Interview with Dead Levee: ‘When I throw a guitar on my shoulder, it’s like putting a battery pack on my back’

Regina, Saskatchewan, Canadian dynamic rock band Dead Levee released their single ‘Shout’ this month, an energetic, riff-laden stomper that heralds a new chapter for the band.

They comprise Tayler “Izzy” Morgan (vocals and guitar), Ray “Sweet Baby” Klapatiuk (lead guitar), Rylan “Buck” Dusyk (rhythm and slide guitar) and Preston “Miami” Laschuk (drums).

‘Shout’ marks a new direction for the band and features Morgan on lead vocals for the first time since he took over from former vocalist Dane Van Hagen, who left the band earlier this year. ‘I used to do all the high notes but I didn’t have enough attitude,’ Morgan said, laughing. ‘We wrote ‘Shout’ on stage at a show eight hours after our old singer left the band.’ They came up with their band name listening to music on the way to the studio: ‘We were listening to Led Zeppelin’s ‘When The Levee Breaks’, that’s where it comes from,’ he said. ‘It’s a versatile name. We’re starting to find our sound, making everything heavier, harder and in your face!’

He describes ‘Shout’ as ‘a redemption song’: ‘You know when you feel like this beaten down dog who’s been neglected and you get to bark? You get to shout out all of your emotions. Our lead guitar player started playing the kind of cut-throat, heavy but sharp riff impromptu onstage the night our singer left and we started jamming it.’ It opens with a wildly hooky riff before Morgan comes in on vocals lamenting: “I’ve got an itch I just can’t scratch. Hellhounds on my trail, man’s worst friend”. It’s an incredibly tight, swagger-filled track replete with defiant riffs and infectious energy: ‘We take pride in bringing the energy to the stage,’ Morgan said. ‘Live, we’re moving around and throwing our hair around (laughs). The question is: How do you capture that on a record? Our producer lets us have the whiskies cutting vocals (laughs), he’s jumped on it. Our mixing engineer knows the kind of sound we want, he’s produced tracks for Aerosmith. ‘Shout’ captures our biggest influences from The Black Crowes to Aerosmith and Guns N’ Roses.’

‘There are a lot of slide guitar riffs, we drop our tuning a bit’

The Dead Levee is currently working on a 10-11 track album that will likely be released next year, with four songs already recorded: ‘It’s a lot heavier,’ Morgan said. ‘There are a lot of slide guitar riffs, we drop our tuning a bit. In addition to ‘Shout’, we’ve got ‘Love and Misery’, ‘Coward’s Blues’ – that’s about our old singer (laughs) – and ‘Good Time Pick Me Up’. ‘Love and Misery’ is somewhat explicit, it’s about the one person who’s so toxic but the sex is good (laughs), a one night stand that maybe ends up being more. Letting out your inner demons, it’s like therapy on paper. There’s a lot of wah on this song. It’s got rock in it with old school punk, a kind of 90’s vibe. It builds lots. It’s my favourite guitar solo to play, it’s such a badass solo. It’s around 25 seconds, it just rips! ‘Good Time Pick Me Up’ is also one of those songs about feeling down in the gutters after a night – or three! – of partying. Where the only cure for that kind of hangover seems to be water, maybe a little bit of weed, and a lot of loving from a girl (laughs). Ray and I worked on this song about a year and a half ago and finally got to put it on record. A bunch of real high energy songs have been recorded for this next album.’

‘Coward’s Blues’ doesn’t pull any punches, especially if you listen to the lyrics: ‘One line goes “Here I am, I’ve got the manners of an animal”,’ Morgan said. ‘It’s in drop tuning, it starts off with a bit of slide guitar with hard riffs at the end of the song, including a riff our old singer neglected for years. We wrote it a week after he left, we used all of the riffs in it that he’d rejected (laughs). It’s about him realising he was in the wrong.’

Importantly, the dynamics in the band have improved measurably since the line up changed: ‘I see the boys on stage now sometimes, it’s not like walking on broken glass anymore,’ Morgan said. ‘You can run and leap around. I was seven years old when I picked up my first guitar, it felt so natural. When I throw a guitar on my shoulder, it’s like putting a battery pack on my back (laughs). My go to guitar is my Ernie Ball Sterling sub-bass, I beat the hell out of my guitar! I love the way it feels, I slap the hell out of it! You have all these guys who have beaten up their guitars – Pete Townsend would put his guitar through an amp and Jimi Hendrix set fire to his guitar on stage.’

‘If you put all of your energy into it, the instrument sings right back to you’

I say that having watched Paul McCartney’s Glastonbury set this year and Taylor Hawkins’ Tribute Concert in London organised by Foo Fighters, it struck me how much energy the musicians who are well into retirement age still have and he agrees: ‘If you put all of your energy into it, the instrument sings right back to you,’ he said enthusiastically. ‘If your heart is singing, your body feels it, too. It’s all balls to the wall, it’s inspiring to see.’

Growing up, he was exposed to big riffs from the off, courtesy of his dad: ‘My dad loves his hair metal (laughs). I watched Mötley Crüe videos when I was seven or eight and thought “That’s what I want to do”. I listened to a lot of Metallica, AC/DC, The Stooges and The Misfits.’

The fun they have recording and playing live is evident. The artwork for ‘Shout’ (below) comprises black and white photos taken when they recorded it and their joy at being there is palpable in the photos: ”Every time we play, we play as if we’re playing to a packed arena,’ Morgan said. ‘It’s a lot of fun in the studio as well, our guitarist plays slide guitar with a beer bottle (laughs), it’s quite hard! It’s all really spur of the moment.’

‘One of our favourite records is the Stones’ Exile on Main Street’

If Morgan could go for a drink with anyone he picks Keith Richards and Mick Jagger: ‘We love our Rolling Stones. I’d love to have a whisky – or whiskies – with him. And Rod Stewart. He’s older now but he’s still a party animal, isn’t he?! He’s one of the coolest guys. One of our favourite records is the Stones’ Exile on Main Street, when they got exiled to France but they’re still kicking it! Mick Jagger makes us young guys look like chumps!’

His dream line up would be all about the riffs: ‘That’s a tough one! The Black Crowes for sure, I love them so much, they shook me and opened my eyes. Guns N’ Roses, when I was five or six, I heard their debut album, Appetite For Destruction, I was so taken by it. I would say probably AC/DC, in a perfect world with Bon Scott singing. That would be an amazing festival!’

Gigs have picked up this year and Morgan is grateful for the ‘quality’ shows they have taken part in: ‘We played a stadium recently to around 35,000 people listening to us rock out,’ he said, sounding genuinely awestruck. ‘We played the football game pre-show. and Katelyn Lehner (an American country singer) played the half-time show. It was the Labor Day class, with the Saskatchewan Roughriders playing the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. I used to play football, it was so much fun. Bruises and sprained ankles, then you go back the next week and do it all over again!’

(Photo from left to right: Buck, Izzy, Preston and Ray.)