Peace maker on Max and Gradyl.
Crusher.
Wow.
Wow, that is very cool.
You know Rob.
Yes.
Peace maker.
Yes.
They're a rock power trio.
Three years in the making.
Harkening back the 70s and 80s artists like Thin Lizzie's easy top crew and Sabbath.
Peace maker adds a finishing touch of punk.
In the verge of a full album release, Madison's Peace maker are right here in the studios.
Guys, welcome to Max and Gradyl.
Greetings back.
Hello.
Thanks for having us.
Thanks for having us.
Yeah.
Wow.
Wow.
Awesome.
You know John, John Stover, singer, guitarist.
You're the front man of well-known band, I am Dragon.
Tell us a little bit about yourself and your life in music.
Give us a little backstory.
Oh boy.
Well, I'm from Madison and grew up playing around here, playing the loft and it's
many, you know, incarnations, yeah, all over the place when it was moving around.
grew up playing like pop hook music and, you know, that was a lot of fun and I, you know,
still know lots of people from that scene from back in those days just being gosh, how
many years ago, 25 plus years ago now, but as far as backstory with me, the obsession
with playing this rock and roll thing just hasn't faded and it just doesn't seem like
it will.
So I just keep at it and it's like what I need to do to stay sane pretty much.
You know, I ask everybody, you know, what role did your parents play in music all
pretty?
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, so my mom was super supportive of pretty much everything that I've ever done
musically and not that my dad wasn't, but I would almost even go further that and say
it was like my grandmother because she was a singer and she would do like the tours.
She's from Iowa and she would do the tours of like all the small little opera houses and
do like whatever the hot tunes were of the days and like the forties probably, but she,
I don't know.
She lived a hard life.
She was a crazy person and I'm also a crazy person, so I can relate in many ways, but
I think that's honestly my big inspiration is grandma.
So Willa, thanks, thanks, girlfriend.
Wow.
How cool is that?
Now you brought your bass player.
Indeed.
Introduce us to your bass player.
Yeah, this is Daniel Rosen.
Daniel here.
Nice to be here.
Thanks for having me.
What's happening, Dan?
Yeah.
And not much.
X Pat from Illinois.
X Pat from Illinois.
That was in Madison for eight years.
John recruited me.
You know, he's like, I wrote these rock and roll tunes and I'm a guitar player.
Me and John have a mutual friends.
We've been hanging out for a while and he's like, you know, during the pandemic, I wrote
these tunes.
I'm looking for a bass player and I'm a guitar player.
So he's just, John's the kind of guy that sends you a lot of links.
Oh, he's like, here, buy this bass.
Buy this bass.
No, no, no, no.
You said you were going to buy the bass before.
But, yeah.
If you're on the internet with Johnny, he's going to send you links.
Yeah.
Just saying.
Anyway, I bought a bass maybe last Christmas.
Yeah.
And then he just started.
The songs are just great and it was enough motivation.
And then he put a great add out on Craigslist and we met our drummer James, who's at home
tonight listening.
Craigslist is alive and well.
Still Craigslist is a Craigslist.
If you can believe that.
If you can believe that.
If anybody can believe it, it's still happening.
It's happening.
Misconnection.
Yeah.
No, I mean, there was a multiple paragraphs in that ad and I was like, no one is going
to respond to this.
And then, you know, James, our drummer, just kind of reached out and he's like, I actually
first off, I want to say I read the whole ad and I was like, okay, one star.
And then he's like, you know, and I liked what you had to say, two stars.
I have a car.
Yeah, I was like, okay, I have a car.
I have a car and a kit.
And I was like, okay, buddy, can we meet?
When are we meeting?
We should probably hang out first to make sure you're not two obnoxious.
And he wasn't.
So I was like, all right, let's jam.
Let's do it.
Let's try the thing.
And it actually just fell right in.
Now, Dan, what brought you to Madison from Chicago?
Oh, yeah.
So, yeah.
I was, I was being in Chicago.
So when my, when my son was born, we were living in the city, my wife and I, and, you
know, we were like, well, we were, let's maybe do something crazy.
You know, my mom was already living up in Madison and, you know, we were like, what, thinking
about me?
So your mom is already crazy.
