Dallas Wax On Their First Single Ahead Of Sold-Out Show

Dallas Wax is an up-and-coming rock band that has been carrying the musical torch in the local scene, coining their own genre as “stepson rock” (read about that later in the article). The band includes Ryan Dallas Wax (vocals and guitar), Alfonso Hernandez (bass), Owen Hite (keys), Matthew Stawinski (guitar), and Gabriel Seiler (drums). Their sound has classic rock influences – energetic drums, steady guitar and bass riffs, guitar solos, and fast and slick tempo changes. The band is a pure-hearted rock and roll band that is breaking through the local New York rock scene and playing venues such as Arlenes, Knitting Factory, and Brooklyn Made. We covered an earlier show here. Dallas Wax released their first-ever single, “Mud,” on February 29th, ahead of their single release show.  

Can you start by giving a brief introduction how you all met and how the band came together?

Ryan: So I guess the first of the crew I met was Alfonso. We met at school together at NYU. I met Alfonso and we were hanging out, both played music, both liked the same music, so just kind of hit it off naturally. 

Alfonso: Kind of the same music. Generational divide. 

Ryan: Kind of the same music. There's enough overlap. I met Matt about a couple months after that through our mutual friend Ethan. And then we jammed a little bit. I met Gabriel a couple months after that at Arlene's Grocery. 

Gabriel: You were playing a show and I saw you or whatever, but some of my other friends were playing, and then we just started chatting outside, and started playing together a little bit.

Ryan: I don't really know how we got talking. I think I was wearing my “Title Fight” t-shirt, some shit like that. And we started talking from that. And then I caught one of Gabriel's shows, maybe a week or so after that. And I saw him play and I was like, “I need that guy.” And I got him. And then Owen was the last to the mix. Met Owen just at the studio. We had some mutual friends that were like, you got to play some music with this guy. So I invited Owen to the studio, and we were just kind of giving him the tour or whatever, and he started playing. And I was like, “okay, this is going to work.” So it was kind of just slowly one piece at a time came together in the best way. I was very much a recruiter. It was like the Avengers for the band. 

Really quick, what's with everyone wearing suits?

Gabriel: This guy (Alfonso) decides themes at the last second. It's great. So he sent the theme as some corporate alcoholic- wife’s taking the kids thing. But the last show we did, the day before he said, “actually I just decided it's leather themed.” And I was scrambling trying to get leather pants and I couldn't in time, but maybe we can get a better heads-up next time.

So the theme tonight is what?

Matthew: Corporate alcoholism. 

Ryan: It's like a stock photo of the wife taking the kids' core, corporate job. So I kind of just will brainstorm something before the show, like we did all black at Arelens. Now we're doing corporate divorce. 

Photo via Tori McGraw (@afterr.hourrs)

How did the band name come about? 

Ryan: It's just my middle and last name.

Alfonso: Because it sounds fucking cool. 

Ryan: I mean, in the easiest way to put it, they're very much like my songs and my words. So it's kind of like a Bon Jovi situation. 

Gabriel: I've been in bands where everyone's coming together and writing songs, and then I've been in this band where this man has created something beautiful, and we all come and maybe we change the stuff and change the parts depending on our skills. But these are his babies. 

Ryan: And I think the reason I named it, there were a couple other names in the rotation.

Like what?

Ryan: The Stretch. I wanted to call it The Stretch. Favorite Gray was another name that was in the realm. The Stretch was my favorite. I was obsessed with that name. When I was writing these songs, they felt really me, very authentic to me. This is the first time in my music career that I've really laid into my strengths on all aspects as a writer, a composer, a player, a vocalist. So it just felt very me. And I think like Alfonso said, I think those two words together, Dallas Wax, are pretty striking. I thought it all kind of made the most sense. And a lot of people, before I even started the band, were like, “that's such a cool name, but you should just go by your middle name.” So that was the gist.

So you have a new single, “Mud,” coming out at midnight. And there's a lot of elements in the band, a lot of sounds going on. So sonically, how was the single composed?

