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E15 CC of Little Hurricane - Give 'Em Hell

· Little Hurricane,CC Spina,Motivational,Inspiration,Band

Michaela:

Today I got to sit with CC from little hurricane band and aside from the fact that us reconnecting in the way that we did was incredibly synchronistic. She is a super inspirational woman. Not only is she a drummer, which is so awesome in a man's drumming world, but she also carried her child during their entire tour in her belly. She was pregnant for the entire time and she would walk out on stage up until 40 weeks and busted out on her drum kit. She is really amazing and she's had such an incredible journey through the music industry and such an inspirational message in the way of staying true to who you are and being your authentic self in spite of the pressures from everyone around you and really just defining who you are in the way that feels right. And I can't wait for you to hear her perspective. And she's our first musician, like real life musician on a podcast. So awesome. The music in this episode was provided by little hurricane. We chat about her song called give him help. Here you go.

Michaela:

I always have to turn Savannah up and me down and it's such a pain in post at it. I'm sure you deal with that sometimes. Tell me a little bit about who you are. Okay, so I go by CC, I am the drummer in the band little hurricane and I am also a mom. Yes, yes. And, um, I want to talk in the future, like as we get going about your new album that's coming out. But I feel like I would be remiss if I didn't at least reflect on like synchronicity and how crazy it is that you're sitting in front of me right now in the room with me. So I'm going to share this story for people because it's just totally crazy to me and I don't think we've even really talked about it aside from in the workshop. Yeah. So my brother-in-law Dan, he's a big music guy and so he's like, we've got to go see this band little hurricane, they're going to be playing in Orangeville at the poor walk.

Michaela:

So we go to your concert. And he was like, she's so awesome and this and that. And um, there was a starting band and you were hanging out in the like, just, you know, sitting at a table or whatever. And I was like, Dan, Dan, I'm like, Oh my goodness. She is, you know, he's so shut up. Just don't, don't say anything kind of a thing. And I went up and talked to you because you guys were from San Diego and I had recently moved up from San Diego. So, um, I think I just mentioned like, Oh, whereabouts in San Diego have you guys played and blah, blah, blah. I used to have this all girl band and we played at a couple of the same places that you guys had played at. And so fast forward and now all these years later and Matt and I started listening to you guys because you were awesome. I mean, it's so freaking good, like once and so he's dragged us to quite a few different, you know, shows and they've all been very good. But when you, I was like, Holy shit, she's the drummer. I mean it was amazing. I could not believe it. And just your talent and Anthony and his talent too. I mean, he was playing like seven different instruments. I mean, your sound was so full for just being the two of you and you guys were having such a good time. Oh, thank you. Yeah, I remember that show

CC Spina:

for a few reasons. I remembered, the reason I wasn't in the green room when I was hanging out was the green room was covered in ants and as I was sitting there on my Thursday, but it was a fun show. I think it was an all ages show. So I remember some younger kids being there. And then another random side note I remember from that show, a guy had come up to me before the show and he was like, Oh CC, you really lost some weight, huh? And I'm like, what? Cause I, I've been a pretty consistent white. And he's like, he used to be like this, you know, making your hands look big and now you're like this. And I was like, what? And so I called him out on stage and dedicated our song bad business to him. Like this is a guy who was commenting on my weight, like this is so not your businessman, but it was a fun chill, you know, I think that was the last show we played in the Sacramento area.

CC Spina:

It's been a long time since we've played out here. Wow. I, and it was such a great show. So where did you guys go after that? Where did your journey to take you guys? Like um, you know, on that particular tour, I'm sure we probably went up to Pacific Northwest cause that's usually the routing. Um, and we put out a few new records since then and we've gotten married and you know, settled down and we've left San Diego sadly. Um, but we never were really consistently in San Diego because we tour so often. So it would be like a combination of weed. You know, like when we first met, we had our apartments and when we went on our very first tour, we sold all of our belongings. Like I sold my bed, I saw all my shoes, I sold everything, we sold everything we owned and packed it up into a trailer and said we're going to go on tour.

CC Spina:

Which was kind of unheard of because we didn't even know what that meant. We just knew like we'd done well in San Diego and it's time to bring it on the road. And since then, so that was in 2010 at the end of 2010. So we've been on the road pretty consistently the past nine years. Wow. Um, and just writing new records and we, we just keep doing what we're doing. So one of the things I read, and I think it was like a rolling stone article or something like that, um, was that you guys, you guys were putting the music first. You didn't want to make it about your relationship. You guys were all about the sound and what you were going on there, but everybody was constantly asking you guys, are you dating? How, what was that like? Especially being in the music industry where, well, you know, when we first started working with management, we had like managers be like, you absolutely cannot tell anyone that you were a couple, which is really silly.

CC Spina:

Looking back I think we were a little more green then and guided by what they were saying. And I mean we had one manager that wanted to make it look like I was dating a baseball player and like just, which is really silly because it's not about that really. If, if we're together, what does that change the music. But it was kind of fun. We had this like secret undercover relationship that people didn't know about and we'd go out and tour and I'd meet girls in the audience that would be like, Oh, he's so cute, your guitar player. So cute. I could talk to him, you know, send them his way. And it was kind of fun for a few years that like it was our little secret and that we could really focus on the music. And during interviews if people asked about that, we would just simply brush it off and go back to like our new record.

