People ask me if Roanoke has “a sound.” Like everything that eventually climbs over the mountains and works its way in here, much of our music is born somewhere else. Not that we don’t celebrate our roots, but then they are frequently buried under several hundred pounds of dirt.

But what does Roanoke sound like — today? That was the discussion I had in mind when I sat down with Blackjack and the Longhaulers. Getting the chance to chat with John, Q, Joe, and Dan, I went ready to shoot the breeze about a healthy side project. What I got was a refreshingly insightful debate on breaking the “redneck music” stereotype and still being proud to play on the front porch.

John Thompson, guitar

Ryan McHugh, known as “Q,” bass

Joe Lunsford, drums

Daniel Bivins, vocals and guitar

Q: Let’s start with an easy one, because it sounds like you guys might have a better place on vinyl…

Dan: That’s kind of what we’re going for when we recorded. We do it all on reel-to-reel, because that’s what we want. We didn’t want ProTools. We didn’t want to edit it all over.

'Q:' It’s not clean, like vinyl was. It sounds put together, but only as put together as we are. It sounds like it really sounds, with a mic in front of the amp.

Joe: There are a lot of possibilities in a ProTools setup. I think some of the limitations of doing it that way is that the analog stuff forces you to think harder about your arrangements and your live performances instead of just chopping stuff up.

'Q': And all the best sounds that we dig anyway are from before the digital era.

John: And I don’t want to deal with a million ideas (laughs), because I’ll get away from the original one.

Q: That’s a lot of personality and thought to put into a side project. If it does continue to stand out to people here as something more authentic, where do you see it heading?

'Q': Well, I don’t think anybody in this bands treats it like its just a side project. It’s like being in another band. We work as hard in whatever. It’s fun, and I don’t want this to turn into job.

John: I think this is something we enjoy enough that we’re going to play it regardless. It’d be better if it really caught on and people liked it, but I’ll play it if I get to paid to play every weekend or not. I know everybody says that, though…

Dan: I think we’ve all been through this enough, too. I remember, back in the day, when I started in a band and I had this idea that I was going to make a great life out of it because I watched too much TV and had this idea put in front of me.

John: But the older I get, that changes a little. When you’re real young, you see it as some grand life and then you play for a while and you don’t want anything to do with that stuff, really.

Dan: I’d rather be some dumb SOB who builds houses during the day and plays music and night, and at least I’m not a ******* about it.

Q: I hate to eat up interview time with a bio people can read off your Web site. Give me the quick version

Joe: We’ve all known each other for quite a while, at least the three of us [motioning to Q and Dan]. Sam, our other guitarist, is my brother, and he’s been in a band with John for a few years. Dan’s always been writing a bunch of songs, and from time to time we’ve tried to put a band together to play with him, to back him up, and record with him. This is the latest version of that. Dan showed up with a bunch of tunes. We started out, just Dan, Sam, and myself, doing some acoustic versions of them, and some of those actually translated over into these electric versions, which is Blackjack and the Longhaulers. You describe it how you want (laughs). That’s the short bio, I guess.

Q: Now I know this isn’t the only band you guys have going on. Being a part of a few different ones, how do you think this one fits in with everything else around here?

Dan: It did start out as a side project, but I really feel like it’s starting to snowball a lot. We feel like what we’re doing is appealing to people up a lot of different avenues. Older people who enjoy the older classic rock, like some CCR, or we can hit the country feel, or a good old feel of the blues. We like that we’re not really limiting ourselves..

Joe: We’re not bottlenecked into anything…

John: I think it seems like we all enjoy what we’re playing, because it’s mixing up the stuff we all listen to. The country. The honky-tonk. The rock or the blues. It’s a good culmination of all that.

Joe: It’s also a killer outlet for all the other material and all the other ideas that maybe ain’t appropriate for whatever else we might be doing. Sometimes you get that really great idea for something, and maybe the band you have couldn’t pull it off or it just wouldn’t fit and so we try it out here. As far as how we are for the scene, I think it’s different because we’re young dudes who are playing it because we like it and not covering it because we thought it’d be popular.