Ryan: It's definitely very guitar forward and upbeat. I think the third song that I wrote after I'd started writing specifically for this project. And a lot of times when I write, I'll start on the guitar, the acoustic guitar, and kind of play something. It'll go somewhere. But this particular song, I sat down behind my laptop and was just like, “I'm just going to make something out of thin air.” And it just ended up with the tempo that it's at and ended up with the bassline. It is very catchy. So sonically, it's very driven. It's very loud, it's very energetic, from the drums to the guitars to the voice. There's a lot of up and down moments and catchy moments, which is why I think we all agreed that it's the best to be the first single. It's a kind of clean, cleaner tone guitar, and then a dirtier guitar. Matt is doing the clean cleaner guitar and I'm doing the lead. And then Owen is just adding a lot of background filling out. And Alfonso and I are pretty much playing the same thing for the song. The riff is stuck in your head long after you hear it, which I think is great. 

Photo via Tori McGraw (@afterr.hourrs)

Did you (Owen) propose your own part or did you just kind of follow the guitars?

Owen: I mean I just kind of played along, but I don't think there was a keys part originally. 

Ryan: I think you followed the guideline, but it's definitely got Owen’s spin on it in the record, which is cool. This is kind of what I like, to bring everything to the table and then let people kind of play into their own kind of stuff. 

What was the recording process and who was involved in doing most of that?

Ryan: For this song, we had a really, really solid demo. The guitars and bass are just pulled from the demo. We sat Gabriel down behind the guitars and the bass part and he played. Then Owen played on it after we'd got the drums. So it is a hybrid of what the demo was originally. I had spent a lot of time really dialing in the guitar tones and the rhythm and everything. We brought all the guitars from the demo. Gabriel played drums live in studio, and Owen played organ. And then I tracked the vocals live in studio as well. It was kind of a Frankenstein project, which is funny because the song really sounds like a live take, which is kind of what we're going for. But for this particular one, it was kind of Frankenstein. 

Gabriel: I liked how much the demo was really put together and that was the first thing I heard that you (Ryan) sent me, just like, “Hey, what do you think about this thing that I did? You want to be a part of it?” And the dynamics of it. And there was so much already done on it. It was hard to say no. It was really, really good. 

Ryan: I wrote the song in July and then I think we didn't have our first rehearsal until late September, so I had a lot of time to sit with the demos and really fucking dial them in. So by that point, when we were ready to go really record them, there's not much we needed to really change. So that's kind of how that came together.

Where did you get the name for the song?

Ryan: There's a lyric that's in the second verse that says, “I’ve been down in away, I've been down in the mud.” I just pulled it from the song. And it really was kind of like a state of emotion, kind of being down in the dumps a little bit. But the song is also very upbeat. I said this at our first show, but it kind of plays into that whole: the best way to get over someone is to get under someone. It was kind of the first upbeat song. It was the first song that I wrote after the breakup that was not, I'm dwelling on this, but it's time to get the fuck over it. So I called it “Mud,” just because if you fall down in the mud, you gotta get up, get out there. It's a comeback anthem.

Gabriel: I like how you're acknowledging something's been bad. I remember that week after your breakup, me and you were like, “alright, let's get fucking hammered every day.” We just have to mourn for a little bit, and then we'll be good to go. And then I remember it was like a week later you were like, “okay, cool. I've spent my time moping around and now it's time to get out of the mud.”

Ryan: We just got drunk for a week straight. And then I was like, “well, that's what I needed. And now it's time to deal with it.” 

Photo via Tori McGraw (@afterr.hourrs)

You played your first show a few months ago in a basement. What has it been like for everybody kind of getting your footing down as a band? 

Alfonso: There's definitely a moment when you're on stage and just everybody knows the songs and the parts so well that that's when it becomes bigger than the sum of all parts. And we've been having those moments already, and we're just so fucking ready to play and just kick ass. And it's great to have that feeling in the band.

