https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rB4b-Ii_sEQ&feature=youtu.be

Hello, everybody, and welcome to the 1^st Edition of my podcast The Bart Factor. I am Bart Robley, the host of this. And this is my very first one, so basically today I’m going to be talking to you about me. I’m going to be talking to you about what it is that I do, and why I’m doing this podcast, and what it is that I hope to accomplish with my podcast. I’ve done some podcasting in the past with my buddy Sam Morrison from The Sam Morrison Band. We have a podcast called, “The Southern Rock Explosion” that’s around our band, The Sam Morrison…well his band, The Sam Morrison Band. I just happen to be his drummer. I’ve also done some stuff in the past with video blogging here on YouTube that is, again, kind of the same stuff. It just has to with drumming and what not, and music. But whenever I do one of these things it’s just a real stream of conscience thought. I’m not going to do a lot of editing. I’m just going to throw it up here and hopefully you guys like it. And so today’s podcast is just kind of introducing myself to the World…introducing myself to the people who hopefully want to start following me on this thing. If you’ve never heard of me. You don’t know what I do. Again, my name is Bart Robley. I’m the drummer for The Sam Morrison Band. And for about the last 20 years I’ve been able to make a living as a professional musician…as a professional drummer. And I do have to wear a lot of hats to make that work. One of the main hats that I wear is, once again, I’m the drummer for The Sam Morrison Band. We tour all over the United States every year. We have been to Europe. We’ve been to Korea. We’ve played for the military troops all over…for our troops all over the World. And that’s something that’s very near and dear to our hearts. I also am extremely involved in music education. I do a lot of session work with Sam and with our record producer, Michael Blum. I’ve written some books. I’ve done DVDs. Just, you know, all things drums and all things music. And so, again, that’s what this podcast is going to be about. The first part of it, The Sam Morrison Band. Been in that band for close to 17 years. If you have not heard of us then you want to check us out, SamMorrisonBand.com is our website. We are a Southern Rock band and we have three shows that we do really. Our original music is also Southern Rock-related, kind of Allman Brothers meets Lynyrd Skynyrd, Molly Hatchet kind of stuff like that. Kind of old school Southern Rock, really influenced by a lot of the outlaw country artists of yesterday as well. People like Travis Tritt, Waylon Jennings, stuff like that. Just real good, you know, Americana Music. That’s kind of what our original stuff is like, so check that out. We also work a lot and probably, I’m guessing, probably five to six hours’ worth of Southern Rock and Classic Rock’s greatest hits. And we’ve also done…we have a tribute show that we do and the tribute show is actually called Turn The…it’s actually…the entire title of it’s very long, “The Sam Morrison Band Presents Turn The Page, a Tribute to the Music of Bob Seger and The Silver Bullet Band.” The way that that show came about was we were working out in Las Vegas quite a bit at a place called The Railhead. The Railhead is at Boulder Station Casino and, once again, in Las Vegas. And we were…we would go in and do the show and in the show we probably had four or five Bob Seger songs in the set, and Sam just sounds like Bob Seger. He doesn’t really try to sound like the guy, he just sings like him. And so whenever we would get done with the show we would always get requests for more Bob Seger songs. So Sam, kind of came up with the idea of “hey, let’s do a tribute show and see if it goes over well, and we’ll keep the name The Sam Morrison Band, because of the branding and the work that we had already done, but we’ll say the Sam Morrison Band presents Turn The Page.” And, we did, and it’s been really successful. And, you know, to be totally honest with you, again, we started doing the show for two reasons: (1) because Sam doesn’t try to, he just sounds like Bob Seger; but (2) it really is a tribute in the truest form of the word, you know, we’re very influenced by his music. In my opinion, Bob Seger is one of the greatest American singer-songwriters ever to have lived. His music is timeless and it’s kind of one of those things when you really listen to the lyrical content of his music you can sit there and say to yourself, you know, “yeah been there done that,” you know, especially if you have a little life under your belt. It’s, you know, it’s good stuff. So it really is a tribute to, you know, one of greatest, greatest, greatest singer and songwriters of our time. And again, like I said, it’s