Show Flyer

There is going to be a HUGE show on November 13th at Giovane’s Restaurant in Salinas. At MC Cambio’s CD release show, you’ll get to see not only Mr. Cambio himself, but the entire Para La Gente crew, including Bocafloja, straight out of Mexico City, and vocalist Shannon Michele! Realization will also be there along with DJ Mike J (spinning soul and funk) and special guests.

It’s an 18 and over show, and will cost only $7 for entrance.

Location:

Giovane’s Pizza
348 San Juan Grade Road
Salinas, CA
(831) 444-6717

John "Broadway" Tucker

Treat yourself to some fantastic blues! John “Broadway” Tucker, the 2006 Monterey Blues Festival Artist of the Year, and his 7 piece Broadway Blues Band will knock your socks off! John Tucker will be playing this Saturday, October 3rd, with the Broadway Blues Band at Giovane’s Restaurant in Salinas. Dinner will be served from 5-9pm, and the music starts at 9pm. You can check out the late night menu as well from 9pm to 12:30am. The cover charge for this show is $5!

Giovane’s Restaurant
348 San Juan Grade Road
(831) 444-6717

Rock Out at Giovane's!

Come see Calijuana and special guests Low Budget perform live at Giovane’s in Salinas.

The show is only $5! It will be on Friday, September 4th from 8:30 – 11:30pm. Click here to go to Calijuana’s MySpace page!

Giovane’s
348 San Juan Grade Road
Salinas, California 93906
(831) 444 – 6717

Photo Credit – StockVault.net

Travis Larson and Pleatherface

We did the impossible and brought together two bands that, well, really don’t have much in common, at least when it comes to looks. Pleatherface is a local one man, plastic-leather mask-wearing musician that brings metal music to the stage, and The Travis Larson Band is a group of extremely talented and nationally acclaimed musicians who play mellow to high end rock music. We brought them all together at Giovane’s Restaurant before the big show, here’s what they had to say.

Participating:
Mike Rodriguez, Owner of SalinasRadio.com
Travis Larson, Guitarist for The Travis Larson Band
Jennifer Young, Bassist for The Travis Larson Band
Pleatherface, as himself.

Mike: So tell me about your bands names, what does Pleatherface mean?

Pleatherface: It means… plastic leather… glued to your face.

Jennifer Young and Dale Moon

Travis: As opposed to fine Corinthian leather.

Mike: And what about the Travis Larson Band?

Travis: After years of playing, I was the only constant musician in the band. Since I was here since the beginning, we just kinda had to have it my way.

Jennifer: We’ve been the TLB since birth, that’s the band.

Mike: Who are some of your inspirations? Who inspired you to start the band?

Pleatherface: Jimi Hendrix, Bach, and Danny Gunton.

Travis: Jeff Bech is what got me to start playing. Steve Morris later on, he plays with Deep Purple. Rush is a HUGE inspiration.

Pleatherface: Rush is great. My step dad made me memorize every Rush lyric…

Jennifer and Travis, Rocking Out!

Mike: How long have you been together as a band?

Travis: We just released our ten year anniversary DVD and Double Live CD. So we’ve been together for 10 years.

Pleatherface: Pleatherface was born two years ago. At our CD release, Travis headlined and it was great.

Mike: So how did you start playing music?

Pleatherface: I used to dream of trying to play the guitar. One day, I was walking home from school, I walked by the bus stop, and in the bushes, I found a lamp. I wished that I could play guitar, and then I learned how. I sacrificed a lot to do what I do.

Travis: When I was five, I first heard of Jeff Bech. I have been playing music since I was ten, playing piano. Typical story, my parents had a piano, got me to do lessons, but when I got to high school, I realized a guitar was a lot easier to carry around. I liked to stand out and be noticed, I was a shy kid.

Pleatherface on Stage

Mike: Do you have to honor any brand loyalty with your instruments? Or are you endorsed by any company?

Travis: We’ve got an endorsement deal, Jennifer and I play Ernie Ball exclusively. We’ve been playing Ernie Ball for about eight or nine years.

Pleatherface: I like Gibson for live stuff, but I love all kinds of instruments, I am not yet endorsed.

Mike: What are some of your favorite places to play?

Pleatherface: Good question, a great spot is the Lounge Underground in Monterey and Giovane’s in Salinas of course. The Lava Lounge was a great place for locals to showcase their skills too. I look forward to all venues. I plan to play every venue in California. I have a list of 110 venues so far around California that I plan to play at.

Travis: We’ve played all over the country, everything from crowds of 15 people, to 15,o00 people. It’s not the venues, it’s the people. If we have a great crowd, then we’ve had a great show.

