Kieran Webber
Director and Founder of CLUNK Magazine, CLUNK Events, and other CLUNK affiliate businesses. You’ll probably find me tucked away somewhere sending emails, listening to music, and creating content.
The New York band Dallas Wax give us an insight into life in big city, new music, and a plenty more in this introductory interview
Dallas Wax are the new kids on the block right now but are already making music that far surpasses their short existence. They’re a young band with a mature and confident sound and their latest single ‘Girl Like Me’ is but proof of this. The guitar driven single is a real face melter that fuses psychedelia with garage rock, creating a fun, hard-hitting sound.
We caught up with the New York band to discuss their latest single, how life is in the “Big Apple“, and a whole heap more.
Kieran: Firstly, thank you for taking the time to chat with us! How have you all been?
Ryan: Thanks for having us. We’re good! There’s 20 inches of snow on the ground right now in New York city but other than that we can’t complain.
Kieran: We are now cascading through 2026 at breakneck speed.. any highlights so far?
Ryan: We kicked off the year selling out our show at Nightclub 101 in New York that was an absolute blast. One of the best crowds we’ve ever had at a hometown show. It was mad. We’ve taken a couple of cool trips already this year as well. Earlier this year we went down to Savannah, GA to shoot a music video for a new song coming out. We also just got back from New Orleans last weekend after playing our Mardi Gras show. We’ve definitely had a busy start to the year, for sure.
Kieran: Let’s start at the beginning.. how did you all meet and at what point did you start making music together?
Ryan: I met everyone in the band in different ways and at different times. I suppose I met Matt (Matt Stawinski – guitar) first through a mutual friend and we started jamming together in various projects. Next I met Gabriel (Gabriel Seiler – drums) outside of Arlene’s Grocery in the lower east side after a show. We just got to chatting about music and shit and hit it off. I started playing a few months later with Gabriel in a band called Water Gun on lead guitar. I met Owen (Owen Hite – keyboards) for the first time at the studio after the idea and demos for Dallas Wax had been born. Owen had been recommended to me as a good keys player by some friends from my hometown that knew him in college. He just showed up to the studio one day when we were working on the The Air We Breathe EP and started ripping on all the songs. It was awesome. Last but not least our latest edition to the band, Kutter (Kutter Reddan – bass) met last summer when we had an opening for a bass player and I went to go see him play with some of the other guys in the band and our friend Janssen (Janssen Rhea) at DROM in the east village. We hit it off instantly. He had the chops and the hair for the job.
Kieran: There is often a romanticism to being an artist in New York, much like London, but what is it like on the ground, from your perspective?
Ryan: People are so talented. It’s pretty easy to get inspired in New York. Some of our best friends in the city are our biggest inspirations and motivators. But not in a competitive way, in fact it feels the opposite. You see artists showing up for one another and supporting each other, at least in the rock scene here. New York is one of those cities where you can pop into a venue on almost any given night and find something new and exciting.
Kieran: What are 5 things you cherish about New York and 5 things you detest?
5 things to cherish:
1) The spontaneity of living in a walkable city with accessible and reliable public transportation.
2) The large number of great venues in New York to see music.
3) Four distinct seasons. I love LA but could never live in beautiful weather all the time I like the changing of seasons.
4) Food
5) The ease of meeting people in a city like New York. I’ve met some of my best friends in some of the most interesting ways just being out and about in the city.
5 things to detest
1) while I love being in a city where I’m not dependent on a car, when its freezing out and I’ve got to lug all my gear into the subway car at rush hour to get to rehearsal I DO sometimes wish I had a car.
2) New York is expensive, man. I think every artist living here would add that to their list.
3) Although I said I love all 4 seasons, the winters are kinda brutal. I think that’s really all I got though. We all love New York.
Kieran: Is there a joint musical taste that influences you or did you each bring something different into the mixing pot, so to speak?
Ryan: I think we all meet in the middle with the blues. I picture it like a big venn diagram with 5 circles and in the middle is like the blues. While there IS a lot of overlap everyone brings in different elements from all sorts of different sub genres of rock. We typically call it Psych-rock or Blues-rock when people ask but it’s really kind of a gumbo of a lot of different influences.
Kieran: You recently released your latest single ‘Girl Like Me’.. Can you talk us through this track and what it means to you?
Kieran: Girl Like Me is just a very fun song. It’s got a fun riff. It’s got fun sing-a-long parts. It’s got an exciting build up and drop. It’s just really fun all around. We have fun playing it and audiences have fun when we play it. It’s loosely about dating in New York in your 20’s. Sometimes it feels like it’s hard to find someone on the same page as you when there are so many fish in the sea. It’s kinda like, why can’t I find someone who wants the same things as me? Why can’t I find a girl like me? It being lyrically one of the more unserious songs on our record, paired with the fun instrumental elements, it felt like a good first single.
Listen to ‘Girl Like Me’ here:
Kieran: What are your essentials to making a solid rock song?
Ryan: Before Dallas Wax, I found myself drastically overthinking the music I was creating. Adding a million elements, a million tracks. All these different production techniques and shit. At some point I just stopped wanting to do all that. I started THIS project to simplify the music I was writing. Not simplifying in terms of what notes are being played, but simplifying in terms of the amount of instruments, and which instruments specifically. I wanted to write songs that a band could absolutely crush live in concert. Just 2 guitars, a bass, keys, and drums. No bullshit. Just raw rock and roll. That’s why I started this project. And also because I wanted to be a front man. I say all this because my answer to the question is that it’s easy to over think rock music sometimes, but it just has to feel good. Don’t overthink it. Sometimes the simplest things just feel the best. You’ll always know when it’s just right. Trust that feeling I suppose.
Kieran: Lastly, what is in the pipeline for Dallas Wax?
Ryan: We’ve got tons of fun stuff coming up. A couple of new songs coming out soon, a US tour happening in May, and a debut album this summer so lots of fun stuff in the pipeline. Hopefully we’ll be able to come see you guys in London.
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