RYAN

NAME

Ryan Walter

 

OTHER ASSOCIATED ACTS/PREVIOUS BANDS?

none

 

WHEN DID YOU FIRST START PLAYING YOUR INSTRUMENT?  WHAT AGE?

I started playing piano when I was 8 years old. I picked up guitar when I was 17.

 

FAVORITE TRACK OFF THE NEO GEO RECORD?  WHY?

If I had to pick my favorite track off the Neo Geo album I would have to say “THS.”  This is probably the band favorite.  I feel this song has so much vibe and power.  Every time I play this song I still get chills when the chorus comes in and when the bridge hits it gives me this rush of adrenalin… which is a lot to say especially after playing it and listening to it thousands of times.

 

WHAT IS THE FUNNIEST TOUR STORY TO DATE?

There are too many to list.  But if I had to pick one it would probably be when our trailer fell off the hitch of our RV. I guess it wasn’t too funny then but it is pretty funny now.  So the trailer falls off in the middle of the road probably around 11:00 at night. Pandamonium breaks loose. But it is as if Neo Geo and their crew were trained for a disaster like this. Before I can even get outside to assess the problem and damage our drum tech at the time is already outside with an orange reflective vest on directing traffic since we are now taking up the majority of lanes. So after the enormous effort of trying to hook up the 35 foot RV back  up to the 22 foot trailer we pulled our crippled vehicle into a gas station. Luckily there was no physical damage just emotional. So after assessing the situation we figured out that the ball of our hitch was too small for the trailer (rookie mistake).

We obviouly have to fix this problem before driving another 500 miles to Sacramento.  So how do you fix a problem like this at 1am with a vehicle that cant be driven.  Well you meet a nice drunk man named Juan sitting at the gas station drinking a 40oz beer. He was kind enough to take our tour manager, Ty and myself to a 24 hour auto zone. I will have to say driving in that 1989 civic hatch back with Juan was much scarier than the actual trailer falling off the hitch. So we finally make it back with a new hitch, for it not to fit the reciever on our RV. So we then had to make a second trip to the autozone with Juan to get everything squared away.

So we all load up and we are all ready to go its now 2:30am in LA and we have to be in Sacramento no later than noon.  So we get ready to roll out and notice that none of the lights are working on the RV except the hazard lights.  A decision had to be made either trouble shoot the light problem or fuck it and just drive 500 miles with the hazard lights on. So I said fuck it. After driving 150 miles with the clicking of the emergency lights I was about to go insane. And I had to fix the problem. I figured that it was a fuse that had blown in the RV so I pulled over to a gas station to investigate the problem. Yet I could not find the manual to the RV to find out which fuse controlled all the running lights.  So pissed out of my mind I woke up Tim who is one of guitar techs and we rolled into the gas station bought a 5 dollar internet card and found the manual on line 40 min later. Once we found the manual I found which fuse it was and sure enough it was blown out. Bought a new fuse at the gas station and we were then good to go.   We finally made it to Sacramento to play our Warped date 40 minutes before we were to be onstage.

 

IF YOU WEREN’T A MUSICIAN, WHAT CAREER WOULD YOU HAVE?

….

 

WHAT BANDS DEFINED YOU GROWING UP?

Growing up I listened to Strung Out, Pennywise, At the Drive in, Refused,  Alkaline Trio, mixed with a lot of classical music, jazz, and even broadway music that was forced down my throat due to my sister being a crazy fanatic.  And who is now a rad professional singer.

 

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE THING ABOUT THE MUSIC INDUSTRY?

My favorite thing about the music industry is listening to stories on how good the music industry use to be!

 

IF YOU COULD DO A DUET OR CO-WRITE WITH ANY ARTIST, WHO WOULD IT BE AND WHY?

If I could co-write a song with any artist I would probably say Yelawolf.  Cause “Pop the trunk” is stuck in my fucking head.  And I always wanted to be dirty south gangsta.  Can’t wait to see him on Warped tour with us this summer!