CC Spina:

But after a while it's like, this is really silly. Our families were getting annoyed because they wanted to like post pictures on Facebook at Christmas when we're all together. And we'd be like, no, you know, it's a secret. Um, and so we didn't actually go public with our relationship till after we were married. Um, and most people kind of already knew, you know? But yeah. Um, but it's just part of our story and I think it's kind of a fun part because we were able to do that and still stay faithful to each other. And it's, you know, and it's, our relationship is different that we work together, we live together, we are together. When we tour together, it's like there is no time apart. Um, and that kind of gave us almost a little bit of space where it shows we could be separate and not feel like, you know, if he's talking to a girl or I'm talking to a guy, we know that that's just like, it's part of what we do.

CC Spina:

Wow. There's so many things that are coming to my mind as you're talking about that. Because I know from, um, living in San Diego and having friends that were, you know, in the music industry and things like that, it was really taboo to have a relationship and because they wanted to promote it as single so that you would get more listeners or they'd have some sex appeal or something. Yeah. And it was, and that's definitely like this Hollywood thing that was big for a long time. And I've even noticed more recently on Instagram, some of the big influencers and stuff they're doing acro yoga together or you know, their whole thing, their hashtag van life is traveling in a van together and now it doesn't seem to be so taboo. It seems people are saying, no, you're not going to tell me how to live my life.

CC Spina:

I want to be authentic to who I am. Um, and if you were authentic to who you were but it, how did that impact how you guys were on stage? Did you have to like were there times when you want it to be more flirty or huggy or something like that? You had to kind of, I don't think we really changed on stage. You want to connect, we look at each other laugh if we make a mistake or you know, like certain songs will be written about me or written about us and nobody really knew that. But I think that's cute. Watching the show. People could always sense that there was a chemistry and it is more authentic. So just be honest, you know, and debate who you are. And I don't think we ever were not like we didn't obviously have me dating a baseball player.

CC Spina:

Completely outrageous. Our friends and family knew. Um, and then it was really fun when we got to tell all of our fans to like, Oh by the way we just got married and you waited until you were married, which is, that's really special that you guys did it that way. How was, what was it like when you went on the tour, I mean, and then you were suddenly thrown into full time together, working together constantly. What was that like? It was really, for me it was really challenging. At first I was more introverted back then. I really didn't like, like I will be the kind of person that will be like the last to come to a party in the first to leave or I wouldn't like, um, spend the night like if you drink too much, you know, I'd find a way home. Like, I wouldn't want to just like crash on someone's couch.

CC Spina:

But the first tour that we did was, you know, I had sold my car and so that helped finance it. But we had thought with, we thought we were doing this thing called a slow tour is what we called it. So we did so well in San Diego over like six months that we're like, well, if we spend like a month in Seattle and the month in Portland and we just play like a bunch of shows and we can build it up to like a mini San Diego and then go to the next town. And like we had this whole idea of enjoying the town while we were there and like creating this following like kind of slowly and I knew nothing that there was, you know, radius clause. So if you go to Seattle and you book a show, well they're not going to want you to play another show within 30 days of that show.

CC Spina:

Oh wow. Because, you know, then that would take away from the show that you're playing. And I didn't also know that you can do really great in one town and try and go to a new town and they're going to say, Whoa, you haven't played here. It's going to be really hard to get a show. So it was, it was more challenging than we thought in that way. Um, and it was, it was hard, but it was really, it was still my favorite tour. When I look back, like, I mean, we'd stay, we, we finally set the standard that we wanted to stay in hotels with only indoor hallways because, you know, there was points where we were just crashing on someone's couch for like a week. And like what we ended up doing, we went up to Portland and Seattle and we rented a music recording studio during the week, like a nine to five when all the other bands were working.

CC Spina:

So we got it super cheap and we recorded our record on the road and we used our time that way. And we ended up, we did like San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, and we'd saved all our money to go down to a music festival in Austin called South by Southwest, which is, um, it's the biggest music festival in the U S because there's like tens of thousands of bands playing in Austin all at the same time. Austin is just kind of notorious for being a music hub even more than like Nashville or I think, yeah. And this particular festival, all of the music industry comes down to see, to find the new bands, you know. And so we thought like, well, if we can get ourselves to South by Southwest, then you know, we can really, we can make it. And we got ourselves there and I was doing our booking and we got denied by the festival.

CC Spina:

We were not allowed to play their official shows. And so I booked us, I think four or five shows over the week that we were there. And I had never been to Austin. I did not realize that those shows were not in the heart of the city and that nobody leaves the heart of the city. Like, you know, they're going where they can walk because every bookstore, every bar, every coffee shop has a band playing so you're not going to leave sixth street essentially. Um, and it was, it was hard. Like I felt like the smallest fish in the biggest possible seat, there was band with like full camera crews following them around and like, you know, like people just putting headphones on your head as you're walking down the street being like, listen to this record. Everybody's trying to be like, wow, get this opportunity.

CC Spina:

And at the time gas was over $5 a gallon. It was like, it took all of our money. We had exhausted all our funds just to get there. And we have this footage of me crying in our trailer. I'm drinking like McAllen 12 with this old bottle of scotch. Like we're paying our dues. And it was right before a show that we had played in the taco shop for when we started playing, there was a lady in her crying baby, they left and then there was no one and then the sound guy came. And so then there was one guy and then a couple of my friends came. Um, but that going there, we ended up, we all, our friends were there from San Diego. They're like, let's just go party and drink. There's all these free parties. And we're like, no, we're like out of money.

