Brother Dynamite

The discussion centered on the evolution of Brother Dynamite, highlighting the band's origins and the personal connections among its members. Alan and Shawn reflected on their long-standing friendship, which began in high school, and how it led to the band's formation. They recounted their first jam session and the welcoming atmosphere created by fellow band members. This camaraderie has been a significant factor in their continued collaboration and musical journey.

Shawn and Alan shared insights into their musical backgrounds, noting that neither came from a family of musicians. They described their early influences and the informal learning experiences that shaped their skills. Both emphasized the importance of peer influence and personal dedication in their development as musicians. Their commitment to songwriting began early, with a focus on creating original music, which has persisted through their college years and beyond.

The conversation also delved into their transition from a full band to an acoustic duo, prompted by scheduling challenges. They discussed the initial difficulties of performing as a duo but eventually embraced the format, finding it liberating. Their recordings still reflect a full band sound, showcasing their versatility. The duo's recent album, "If We Dare," released in 2022, was highlighted, including their collaboration with artist Hugh Syme and the creative process behind their singles.

Advice for indie artists was a key topic, with Alan and Shawn stressing the importance of authenticity and perseverance in today's music landscape. They discussed their flexible songwriting process, particularly for their single "Radio Silence," and the significance of developing a unique sound. The conversation concluded with updates on upcoming projects, including a lyric video and several singles, as well as their social media presence for fans to follow.

Transcript

6:09 - Debra LaMotta 
All right. Hi, welcome to the R2RB Indie Artist Podcast. And today I have with me Alan and Shawn, a brother dynamite. Thank you so much for joining me. How are you both? Doing great.

6:20 - Alan 
Thanks for having us, Deb. Great to talk to you.

6:24 - Shawn Moynihan 
Great to be here, Deb. Thank you.

6:26 - Debra LaMotta 
You're welcome. I'm so excited to have you here. And I always like to ask two questions to get us started. What is your favorite app on your phone and why?

6:37 - Shawn Moynihan 
Alan, you want to go first?

6:39 - Alan 
Sure. Favorite app on the phone. I have two. One is Shazam, because you always want to know what is that song they're playing in the restaurant or the supermarket or whatever. The other is the Voice Memos app. As a songwriter, it's invaluable and can't live without it, as I'm sure Shawn and every other songwriter out there with an iPhone will attest.

7:04 - Debra LaMotta 
I bet. I bet. Shawn, what about you?

7:07 - Shawn Moynihan 
I'll have to echo Alan's answers, except that I would go in the order of the Voice Memos app, which I always say had to have been created by a songwriter.

7:21 - Debra LaMotta 
Had to be.

7:23 - Shawn Moynihan 
I would bet good money that whoever designed that app was a songwriter, because they had to have done that. But yeah, and my second choice would definitely be Shazam because I use it quite a bit. I do too.

7:41 - Debra LaMotta 
I mean, not that you're supposed to be using your apps while you're driving, but I've been known to like push the button. Like what's that song? We won't tell. We won't tell. Okay, good. All right. If you could collaborate with anyone, who would it be?

7:59 - Alan 
I'll let you take that one, Shawn.

8:04 - Debra LaMotta 
Either or both, before and after. Let's see.

8:08 - Shawn Moynihan 
Al, you want to take this one? Sure.

8:12 - Multiple Speakers 
I would love to collaborate with Freddie Mercury. I'm a huge Queen fan, and he's just the best, and that would just be spectacularly incredible to collaborate with him.

8:28 - Alan 
Wow, I like that one.

8:31 - Debra LaMotta 
Yep. So collaborate with me and collaborate with Freddie Mercury.

8:34 - Shawn Moynihan 
There you go.

8:36 - Debra LaMotta 
That's right. That's right. That's that's that's definitely a better choice.

8:40 - Alan 
It's I think she's talking about if it was somebody other than you. Of course, I already get to collaborate with you.

8:48 - Multiple Speakers 
Right. But you know, the first the first band I thought of when you asked that that was was in excess.

8:56 - Debra LaMotta 
Really? Yeah. Okay. All right.

8:58 - Shawn Moynihan 
to have been able to, you know, write with them or sing with them or anything.

9:04 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah. I mean, we really had some great ones way back when. Oh, my God. Absolutely. I would go with the two that you have mentioned as well. All right. So where did Brother Dynamite start? I mean, you guys have known each other now since high school or elementary? High school. Yeah.

9:21 - Alan 
So just a few years ago.

9:23 - Debra LaMotta 
Just a few years ago. About five or six years ago.

9:29 - Alan 
It's been a few decades, not a few years.

9:33 - Debra LaMotta 
So were you best friends in school, friends in school, playing in a band together at that point?

9:42 - Shawn Moynihan 
We were introduced, the short version is we were introduced by a mutual friend and that person reached out to our good friend, Joe Orlando, who put together our first band. And I remember Joe and Alan pulling up to my house, my parents' house, you know, when I was 16 years old to say, you know, hey, we're gonna go jam at this guy, TJ's house. And TJ Quattrone was a friend of, still is a friend of Alan's and and Joe's and TJ was in a seminal punk band called Rule of Thumb. And, and they they picked me up and said, All right, let's, you know, let's go play. And, and, and Joe, I'll never forget this Joe said, Al, this is Shawn, he's gonna be the drummer.

10:37 - Debra LaMotta 
And I said, I said, Hey, hey, hey, how you doing?