been really successful. In 2007 we got the attention of legendary record producer Michael Blum. Michael has recorded such artists as Madonna, Michael Jackson, Pink Floyd, I mean you name it, the who’s who of the music business and he decided to come up with the record label called “Titan Tribute Media.” And it’s been really successful for him. We’ve pretty much re-recorded the entire Bob Seger catalog. It’s on ITunes. And it has been, you know, we’ve sold close to like $750,000 downloads of certain songs and been streamed over, you know, well over $5 million times on the Internet. And, it’s just been great for us. And it’s also been a big learning experience working with such a legendary record producer as Michael Blum. It’s been an incredible, incredible learning experience. So, that’s kind of the story there about how that show came to be. The original stuff…we have two original albums out and we are in the process right now of writing and recording our third original album. And it’s coming along really well. Hopefully it will be out…Sam is shooting for an August release date which is coming up pretty soon. We don’t know if that’s going to happen but we’re…at least that’s what we’re shooting for. Now, I also said a minute ago that I…and so that’s where like the session work also works itself into the story…we do a lot of re-records. We do a lot of session work for music that goes into movies and television and commercial use, and so it’s really cool to be involved with that. And again, really educational working with somebody of Michael’s caliber has really upped the game for everybody as far as musicians…or musicianship is concerned. As far as music education yeah, I’m extremely involved in music education. I have well over a hundred private drum students and I have a lot of people say, “well, how do you do that?” I don’t necessarily see a hundred students every week. I see a good portion of students every week, but I have students that are on my active roster. Some of them I will see once every six months. Some of them I will see quarterly. Some of them I will see them once a month. I do a lot of clinics. I do a lot of master classes and things like that for all of my endorsers. I endorse some of the greatest musical instrument companies on the planet, I’m proud to say. And I will give a list of those in a future podcast when I do a podcast on endorsement. So anyway, that’s kind of what I do there. As far as the music education thing, too. This is kind of a misnomer and I’d like to talk about this because, you know, there’s an old adage that those who can do, do; and those who can’t do, teach. Well, I’m here to tell you that that is a bunch of bullshit. And I can say, “bullshit” because it’s my podcast, right? So, anyway, I think it’s a bunch of BS man, you know? I remember back a few years ago…I’ve had the great opportunity to study with some of the greatest drummers on the face of the planet. And I remember going to study with Gregg Bissonette. And I remember going to Gregg Bissonette’s house. For those of you who don’t know who Gregg is, Gregg has played with some of the biggest names in the music business. He is the drummer for the Ringo Starr All Stars Band. He played with David Lee Roth in the 1980s when David Lee Roth left Van Halen. That’s really what put Gregg on the map for everybody. He’s such a great player and at the time David Lee Roth was the biggest star in the World. And Gregg got the gig and has gone on to do some amazing things in the music business. And, anyway, I was studying with Gregg. And I was at his house. And I’m looking at these platinum records on the walls of his study. And I’m sitting on a drum set that he had used during the Ringo Starr All-Stars tour. And he comes in and he sits down and he starts…he’s a little bit tired. He goes, “you know, I just got back from Europe, I played over there at Wembley Stadium with Spinal Tap.” And I thought to myself, “you know this guy probably isn’t giving me the lesson because he has to have the money right now” you know? He’s doing it because he loves music and he loves drumming, and he wants to pass that along. And I think that’s really important to understand. So if you’re a young person; you’re a young drummer; and you’re just starting out, you know; know that you’re going to have to wear a lot of hats to make this work. And, you know, I’ve had drum students come to me in the past and say that they were actually, you know they were a little bit ashamed that they didn’t want to just go into teaching. All they wanted to do was play. And I always tell that story when I kind of…when I get that…when somebody, you know, says that to me. I kind of tell them that story. Teaching is a great thing. And just being able to touch people’s lives and help them along their