Dale Moon on his AMAZING Drum Set

Mike: What songs do you play the most?

Pleatherface: Purple Kool-Aid. We’re not endorsed by Kool-Aid either. It was inspired by the Jim Jones tragedy, where everyone drank purple Kool-Aid…

Jennifer: [What songs do we play the most?] The good ones.

Travis: We play a little from every album. We have five albums over a decade, so we try to play all of our favorites from each album, and we promote our newest one, of course.

Jennifer: … The good ones.

Mike: Do you play any covers?

Travis: We do two covers, Georgia on my Mind, with Victor Wharton, he was the best bass player five times in a row in Bass Player Magazine. he can’t even enter the competition any more. We also play People Get Ready by Curtis Mayfield, recorded with Steve Lucither. He’s a Grammy award winning musician.

Pleatherface: What was the Grammy for?

Travis Larson, deep in his guitar solo.

Travis: He won the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award for his album with Larry Carlton.

Mike: Who writes your songs?

Pleatherface: I write all my stuff. The last album, all the instruments were played by me except for the drums.

Travis: I write all the stuff, but the band arranges it. They are all great musicians, and add their own stamp to everything I write.

Mike: Are you part of a record label?

Travis: We are on Precision Records.

Pleatherface: I’m with Knife Records.

Mike: Are there any shows coming up?

Travis: We’re playing at Woody’s tomorrow in Monterey. (8-22-09) And we’re doing the UFO Tour as well in October.

Mike: How has your band progressed and evolved since you first started?

Pleatherface: Well, I’ve been playing more mellow music lately, as opposed to the first stuff which was really hard. There will even be some piano stuff on the next album.

Travis: I won’t say we’ve gotten better, but we’ve gotten more diverse over the years, much more polished as musicians.

Jennifer: And grumpier!

Mike: Where can fans find your music and purchase your CD’s?

Pleatherface: Well most listen to me and support me because I am strange and instrumental, you can find Pleatherface music on Pleatherface.com and listen to us on MySpace and YouTube.

Travis: They can listen in and buy our CD’s on our website, TravisLarsonBand.com, and on our MySpace. Our fans are a wide range of diverse people, from teens to…

Jennifer: … to retirees!

Travis: … to people inn their 70′s and 80′s…

Jennifer: … people who like to hear the GOOD songs. And I like to finish your sentences. Good music speaks to a large number of people.

Mike: Is there anyone you would like to thank?

Pleatherface: I’ve been listening to the Travis Larson Band since 1999, I saw them at the Monterey Rock and Arts Festival…

Travis: Which is now defunct…

Pleatherface: The Travis Larson Band inspired me to be a better musician and a better person.

Travis: Pleatherface is all too kind.

Mike: Any last words?

Pleatherface: Thank you for this interview.

Travis: Keep supporting local and live music!

Pleatherface: Definitely support live music! And get the kids to put down Guitar Hero and play real guitar!

Jennifer: I like doughnuts!

Mike: Thank you for taking the time to do this interview for us, it was fun.

Omani

Our very own featured artist, Omani, will be playing live at Giovane’s Restaurant on Saturday, August 22, 2009 along with Reality Sound International selector DJ Daddy Spleece. The cover charge is only $7 at the door. The first 50 people in get a FREE OMANI CD! That’s right, $7, and you’ll get to see a great show with an awesome DJ, and on top of it, get an Omani CD absolutely free. The show is for ages 21 and over and starts at 9pm. Great food, beer, and wine will be available.

“OMANI is a five piece reggae band hailing from Salinas Valley and the Monterey Bay Area in the central coast region of California, bringing deep hypnotic grooves and satisfying positive vibes. Blending new and traditional interpretations inspired from an array of musical genres, but presented with a decidedly west coast roots reggae sound.” – OmaniBand.com

Giovane’s
348 San Juan Grade Road
Salinas, California 93906
(831) 444 – 6717

Travis Larson Band

Happening THIS FRIDAY at Giovane’s Resturaunt in Salinas, CA. The Travis Larson Band and Pleatherface will be playing live! These two bands will raise the bar for Salinas and Giovane’s. Please support the venue. Drink specials, great food, and you don’t have to drive far to see a GREAT show! Hopefully we’ll get both bands permission to get them up on the air on SalinasRadio.com for your continued rocking.

There is a $5 cover, this show is for ages 21 and over.