10:41 - Unidentified Speaker 
Good.

10:41 - Shawn Moynihan 
Good to meet you. And that was and there was never a chance for us to become friends and then sort of, you know, the graduation. It was like, okay.

10:53 - Alan 
We just piled his stuff into Joe's, I think it was a Grand Fury, big old gas guzzling clunker and all hopped in the front seat and off the TJ as we went. And I was like, okay, how you doing, Shawn? Nice to meet you.

11:09 - Shawn Moynihan 
And that was it. Wow.

11:11 - Debra LaMotta 
So you, and you've been together then since then. And have you ever been apart or you've always been doing music together?

11:19 - Alan 
We've always been doing music. There was a brief period where we were kind of in other projects. But basically, we've we've always been making music since then.

11:30 - Debra LaMotta 
And so do you both come from families that were musicians, music artists of any type? No, not not me anyway.

11:38 - Alan 
Not at all. No, not really.

11:40 - Multiple Speakers 
I mean, my dad played the spoon and a little harmonica, but no, that's about it.

11:47 - Debra LaMotta 
I shouldn't laugh because my grandmother could actually play a mean spoon to a tune. My grandmother was Irish and she also was self-taught on harmonica. And the lady could sing, play those spoons, and sing, had a beautiful voice.

12:07 - Alan 
That's impressive.

12:08 - Shawn Moynihan 
Dual process. Not enough spoons.

12:11 - Alan 
players around these days. We need more of them.

12:14 - Multiple Speakers 
Now my mom wanted me to take an instrument and she thought originally the trumpet, but I had two friends in seventh, eighth grade that were really into guitar.

12:26 - Alan 
They played guitar. They were really into this band that I didn't know called Van Halen. And I was like, I said to my mom, how about if I played guitar? My two friends play guitar. And she said, okay, that's fine. Excuse me. So that started my path on guitar. I wasn't listening to rock music at all. I listened to the stuff my mom listened to, which was Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, you know, things of that ilk. She was listening to a radio station in New York at the time that played all that kind of stuff.

13:00 - Multiple Speakers 
So I didn't know these bands.

13:02 - Alan 
And it was my two friends that turned me on to this band called Van Halen, you know, just like, wow, that's, that's cool. I think I like that. And, and off I went on my, my rock and roll journey. And that was it. But I got into it very, very late. And I didn't start playing guitar until I was right after right after I graduated gram school. So I was 14. Okay. Are you self taught?

13:27 - Debra LaMotta 
Or did you take lessons for the guitar?

13:29 - Alan 
I took lessons, she said she got me the guitar. And oddly enough, I still have same acoustic guitar with the same six strings on it. I never broke a string on that guitar.

13:40 - Debra LaMotta 
It's ridiculous.

13:40 - Alan 
But no, I took lessons for many years, but the teacher mostly would say, what do you want to learn this week? And I'd name another Van Halen song, write it out, and I would go home and learn it. I didn't really have a lot of theory background or things like that. It was that kind of a lesson. I was a kid that was probably like two years older than me teaching me. There's an A chord. That's it. What else do you need? Mostly, I got it from guitar magazines, which had transcriptions of songs in them, which were invaluable.

14:13 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, that's right.

14:14 - Multiple Speakers 
They had their own system of notation.

14:17 - Alan 
Instead of formal music notation, they had a thing called tablature, which showed you the string and the fret that the note would be played on.

14:26 - Multiple Speakers 
That's how I learned everything.

14:28 - Alan 
Wow. That was invaluable. Grateful to those guitar magazines, which I still have piles of in my house. I like it. I like it. What about you, Shawn?

14:39 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah, I started out. Well, I took acoustic guitar lessons when I was 10 or 11. But, you know, I was too young, I think, to appreciate it. But I learned, you know, all the basic campfire chords that I still use. So that was the beginning. But then I I got serious with music lessons when I was 15. I started taking drum lessons from a jazz drummer who was a friend of my mom's. And then when Al and I got into our first band and subsequent bands, we just had this revolving door of singers. And one day, a buddy of mine said, why don't you try? And I thought, OK, you know, let's why not? Because Alan and I were writing all the songs anyway.

15:33 - Debra LaMotta 
Oh, wow. Oh, so you started your guys started young with writing.

15:38 - Alan 
We were always into writing songs. Wow.

15:40 - Debra LaMotta 
We were really always into it.

15:42 - Alan 
I mean, as soon as we had gotten the band thing going a little bit, learned some cover songs and had done a couple of gigs, we really gravitated to writing very, very quickly and very early in our our musical

15:57 - Unidentified Speaker 
relationship.

15:58 - Alan 
Yeah, it's been something that we've always sort of had an interest in.

16:03 - Multiple Speakers 
Oh, that's, that's cool. Very cool. Very first gig when when, gosh, I was 16.

16:08 - Shawn Moynihan 
The very first gig we did an original is, you know, song is part of the set.

16:15 - Debra LaMotta 
Wow.

16:15 - Shawn Moynihan 
So then I Alan, the other guys wrote, you know, the guys who could actually play real instruments.

16:25 - Shawn Moynihan 
I don't mean that. I don't mean that. The guys, the guys, but the other guys wrote, you know, wrote the song, but, but from right from the jump, we were...

16:34 - Debra LaMotta 
The two of you just collaborated on that as well.

16:37 - Multiple Speakers 
Just bring our own stuff out. That's so cool.

