Appearing as a guest on popular long running radio show Breakfast With The Beatles, Bayonets lead singer and guitarist Brian Ray discussed the formation of his new indie band as well as some of his greatest musical influences.
Speaking to host Ken Dashow, Brian was quick to sing the praises of band-mate and Bayonets co-founder: “The Bayonets was started by my friend Oliver Leiber, the son of Jerry Leiber or Leiber and Stroller fame. His father famously wrote Jailhouse Rock, The Boardwalk, Hound Dog, Poison Ivy, Stand By Me…Anyway, the apple didn’t fall far from the talent tree with Oliver, and he’s been my favourite collaborator and best friend for some twenty years now.
“When it came time to write some more solo music of mine, Oliver said ‘why don’t we do a band instead?’ And I said ‘great, okay let’s go!’ Then of course three months of bad band names floated around. We had some good ones, some bad ones and some nasty ones!”
While Brian and Oliver are the brains behind The Bayonets, Brian recognizes that without a little help of his musical friends none of it would have been possible. “It’s Oliver and I and a revolving cast of characters, including but not limited to Lucrecia Lopez Sanz from Buenos Aires band Nube 9, Adam MacDougall from the Black Crows on keys, we have Davey Faragher from Elvis Costello’s band, Scott Shriner from Wheezer, and it’s just a lot of fun. It’s raw, it’s rock and roll, but it still has a pop hook sort of sensibility.”
Growing up in California, Brian picked up the guitar at an early age and was incredibly influenced by the abundance of legendary guitarists that were blasting from the radio at the time. “When I was a kid the guitar heroes of the day then were Scotty Moore, it was Dick Dale a little later, it was Duane Eddy the king of twang, and Eddie Cochran and guys like Link Wray. They were these maverick, kind of scary, bad sounding guys! They sounded like they were bad men, you know! And it was a visual to me too, because we didn’t really see theses guys, we made up these lives in our minds. So I wanted to bring back some of the earliest guitar heroes in a modern sort of raw rock way.”
The Bayonets’ first two singles Sucker For Love and Smartphone are available as a MP3 downloads to purchase from www.thebayonets.com and www.brianray.com. They can also be found on iTunes, Spotify and anywhere else where digital music downloads are sold.
You can also head over to The Bayonets’ Wikipedia page and find out more about the band and hear the full interview with Brian on Breakfast With The Beatles here!
Josh Gill 