CC Spina:

We're not going to just give up. So we went to Kinko's and we printed these little flyers with our shows and we burned a bunch of CDs. And I went down on sixth street where everybody was, I had this captain's hat on and handing out CDs and just handing out our flyers. And we ended up in a witch, which for lunch. And I see these guys with the full itinerary and they look like industry guys. And so I walk up to them like, hi, I'm in a band called little hurricane and you probably won't make it to our shows, but at least look us up. We have some videos online and look us up. And you know, we left there with our heads hung so low, like what are we going to do now? And month later I got a call from a record label in New York and he said, I'm looking at your flyer.

CC Spina:

You handed it to her radio promotions guy and we want to fly you to New York for a showcase. And we flew to New York. We played with of monsters and men. It was their very first us show. They were brand new then and played for a huge record label. And you know, from there we got our attorney, we got our manager wouldn't, before we had even gotten on the plane ride home, we'd gotten an offer from Austin city limits. Um, from my dream agent that I had wanted, I'd been writing for months and she was like, I just heard of you guys from the showcase that you played. And so it worked out.

Michaela:

All started to unfold. As you're telling the story, I'm getting chills just thinking about one, your passion. It's like radiating off of you for what you do. And then second, the fact that you just didn't give up. You guys kept going. I mean hearing you say gas was $5 a gallon and we had no money and we're out. You know, I'm just like feeling that sense of loss that you must have felt like I can bury my head in the sand and just call it. But you didn't do that. You guys still just dug and found a way. And I mean those flyers are ultimately that Kinko's flyer is ultimately what got you there. And what a journey to get to that space to have the courage to just go walk up to a guy who sandwich shop and be like, listen to us please. You know that. I mean, I think for so many people, they see people doing it, they see people that have achieved the level of success and you think, Oh, they look at them. That's so easy. They made it. But they probably didn't. They probably had a very long journey that started with a lot of let downs.

CC Spina:

Yeah. Well, and that flyer was one of hundreds that we handed out and you know, eight years later we're still like fighting. We're still, you know, trying to be heard. And you know, like we, after that we did have like a full, like, month and a half where we didn't pay for lunch or dinner because we had all these managers and record labels just like descending upon us that everyone wanted to sign us and we, we thought, Oh wow. And then you think, Oh, this is it. This is like the big opportunity. Um, but for us, it, it really was, I mean, it was part of the story and we're still climbing, but it wasn't this huge, it was a huge shift that we decided, well, now we can, but this is our job. Like we can make money, we can do it this way.

CC Spina:

But the kind of record label deals we were offered were stuff where we'd have to sign away rights to our music for eternity in perpetuity. And we wouldn't do it. And I think because we were young but not that young, and we were green but not that green, like, um, we could have maybe picked an easier path towards fame, but not in my mind success. Um, so now, however many years later, we own all our records. Um, we do a lot on our own, but I think we're much more successful because we're not our kids. They're going to be the ones that inherit our and our songs and our catalog and we've maintained control. But it's not, um, it hasn't been the easiest path. You know what's interesting though, when you're saying that I think about people who probably took the easier path and S and sold out quote unquote.

CC Spina:

And what's sad about that is that then who they are gets redefined as well in the, in the light of the label or whatever. And not only that, but um, but I think that you lose some of, of your identity in that process. Like you're describing. It might've gotten us to fame faster, but at what cost? At what loss? And um, I think that's incredible that you guys are still so raw and still who you are. One of the, one of the comments that I read, Oh, and this was rolling stones. They said you were a bee witching beauty. And, and I totally agree with that. Like you just have this super, um, Bohemian spirit about you and, and I love that no record label defined you into like a pop star or a whatever they might've wanted to shift you into and you still are getting to radiate who you are.

CC Spina:

Yeah. Because we might not be abandoned anymore if we had gone that route, you know? Right. We've been able to, like, most bands don't last this long, especially new bands. Um, so I'm really proud of our path that we're on, but it's scary. It's definitely scary, but that makes it exciting. You know? So you could have had a one hit wonder or whatever and then petered out where here you've continued on the slow incline. Yeah. So what does that, um, so what does that look like for you? Oh, you know what? Before we go on that path. I want, I want to ask you about this because, um, so you toured the country you did Lollapalooza, and one of the things that you kind of talked about is that one of the only songs, and maybe now you have more that you sing on is give them hell and you in kind of light of being introverted and stuff, you didn't want to hear your voice and you didn't want to say, how did you overcome that?

CC Spina:

What was all, how, how are you doing that? Um, it's, it's still a challenge and I still sing on some songs. You know, I've sang on a few more, but, um, it's hard as a drummer, I tend to hold my breath when I play, which is the opposite of a good singer. And I was trained as a drummer from a kid on, I didn't play the piano unfortunately, or different things where I would have a sense of pitch. Um, but it's just a matter of like, this is my voice and it's not gonna be perfect, but you know, my husband loves it. And people that hear me sing say it's okay and you know, it's, it's definitely, I feel like you're most vulnerable when you're singing. At least I feel most vulnerable to be, you know, like trying to project my voice into a microphone and then it gets projected into huge speakers.

CC Spina:

I feel like at Lollapalooza, like thousands of people, it gets magnified and I just wanted to keep it so small because I felt so insecure about it. But that made it sound worse. You know? I'm just trying and just like pushing through that is better than trying to like somehow secretly hide that. Like for awhile I would try and hide like just sing really quiet or shy away from the mic or, but the, you know, it's my voice. It is what it is and love it or hate it. Like I've got to just accept that it's, it's part of me. It's interesting to me how many people squash their voice in so many ways. I know even for me, when I'm out of alignment with my true self, it's because I'm not speaking my truth. I mean, I know that's not singing, but you know, that withholding because of fear or, um, that you're afraid of how it's going to be received or judged or, or whatever.

