In spring of 2023, we at Tuonela Magazine decided that it was in everyone’s best interests if we could help the world get to know CLASSLESS ACT a bit better, in the hopes that they’ll find their way over to Europe sooner rather than later to show off their debut album, “Welcome to the Show“ (2022, Better Noise Music). As such, we partnered up with their team and did an in-depth interview with each one of the band members! First up, we have guitarist Griffin Tucker, who talks about having perfect pitch, his time of American Idol and The Voice, joining CLASSLESS ACT, and more!
Hi everyone, I’m Bear Wiseman from Tuonela Magazine and I’m here today to help you get to know Griffin Tucker, one of the two guitarists from CLASSLESS ACT!
Hello there, it’s so good to be here. Thank you for having me.
First of all, as I understand, you’ve been dabbling with music your entire life and one of your “natural superpowers” is to just pick up an instrument and make it work for you. Is that true?
I do play a lot of different instruments. Guitar wasn’t my first, I actually started on drums. But I do have what’s called “perfect pitch,” which basically… it’s like how people see color and you immediately notice the color, that’s like me with notes and chords and such. So that definitely helps with picking up instruments and at least finding where notes are. Maybe not like, exactly how to do the technicality part – I’m not necessarily like a horn player or anything like that – but especially if it’s like strings, even if it’s a violin, I can kind of… fiddle my way through it all. I mean, I just love music so much, so I just… I naturally want to learn as much as I can about instruments.
Have you ever come across an instrument that’s totally stumped you?
Brass instruments. I can’t for the life of me get that buzz that you’re supposed to get with the mouth to play trumpet or French horn or whatever. I could never get the hang of that.
Is there an instrument that you haven’t learned to play that you’d really love to learn?
Oooh, any of those orchestral instruments and I’d love to get better at violin, just because I love bands like ELO actually. My first introduction to music was actually classical music when I was really sick in the hospital when I was like 6 months old. I had to have tubes down my throat and a bunch of gross, gross stuff, but the only thing that would calm me down was listening to classical music. So I’d love to at least… if not incorporate it into music that I am doing nowadays, I’d just love to get a better understanding of how all that stuff works.
Have you ever had any music lessons specific to one instrument, or singing, for example?
I have, especially for singing, but I did have maybe a few months of drums and guitar, but I’m mostly self-taught on all of the hand instruments. But it definitely took me – especially you know, when my voice changed – it took me a very long time to get it to a condition where I was comfortable enough using it to just sing my own songs and sing other people’s songs. So I definitely had some lessons.
So with that in mind, you said you started on the drums. How did you end up as a lead guitarist as opposed to a drummer or a singer or a pianist or whatever?
Right? The whole thing was, I started because my dad and my brother wanted to go to a music store and, of course, I was 4 years old so I couldn’t stay at the house by myself. So we took a family trip over the guitar store and my brother and my dad started strumming along with some acoustics and I got bored and I was like, “Can I go play? Can I go to the drum room and just, like, hit stuff?” So that’s how it all started. And then that turned into watching THE BEATLES on The Ed Sullivan Show on a DVD that I had and I was just like, “I want to do that. That looks fun.” And so I started with drums and I’m like, “I want to do what those other guys are doing.” So then it became piano and guitar and all that stuff. So it really came from a desire to recreate the sounds that I was hearing, and then later on down the line, then I started to want to create with those same instruments.
Now I’ve also read that you’re quite an introvert, so is it nice to sit back and let Derek [Day, vocals] be the frontliner guy or do you also find that same sort of energy from being up there?
It’s interesting, because as much as I like being myself on stage, it’s definitely a performance. If I’m gonna get 45 minutes to spend with people that I may not see for months, or maybe even years, then I want to give it everything that I possibly have. So you know, that’s a lot of moving around and really just like… if it’s not focusing on my playing, it’s really engaging the audience, but I also want to really focus in on the technicality and making sure that all that stuff is as great as it can be, so that that leaves a lasting impression on whoever I only see for that 45 minutes.