Yeah.
Well, no.
We were like, let's just do something different because, you know, Madison, we knew it was
just like a great place to raise a family.
So we moved up here for a job.
And just my kid has been, ever since he was three months old, been in Madison.
So nice.
It's been a great place to be, a great place to learn.
He learned how magical Wisconsin is versus Illinois.
Well, it's funny when I used to come up here from Chicago, I feel like my blood pressure
lower when I come up here.
See?
Same thing.
The parking is easy.
I have the entrance.
I can go snowboarding.
I can do things.
I can grab the bears.
I'm not a big NFL guy.
He's neutral.
He's neutral.
Sweet.
I got it.
Thank you, buddies.
Thank you.
All my guys, cool buddies that I text with are still huge bears fans.
He's that country.
Yeah.
I'm neutral on that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Rock and roll.
Yeah.
Rock and roll brought me and John together.
And the songs were great.
So we just started practicing in the rest of history.
Yeah.
Peace makers.
New self title album is due out in May of this year.
That's correct.
Tell us about your upcoming album.
Well, we recorded it with Tim Consequence at Acme Sound Studios
on Willie Street in the Old Nature's Bakery, basically in the basement.
He's been there for many years.
That guy, boy, I couldn't be happier to just kind of fall into that too
because we kind of had an arrangement.
Well, James had an arrangement with him previous where we had some credit
that we, he was due for a different arrangement.
And so, you know, we rode that green pants dance right into the studio
and cut the first tracks and we did.
It's all live.
Like the overdubs that we did are basically just, you know, the band
three of us played together, all the original music and the overdubs
are just, we added like a second guitar, maybe just mostly just thickening
stuff up here and there, a couple little leads, but not much.
And then the vocals are overdubbed.
But it was, it's a shoestring budget release.
But I'm like, I can't, I can't, I listen to it and I'm wowed
at what it sounds like based on what we spent on it.
And now you've released some songs digitally
as singles, but you're telling me you're thinking about vinyl.
Yes.
Yes.
Oh boy.
Oh boy.
Yeah.
Here we go.
It's a point.
Who's saying yes?
Who's saying yes in there?
Oh, absolutely.
Okay.
Okay.
John likes physical media.
He wants to touch it.
Can I put you down for a pre-order?
That's my next question.
Absolutely.
Okay.
I can't afford to front it.
That's the big, that's the hangout.
That's the hangout.
That's the hangout that he needs to get the names of the pre-orders
because it's like, we'll talk.
We'll talk to you at cost.
You got to order 100 or whatever you know.
It's gay.
Okay.
Put him down for like 20 years.
Yes.
That's right.
Business.
Business.
Yes.
No, it's been a fantasy of mine.
I got the vinyl bug real bad maybe 10 or 15 years ago.
I mean, I grew up.
I had my parents like old vinyl collection when I was like a teenager,
but didn't really like fathom how different that sounds and how special it is.
It was just kind of like, ah, these are cool and like old and whatever.
But really got the bug and even stuff that I listened to like in my 20s
that was always digital and you know, it was all the beginning of MP3s
and whatnot.
You'd be barely streaming stuff or listen to a CD that you ripped onto your iPod.
And I went back to a couple of these albums and picked them up on vinyl.
And like the one that really stuck out to me was and I'm such an emo kid of the 2000s.
But my chemical romance is, you know, three spheres of sweet revenge
and maybe you guys know that and maybe you don't, but if you don't,
go listen to that shit because stuff.
Oh, there's the jack button.
Get me out.
But great album, but the first time I heard it on vinyl,
it just, I don't know, it's just like that happy feeling for your ears
where something about the lack of digital, you know, perfection
and a little bit more real live organic sound.
I don't know if it's all the cliches that crack people say.
So yeah.
So basically my fantasy is to put my own music on vinyl.
And for the longest time, it's such a hurdle because it is a cost.
I mean, you're looking at well north of $1,500, $1,500 to do a hundred records.
And then you have to sell them, apparently, but or they sit in your garage.
Exactly.
They're not, they're not drink coasters.
Yeah, they make great, I mean, I want to drink that big.
But yeah, so I mean, it's, it's a daunting thing,
but I think I've met enough people who also share that passion
for physical media and what it is and how it's special from what we,
you know, technology is great and streaming is great.