Giovane’s
348 San Juan Grade Road
Salinas, California 93906
(831) 444 – 6717

Here are a few press quotes about The Travis Larson Band:

“…unquestionably a guitar lover’s dream, this dynamic power trio offers much more than the dime-a-dozen Berklee educated wankers vying to dethrone Joe Satriani...”
-Sea of Tranquility

“…this band has all the chops and blazing technique to send all you wannabe shredders back to the woodshed, but what makes them stand so far apart from their peers is the SONGS…”
-Foundrymusic.com

“Think of a musical stew mixing a thick brown Rush gravy with big hearty chunks of Steve Morse and a dash of Jeff Beck…I haven’t been this impressed since the pairing of nitro and glycerin…”
-Ray Sansom

“…a smoking instrumental power trio…With tons of technique to burn…”
-Expose Magazine

Robert Plant*

We got to sit down with Robert Plant (Jeffery James) of “Hearbreaker,” a Led Zeppelin tribute band at Giovane’s Italian Restaurant. Here’s what he had to say.

Why “Heartbreaker?”

We decided Heartbreaker because it’s a Led Zeppelin song off their second album and has good kick to it, good name, good 80s name, it’s just a great name for an 80’s band.

Were you always Heartbreaker? Or did you have other names?

Originally we had, the band was called “Song Remains the Same,” but it was too long, so Heartbreaker, then when we did Heartbreaker we had to change it, because people were like,  “Is it a Pat Benetar tribute?” Its kind of a theatrical show, Led Zeppelin Live – Featuring Heartbreaker.

How long have you all known each other?

I know Stew, we’ve all known each other about 20 years, except our drummer, we have been with him for about 5 years, but we’ve all known each other for about 20, maybe longer. We were all kids in different bands together.

Jimmy Page*

When did you start playing?

This band formed in 99’, ten years ago, then we got a drummer in 03’, and ever since…

What inspired you to form your band?

We did the top 40 thing, and we didn’t wanna do “Brick House,” “Brown Eyed Girl,”… we wanted to be challenged, and do the most challenging band, so I started finding the members, Stu is our third guitarist, Marcus is the 2^nd bassist… the other (our first) members couldn’t hack it.

Where are some of your favorite places to perform?

We’ve played Lake Tahoe, Esqua Valley, that was great, The Civic Center in Thousand Oaks, The Caribbean, The Hard Rock Café in Santa Domingo, Trinidad, The Caribbeans is a fun place, Road Island, and our next shows in Tennessee, and Memphis this September… Alaska… everywhere!

What songs do you play most?

There’s a group of songs that people EXPECT to hear… Stairway to Heaven, Rock and Roll, Kashmir… etc.

What shows do you have coming up that you really want people to know about?

We are going to be in Memphis for Delta Music Festival, that should be fun.

How have you progressed since you first started?

We’ve gotten a lot better, it took 2-3 years to really learn to sing this stuff, I learned to sing the high notes without blowing my voice out, it took 3-4 years to really get it right. We added the higher songs like “Misty Mountain,” “Black Dog,” I sing all high notes, I don’t cheat, haha. It took time to learn how to do that,  I definitely didn’t learn overnight.

Where can your fans listen to your music?

ZeppelinTribute.com, we have live videos and everything.

Are you local to the area?

Were from San Francisco, but basically all around the Bay Area. (Central California Coast)

Any last words?

Were all live, no sequencing. Keyboards, vocal harmonies, we take all the high notes, we don’t cheat, we don’t screw up any parts, we play like the record, from the keyboard solo, to Stairway to Heaven, everything is done as close as possible, as true as we possibly can, between the live and album version.

We’re not here to be famous, I don’t even use my real name, it’s about the people, I don’t want people to know it’s not Led Zeppelin, I don’t want to ruin the illusion, it’s not about people knowing who I am, I want people to see Robert Plant, not Jeff Larson.

* – Or is it?

Heartbreaker, Led Zeppelin Tribute Band

A night of Led Zeppelin and Classic Rock!

Led Zeppelin LIVE starring Heartbreaker w/ Opener AUGUST SKY at Giovane’s in Salinas!

8pm – Midnight! Maybe later!

$15 Doors at 8 PM

FOR ALL YOU ZEP FANS, THIS NIGHT IS FOR YOU!

This show is ALL AGES!

Also, SalinasRadio.com will be featuring August Sky and their new album, “That’s Rock & Roll” featuring all original classic rock on the air!

Moni Lujan

We were able to grab Moni Lujan of Dub Wize for a quick interview at Giovane’s in Salinas before their show tonight, here’s what he had to say.

What exactly does DubWize mean and where did it come from?