I think the case is also the same for Derek. As much as he is that maniac that he presents himself as, he is also a human being, maybe more behind closed doors, than I am. He’s just… I don’t know, I think he just feels more comfortable being more in-your-face and being the center of attention. And he’s great at being that person. You know, I definitely am… in more of my personal life and just as a person off stage, I am more of an introvert. But I do like to perform when I’m on stage.
Do you find that tour life really strenuous, being on the road all the time, or is there something energizing about it as well?
It’s a very difficult question, because there’s so much that comes along with touring. We started touring when I was… gosh, it would have been March of last year, so I would have been 20, I think, and I had just started living in California. I lived in Texas for 19 years with my parents and I had never really had an experience where I was away from them and also taking care of myself. I’ve always been in this environment of like, everyone takes care of each other, so that we all will care for each other, instead of always focusing on ourselves. But of course, being on the road, as much as we are a family and we have to be there for each other, we also have to just kind of be there for ourselves and really, you know, just be an adult, which is something that I wasn’t exactly used to.
But you know, being in a band, it’s… and I’m really, really fortunate to have such a great group of guys to share the experience with, but it definitely was very different, but I don’t think I would have even contemplated doing something like that if I wasn’t playing music every night and getting to see the other side of the music conversation, where it starts with writing the song and trying to connect with yourself, trying to understand more things about yourself and write that down. And then the other part is giving that to somebody else and hopefully it strikes a chord or connects with them. And it’s harder to feel that connection when it’s all social media -based. But when we get to go across the country and see all these different people that I still can’t believe love our music as much as they do… it’s crazy to see people connect in a very real way to the things that we’re singing about and the things that we’re touching on. So the touring thing, it’s all very worth it. It’s very different but I do love doing it.
I was looking you up online, of course, getting all the backstory, and I found these videos of you on American Idol when you were 15 with fully… Lionel Richie saying he was afraid of your potential and everything. So what was that experience like because… you know, you hear all the weird stories about how hard it is to get on there and how strenuous it is. So what was that like?
I was very lucky with that whole experience, because it sort of just came out of thin air. On both The Voice and American Idol, the teams that scout the talent or, you know, curate whoever gets on the show, they scouted me out because I had… I think it was some video. I think I was like, doing a guitar competition and I won the competition, so they saw that video and thought that they’d invite me on the show. It was a really, really cool experience. I’m very fortunate that I didn’t have to go through the practically millions of auditions and callbacks that most people have to go through, and waiting in line and such. I just feel very fortunate to do that.
But you know, it’s very much that they are TV shows and they’re very much controlled in that way, so that everything fits the narrative, the season goes on for how long, and all that stuff, but at the same time, getting to meet legends like Lionel Richie, Katy Perry, Luke Bryan, Adam Levine, Gwen Stefani, Blake Shelton, and Alicia Keys… it was amazing to be in the company of such great minds and people who have been in the business for such a long time and working at their craft and knowing what industry people like and don’t like. It was very interesting to put my… I’m just so naïve to all that stuff that they know, and to get up there and play some songs and play piano, and to hear what they have to say… it was a very valuable experience. Because there was so much more that didn’t get to air of advice that they gave me. Like Luke was talking to me about like, branding. Of course, he said it in a very Luke Bryan way, he said [mimics accent], “you need to pick a horse. You need to figure out what your ‘thing’ is.” [laughter] But it was very cool to hear what they had to say about… they were initially hesitant on giving me a golden ticket on Idol, but as I brought out different kinds of songs and kind of showed that variety or that versatility that I try to have and also that I have in my influences, of artists that I love. It was interesting seeing that play out in real-time instead of watching it happen to somebody else. It was an awesome experience.
