Dirty Reggae Punx embody the true spirit of the punk rock, DIY ethos!
Having crossed paths with them in Sacramento, as well as having jumped on the mic to freestyle during one of their sets, in addition to learning a lot more about the band and the movement through lengthy conversations… I’m here to allow Kelly from DRP to introduce you to the band and their potent history.
In this interview spotlight, I chat with DRP about their music, the nomadic tour life, the #DRPNation and more.
Full Q&A along with links and music below.
Where are you from and what style of music do you create? (In your own words, not necessarily in marketing terms or by popular genre classifications.)
Originally from Minneapolis, Minnesota (and small town rural MN) but now we reside in the greater Sacramento, California area.
As for style of music we like to try and create feel good music. We typically don’t go into things with a style in mind but just a creative concept, and we let it organically form it’s way through the process. Typically predominant styles that come out are blends of Ska, Reggae, Hip Hop and Punk with blends and influences from Rock, and Blues to folk music and country styles. We aren’t into boundaries when creating.
What led you down this path of music and what motivates you to keep going?
I started making music as a child growing up with a father who was in a rock band and also a writer. Art has always kind of been in my life in some aspect. It always resonated with me on all levels. I spent my childhood in garage bands, put down music for a long time as I was growing up and chasing tail… but later in life I had 2 kids and my father again brought me back to music. He said I needed a hobby and bought me an acoustic guitar. Within a year I had refreshed myself and was doing home recording mixes with a buddy and making instrumental intro songs for a local radio station blues show. Later I joined Green Jello which is definitely it’s own story. After that I was picked up by primer 55 and also it’s own story. Both of those two bands led to me spring boarding DRP into a touring network.
What motivates me now is creating art that is as silly and stupid as possible to remind people we can still have fun once in a while in a world that has become too serious and downtrodden, even when we are talking serious issues like where the music industry failed…
I want to create an escape from reality through music and visual arts that allow people a break from day to day strife.
What inspired or led to the creation of DRP? Dirty Reggae Punx?
It’s a long journey down that question… okay so to start off it didn’t start with a band but the idea that a band would be cool… only problem is I sucked really bad! I had only ever played at campfires, at open mics, and in my living room. I had played all my life on and off but not consistently and rarely ever an actual show.
I had met Panda and after we started dating and I joked cuz we all just called her hippy when nobody really knew her name but then hippy stuck as a nickname for her around the house for awhile. Anyway… she said that she had me in her phone under Dirty Reggae Punk when she didn’t know my name and she left it like that for awhile until we got serious.
I thought it was so cool and funny I was like 💡 “THAT WOULD BE A FUCKIN AWESOME BAND NAME!!!!”
So I decided I was gonna start a band. We just played some covers and when I say we I mean I…
Slowly I had written a few originals and played them out and about and people probably hated them but a few maybe saw something even I didn’t.
But my buddy was a drummer and I had lots of open mic musician friends in this small little rural conservative town. So I took a local metal drummer who bought some weed from me occasionally and a blues guitarist who frequented the open mic’s and he played bass for us at first, and I started what became known as the Dirty Reggae Punx.
Then I was told by Bill Manspeaker that I was a bassist for his Grammy nominated shittiest band in the world Green Jellö and under his direction I realized that you didn’t have to be good…
DRP is bigger than just a band and some music…right? Can you expand on that briefly?
Haha it has become way bigger than we ever would have thought when we started for sure. So we were never really a local band but always toured out the gates because we really couldn’t get many gigs around our small town.
So hitting the ground with DRP as a touring band was our start and we were loved by dive bars from Minneapolis to FL. A band they could pay with pizza and gas money and everyone had a blast.
We would tell stupid stories about being chased by zombie raccoons and sing songs about weed and everyone loved us. We would play any show too lol…if you would book us we would play. And we honed story telling skills and kept writing songs. But we stood for DIY… independent music and we fought every battle. Refusing pay to play and avoiding politics and standing out against real world issues both in real life and entertainment all while sharing our brand and telling our stories.
Now we have created a magnitude of stories to go with our brand of hard working independent artists putting our foot down against the evils of the in”duh”stry and are working on releasing a crazy plan to bring this band to a full fledged entertainment company.
Dirty Reggae Punx
The Symphony of Stupidy
Name one or two challenges you face as an indie musician in this oversaturated, digital music age? How has technology helped you (since we know it does help)?
We face all the challenges as indie musicians. We have been overly challenged because we refused for a long time to switch to digital media outlets. It really kept us out of sight and out of mind.
How its helping is we finally caved after our fans have pleaded they’d be able to listen on streaming services so we agreed to be added to streaming platforms to utilize the internet to spread our stupid utilizing our very demise… the Appidemic!
Which do you prefer? Vinyl? CDs? MP3s?
…Live Music? Lol idk vinyl is expensive and the wrong people get paid, Cd’s are rarely used by me. I suppose I listen to music on my phone. A lot of friends send me music on digital platforms and I listen to those a lot.
How about this one…. Do you prefer Spotify? Apple Music? Bandcamp? Or something else? Why?
I don’t prefer any of them. I recently started using Spotify. Apple is popular but I don’t use it. I used to just only use YouTube cause I am really not that into the appidemic and am not savvy enough to reap technologies benefits as much as others.
I am trying to learn so the future doesn’t leave me behind Haha!
Where is the best place to connect with you online and discover more music?
well we have always had our staple website
And you can find us under that name on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and where ever UL Sounds puts us!
Anything else before we sign off?
Stay tuned for a full dose of entertainment coming from us. We have a multitude of talent and artists teaming up on a stellar project to stimulate your sensors!
Welcome to the #DRPNation!