CC Spina:

And, and, um, even the podcast has been a big learning curve for me on just saying it. And if somebody gets pissed off, Oh well, you know, kinda thing. How did you, how did you overcome it? How did you push through it? I think like listening to yourself on recordings helps. Um, you know, I think just with the more I did it, the more it's like, well I'm just going to keep doing it. And I, you know, I don't know if I've fully overcome it yet. Yeah. But it's, it's part of what we do. So I just, I feel like I kinda, I have to do it and I've always wanted people to be like, you should sing more instead of like, you should sing less. And so we just keep it like, you know, it's, it's not like constantly there. Cause my husband has such a beautiful voice and he S he played or some choir in high school and you know, he works as an audio engineer and very much understands pitch in tune.

CC Spina:

And when we first started recording, I would get in the vocal booth and he'd be like, well you're a little flat so try and sing higher. And I would just like raise my body higher. Like, is this helping? Like inevitably I'd end up in tears every time cause I'm like, I'm just, I don't know how to do it. Um, but I've found what's really helped me more than anything in recently is I understand notes. I understand the scale. I'm like, when I played the drums for me, uh, I wish that I could say it just like radiates out of my soul and I've just got this rhythm, but I don't, I need to map it out on paper and write out the beats written into music form. Wow. And if I can write my vocal parts and music form, even though I don't know what those notes are when they're landing on the scale, I can see where this one's higher than this one and this one's lower.

CC Spina:

And that's how my mind works in order to understand like, okay, this is how the melody goes. Because if I just hear it, I can't repeat it. But if I can see it and visualize it, that helps me tremendously. Yeah. Yeah. And he does have such a great voice too. He, he must be such a great mentor and a great coach. Yeah. You guys seem to make a really good team. Yeah, we balance each other out for all my lack of experience I had starting the band, he had a tremendous amount of experience. Like when we had met, I posted an ad on Craigslist and I was looking for a guitar player and I put this little video of me drumming and I got a bunch of really creepy, weird responses but didn't respond to any of them. I'm like, whatever. And he wrote again and he, my ad was kind of over the top that I'm looking for someone to be in the duo with and like, they have to have sex appeal.

CC Spina:

I want panties thrown on stage, like you gotta be good, you know. And then in his second response, he had said, like, Christina Aguilera kissed me on the cheek and Gwen Stefani, I don't know what, like with all these pop stars that he'd worked with, and I did not believe him at all for a second. I was like, whatever. And so I wrote him back like, okay, we'll come into this bar where I'm working and we'll, we'll see if you're telling the truth. And he was telling the truth. He's recorded a lot of really, really big artists and help them tune their vocals. And um, he worked for the Grammys for many years recording the live stream of the audio. And so he was an audio engineer before he joined the band. Wow. That's what he did and said, okay. So he worked out in LA a lot.

CC Spina:

But yeah, he would do like the big TV productions or he did the Coachella film when Coachella had a film or working in the audio trucks that are recording live audio. So he was really great at that and I had no idea like, and even when he told me that, I was like, what? How do you pay your bills? That's how I pay my bills. And like, people don't like make money off of music, like you're lying. But, um, I found out pretty quickly he was telling the truth and he's a pretty humble guy. So for him to say all that stuff, he was just really like, come on, I've got some experience. And um, it worked out because he thought I had an energy that was really fresh that like I wasn't like weathered and kind of just put off by the industry, which I wasn't because I didn't know how it worked. I'm a little more that way now. But, uh, it was a good balance where he kind of had experience knowing how things really work behind the scenes. And I had none. So it like, somehow it worked.

CC Spina:

I had cooked for many years. I went to culinary school and um, it was the wrong fit for me. I think I cooked for a total of seven or eight years in Chicago and San Diego. Um, and I'd finally gotten laid off from a cooking job in San Diego and I, that was it. I was like, I'm not going to go back to another kitchen cause I just didn't, for me the environment was all wrong. Like I hated working in kitchens. I love to cook, but it's a very hard job and it's high stress and not a lot of women and not a lot of gratitude and not a lot. It's just not for me. It always felt like I was working in a locker room, like just with a bunch of dudes talking about their sweaty balls and like I just, I would get mad and I would butt heads with the chef and I leave with my middle fingers up like F this place.

CC Spina:

I'm not, I'm done. And then I just go to the like restaurant down the street for another $10 an hour. Um, and I had gotten laid off from the Ivy hotel in San Diego, which at the time was like the biggest, fanciest, most expensive hotel. Yeah. And I was making I think $14 an hour and I was one of the top paid cooks. So they let me go and it was the best thing that could happen cause I'm like, okay, I'm going to not do that anymore. And so I went and I bartended, um, because I just didn't, I didn't know, I knew that bartenders made a lot more money than cooks. And so I went to bartending school and I got a job in North park and then that was what held me in that, from that job I was able to afford my electronic drum kit, which I had bought, um, to play at home just to see if I could still play.

CC Spina:

And then from there I posted the ad. So it was you played as a kid? Yeah, I played in school band. What age did you start drumming? I was 10. Wow. Okay. That's crazy. What a neat journey. My husband always says he wants to be a chef. Like, he's a really good cook, but he blows up the kitchen and I'm like, you would be fired. Like you can't make such a mess. He's like, no, I would have sous chefs. And until you get into the sous chef, you do have dishwashers. I do the same thing. My parents would hate when I cook at home because there's no dishwasher to come and grab your pots and pans and I've just make a mess. Literally a tornado. Like I don't know how he does it. There's flour in places that I should not have love. But he's really good.