16:40 - Debra LaMotta 
Oh, wow. And to be able, and to be able to start, you know, back when you did and all the way, you know, that you're still doing it together now, because, I mean, you know, that doesn't always happen that you continue to be, you know, friends and writing together and still liking each other.

16:56 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah, that's that is the best part of this.

17:00 - Alan 
This whole experience for me. You know, we're you summed it up perfectly. I mean, we're we're best friends. We're musical partners. And it's it's been a great ride. And we're still enjoying it. You certainly are. And you just have a new release, which we'll talk about in a few minutes. That is that is really fantastic. Shawn, I know I kind of cut you off.

17:23 - Debra LaMotta 
Did you want to add anything else on to that with your vocals? You were doing guitar. Do you play the drums?

17:30 - Multiple Speakers 
Who plays the drums? Yeah, the drums are my first instrument. But I figured if I'm going to be the singer, the only thing I was going to add to that is, you know, when I became the singer, I said, OK, you know, singer and rhythm guitar player, I said, OK,

17:48 - Shawn Moynihan 
I need to go learn how to do this properly.

17:51 - Multiple Speakers 
You know, I don't want to sing, you know, amateurishly. I really want to learn the craft.

18:01 - Shawn Moynihan 
And so I took lessons for two and a half years from the lead singer of an all-female heavy metal band.

18:12 - Debra LaMotta 
There you go.

18:14 - Shawn Moynihan 
Called Misdemeanor. Best way. And she was amazing. Jackie and she was incredible. So if you hear this Jackie somewhere, thank you. You know, I trained with her for a long time and, you know, learned how to do it. And I've been able to, you know, preserve my voice, you know, for all these years. Thank goodness.

18:33 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And that is one of the biggest things you want to do. So. All right. So you get through high school, you're in the bands together. Excuse me. And then do you go off to college or you continue with music full time?

18:45 - Multiple Speakers 
We both actually ended up going to the same college and Right here locally, so we didn't like separate move away or anything like that So a lot of our college time of college years were spent with the band and

18:59 - Alan 
you know Forming bands and gigging and things like that writing songs all of that So that was that was a big part of that too because we had started this musical journey it sort of at the tail end of my high school career. I was a year ahead of Shawn. And so, yeah, so we were doing music all through college and everything. And post college, you know, starting to work and everything like that, we still kept it going. And we were, you know, we we had some years where we're doing a lot of a lot of gigs with different bands. And we would drive down to Philadelphia from New York City on a Monday night, go play an open mic and get back at three in the morning and get up and go to the city the next morning for work. So yeah, we did all that stuff. We did all that stuff.

19:48 - Debra LaMotta 
The days that we could be able to do that to stay up all night, get an hour, two hours of sleep and be able to function the next day.

19:57 - Alan 
Right, yeah. And now you realize, I can't really do that. And you get a little smarter and think, I don't really know if that's really worth it. It wasn't the time, maybe.

20:06 - Multiple Speakers 
What am I going to get out of playing for those eight people?

20:10 - Alan 
on that place on a Monday night.

20:13 - Debra LaMotta 
Well, we didn't know it was going to be in front of 80 people.

20:18 - Alan 
Some of them were good.

20:20 - Shawn Moynihan 
Some of them turned out to be a little late.

20:24 - Debra LaMotta 
It's all part of your development.

20:26 - Shawn Moynihan 
It's the journey.

20:28 - Multiple Speakers 
As a writer and as a performer. Absolutely.

20:31 - Shawn Moynihan 
Every one of those steps is another step in honing your craft.

20:35 - Unidentified Speaker 
Absolutely.

20:36 - Debra LaMotta 
And every artist goes through those steps. The longer you're on that journey, you're going to go through every one of those steps.

20:46 - Alan 
And it's that fortitude that keeps you, that you need to have to continue on to the success that you both have had. Right. And I think the reason that we continue on this journey is not because we're seeking the the affirmation from other people, it's because it's what we love to do, right?

21:10 - Debra LaMotta 
What Shawn and I love to do.

21:12 - Alan 
So if we were simply doing it for the affirmation, good chance, you know, maybe we wouldn't be doing this. Because you can't bank on that all the time. But because we love to do it.

21:26 - Debra LaMotta 
That's why we still continue it. We want to hear.

21:30 - Alan 
Right.

21:30 - Shawn Moynihan 
Like we write the songs and make the records that we wish, you know, other people were making, you know, we enjoy, you know, we enjoy that the entire process. And it comes through your music.

21:42 - Debra LaMotta 
I mean, and then and also your little your little blurb, you know, rock and roll, you make rock and roll fun again. Thank you for picking up on that.

21:51 - Multiple Speakers 
Yeah, no, but it's true.

21:53 - Debra LaMotta 
I mean, if you're, you know, listening to your music and following you guys, I mean, that's what you get out of that music. So what you put into coming out loud and clear. So kudos to the both of you. Alright, so we got into college, you're out of college, you both are working full time jobs doing your gigging and recording. And then about when does Brother Dynamite kind of become a thing?

22:20 - Shawn Moynihan 
I think I want to say it. Correct me if I'm wrong on this, Alan. I think that was that was probably around 2011? Yeah, it was around there.

22:33 - Alan 
The band situation, the full band situation, the wheels started falling off because our drummer wanted to go join this other band. Our bass player got a job out in California, I think it was. So we lost the bass player. By the way, bass players are the hardest musicians to find.