Q: To listen to you, it doesn’t sound like young guys. It brings to mind someone who’s got about 25 years worth of beer-soaked records, and who sits around and plays on a porch somewhere.

John: That’s pretty right on. I mean, I think we all live in the past anyway.

Joe: Well, it’s what we all grew up on. We’re all from the South, we appreciate that type of music, and being young, we can explore all that stuff and not worry about being traditional.

Q: So tell me about the La Finca gig. Let’s say I wasn’t all-knowing and I just wandered down there. What am I going to get?

Joe: Well, we rule, sure. For this gig, there are some other acts on there that are pretty notable [Tim Barry of Avail, Josh Small and the New Roanoke Jug Band].

Dan: Tim’s been around for quite a few years, doing some really heavy stuff. We love to play with the Jug Band, and we really wanted to put together a show that is something nice, and lets people feel good with a little bit of mountain music.

Joe: It’s definitely going to be familiar stuff, whether you want to admit it or not. I mean, [96.3] ROV beats that stuff in all the time; it has that Southern rock sound. But I think that people see us and see younger guys and we aren’t playing a cover of something — we’re writing our own tunes that way. It’s loud, there’s [expletive] guitar solos all over the place…

'Q': When younger folks hear that, they can hear some heaviness, some double guitar shredding, or some big-ass drums. And then some of the older guys around here will hear this and it brings them back to playing and drinking and being our age. That connects.

John: And I think that because we love it, that realness comes through and is part of the impact.

'Q': Well, we aren’t an alt-country band or something like that. Not that we’re hating on those guys, but it’s not what we’re doing. It seems like to younger kids, not necessarily from around here, but in other cities, that can kinda be a trend.

Q: Just a different kind of rock band? One that says “hey, let’s try country…”

'Q': Exactly.

Joe: You grow up, and you’re raised on it, and then you feel like you should be ashamed of it. Like “this is redneck music” and maybe you force yourself into doing something else…

Dan: Something more accepted…

Joe: Yeah, more hip. Do indie rock. Do punk. That’s what’s in. And you do feel pressured, like someone is going to think you’re dumb — like I’m some ignorant redneck for playing it. What the [expletive]? We like that [expletive]. Why act like we don’t?

John: People aren’t dumb. They can hear that. It shows up in the way that we write it and in the way we record it.

Q: It sounds like you guys might have a better place on vinyl…

Dan: That’s kind of what we’re going for when we recorded. We do it all on reel-to-reel, because that’s what we want. We didn’t want ProTools. We didn’t want to edit it all over.

'Q': It’s not clean, like vinyl was. It sounds put together, but only as put together as we are. It sounds like it really sounds, with a mic in front of the amp.

Joe: There are a lot of possibilities in a ProTools setup. I think some of the limitations of doing it that way is that the analog stuff forces you to think harder about your arrangements and your live performances instead of just chopping stuff up.

'Q': And all the best sounds that we dig anyway are from before the digital era.

John: And I don’t want to deal with a million ideas (laughs), because I’ll get away from the original one.

Q: That’s a lot of personality and thought to put into a side project. If it does continue to stand out to people here as something more authentic, where do you see it heading?

'Q': Well, I don’t think anybody in this bands treats it like its just a side project. It’s like being in another band. We work as hard in whatever. It’s fun, and I don’t want this to turn into job.

John: I think this is something we enjoy enough that we’re going to play it regardless. It’d be better if it really caught on and people liked it, but I’ll play it if I get to paid to play every weekend or not. I know everybody says that, though…

Dan: I think we’ve all been through this enough, too. I remember, back in the day, when I started in a band and I had this idea that I was going to make a great life out of it because I watched too much TV and had this idea put in front of me.

John: But the older I get, that changes a little. When you’re real young, you see it as some grand life and then you play for a while and you don’t want anything to do with that stuff, really.

Dan: I’d rather be some dumb SOB who builds houses during the day and plays music and night, and at least I’m not a ******* about it.