Dub Wize is a style of Reggae Music, Dub Music is the style, its pretty much back in the day in Jamaica, the engineers would get into the music, add effects, add reverb, take the vocals out, its all about drum and bass, that’s the rhythm in a Dub band, Dub Wize, we’re wise of the dub, but we mix it up with a lot of flavor,  Latin flavor is one that we bring in a lot. We mix it up a lot.

Have you ever changed the bands name before, or was DubWize your first and only choice?

Dub Wize was our first and only choice.

Who are your major influences?

We have a big range, of course Bob Marley, Bunny and Peter, Steel Pulse, Roots Raddicts, and also Bayanga which is a Latin band, and Skatalites. We have a horn section and like to bring that sound, the horns are crucial to what we do.

How long have you all known eachother? How did you all meet?

This is our tenth year, most of us from high school, drummers always been around backing us up since we were youngsters, basically everyone is from our neighborhood.

When did you form your band?

We formed around 97 and 98, that’s when we first formed up.

What inspired you to make music together?

Just reggae music in general was our inspiration, we used to go to concerts, and we just knew what we wanted to do, what we wanted to play and what we wanted to be, it influenced us a lot in our life and keeps us on the righteous path.

What can you tell me about your instruments? Are you subject to brand or store loyalty, or do you buy them based on price or looks?

Its a persona preference to each musician, each person has their own setup and gets what they like. I prefer Steinburger bass guitars, its the best for reggae music, Korg and Rolland keyboards, that’s the style we like to use. We’ve got a trumpet and a sax player, sometimes trombone, but we usually keep it as just two, its a good blend. We have Skinner who plays melodica, which is a key part of our band, its a big part of dub music in general. The originator was Agustus Pablo, definitely a big one of our influences.

What are some of your favorite places to perform? Largest?

Some of the largest has been the Koral Amphitheater, Ventura Mystic Theater, The Catalyst, we’ve headlined The Catalyst 7 times, and Avalon Ballroom in San Fransisco, we did that. The Ventura Theatre was probably the biggest one. We opened for most Reggae artists out there, Tony Rebel, Burning Spear, Culture, Isreal Vibrations, the Waiting Souls, there’s just so many, we’ve been on tour in Puerto Rico a few times, that’s always a good tour, lots of friends and good vibes there.

What songs do you play the most?

I’d say Father Freedom, In a Time Like This, Love, Two Hearts, Bring them Home, that’s what we usually play a lot.

Do you do any covers?

We add in a Bob Marley tune in one of our own songs, No Woman No Cry, we cover Barrington Levy, and Exodus.

Who writes your songs?

Lyrical, I write them all. Musically, we all work together. I do a chord progression and we all work on adding our own flavor to it.

Do you have a record label or are you a member of any music organizations?

I have my own im starting called Yard Stylee Records, http://myspace.com/yardstyleerecords

Any upcoming shows?

Yeah, we’ve got the Monterey Bay Reggae Festival, and on August 15th, The Community Arts Festival.

How has your music evolved since you first started?

When we first started we weren’t as good as we are now, but our music has definitely evolved in the dynamics area, when we first started we were really beginners, but after 5 years of playing together we developed a tight sound together and we keep going on that. Everyone in the band is definitely skilled.

How can fans-to-be gain access to your music? Do you have a CD?

We only have live CD’s and we have a demo with half live, half studio stuff, we usually give the demo out at concerts and sell it for 5 bucks, or you can check out music out on our MySpace or DubWizeMusic.com

Is there anyone you’d like to acknowledge for offering financial or emotional support?

Our fans, family and friends, they’ve always backed us up and stood by us, they are the kind of people that don’t wanna be on the guest list, and WANT to pay to get in, which really helps us out.

Any last words?

I wanna thank the fans and everyone for their input, and for responding to the email on what songs that they wanted to hear for this show, and for supporting us. I hope they can all make it out because tonights show is definitely for them. For sure.

Dub Wise/Giovane's Show Flyer

DUB WIZE will be at GIOVANES in Salinas! Entrance is $8.

This is local reggae at it’s BEST. You must be 18 and older to get in, and 21 or older to drink.

“Dubwize is a 6 piece Reggae / Dub band coming out of the Salinas Valley, Californias Central Coast. Dubwize is a well known and respected Reggae band, and has been around for 8 years, and is still going strong as one of the hardest working reggae bands in California, touring both northern and southern California and also the island of Puerto Rico. Dubwize original music is truly exciting. They bring deeply anchord rythums, lots of energy, conscious lyrics and creative freestyle dubs. With tight horn lines and sweet melodica melodies, Dubwize is sure to touch your heart, inspire you & keep you on your dancing feet. We hope to spread the message of love, peace and unity, to bring positive vibes to the people with creative and heart felt original music.” – Live En Vivo Magazine