22:56 - Debra LaMotta 
So anybody who's out there wondering, to take an instrument.

23:00 - Alan 
What should I learn? Learn the bass.

23:03 - Multiple Speakers 
Never be without a gig. Write your own ticket.

23:07 - Alan 
Yeah, we have been struggling to find bass players throughout our entire journey.

23:13 - Debra LaMotta 
So learn the bass.

23:14 - Alan 
But so it just got to be challenging with getting four people's schedules on the same page. And we gravitated towards this duo thing. Of Shawn and I, Shawn and me, and it just became something that was easier, and we started this acoustic duo process, which at first was, you would think it would be easier, but it was a big challenge, because we were used to having the loud drums and the guitars and the vocals and the bass and everything else, and there was just the two of us sitting there with two acoustic guitars and two microphones. A very different animal. And the first time we ever did that, we walked on stage and we were like, wow, we were not that good.

24:02 - Debra LaMotta 
Oh no. I was good.

24:04 - Shawn Moynihan 
We were really like- You weren't that, I was good, you weren't that.

24:09 - Alan 
Well, Shawn was always good.

24:11 - Multiple Speakers 
Yeah, I weighed us down. Don't go dragging me down.

24:14 - Unidentified Speaker 
Yeah.

24:15 - Multiple Speakers 
It was very different though. Nah, he's right. It was terrible. It had to be different.

24:21 - Shawn Moynihan 
first time and just go because there's because, but you live and die by that, you know, that unfiltered talent, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, if you go out and you can, you can, you know, just sing and play under one white light bulb, you're that's you're, you're, you're somebody you're, you know, it's, it's, it was, it was a very intimidating But to Alan's point, yes, it was, it was a little intimidating at first. But then, over time, as we got, got more relaxed with it, and got more acquainted with, you know, playing and performing that way and singing that way, it became a lot more freeing, because there's a lot more spontaneity that can go into it. Now, if somebody yells out, you know, hey, play such and such, you know, like, well, we'll give it a shot, you know, like, you know, whereas with a full band, it's like it's extremely difficult to Yeah, have somebody throw

25:22 - Alan 
something at you and play right or there's songs There's like a song that we can be doing and like it's a cover song, you know a lot of times we're playing in bars and playing cover songs and we can just get to like the midsection and We'll just start jamming on it. Just taking it in different direction Then we reign it back in and then we take it back to the song and finish the song Yeah, we can sort of, we know like where we're going.

25:50 - Multiple Speakers 
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

25:51 - Debra LaMotta 
I just I had a question about your first time when you were performing as a duo and you didn't feel like you had done well. Did you get feedback from the audience?

26:05 - Multiple Speakers 
Or I mean, or is that? Yeah, I liked it.

26:09 - Unidentified Speaker 
Yeah.

26:10 - Shawn Moynihan 
I don't think the audience written, you know, I don't, it's not like, it's not like we went up there and screwed the pooch in front of, you know, a room full of people. They, they, they, we have, we have friends that would have told us if we were, if we were bad. Yeah. We, we went up and, and played and, and just, um, we have ridiculously high standards, like for, for ourselves, you know, in our performance. So if we were rehearsing, thing earlier that week and everything and we felt good about it, you know, and you go out and if you make one mistake, you know, like, you really can't get to, you know, too hard

26:55 - Multiple Speakers 
on yourself, because it because at that time, it was new, right?

26:59 - Shawn Moynihan 
I think we were, you know, a little tougher on ourselves, then, you know, then we would normally be right now.

27:07 - Alan 
Right now. Is that fair to say?

27:09 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah, I would say so.

27:11 - Alan 
And now we're very comfortable in that format. So yeah, to the point where we haven't played electric in a long time. It's really been this this acoustic duo thing.

27:20 - Debra LaMotta 
Oh, cool.

27:21 - Alan 
But on our recordings, it's full band, you know, electric guitars, drums, the whole thing.

27:26 - Multiple Speakers 
Right. Yeah. Because I think we are our own worst enemies, you know, and usually the feedback is always positive, but we're always the hardest on ourselves.

27:34 - Alan 
Well, and you know where you've gone wrong more than anyone else in the audience would know.

27:42 - Debra LaMotta 
That's right. Right. Absolutely.

27:43 - Unidentified Speaker 
Cool.

27:44 - Alan 
All right. So let's talk about your music and let's start with that album, If We Dare, which was back in 2020. 22. It was 22. Okay.

27:55 - Multiple Speakers 
I have so many numbers on my page here. Okay.

27:59 - Unidentified Speaker 
2022.

28:00 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah. If we dare.

28:02 - Debra LaMotta 
And looking at that cover of that album, and I was looking on who the artist was and his name is Hugh Sim. Shawn? Is that right? Shawn.

28:15 - Unidentified Speaker 
Shawn.

28:16 - Alan 
Okay. Yeah. Oh my gosh.

28:18 - Debra LaMotta 
So tell us about the album, the project, how long you were working on it before it was released, the artist of the front of that album. Is it available on vinyl? No, it's not available on vinyl.

28:35 - Alan 
And it's actually, we did make physical CDs, which you can get on our Bandcamp page. Okay.

28:41 - Debra LaMotta 
Hugh Sime, who you mentioned, did the cover art.