journey has been fantastic. And, on the corny end of things, I mean I always wanted to kind of be the drum teacher that I never had growing up. So I take…it doesn’t matter to me if I’m playing a show or giving a drum lesson or if I’m, you know, in a recording session, whatever. I take everything as seriously as I possibly can. And every time I sit down to play I may not be the best drummer in the room but I’m going to give you the best Bart Robley I’ve got, every single time. That’s one of the things that I’ve kind of, you know, hold near and dear to my heart, and try to keep my standard very high when it comes to that sort of thing. I’ve also written some books and done DVDs for Centerstream Publishing, and they’re distributed by Hal Leonard. You can find those all over the website…my website, which I’m going to plug here in a minute, but you can find them all over the web. Just Google my name, and all of my books and everything like that will come up. I was really proud that in 2009, I won a Telly Award for my first DVD which goes along with my first book, both of which are entitled, “The School of Hard Rocks.” And a Telly Award is an award for a non-broadcast video that can be anything. It can be an instructional thing. It can be whatever. But, anyway, I’m really proud to have won a Telly Award for that. So, I got to do that. I got started in the music business very early. When I was a kid growing up, my mom was a huge, huge Elvis fan. So much so that my earliest memories are of her listening to Elvis and always had Elvis on. And I didn’t realize there was other musicians, you know. I just thought that Elvis was THE MUSICIAN, you know? That’s how much she listened to the guy. So if you wanted to hear music, you listened to Elvis. My father brought home a Jim Croce record one time, and I remember him putting it on and I remember being really young and thinking, “wow Elvis sounds weird.” It didn’t equate to me that there were other musicians other than Elvis. Anyway, I tell that story for two reasons is because: (1) I’m a huge Elvis fan, and to kind of pay homage to my mom and what she started by listening to…having me listen to Elvis at such an early age. I again, to this day, I’m a huge Elvis fan. But what kind of got me into the drumming end of it was my mom…I’m old enough that I got to see Elvis. It was the very first concert I went to. I was about five years old. It was at the Denver Coliseum. I remember it was in January and it was snowing and very cold. And I don’t so much remember the concert as I remember the gravity of it. I remember that it, you know…he had a comedian that came out and opened up the show. And then after the comedian came out and opened the show the Sweet Inspirations, who were his backup singers, did a warm-up set. And then Elvis came out. And the electricity and the vibe in the building was just amazing. It just blew me away. And, so I knew I had to do something like that even at a real young age. I just really fell in love. Shortly after that, the now famous concert Elvis: Aloha from Hawaii came on and aired on television. And it was the first concert ever to be broadcast “via satellite,” as they said, around the World to live television. And there was…anyway we stayed up and watched that. And I remember there was a camera set up behind Elvis’ drummer Ronnie Tutt. And he would be playing. And I was just…I was mesmerized by watching him play, you know, watching. And, you know, he had this big blue sparkle set of Ludwig drums. I remember the hi-hat, you know, the hi-hat would be going up and down. And I remember thinking to myself “my god, is he doing that or is that automatic? How does that work?” And I was blown away by the whole thing. And so to this day I still, you know, I remember that. And I remember that’s how I got involved with music, so. And growing up in Colorado, you know. I grew up on a cattle ranch. So it was a real work ethic type of thing, you know. You had to get up every day and do your jobs around the ranch, and everything. So I’ve always kind of applied all of those things to my drummer career. And so that’s who I am and what I’ve been doing for a number of years now. And you know, again, very involved in education; very involved in live drumming and session work, and doing albums; and just kind of doing the whole thing. And anybody…and so that’s why I wanted to do this podcast…was to kind of hopefully help educate people through the podcast. But then one other very important reason. And so if you’re one of my drummer friends, and you know me personally, expect a phone call or a text or something from me because I’m going to bug you to come over here and do one of my podcasts. I think it’s really important to not only, you know…I’m a big, big, big shameless self-promotion type of person. I’m big