Getting to Know… The 3148s | Interview 🎤

In the 280^th Q&A in our Getting to Know… series, we get the inside scoop from Detroit four-piece rock collective, The 3148s.

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guess the thing that makes us stand out is that ¾ of us are practicing attorneys.  It’s not often you find a group of guys who are just as adept at litigating as they are at melting faces.” Mind blown 🤯, 🎙 3148s! In response to our first burning question, the band elaborates on their performance, asserting, “Our live show is certainly never boring.  We jump, we scream, we live the music we are playing.” That’s the spirit! Formerly solely a cover band, The 3148s, which now record originals, is comprised of four members: 🎙 Ian Coote (vocal, keys, guitar), 🎙 Greg Jones (vocal, guitar), 🎙 Tom Jones (drums), and 🎙 Jason Seifert (bass).  Like our many other Getting to Know Q&As, we get the inside scoop on the genesis, goals, musical influences, and of course, current, and future musical endeavors of the band. So, without further ado, let’s jump right into 🎤 Getting to Know… The 3148s: Interview No. 280!

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For those who may not be familiar with The 3148s, what would you say makes you distinct or unique? How do you rock the audience’s socks off?  

🎤 I guess the thing that makes us stand out is that ¾ of us are practicing attorneys.  It’s not often you find a group of guys who are just as adept at litigating as they are at melting faces.  Our live show is certainly never boring.  We jump, we scream, we live the music we are playing.  People have often said that we are captivating when we are playing live if anything, just because we look like we are having just as much fun playing our songs as the audience is listening to them.

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Okay, let’s explore some juicy backstories. How did The 3148s form and what were some of the goals or the visions you had as a band early on?

🎤 We started off as a 5 piece.  Ian Coote (vocal, keys, guitar), Greg Jones (vocal, guitar), 🎙 Jeff Smythe (vocal, guitar), Tom Jones (Drums) and Jason Seifert (bass).  We were a group of attorneys who used to grab beers after court with a shared love of music.  What started off looking to play covers that cover bands don’t normally cover.  How often do you hear a cover band play Rush, The Interrupters, and Ghost in a set?  Well, we did.

However, the more we played, the greater our musical connection grew.  Ian started bringing some songs to practice and we started putting our own spin on them, developing our sound.  Unfortunately, Jeff was never really interested in writing original music (even though he composed riffs that would influence later songs) and would often leave the stage and grab a beer while we played our few originals.  During COVID, Jeff ultimately left the band.  The rest of us, inspired by isolation and extreme boredom, started a project of “socially distant covers” where we recorded and mixed a series of songs from our respective houses all over Metro Detroit.  This bout of inspiration lead to the original songs that would be our second EP, 💿 Sanctuary.

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Let’s talk more about goals.  Have your goals or your perspectives changed since first starting out? What do your aspirations or goals look like now?

🎤 Our goals started out as to play a few lawyer events around Detroit and have beers with our friends.  However, once we started creating together, it increased from there… rapidly.

Right now, our goal is to continue to make music that is just as much fun to play as it is to listen to.  We have goals to do a series of small tours over the summer and play a festival or two.  Bottom line, we love playing live and the more we can do that, the better.

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Everybody is influenced by somebody else. Whom would you consider some of your biggest musical influences and how are they influential?

🎤 Our musical influences are all over the map.  Ian gravitates more towards Americana and Indie Rock (Tom Waits, The Eels), Greg is into the more bluesy Alt and Classic Rock (Led Zeppelin, Jack White), Tom is our resident metal head (Metallica, Arch Enemy) and Jason draws his inspiration from punk and new wave (The Cure, NOFX).

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Ah, the fun stuff.  What’s your craziest tour story or the wackiest thing that’s happened during a performance?  Feel free to be creative.  

🎤 We have certainly had some near disasters playing live.  At our biggest show to date, opening for The Pack A.D. at the Magic Bag in Ferndale, Michigan, one song in, Tom’s kick fell apart mid-song.  However, Tom was able to pull out a drum key, and fix the pedal without missing a beat.  It’s funny now, looking back at the video, you can see Jason (on bass) turn around and continue to check on Tom.

The most memorable gig we have had, for all of the wrong reasons, has to have been the block party we played in Detroit, just a few weeks after our first live gig.  For some reason, it didn’t occur to us that playing a rock show, outside, required a much different audio setup than playing in a small club.  Needless to say, we couldn’t hear anything.  We played our hearts out, but wow, was it all over the place.  It served as a good check for us though and we realized how much harder we had to get our live set together in order to never have that happen again.

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Up until this point in your career, what would you describe as your favorite song you’ve recorded or performed live? What makes that song special?

🎤 For sure, 🎵 “My Old Lady (Don’t Tolerate)”.  Not only was it the first song we ever wrote, but it’s also often our most requested.  It’s a song Ian wrote about his wife and his mistakes in housekeeping.  It also helps that it has just a killer riff.

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Is there anything else awesome, cool, or left of center the world should know about you? Secret talents or surprising tidbits?

🎤 Ian can play almost any instrument he can get his hands on.  Our song, 🎵 “Arkless in the Storm”, at one point, had a whole bluegrass section, with Ian adding a mandocello.  He is determined to work a banjo solo into one of our singles.  Not only that, he is an established carpenter and has not only done many renovations to his house but made his own tools to do so.

Greg is completely self-taught on guitar, but you would never know given the way he absolutely shreds on guitar.  Greg and Tom, being brothers, have played together literally their whole lives and have written some of the funniest songs that will never be heard.

Jason is also a professional wrestler and owns the independent pro wrestling company, 🎵 “Sanctuary Fight Club”, which has produced stars that have worked in Impact Wrestling and AEW.

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Closing out, what is The 3148s currently working on, promoting that you can share with us or want us to know about? We love secrets, but there’s no pressure. 

We currently have two new singles coming out through The Animal Farm Music.  The first, 🎵 “Guillotine”, will be released on July 8, 2022. We are also promoting a big charity gig here in Detroit for ALS research, a cause that is very personal to us and that we are passionate about.  You can find more info at www.lawlapalooza.org.

Thank you so much for sharing taking the time to answer these questions, and best of luck moving forward. 

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Getting to Know… The 3148s: Interview No. 280 [📷: The 3148s, Brent Faulkner, The Musical Hype, No-longer-here, OpenClipart-Vectors]

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