28:45 - Alan 
Hugh is mostly known for all, he did pretty much every piece of graphic design that the band Rush ever put out. And he's still working with them on their re-release reissues and stuff like that. So he's done a tremendous amount of work with Rush. He's done Joe Bonamassa, Dream Theater, Bon Jovi, Kiss.

29:06 - Debra LaMotta 
He's got a list. So many.

29:08 - Alan 
I mean, almost everybody can think of Aerosmith. Yeah, Aerosmith. And he, I'm sorry, go ahead.

29:13 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, no, I was gonna say, now, how'd you get hooked up with him?

29:19 - Alan 
It was funny because we started working on this album during the pandemic when everybody was at home. And on a lark, I just thought, you know what, I wonder if I could get in touch with Hugh Sign. And I found an email address for him, sent him a note, said, we would love for you to consider working with us on this album that we're working on. And he actually replied. And after a conversation, he wanted to know, like, what's the title? What kind of music is it? Can you send me some demos? He wanted to suss us out and make sure that it was going to be something that he was not going to be afraid to put his name on. And he agreed to do it. And we were just beyond joyed that he got involved with the project. And he mocked up a few different covers for us, but the cover that we ended up using, as soon as we saw that image, both of us said, oh man, that's it. It was just so, it was so arresting, the image. For those listening, it's a blue sky with the nose of a jet airliner on the right side, poking through the right side of the image, and a skydiver center image looking like he's either about to hit the jetliner or the jetliner's about to hit him. And it was all off of the title If We Dare, which is the name of the album, and it just sort of evoked these kind of daring images and everything that Hugh does is evocative. In that matter, it really makes you think like, what's going on here?

30:55 - Unidentified Speaker 
Wow.

30:56 - Alan 
And the CD that we sell on Bandcamp has additional artwork that Hugh created for us that you can get if you get the whole CD. There's a lot of other really cool artwork, all with that daring theme. But it was it was a pleasure to work with him on that. He was great. He's just just a great Did you did you ever think that he would respond to your email? Did you? Not really. Not really. I was pretty surprised when he responded. Yeah, he's a talent in another stratosphere.

31:28 - Shawn Moynihan 
You know, you think like, oh, you know, it's it's like your dream designer, right?

31:33 - Debra LaMotta 
To come in and, you know, and work on your album cover, you know?

31:38 - Unidentified Speaker 
Yeah.

31:39 - Alan 
I mean, you don't expect somebody like that to to cross your path in that kind of way.

31:45 - Multiple Speakers 
But, you know, the old lesson is the squeaky wheel gets the grease or you don't ask, you don't get it. Yeah, I got it. Absolutely. So here you are with this amazing cover for If We Dare. How how did that all come together?

32:02 - Debra LaMotta 
So had were these songs that had been already written and recorded prior How did it work?

32:12 - Shawn Moynihan 
Well, we're always writing. We constantly have this big backlog of song ideas. And usually how an album ends up taking shape is we get to the point where we have, say, anywhere from like 12 to 14, 15 ideas that we know that we love that we say, all right, know, we want to and we make a list and go, Okay, well, we know we want to do this song, this song, this song. And that's how that's usually like how an album project starts rolling. And then working at the logistics of like, okay, what did we record first, you know, and then building with an out jumping here, but but building the home studio, but but once we had our, you know, once we had our home studio up and running, you know, we had flexibility to just work, you know, whenever we wished, and be able to do everything at home and save a ton of money, you know, like, in, in recording expenses, because

33:18 - Debra LaMotta 
we weren't looking at the clock, right?

33:20 - Multiple Speakers 
The whole time, it was a learning curve, definitely a learning curve, learning how to use all that gear, how to use pro tools, how to, you know, manipulate it the way we wanted to the way an engineer, professional engineer

33:35 - Alan 
would do, So it was definitely a learning curve, but we weren't in a rush. We didn't have a deadline to get this album out. It was sort of like, we're doing these songs, we know we're going to release them eventually. It took longer than we would like to release, and the pandemic probably slowed us down a little bit, naturally. But we got to the point where we can utilize the equipment, and we can record at our whim, which is with live drums and everything.

34:05 - Multiple Speakers 
Yeah.

34:05 - Debra LaMotta 
And how many songs are on how many songs are on that album?

34:11 - Alan 
There's 12. 12. Yeah, 12 original songs.

34:14 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah, we wrote them all. Bill Donnelly, who's who we've worked with, you know, for ages, you know, who's always been our, you know, producer and engineer, he, he was instrumental in helping us get, get the live drums up to speed at home to be able to record those, you know, and that was the biggest challenge.

34:36 - Multiple Speakers 
That was that was the that was the key to everything because once you can once you're once you can, I mean, you don't even have to do live drums anymore.

34:45 - Shawn Moynihan 
But we do because because we would we would, you know, in most cases, we would prefer to write. So once we got that up and rolling, that was sort of the fulcrum for, you know, for all the rest of it.

34:57 - Alan 
Yeah. Followed after that.

34:59 - Debra LaMotta 
Who laid out the sequence of songs on the album? That was Shawn.

35:04 - Alan 
Shawn makes up our set lists, and he made out the track listing for the album. I let him do it, and I said, this is right in your wheelhouse. You do it. And I didn't ask to change anything. He presented the 12 songs. I said, that's great. Let's do it.

35:27 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, because I don't think everybody's, yeah, I don't think everybody's aware that there's a process for that, the way you, you know, put, you know, lay those tracks down and where they fall on the album.