on Facebook, and YouTube, and whatnot. But I also think it’s important to promote other musicians and to promote other drummers, you know? I think that’s what keeps the art form alive. And I think that’s what a lot of people, you know, maybe sometimes may be missing the mark a little bit when they make it all about themselves. And granted, of course, I’m going to talk about myself. I’m going to talk about the things that I do and what make me tick. But I also want to work with my other drummer friends. I want to promote them. I want to promote who they are. And I’m not just talking about drummers here in Southern California where I’m at. I am going to reach out to some of my friend all over the place. I’ve got some great friends who are amazing players in Las Vegas. I’ve got some amazing drummer friends back home in Colorado. Just a lot of people that I want to reach out and kind of pick their brains. So, again, if this is something you’re listening to and you want to get involved with this, send me a message on Facebook. Send me a, you know, get in touch with me and we’ll definitely hook it up and get it happening. So that’s my story. That is what I do. And I hope you enjoyed it. That was my first podcast. And again, you know, just kind of talking about me I know, but I wanted to let you guys know how music…you know how I got involved in the music business and what it is that kind of makes it work for me. The one last thing that I’ll kind of say before I sign off, is this: I think that the reason it’s so important for me to get this out there is…again I keep saying music…I’m a drummer and I’m going to promote and I’m going to interview a lot of drummers and a lot of drum-related stuff in this podcast, but music to me is…the way that I see it…is the most important gift that we’ve been given. Music is there for us all the time. It doesn’t matter what kind of mood you are in, when you put on music it will change your mood. If you’re in a bad mood it can make you happy, you know. If you’re sad it can lift you up. If you’re really excited it can mellow you out. It can do so much to our emotions. We celebrate with music. When a baby is born we have a party…we have get-togethers, we have music playing. People worship their…whatever their beliefs are…they go to church and they worship with music. When, you know, when somebody gets married, and it’s a joyous occasion, there’s a band or a DJ and we have music. When somebody sadly passes away we mourn them with music. Music is always there. It’s always around us. And it’s something that…it touched me so deep. And for some people, I think they just take it for granted, you know. They get in the car, they hit the go button on the radio, and suddenly music…this beautiful music comes out of the speakers. But what you want to remember is somebody had to create that. Somebody had to write that. Somebody had to go into the studio and record that. It takes a lot of work to get music to the masses. And when you see somebody that’s playing a musical instrument it’s much like seeing somebody who is a great athlete, you know. When you see them do what it is that they do, you’re witnessing the end result of a lot of hard work. And I think it’s important to understand that. So, anyway, that’s what I’m going to leave this on. I thank you guys for listening. I will be back with another edition of The Bart Factor here, real soon. I’m not going to say that I’m going to do one a week or two a week or one a month or one every two weeks. I’m just going to say that I’m going to put them up from time-to-time. And whenever I can get together with one of my friends who’s a drummer or a musician or a singer or guitar player, I’m definitely going to do it. And again, this is all just conscious stream of thought stuff. So, you know, I’m just speaking directly from the heart. I have no script. I’m not going to have anything like that. When I interview somebody, obviously I’m going to have certain questions that I ask them but I’m just going to let the interview go where it’s supposed to go and let people talk about what it is that they want to talk about when I do this. So anyway, guys, thank you so much for tuning in. The 1^st Edition of The Bart Factor is in the can. If you are a musician or a drummer go practice. Please check me out on the web. I am on social media like I said, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. My website is www.BartRobley.com And I would also like you to check out my new website, www.DrummerSwag.com I have all kinds of cool drummer t-shirts on there, and I also have a lot of drumming educational stuff on there. You can get a lot of great drumming educational stuff from my website, DrummerSwag.com. Guys, thanks for listening and I will catch you guys in the next episode of The Bart Factor.