shows, I imagine we’d be making songs together. Kill Vargas is just part of who I am. “Being a band with your brother [Griffin Bush] and someone you grew up with, since you were a toddler [Austin Engler], I feel like we can be 100 percent honest with each other and know that we’re not going to hurt anyone’s feelings. In the practice space, when we’re discussing things, nothing’s personal. It’s all for the good of the band. I

Candice Sullivan is a classically trained vocalist who fronts Candice and the Business Casual. "I grew up in the classical field. From age seven until about 18, I sang in operas only. I moved to Wichita with my family and was singing Aretha Franklin and thought, 'I can sing something other than classical.' That's really where it started.

Michael Peltzer is a multi-instrumentalist based in Wichita. He has played with a variety of acts throughout his career, including The Watchers with Jenny Wood and with Reggie Littleton’s jazz group.

Jade Hopkins is a singer-songwriter and guitarist based in Derby, Kansas. “I’ve been a songwriter for a long time but I got really into Jerry Reed. Most people know him as an actor but he was also a country singer. What most people don’t know is that he’s one of the greatest thumb-picking guitar players ever. This guy can play could play things that were completely unbelievable. When I heard it, I couldn’t understand how he did. So I sent away for these tapes to learn how to play like him and the songs that I play of Jerry Reed’s, it took me about 10 years to learn. “I have been writing songs since I was very young. My dad is a songwriter. He was always sitting at the piano. I remember, I probably wrote my first song walking back from Boy Scouts to my house when we lived, for a short time, in Whitewater, Kansas. Probably around 10 years old. “A guitar that’s not played is not loved.”

Cody Cloud is a founding member of the band Vehicles, for which he serves as guitarist and vocalist. The band is at work on a new album for release in 2020.

Joe Simpson is a member of the band Circular Reference, which recently issued the record One. “One of the most important parts of being a musician is being a good listener. I think we have the responsibility to be the type of fan and listener that you would want to be at your shows. Whenever you can pick up gear, help a band on the stage, tell them how much their music means to you, put money in the tip jar, buy a cassette, buy a CD, even just showing up … that’s what makes our music scene in Wichita great. How I take my influences and craft it into Circular Reference is really kind of pigheaded. I take the guitar and I make a chord that has some really extreme voicings. You’re adding all the extra harmonies, notes that don’t make sense. I pound it out one chord at a time. Then comes rhythm. Then comes melody. Then comes harmony. Drums are an essential part of making any music interesting. I don’t think there’s a good band that has a bad drummer. I worked in a music store for about

Grant Boesen is a member of the Wichita band Pretend Friend. “As a child, I dreamed of rock ‘n’ roll, listening to my dad’s old Queen records and Boston records. The guitar solos just hit me. I had to play piano for a couple of years, my mom made me, before I could get a guitar, just so I’d learn how to read music and do all of that. Which was a good thing. I got a guitar when I was nine-years-old and tried to play rock ‘n’ roll ever since. The bluegrass has kind of been a new development. I was playing acoustic guitar so much, just for the purpose of writing songs. Then, I’d transfer all that to electric guitar. Eventually I think I became a little impatient and kept everything on the acoustic. It’s a lot easier to carry around. No amplifiers or anything. “When I was starting, it wasn’t so much the creative process that made me want to do it. I wanted to emulate something I admired. It was a feeling, it was the energy of a guitar solo or these rock ‘n’ roll bands that I thought were