CC Spina:

He, he's an incredible, incredible chef, incredible cook. And um, I think I sometimes think someday he'll probably have a restaurant. Like ultimately he's now a days, it's different. Like they didn't have food trucks back when I was cooking, but they're so cool because you can start a business for $50,000 and not have just that overhead of running a restaurant. And so I'm glad there wasn't food trucks cause I may have gone that route cause I've always wanted to be an entrepreneur. I always wanted to work for myself. Um, but I knew that I didn't want to run a restaurant because it's really tough. I don't think. Yeah, I don't think my husband would deal with the people very well. Like, and he's a good people person, but I think if he was getting a lot of complaints and stuff you probably would. He's he, he's about the food, you know what I mean?

CC Spina:

Wants to make good food. He probably wouldn't deal well with that stuff too. But um, he does run a business and he does very well with that, but he doesn't have to deal with general public and that's a whole different ball game. Yeah. Everything's a liability. Could hurt somebody or staff to be being sexually harassed, you know, like it's, it's a lot of pressure and very little profit margin. It's tough. And the people that I cooked with him went to culinary school with, now we're finally getting their executive chef jobs and getting like, you know, the recognition that like I had always felt like, God, this is just like I'm cooking all day and you only really get feedback when you make a mistake. You might do 200 plates. Right? And that's, you just, you did your job. The chicken was overcooked, but yeah. And then you get yelled at and then it's like, this isn't, this isn't worth it.

CC Spina:

Right. But there's this massive juxtaposition for me now where like when I go to work, people like clap every five minutes. Like it's crazy. Like I will never, like, it will never be lost on me. I will never take it for granted that like, wow, after I've like can play for an hour, people are coming up and like wanting an autograph or shake my hand and like, that's amazing. Like, so many people deserve that when their jobs that is, I never thought about it like that, but you're so right. You know, that kind of gratitude. And um, I, I do try to leave like positive Yelp reviews for just that reason. You know, if somebody does a great job, I try to like put it up on the Yelp or whatever. It makes a difference. Yeah. So, so in talking about, um, kind of reflecting back on Lollapalooza being such a big venue and stuff, how do you deal with stage fright?

CC Spina:

Is that a thing you have anymore or do you not really get that anymore? I'm doing it so long now. Well, Lollapalooza was interesting because we had played the D, so I'm from Chicago, we had never played in Chicago before and we had played the day before at Lollapalooza on the kids' stage. And um, we're not a kids band. Our record was called home wrecker. Like we're kind of like a dirty blues, like in your face band and they're like, whatever, just play your, your normal set. And like the guy before us playing had like everyone being on your surfboard and you're a shark right now and all these moments and it was all for kids. And then we just get up there and we would play our set and we had a horrible review, um, that night just tearing us apart. And they said, my husband looked like the gap model on stage and that like my drumming was no good and I woke up just completely losing my mind.

CC Spina:

Like now we're about to play on the real stage and you know, like it's going to be horrible, it's going to be awful. But you know, it's just a matter of like, I can do this. Like, like I've always had the saying in my head like drunk jump and believe you'll grow wings. And like, I still have to tell myself that, but like I'm just gonna, it's like I'm just jumping in the water and the next day we had like the most amazing set and it was perfect and like it had rained all morning. So I'm like, this is great. No one's going to be there. Like no one will be there. Perfect. And you're going into it thinking like, no one's going to hear me. And then like the clouds cleared and we ended up on a stage for a band that had canceled last minute. So we were on a much bigger stage than we expected and a much better time slot. Oh wow. And it was, it was great. And after that, like, you know, I'm going to make mistakes on stage, I'm gonna feel dumb here and there or say something I regret or do something wrong. But like if you laugh and you smile and you have fun through it, like people will sense that and nobody's really going to judge you that hard. Like they don't, they're not as hard as the critic from the kid stage.

Michaela:

Well, and the funny thing is like, I think that, um, you probably notice your mistakes a little bit more than anybody else would, you know. And, um, it's interesting when you were talking about even like your voice, how, how much, um, it's acceptable now to just, I mean, even if you sing terrible, it's okay. Like YouTube successive stuff come from these people that are terrible, like by industry standards, but they're, they're being them, they're doing them and it works out. I saw this one girl and I'm forgetting her, um, her last name now, but she was on SNL and she sings, um, Oh gosh, what is that song? It'll come to me. But, um, leave the lights on. I'll leave the lights on that I'm forgetting her name. But anyway, and she was so out of pitch and so off too, but she was dancing on the stage and just feeling it and having a great time.

Michaela:

And I'm like, she's awesome. Yeah. But the, but the reviews the next day, it was, it was kind of rude. I was kind of shocked at how critical people were. Cause I saw it as like, man, she's just having a great time. This is the best day of her life right now. You know? Um, so that balance between you have, people are judgy. They are, you know, it's, um, it's, it's an interesting, like you said, juxtaposition when you do have these critical people, but then you also have these super loving people and play for them and yeah, and finding that space and that way to just focus on that. I imagine that's really hard sometimes.

