Hailing from Detroit and Dayton, The Strains are a group of seasoned, touring punk rock veterans who are preparing to get back in the van. Their tour starts this weekend in Dayton at Blind Bobs on Oct. 31. Jamy Holliday and Gretta Smak, who both provide guitar and vocals for the band, stopped by the WYSO studios to chat with Juliet Fromholt about joining the band and their upcoming tour.
Smak and Holliday have shared the stage with Paul Smith before and had heard the previous version of The Strains, but Smak says it's an honor to be apart of the current iteration.
"We were already like big fans of The Strains and Paul Smith's songwriting. I mean he's just an excellent songwriter. It was like,'Oh my gosh, now we're up here doing the songs that I've been listening to."
One of the Daytonians of the group is bassist and vocalist Kellen Mutter, who is actually Smak's son. He has jumped straight into the fray with a group of gnarly rockers. Even from the very beginning, Holliday says that Mutter has been a perfect fit.
"He's playing in the home of the MC5, he's singing lead on an MC5 track. He's playing his first gig, he's playing on a band with his mother and it didn't really work out the way we thought in that the place was packed. We started 30 minutes after the doors opened and I mean the line was down the block- two three blocks when we went on stage, it was a full house. There was no 'get up there and blow it.' And I'm looking at Kellen thinking,'Oh, okay kiddo.' He just leaned in and we were off and running. It was great."
You can hear The Strains live alongside Frank Meyer this Friday, Oct. 31, at Blind Bob's starting at 8PM.
