Go with the flow
Local rocker Garrett Young gives advice to budding bands

Greetings, dear readers! For this week’s Between the Beats, I sat down with local blues rock shredder Garrett Young. His band, the Garrett Young Collective, recently opened up for both the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band in Gunnison and the Bellamy Brothers right here in Durango.

Growing up in La Plata County, Young was a competitive mogul skier for many years and only found his passion for guitar and songwriting in late middle school. By the time his high school senior year rolled around, he had gone – to use the local mountain parlance of our times – “full send” into the life of a musician. He was playing at Los Angeles’ Whiskey A Go Go at the time most kids his age were peddling each other Adderall and cramming for really, really expensive college finals.

Young is humble, effuses positivity and has a bright future in front of him. We should all be proud of this hometown hero on the rise. Enjoy some snippets from our conversation.

Garrett, thanks for sitting down with me! You grew up in Durango, right?

Until I was 5. Durango and then Bayfield ever since. I moved to L.A. halfway through senior year and ended up finishing my degree living in L.A. as an 18-year-old.

What took you to L.A.?

I had a producer that lived in Beverly Hills, and it just made sense for me and my band to move out there. We basically did everything you shouldn’t do, like standing outside of the exit gates of Capitol Records trying to pass out our demos to A&R reps as they were leaving. You can imagine how well that went.

Who are your influences?

There’s a huge array. My dad is country/western through and through. All of my friends were into hard rock in high school, and I got super into classic rock. I love everything, though. I just put it in a big musical crockpot.

Tell us about your last record “Get Gone!”

That came out at the end of last summer. I recorded that at a home in the garage. I do all the engineering. It’s fun, it’s a challenge. The hardest part is that you’re so invested in it. As the writer, the singer and guitar player, sometimes I’m like, “Ok, I’m looking way too deep into this. What does a rock song need to sound like?”

Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, the Bellamy Brothers. What are you learning from these incredible opportunities to open for Hall of Fame-level musical groups?

Mostly I’ve learned that you’ve got to go with the flow. When you’re opening for the Bellamy Brothers or Nitty Gritty, you don’t need to play your heavier stuff. Just go with the flow, and have fun.

Seeing as you’ve played around the country for more than 10 years now, what are your insights into the national musical industry right now?

What I’ve found is that there’s “mainstream,” and that’s obvious. That’s where the bucks are. And, then there’s the more niche groups and genres. What’s cool is that there’s huge opportunities in every vein right now. You’ve got to know your place and where to go.

Streaming has made live music the only profitable income for musicians. Most of the money from streaming goes to the top 20% of artists. So, up and coming artists are making nothing from streaming. You can be upset about that. But, it is also a really cool, convenient way to get your music in front of a larger audience. Concert tickets are not going down in price, so that’s promising. It’s tough, it’s always been tough, and it’s always going to be tough, so you’ve gotta love it.

What advice do you have for a local shredder? If you could give yourself advice now looking back, what would it be?

Take every opportunity you can. Don’t pigeonhole yourself. It can be easy to overthink things. If you had asked me three years ago if we could open for the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, I might have said, “I don’t know if we really fit that.” But, you make it work, so you get these opportunities. Outside of that, make it fun, first and foremost.

What’s on the horizon for Garrett Young Collective?

Play as much as we can! Write as much as we can. We’re out at the Lauter Haus Brewing Co. in Farmington on Sat., Aug. 19, opening for Alex Williams. This fall, we’re going to L.A. to record a full-length live album in North Hollywood. I’m really excited for that.