35:41 - Shawn Moynihan 
So, wow. Yeah. A good, a good running order makes an album, you know, and conversely, you know, a subsequent, yeah, it can, it can, it can ruin it.

35:52 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah. So, yeah, absolutely. Great job. Wow. Absolutely. All right. So last year, 2024. Can't believe we're 2025. Oh, my gosh. You had three singles, right? We did. Yeah, we did.

36:06 - Alan 
Yep. Let me tell let me tell them what they are.

36:12 - Multiple Speakers 
It's my turn. Remastered. It's Christmas time.

36:15 - Debra LaMotta 
All right. The girls in love. What are you waiting for? Three awesome songs. Oh, my gosh.

36:24 - Debra LaMotta 
Thank you very much. Yeah.

36:26 - Alan 
So 2022 was the album, two years and then three singles out in 2024.

36:32 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, we kind of thought that we weren't looking to make another album.

36:37 - Alan 
We have songs, we have plenty of songs, but an album takes a long time and you put 12 songs out there in an album format and two or three sort of pushed out there as singles, they get some attention, and the other songs kind of fall by the wayside to some degree. So we decided, both of us, that let's do singles, and each track can have its own spotlight. So that was sort of the impetus behind starting to release singles last year.

37:11 - Multiple Speakers 
Is that your first Christmas song that you had recorded?

37:14 - Alan 
Yeah, we had recorded that actually a few years ago, but, you know, with modern technology and streaming and all of that. You know, when you take an old recording and you put it out again, you remaster it, get a chance to sort of polish it up, make it sound even better. So we thought after the first two singles and we'd gotten some attention from those, we thought it'd be a great opportunity. So let's get that Christmas song out there again and show people that side of us as well. Yeah, that was great.

37:45 - Debra LaMotta 
It was a great way to end the year. Absolutely. And the girls in love. When did that come out?

37:52 - Shawn Moynihan 
That was that was December. Yeah, it was. Yeah, it was about fall. Yeah, that was early fall.

37:59 - Debra LaMotta 
And what are you waiting for?

38:01 - Shawn Moynihan 
It came out in May. May was May.

38:04 - Debra LaMotta 
So you had your spring, your fall and your winter. Yes.

38:08 - Unidentified Speaker 
Yes.

38:09 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah. It's nice being able to control all our own release schedule.

38:13 - Multiple Speakers 
Right. You know, it is. And is that one of the things because I'm sure there's so many things that you like, you know, aspects of being an indie artist is is that one of like your top things being able to control and and decide

38:28 - Debra LaMotta 
when, where, how, what you're going to do when you're going to release it being an indie artist versus being on a label?

38:36 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah, listen, we have no you know, we have no problem with you know, being assigned artists. If somebody's interested and they come to us with the right terms and the right stacks of cash, yes, absolutely. But for the time being, yeah, I mean, it gives you an enormous amount of creative freedom to, you know, decide, you know, what songs are gonna come out next and what you're gonna record next. And, you know, like this year we have, you know, a bunch of, you know, really, really strong new songs in the pipeline, you know, that we're really excited about, you know, getting out this year. So yeah, it's, you know, it's so exciting to be, you know, to, and you can come up with a brand new song and go, Okay, yeah, this is this, this is this smokes, let's let's finish recording this.

39:30 - Unidentified Speaker 
And we'll make this the next single.

39:33 - Shawn Moynihan 
You know, that's another advantage of putting out a one song at a time, because each, you know, each one, to Alan's point, gets its chance to, you know, breathe. Right. Gets a chance to catch on, you know, before we even put the next one out. And then you can pick up that momentum.

39:51 - Debra LaMotta 
So before, you know, you can have that span in between. So you can market the one song, give it all its glory and really market it to the best that you're able to before the next single comes out. So, you know, I I like it that way. I know there are other indie artists. I will do one a month, which is there's nothing wrong with that. But I kind of like the space in between. And then you get excited and you're waiting for the next one to come out, because then I've been you know, we were all waiting for the new one for 2025 radio silence. Right.

40:26 - Alan 
January 30th, it came out. Oh, my God.

40:29 - Debra LaMotta 
It just gets better and better and better.

40:31 - Alan 
Thank you. Yeah, so did you collaborate on the writing for this song? Yeah, like all our songs, they're all collaborations. I mean, Shawn and I, for the most part, we'll write like the Beatles used to call it, eyeball to eyeball, where we're sitting across each other with guitars, just basically looking right at each other and coming up with chords, coming up with music, coming up with lyrics. But yeah, this is Radio Silence, the new single. Is another collaboration. Shawn handled, I think, pretty much all the lyrics on that, and actually came up with the intro riff that got the whole thing kicking off. So, yeah.

41:12 - Shawn Moynihan 
Which is rare, which is, which, believe me. Really? Is not, is not our normal, because Alan's, listen, I know my role, you know, as a guitar player, I know my role in this band, and it is to support Alan in every way I can. Like, coming up with the riff for this, I was like, yeah, what do you think?

41:34 - Multiple Speakers 
And he was like, yeah, great. Oh my God.

41:37 - Alan 
Absolutely. And I could hear exactly where the song was wanting to go. When he played that riff, I was like, I could totally picture where the song was going. And it didn't take us very long to write it, from what I remember.

41:50 - Shawn Moynihan 
But it's a rocker.

41:52 - Alan 
It's definitely a rocker. It is. It is.