And it's all amazing.
Like what we have now is so convenient, but at the same time,
like there's something to be said for like having a decent stereo.
And I'm not talking like go spend money.
I'm talking like go to the thrift store and pick up like a receiver speakers
that aren't broken.
And like some record player that is functioning with a good needle.
You know, I just built a stereo for somebody.
And it was like 60 bucks for all three of those things.
Oh, and you can get great.
And it sounds great.
Like when I was a kid, you used a drill over some of this.
Yes.
Exactly.
That's the same.
Now you can pick it up.
Right.
This is worthless.
It's huge.
And they're like, why are your speakers so big?
Yes.
I have.
I know I've had this conversation multiple times.
And it's like, well, let me show you.
And then I put something on.
And they're kind of like, OK, there's something to that.
You don't have a subwoofer.
No, no, the subwoofers are built into each speaker.
But as it pertains to like the record, I think we're going to do like a digital
full release.
We released a single just actually last night.
The first song off of it on Bandcamp.
And we have that out there.
And we're probably going to put the rest of the album just all the different spots that
Spotify.
Yeah.
Spotify Apple is the businessman.
You know, they have like CD baby or these other programs that put you stuff on all the
platforms.
So we're going to do it.
So we'll do that probably within, honestly, probably a couple of weeks here.
We're going to have all eight songs out there for that.
But my thinking was that would just build the hype for the people that probably want
to pre-order the vinyl because it's like, that's not going to sway people who are
in the vinyl with a hear.
You know, oh, I can stream it.
That's cool.
I want to hear it on the warm stereo at their house and open the thing and it's got
the art and, you know, if it's on Apple music and Spotify, I can send it to my mom and
she can send it to her.
You know, I got to get it out there.
We definitely got to get your mom's friends on board.
And that's very important.
What's your website?
Well, right now we're just basic, basic people, so I almost went there again.
You know, we have the Bandcamp site is a peacemaker rock dot band camp dot com.
And that's where you can listen to.
I do my best work at night, which I believe we will listen to after all this jibber jabber.
Yes.
And other than that, we just have the Facebook page.
Yeah, pretty much just, you know, Facebook dot com slash peacemaker rock, I believe it
is.
Hopefully, that's right.
But soon we'll get a MySpace page.
Yes, maybe.
We haven't worked in a whole thing.
We're trying to get them to find the servers.
We're bringing MySpace back.
Yeah.
So I don't know.
I mean, eventually a real website would be a thing probably released with vinyl, but
ever.
But I don't know.
We're just kind of doing it simple and dirty and well, Bandcamp seems good.
You just put it up there.
But people can pay for it.
It seems like they can pay to download, you know, if you want to, you can set the mountain.
I mean, that that site's been around since, gosh, you know, 20 years plus.
And it's still like a really great platform for artists that aren't on a label to get
their stuff out there.
Well, John and Dan, thank you so much for taking the time to come in and speak with us
tonight.
We really appreciate it.
This first single that you just released is called, I do my best work at night.
Is this song about vampires?
Well, I mean, yes and no.
I would consider myself part by empire, but I mean, really the, the, the, the, the, just
of this, this one is, um, being, being a crazy artist person and, um, for me, nighttime
is the right time when it comes to making that art.
And I really am that person that's like, okay, I have a life tomorrow.
I have, you know, kids that I need to wake up for.
I have work to go to.
I have all these things.
But then like all of a sudden inspiration hits and all of a sudden you can't say no and
you're like, I'm furiously, you know, furiously writing lyrics or a melody or something.
And usually nighttime is when the guitarists happen the most.
But that's kind of the, the main, you know, theme of that song is just like trying to
avoid that pitfall of like ruining your life, but also like you can't avoid that, you
know, absolute obsession with like, oh, I have to create this right now.
It has to happen, you know, so.
So what you're saying is you're a morning person?
No.
I mean, I get up.
I'm a person.
So yes, he's a night owl.
Yeah.
So whether, whether, you know, smart or not.
All right.
Well, let's hear it.
This is like, do my best work at night.
This peacemaker you're listening to Max and Gradio, we are local music.
