Driving Wheel & Lions of Hazelwood

DRIVING WHEEL
The members of Driving Wheel might not be on a mission from God. But that doesn’t keep them from existing as blues brothers, driven by a family vibe and a passion to perform for any crowd that will have them.

And many have delighted to do so — the band has played at Roots N Blues N BBQ festival, shared a recent bill with Tab Benoit and held hands with fellow local standouts such as The Mojo Roots. The duo that makes up Driving Wheel’s core — guitarist Ryan Tomlinson and bassist Jeremy Hunsaker — has fine-tuned a sound that’s indebted to torchbearers in the blues, Southern rock and alternative camps. Yet, to hear Hunsaker tell it, the pair’s biggest musical influences are one another.

The two met when Tomlinson was still in high school and, with a shared love of artists such as The Black Crowes and Lynyrd Skynyrd, decided to start a “bluesy, boozy rock ‘n’ roll band,” Hunsaker said. Spending time together, they introduced each other to artists and ways of playing they might not have experienced alone. Hunsaker brought a steady diet of ’60s and ’70s rock to the equation while Tomlinson “drug me kicking and screaming into the modern age,” he said, exposing him to acts such as Foo Fighters and Citizen Cope.

It is clear the two are complementary parts working together in one rock ‘n’ roll machine — Hunsaker used several sets of opposites to describe their dynamic. Tomlinson is “jovial” while he’s more “introverted,” he said; Tomlinson is a “boy genius,” Hunsaker a “mad scientist.”

“We like to call it ‘mess and finesse,’ ” he said. “… He’s loosened up some because of me, and I’ve tightened it up some because of him.”

That sort of brotherly soul has kept Driving Wheel together, even during a hiatus when Hunsaker briefly moved to Chicago. Re-forming, as they always intended to, the band’s internal harmony is as tight as ever, even as it invites others into the fold. Driving Wheel has never had a permanent drummer — instead, the duo enlists friends as they’re available; Dana Johnson joined in 2009 as the band’s primary live drummer. By keeping their working relationship free of inside jokes and inside baseball, their bond has not intimidated potential allies, Hunsaker said.

Five years in, Driving Wheel has achieved a blistering sound built around tough, melodic guitar licks, grinding grooves and vocals that come from somewhere deep in the gut. Its music contains echoes of long-gone blues masters while finding room for a more modern musical language. Songs can go from a whimper to a roar in a heartbeat, such positive volatility springing from the respect band members share.

“I feel lucky that I get to play in a band with one of my absolute favorite guitar players,” Hunsaker said of Tomlinson. “His phrasing, his tone … because I know him, I feel like those are extensions of his personality. Listening to him talk is like listening to him play guitar, to me.”

For his part, Hunsaker has grown by leaps and bounds on the bass, an instrument he picked up out of necessity when the band began. At first, he played it more like an electric guitar; now, he has adopted a less busy style and improved his ability to further a groove, he said.

Rough cuts of the band’s next record, slated for release next year, suggest a real turning point. The songs are marked by crunchy, immediate riffs that exist somewhere between roadhouse blues and the fun-size arena rock of AC/DC, chugging bass lines that reflect Hunsaker’s progress and filthy floods of organ. They retain the raw musicality of the band’s shows yet reveal a mature sound that has been won over time.
Recognizing the live experience is inherently fleeting, and that records are meant to exist in many different moments, the band has avoided simply replicating that feel in the studio, Hunsaker said. Instead, they’ve put on their “lab coats,” taking songs and turning them “inside out.” Those efforts have resulted in a critical mass of more instruments, more overdubs, more guest musicians and even more guitars, with Hunsaker playing foil to Tomlinson. The band’s aim is to craft something a listener would want to take apart and become swallowed up in.

“Ultimately, we want it to sound like the records that we liked growing up,” Hunsaker said. “We want it to sound like a Lynyrd Skynyrd record, something you could hear that sounds timeless.”

Working toward a timeless sound makes sense for a brotherly band that has put no limitations on its time together.

“As long as the two of us are still alive, there will probably always be a Driving Wheel,” Hunsaker said.

Courtesy of Aarik Danielsen of The Columbia Tribune

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