41:54 - Debra LaMotta 
that beginning, that intro.

41:56 - Alan 
And our friend Lou Iacobelli, who drums on pretty much everything that we do, with the exception of a couple of songs that Shawn drums on. He does a fantastic job drumming on this track. He's really something special. Yes, absolutely. He has a special quality to it.

42:16 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, yeah. I happen to like a good drummer and definitely that was a great song. So what a little, little background of that song, though, tell us where, what you were thinking what you were talking about?

42:32 - Shawn Moynihan 
Well, we, you know, despite the fact that, you know, perhaps we're best maybe best known, you know, as a, you know, as a, you know, indie power pop band with a lot of, you know, radio ready stuff, we we write for for the song itself. Right. And as Alan said, you know, the song tells you where it's going. Right. And what it what it wants to say. And this was one of those cases where, you know, we had something that was that was uptempo and heavier. And we and we and we both love that stuff, you know. Anyway, so we just embraced it and said, OK, let's come up with a, you know, a really strong, catchy sing-along chorus to sort of give it wings because it, you know, because it needs that. Any song that we come out with, you know, needs that.

43:34 - Debra LaMotta 
It needs the big, it needs the hook.

43:38 - Shawn Moynihan 
Because that's what we, again, that's what we want to hear. So when we, and it's funny because we, when we wrote the song, that chorus went through a couple of different iterations before we hit on, you know, what ultimately came to be the final hook. And we recorded the whole song before we went in and wrote the lyrics and did the vocal.

44:02 - Debra LaMotta 
Really? Yeah.

44:03 - Shawn Moynihan 
So we sort of did it in reverse, like the whole song was written and ready to go. I mean, we had like the melody, but we didn't know exactly what it was going to be until the 11th hour. And we said, oh, OK. And we hit on it. And, you know, you tried you tried, you know, different approaches. You know, Brian Adams said I said in in an interview with American Songwriter magazine years ago is one of my favorite quotes. He said he gave this incredible advice. He said, don't be precious with your ideas.

44:39 - Debra LaMotta 
Wow.

44:40 - Shawn Moynihan 
And we're not afraid to, like, you know, take stuff apart and rewrite it and, you know, completely change the chorus or whatever so that it, that it, you know, maximizes the impact, you know, of the song. And this was one of those, you know, where, like I said, we hit we hit on it, we hit on the, the, we wrote the wrote the lyrics and wrote the chorus like last. It's crazy.

45:06 - Alan 
Yeah, you know, that's, that's part of, that's part of the craft of it, you know, And the initial burst of it is the inspiration part.

45:15 - Debra LaMotta 
And then the rest of it is the craft part of it.

45:19 - Multiple Speakers 
It's like having that block of marble and you're taking your hammer and your chisel and you've got to work at it before you get that statue.

45:29 - Debra LaMotta 
But the initial bit, like I said, is the inspiration.

45:32 - Alan 
But it takes a lot more than that. You have to go way beyond the inspiration to get that finished product.

45:40 - Debra LaMotta 
that you're looking for. And you certainly did that with Radio Silence, and you two are so fine-tuned to each other, like you've almost become one, it sounds like, when you're working together. Yeah, you know? I mean, I don't know how many other duos are, you know, how, you know, their process is, but, you know, speaking with you two tonight, it's like you two, I mean, even in this conversation, you just kind of flow so nicely, because it doesn't always happen that way.

46:09 - Alan 
Thank you, you know, we take a lot of pride in in our vocal interplay and We are really proud of the fact that our vocals sort of really complement each other So even even on that level There is a sort of a symbiotic thing going on there But yeah, thank you for noticing.

46:31 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. One question that I like to ask is What advice would you give? Of a indie artist just starting out in the business these days.

46:46 - Multiple Speakers 
Besides become a bass player?

46:49 - Shawn Moynihan 
Come up with a hook or something different that makes you unique as an artist instead of being like two white dudes from Staten Island.

47:06 - Debra LaMotta 
who never had anything weird about us.

47:10 - Multiple Speakers 
We'd lose in Battle of the Bands all the time because we weren't like two bald guys playing trumpets. Am I right?

47:23 - Alan 
That's a true story.

47:25 - Multiple Speakers 
Yeah, and that's a true story. No, I would say, in all seriousness, I would say don't be afraid to be authentic.

47:37 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah. You know, like, because, because if you have, for better or worse, if you're authentic, in your, in your approach, in how you present yourself on stage, how you write songs, like, you know, not everybody has to get it. No, no, like you could you could carve out a niche, you know, for yourself doing, you know, to doing your own thing. My son is way into Frank Zappa. My 15 year old son is like way into Frank Zappa right now.

48:13 - Debra LaMotta 
That's crazy.

48:14 - Multiple Speakers 
Which is so awesome because it just goes to show that like, you know, who's more unique than Zappa, right?

48:23 - Shawn Moynihan 
Over how many decades and people and it still resonates, you know, with, you know, with all audiences.

48:31 - Unidentified Speaker 
Absolutely.

48:31 - Shawn Moynihan 
Each audience might grant you grant you, you know, it's not, you're not going to play that kind of music in a stadium. But, you know, be like, just do your own thing, do your own thing.

48:44 - Multiple Speakers 
And, you know, just give it everything, everything you have. I like that.

48:48 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, that's really true.