CC Spina:

Yeah. Well that's right. It's not the critic who counts. I mean, that quote I think about constantly in the really it's about the music and about the fans and you know, your fans aren't going to judge you if you have a bad night, which we're still going to come back and you know, the industry might, but they can't do it. If they could do it for the guy writing the, you know, the review the next day could do it then it would be, but he can't. So it's easier to sit back and judge, but they don't really matter. And I think on that same hand, like what we always try and say is like, yeah, you might go on, like I don't go on our YouTube at all. I don't read the comments, but um, if I have, or when I have in the past, it's like either people hate me and think I'm horrible or they love me and think I'm way better than I am. So you can't trust either. Like neither end is true. So what's the point? Like, I'm not going to let those people saying that I'm so great, let it go to my head, but I'm also not going to let the people who say I surf and she'd go back and take drum lessons like

Michaela:

well define you. Yeah. And I think that's true even for people who maybe aren't, who are listening to this podcast who aren't even, you know, musicians or whatever. Kind of finding that space in between what people say that senior praises and people like your mom and people that are really hard on you and are judging you. And it's hard. It's super hard for me. I know we have a YouTube that's a fishing channel and I've edited videos to be funny and cute. And then some guys are like, why the hell did you bring your wife on your boat? That's your problem. You know? But then you have people that are like, that's so cool that your wife sleeps on your boat with you. You know that you can take her fishing. So I've seen that. But the funniest story that we have saw, I had an all girl band.

Michaela:

I mentioned to you, what was the name? Sky and what did you play? Bass. I played bass. And um, so I started in the Bay area and I went Craigslist was just for bands and put together this all girl band. And I was kind of also shocked by none of you can be dating or you're not going to have a successful album cause you need to be, you know, available to you all that we went through, jumped, jumped all those hoops and, and I kinda got disgusted by the whole, this is what you need to look like and this is what you need to wear and this is how you need to be. But we were getting some pretty big shows. We opened for smash mouth was pretty big. It was a, it was like a festival in a park. And um, I think it was the nature of smash mouth spans because it was an awesome show and we had a killer time and everyone was clapping and cheering.

Michaela:

It was just a ton of fun. And then, um, we ended up at this festival in Hollister, which was a motorcycle rally. And that was not really our fan base, like not our style of music at that point. We were pretty poppy, like Papi Rocky. And um, so we were like, well, we're going to have to do some covers because that, you know, this audience is not necessarily, we'll mix them in. And so we chose to do sweet home Alabama and you know, that guitar riff is so identifiable. So we started it and the whole crowd was like, Whoa. And then my guitar player fucked it up.

Michaela:

Like just, she just got nervous and lost it and I still want her, it was like crickets and then people were like, boom. And it was like, Oh, that just sucks. So, but we did, it didn't get us down. We kept going. But um, it's interesting that dynamic. It really is. And, and how either people love you or they hate you and it could turn on a dime. Well, you can. And that was one case where, you know, I say most people aren't listening. They don't pick up on the little things here and there, but they definitely Mayer yeah, we were just laughing and we're like, you know what, let's just go drink some beer and have a good time. And, and, and then it ended up being a fun day and a learning experience. But man, it makes for good stories. Right? Oh yeah, for sure. In hindsight. Um, but we did have some groupies that followed us all over and it was so that's awesome. Like wow. It's crazy to think they like us that much. You know, I don't even realize that we're that cool. Um, and I still think we were, we looking back, I'm like, Oh my, what were we doing?

CC Spina:

Cause we were trying to like fit into that mold, you know? And if we had just been who we were, we probably would have had a lot more success than trying to fit that stereotype. Yeah. Well, it's hard where you can look everywhere and be like, well that's successful. And so maybe that's, maybe that's why they're successful, you know? But usually the most successful people are the people that are just, they're doing their thing, they're the most authentic and they create the new sound or, so that was one of the things that I, that I noted on here was how you guys have stayed so true to who you are and your style is so different and so neat. And I don't even know, I mean you described it kind of bluesy, but you almost have like this seventies, five, two or like a 60 seventies vibe with the retro feel.

CC Spina:

I mean, what, how do you describe you to, I mean that makes sense. We grew up, both of us grew up on her parents' music, so like a lot of like the Beatles and Bob Dylan and um, James Taylor. So I definitely tend to listen to that kind of music. We call it dirty blues, you know, and we have like our last record, we put a kind of different song on there that we had a record label and they pick that as the single and people, the internet tours apart, like they've changed, they've changed their sound, which is really hard when you've been a band for a long time. If you explore an experiment, sometimes people want to say, well you're different now. Um, but you have to evolve. But we've kind of stuck true to like, you know, like the grimy slide guitar and like really crunchy guitar tones and we are just drums and guitar.

CC Spina:

So it's going to be pretty raw. Um, but yeah, we call it dirty blues, but like we just submitted our record, we put it in the alternative rock category, cause you know, PE, some people hear the word blues and they think that you're going to sound like this like 12 bar blues band. And a lot of times that's where we end up with our wrong crowd. When we ended up, like on the bluesy blues festivals, we play the blues cruise one two, which was um, it was older crowd, much older crowd. They were like, Whoa, what's happening? They were not the, they were, most of them were up by what time we were playing at 10:00 PM. But um, you know, I'd like to think that we'd fit more in like an alternative or indie rock category. But music just keeps evolving and changing. And over the course of our career, it's gotten very electronic for awhile and very poppy and we tend to do better like in Europe, um, where they still want that, like kind of Americana or raw sound, but it comes and goes in waves.