Ryan: And also we're doing this interview now right before our first song has even come out, and this is now our second sold-out show in New York City, in Manhattan. To have a fan base already when you don't even have music out is a pretty good omen, I feel like. Especially at the last show we played at the Knitting Factory a couple weeks ago, people knew the words and knew the cues and knew the guys and  it's cool. And it was like we played that basement show. It was like no one had ever heard our band before and now it's playing our second sold-out show without a song even out.

Gabriel: I think it speaks to the live experience and the role that playing live music is in this genre specifically. You can listen to tracks and they're cool. I love listening to our masters and the finished products, but something about the live version of these songs is just completely different. And so I think you don't even have to have songs out for people to love this, they don't need, and they know it now, but it's just such a good time to be in a band like this and to hear music like this live. 

Owen: I would also say that newer demos have been written to kind of fit more to the band's sound, everyone says now that we've come together, compared to what was on the EP before some of us had even met each other. 

Gabriel: Well, I'm also excited because we recorded the whole EP. I recorded all the drums in one session, and so we've now got five or six more songs that we've been playing live together, and they haven't had any time in the studio. So they've had time to germinate and new things emerge, and we do certain things that if we just sat down and recorded them before we had ever played them live together, they just wouldn't have come out. So the live music is a big part of the sound for sure. 

Ryan: We're going to put out an EP in September, spoiler, probably around September. We're going to put out an EP, five songs, and I wrote all of those pretty solo before the band was even the band. Since then, the stuff that I've been writing for the album is a lot more geared. And on one of the demos, I do a Matt impression of his solo. I thought it was fucking spot on, dude. And especially, I'm not a keyboard player, but it's kind of knowing what Owen likes to do and what he can do. Even if I can't put that into a demo, I can still hear it in my head. A lot of the songs are geared more to understanding my band and stuff.

Photo via Tori McGraw (@afterr.hourrs)

So, can everyone go around and say one or two musical inspirations.

Matthew: Lately, it's Rick Mitarotonda from Goose. I think he's one of my biggest musical inspirations right now. And I'm a big John Mayer fan. So when Ryan says that he played a solo in the style of me, he was probably more playing a solo in the style of John Mayer.

Owen: I'm going to have to go with Dr. John and Steely Dan. 

Alfonso: I'm going to go with Black Sabbath and Oasis. 

Ryan: As a guitarist, Marcus King, he's definitely one of my biggest inspirations, which is kind of weird cause he's also the same age as me. Marcus King is definitely probably my biggest inspiration on the guitar. I love Led Zeppelin, man. I don’t know, what can I say? 

Gabriel: Steve Jordan is great, especially this style of music we play, I lean on that a lot. I listen to a lot of stuff like early Cage The Elephant and Deftones a lot. But I was thinking the other day, I was talking to somebody and we were listening to a Royal Blood song, and then it just hit me. I just played drums like Ben Thatcher from Royal Blood.

If everybody could give a word or a phrase that you think would describe the band right now.

Gabriel: Energetic 

Ryan: Hot.

Alfonso: I carry a madness. 

Owen: I'd say we're cooking.

Matthew: I’d say punch me in the face. 

Gabriel: Wait, we've been trying to figure out what we call our genre. We've had “hot guy rock” said about us, and I've been saying “stepson rock,” which is just like the reverse of dad rock.

Photo via Tori McGraw (@afterr.hourrs)

Can you give a little insight into what's coming up for you? 

Ryan: A bunch of stuff. 2024 is going to be a very big year for Dallas Wax. Just in New York through June, we have four or five shows lined up. We have an EP that's recorded and pretty much ready to go. Our second single “Oh Oh Well,” we're going to put out in probably April, maybe early May. Then we'll have the EP. The EP is called “The Air We Breathe,” five songs. We're going to put that out maybe by the end of summer and we'll see. 

Stream Dallas Wax’s first single “Mud” here. Follow Dallas Wax on Instagram and Spotify.