48:49 - Alan 
Just be the best you that you can be. You don't have we don't need, you know, another whoever name an artist here, we already have them be the best you that you can be, and you'll find your audience.

49:03 - Multiple Speakers 
And I think also, you know, playing off of that, like, find your own sound. You know, don't try to play the guitar like Eddie Van Halen or the trumpet like Louis Armstrong.

49:14 - Alan 
Find your own sound, something that when people hear you, they know it's you. Because that's probably the highest compliment that I think any musician would want to hear is as soon as you hear one note by B.B. King, you know it's B.B.

49:30 - Multiple Speakers 
King. So aim for that.

49:32 - Alan 
Aim for that identifiable sound.

49:34 - Debra LaMotta 
I like it. I like both of you. I like the advice because the younger generation definitely need some advice.

49:42 - Multiple Speakers 
I mean, when you hear our music, for better or worse, it sounds like us.

49:48 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah, it is you.

49:50 - Debra LaMotta 
Right. We have our own sound.

49:52 - Multiple Speakers 
Yeah, absolutely.

49:53 - Shawn Moynihan 
When you hear us, you know it's us.

49:57 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, yep. It's that rock and roll is fun again.

50:00 - Shawn Moynihan 
We don't we don't try to, you know, our influences are, you know, I like to think are pretty, you know, pretty obvious, you know, get into the DNA of it, right? Right. But, you know, we don't sound like, you know, you sound like you, but it goes, because then you go through those phases of your own right now of your own, you know, development, where you first emulate your favorite singers or your favorite drummers or your favorite guitar players. And then after a while, hopefully, you sort of- You have to shed that.

50:40 - Alan 
Shed that skin, right.

50:42 - Shawn Moynihan 
And develop your own approach and your own sound.

50:46 - Debra LaMotta 
And it takes time. It takes time. I know the younger artists or whomever's coming into being an indie artist at this time. I know that it's a very frustrating business these days at present with all that is that goes on with streaming and numbers and what have you. And they, you know, they just have to just keep going. Don't quit. Don't give up. Maybe take a step back if you need to. But, you know, you guys, didn't get to where you were overnight. Like, you know, love it.

51:24 - Shawn Moynihan 
You know, yeah. Embrace the love of playing, you know, and just just keep just do it and get it if you're if you're young, and you're playing an instrument, like the best way to get better is to get into a band.

51:38 - Debra LaMotta 
Yeah, absolutely. Right. Bring bring your bass.

51:40 - Alan 
You're good. Exactly. Yeah, bass player keeps coming back to that.

51:43 - Shawn Moynihan 
But yeah, you have you have to love it.

51:46 - Multiple Speakers 
That's what keeps us going. And that was that's what keep anybody going.

51:51 - Alan 
Absolutely. Do it for the love of it first.

51:54 - Debra LaMotta 
That's right.

51:54 - Shawn Moynihan 
We love doing it. Right. I mean, and I and you know, I, you know, at the risk of sounding how it's going to sound, I think that shows.

52:05 - Debra LaMotta 
Absolutely. Absolutely. So what's coming up in twenty twenty five? You've got some new things you're working on to release anything you can talk about dates or anything.

52:15 - Alan 
We have a lyric video that's coming out Radio Silence very soon. And so yeah, that'll be out soon. We've got a couple of more singles that are in the works right now that'll carry us probably into the summer. And we're currently recording other music. So we've got singles that'll be coming out over the course of the rest of the year and beyond, actually. Oh, good.

52:38 - Unidentified Speaker 
Yeah.

52:39 - Debra LaMotta 
Lots of music in the pipeline. Yeah. Oh, cool.

52:42 - Shawn Moynihan 
It's all different, too. It's all different kinds of songs, too.

52:46 - Debra LaMotta 
Oh, cool. Live gigs up there in Staten Island? Correct. Yes, we do.

52:51 - Multiple Speakers 
Yeah. So we will be doing some shows.

52:55 - Alan 
You can catch the dates and everything on our Facebook page or Instagram.

53:00 - Multiple Speakers 
And where can they find you? What's your handles on Facebook and Instagram?

53:06 - Alan 
Instagram is Brother Dynamite Music and Facebook is just Brother Dynamite.

53:10 - Shawn Moynihan 
Awesome.

53:11 - Debra LaMotta 
You guys are so great. Thank you so much. I really enjoy speaking with you. And excuse me, we've had a few conversations before tonight. But thank you so much for doing the interview and sharing your journey journey with everybody. Is there anything you'd like to share that I haven't touched on? You guys haven't touched on? I haven't asked? No, thank you.

53:33 - Shawn Moynihan 
Yeah, it's such a such a wonderful opportunity to get to, you know, get to come on and, you know, talk about talk with you about what we do. And hopefully and what we love.

53:44 - Alan 
Good. Cool. Very, very cool.

53:46 - Multiple Speakers 
We appreciate it.

53:47 - Debra LaMotta 
All right. Well, thank you guys. Thank you both, Shawn and Alan. Brother Dynamite, please go check them out on their Facebook, Instagram. You can find them on Bandcamp where you can purchase their singles and the album. Oh, are you working on another album?

54:03 - Alan 
Right now we're doing singles. Just singles.

54:05 - Debra LaMotta 
Okay. We're not ruling it out. Okay. We never rule it out. Stay tuned. All right, guys. Have a great evening.

54:13 - Alan 
Thank you, Deb. Thanks, Deb. Okay. Well, thanks, guys.