CC Spina:

So we never know like, well maybe with this record it will be the one that like can take off mainstream in the U S um, cause we, we have our fan base, but it's, it's not, we're not mainstream. There's more people who haven't heard of us than have heard of us. Yeah. I love your vintage-y sound. It's like, like you said, like a grungy blues or something like that. And I love that sound. It's really great. It's awesome. Do you have a favorite song? Oh man. Well I mean give him hell. That one was one of my favorites cause that's one way I wrote a lot of the lyrics. Um, I definitely have some favorite songs off our upcoming album. So our new record's called love luck. So that will be our first single. And that's my favorite one so far on the whole AP or whatever the title track.

CC Spina:

So, um, and how and how, when does it come out your new album? August 9th. No one knows that yet. We haven't announced it to the public, but here it goes all this night. No, is that okay? Oh, that's awesome. It's totally fine. Wow. So that's coming up really soon. So what is it going to look like for you guys when it, when it goes out and launches? What's that? Gonna what's that gonna look like? Um, we're doing a very, very West coast focused tour this time. Normally we toured the entire United States and most of Europe, but for now we're just focusing on the West coast. So we're focusing on our favorite markets and the markets that are easy to get to because now that we're parents, um, it's a lot harder. I'm not going to drag our kid to, you know, like the last record or tour started in New York.

CC Spina:

Um, so you're driving for four days just to get to the first show and then you're working your way all the way across the country and we're just not going to be doing that this time around. So we will hopefully get to New York and Chicago on this tour. But mostly we're focusing, you know, San Diego, Portland, Seattle, LA, San Francisco, West coast, and it makes sense for us. So there's a couple of things that are coming up that I want to make sure that I hit on before we have to go and not as, um, that you were pregnant during your entire tour, right? You were drumming pregnant up until like nine months. What was that like? Talk about that. It was amazing. It was, I think the most magical experience. I think pregnant women are magical. Um, I think that there's like there's a baby in there, you know, I was afraid that like people would come up and want to touch my belly by the end of my touch.

CC Spina:

This, there's like a child in here like come grab this thing, it's moving. Um, it was really cool. Like most people don't expect me to play the drums anyway, but when you show up pregnant, they really don't expect you to like be playing. And especially the drums, they think you're just a groupie or something. Like nobody thinks you're there to be performing. And so I like that element of surprise and I liked the fact that my son could be on stage with us throughout, you know, we did 12 countries, we did 60 shows, we really toured hard and it was like, there were days where we'd finished playing and I couldn't, I couldn't walk straight in the hotel room hard. Yeah. But honestly like playing, playing the drums invigorates me and it makes me so happy inside that like I think that that's the best thing you can do for your baby is like be sending all those good feeling chemicals and energy to him. And you know, I went to multiple doctors before getting pregnant and made sure that his hearing wouldn't be affected, that he wanted to be startled by the noise. Um, I wear my, my in ear monitors, so instead of the speakers being pointed at me, it's all in headphones. So it's, it's much quieter on stage than it is in the audience. And it was, it was awesome, but I wouldn't trade it for the world. That's such an issue.

Michaela:

[inaudible] to so many women who, you know, it's easy, I think when you're pregnant to kind of roll into that, Oh, I'm pregnant, I can't do anything. I'm just, my life's over for this nine months and here you are going, no, I, I'm inviting. He's coming into our world and we're going to take him along for the journey. And we always did that with our son too, although my mom said that Tucker was safer out of the wounds and the, whoops, I, so many things happen while I was pregnant. But, um, we did that same thing where like, no, you're, you're coming into our world, you're going to be on a fishing boat 40 miles off sea coast and, and he's such a go anywhere kid now. It's awesome because of that. So how did he kick a lot? Like when you were playing? I mean,

CC Spina:

yeah, he would, well he would, the funny part is, so we'd normally play at 10:00 PM every night and on the nights that we weren't playing then he'd be like drinking at 10:00 PM, you know, and then we'll drop her in there. And he loves drumming. He loves music, he loves to dance. So it's really like, it's pretty awesome. Like I think that it helped create, hopefully the person that he will be. And um, I wanted to like print up a map of all those countries we toured and on his 18th birthday, like you're going back by yourself now kid. Like, here's a backpack. And you got to go and recreate the tour but just go and do it for fun. So who knows? He could want to be like an accountant or something like that. Like I just want to be in a quiet environment, but he seems like it's, it's created like a, not high energy cause he's pretty mellow but like he loves music.

Michaela:

So you guys are going to take him along. What's his name? Rocco. And you're going to take him along on the tour.

CC Spina:

Some of the tour dates were already doing it where he won't have to make the incredibly long drives, but he's coming with us to Montana. He's already I think flown two dozen times. Wow. So he's a year and a half and we've brought him to shows in Vegas and DC and Arizona and Colorado and he stays backstage in the green room. He'll stay in the green room or if we bring family and it's late, he'll go and go to sleep cause he still has his schedule. But um, he's been able to see a few shows and we show him music videos and he knows that's mom and dad. And, and so will it be, um, pretty big venues or will they be more intimate venues? So this tour is pretty small venues. We're trying to, like I said, the focus on this West coast and hopefully sell out the whole tour and the next year come back and do the same thing and then really build through the internet because conventional touring is so wasteful.

CC Spina:

It's wasteful with gas. It's wasteful with energy. Like if you see a band that's from the West coast and you're seeing them on the East coast, it's like, yeah, you sing them for 90 minutes and you're not realizing the like months of planning to, and then like the, just how much waste there is to get there. And um, so we're trying to focus more with, we've created a lot of new videos and a lot of new content for the internet, so hopefully that will spread. And so how we kind of reconnected is so wild to me. I mean, just synchronicity in general in life. I feel like you have to listen to it when it happens. But you came to my January workshop. Yeah. And for Furby you find happy. And I knew I you looked familiar, but it's a small town and I thought, Oh, you know, I've seen her out and about or whatever.

CC Spina:

And then when you came back in April for the next workshop and it was more work oriented and you talked about what you did and it just immediately, I knew you were at the jar for a little hurricane, I just knew. And that's what I said, you know, what, what is the name of the band? And I was like, I knew it right then. I just knew it. And so, um, you know, a lot of people, I called everybody after that works, but I believe it was in my workshop. So, um, but what was crazy to me is that you guys wound up up here. How did that happen? How did what, how did you decide to leave San Diego? Well, we had gone on that tour, you know, and we had left San Diego a few years prior trying to move closer to Santa Cruz, um, which is where my husband's family lives.

CC Spina:

And then while I was pregnant, we were touring and we lived in Tahoe for awhile. Um, in between, cause we always want to live somewhere beautiful and scenic and San Diego is like the most beautiful and scenic. But Tahoe is, uh, is pretty great. And while I was pregnant, we toured all the way up. So my son was born in October and by September we're like, okay, we need a place to live somewhere to now we're about to have this baby. And so we found a house up here, which, you know, this is kind of like a little pocket where it's super affordable and we were able to get two and a half acres and have enough space where we can record at home because that will be the problem living in San Diego to have a kid and we record at home. So you can't be in like a cute little craftsman house in North park like we'd love to be because the neighbors are gonna just be, you know, like super frustrated if you're recording all day.

CC Spina:

So we found this space out here and it was close enough to Santa Cruz because Santa Cruz is just crazy expensive right now. Um, and we actually found the house right before we left for Europe and we put an offer in and we signed all the papers while we were in Europe and came back and we moved right in right before he was born. So. So that was pretty synchronistic too. Then it all worked out. We found a house that like a movement because you know, you look at houses and our budget was pretty limited and most of them need a new foundation or a new roof and you need tons of work. And we found this cute little house on two and a half acres that we could just move right in. And it was perfect. So, and so then you guys had to buy a bed and a chair and it's definitely neat.

CC Spina:

Yeah. And so what, what do you, I mean, do you enjoy both? Do you like being home or do you, do you enjoy more being on the road and that kind of lifestyle? Um, I love being on the road, but I would not trade like kid time for stage time at any point. That's like the greatest benefit to having this job is my son is 18 months old and we've been able to both stay home with him. You know, we've been touring, you know, I think we did like 25 dates last year so it's not that much compared to if I had to go work a nine to five and leave him. And like we love being parents and you know, it's a scary step to make. Like okay, you know, we're musicians and like through that we've gotten someone, we've gotten rid of them.

CC Spina:

Some have been dropped, but from we don't have a record label, we don't have an agent, we don't have a manager, we have a UK agent, but we don't have all of the same things that we've had with the last three or four releases that we've done. We've had a whole team of people and you put out a record and you get a big advance from the record label and they fund all the marketing and publicity and this time it's very different. We're borrowing against their life insurance and we're doing it through our own record label and we're doing it exactly how we want. And um, it's definitely not traditional in this industry. The just be like, we're gonna, you know, the last manager we had, we said we want to fund our own record instead of sign with the record label. And he literally laughed and said, I would never let you do that. Wow. But we're a small business and like any other small business, we need inventory. And in order to get that inventory, we have to take out a small loan and we would think that it will pay off. So wow. I am so excited about

Michaela:

for you guys. I'm excited too. So Danny, my brother-in-law is coming down with his girlfriend on August 17th. Can we announce that on August 17th to Marcos, Marco Loma? That's a great little local venue. And I feel so honored that you're going to be playing in this town and I, and I know it's going to be packed because I have been seeing your guys since praises like weeks. Yeah. Um, but we're really excited to hear your new album and support you guys and thank you. I just think you're such an inspiration, like everything that you guys have done and your journey to get here and how you've really stayed true to who you guys are. And I mean that's, that's really powerful message that definitely needs to be heard. And I'm so glad that you shared it today. Thank you. Um, I'm really inspired by you and like after I did the first workshop I was like, wow, like instructor, it was really cool.

Michaela:

Like would it be weird to be like, can we be friends? But like everybody wants your attention cause they're all there to like get some sort of health, you know? And then so I was glad that you like knew about the band and we could do this because the workshops are really helpful. Thank you. I have a feeling that it's going to go big for you guys. I do. And I think what's really awesome is that I don't think you guys are going to be a bit different. I think you're just going to be who you are. And that's so awesome. Like I can't wait for that for you guys.

CC Spina:

I hope so. And even if that doesn't happen, it's still like following my dreams has been the best like life story I could have ever written. So I'm happy where it is. But those kinds of stories are great to hear because everyone plays those shows where there's hardly anyone there and you kind of tell yourself

Michaela:

those people that are there one day they're can go and say, I saw them in front of nobody, you know? Yeah. So it's great to hear those kinds of stories. Yeah, for sure. And then if all else fails, we definitely need another restaurant up here so, so you can do that. It's true. How much, so thank you so much for being on the podcast and I'm so stoked and we can't wait to hear you guys on the steadily fund at Marcos. It's a, it's a different kind of show, like we have to bring our own sound system and you know, like it'll be, it's fun.