Very cool. Well, with that in mind, I was gonna ask this a bit later, but do you have any artists or songs in your favorite tracks that people would find surprising that… just as an example, I’m a metal journalist, so people find it crazy that I love country music. [laughter]
One of the bands that always gets a chuckle whenever I bring it up is ABBA. I cannot get enough of ABBA. It’s literally just two mad scientists writing for two angels. The music is so perfect and the two girls’ voices are so perfect. But other than that, I mean, I love some Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson. Other than that I love just the rock ‘n’ roll -type of stuff, but I love ELO. Of course my big three are THE BEATLES, [LED ZEPPELIN], and QUEEN. I love AC/DC, AEROSMITH, all those… more of the classic bands. There’s just an element of a more real connection to their instruments, especially at that point towards the ’70s, there were more things that were being sung about and things were being brought to the table, like, one album that I am only recently just getting really into is “Dark Side of the Moon,” which is an album that’s completely about mental illness. It’s amazing that music had progressed to that point of, “we can actually sing about this stuff” and it’s not just “I love you, you love me,” and that’s it. And of course, all music is derivative and I think we’re all just… they took from the artists from the ’50s, the ’60s, and we’re taking from the artists from the ’80s and ’90s and the ’70s and such, so I always enjoy listening to those older bands, to see that higher standard that they held themselves to.
I understand also that you’ve released some solo material, at least 5 or so years ago – at least one anyways. So what was that like and who were you working with?
Well, I was a solo artists for 8 years before I joined CLASSLESS, and Derek was also a solo artist for many, many years; that’s how he got his start. But it was just my way of… I started when I was 11. I recorded a song called “Girlfriend.” It was a deal that I had that I gotten with this guy named Patrice Wilson, who some people may know produced “Friday” by Rebecca Black. It was a very poppy song, but it was an introduction to get me into the whole world of being a solo artist.
But that started to blossom into writing more material and only now am I really starting to get to writing worthwhile lyrics and trying to tap into my soul to find that stuff, instead of writing what I think I should be writing about. But yeah, I mean, it was always very Texas-based with the whole solo artist thing and I’ve put somewhat of a hold on it for right now because I really want to put myself into CLASSLESS and, of course, it’s out in California, which is where we all need to be to make it all happen, because we have a very knowledgeable and very wise group of people that are helping us behind the scenes to get this music out there, to get this music branded correctly, marketed correctly, all that behind the scenes stuff. So I needed to take that journey because it helped me to get to where I am now. But it’s all just taking little steps forward.
Who was then the first member from CLASSLESS ACT that you met and how did you meet them?
Well, my first introduction to the whole camp was our manager. He reached out to me over social media because I had just started a Tik-Tok that I was super resistant to start; I was just like, “Tik-Tok is just like… all these kids are using it” and I already had that old man attitude. But I started it up and I had a video, it was a perfect pitch challenge. Basically, my two best friends sat down at the piano and they would play notes on the piano and I would, without looking, tell them what notes they were playing. And I just posted that because like, “that works, it’s content.” But he found it. I wasn’t even playing an instrument, but he was like, “I like this guy’s positivity. I like this guy’s energy.” So he kept scrolling and keep scrolling and found that I played this instrument and this instrument, so he reached out and asked me if I wanted to be in this band in California and I was like, “this is 100% a scam.” [laughter] Of course, I read into his bio and of course his history, and he’s a very knowledgeable guy in the industry and a very well-known person in those circles, and I decided that I would just give it a shot. So he was the first person to open the door and be like, “do you want to try this out?”
But yeah, I remember I had my first audition with all four of the other guys. From what they’ve said, I mean, the whole thing was like, they were looking for guitarists and the whole album was practically written and recorded by that point, mainly waiting to be mastered. So they were just looking for someone who could learn the material, but also as quickly as it’s all recorded, so they could get back on the road start and building up chemistry for tours that were coming up, like The Stadium Tour was already on the table and they were looking for a lead guitarist. I got there and I had learned like nine of the twelve songs. They gave me the entire album to learn. I had learned nine of the twelve and from what they said, the other guitarist had learned maybe like three of the songs before that rehearsal. And they were very loose on all the parts. But I remember I stressed that entire week leading up to that audition, working endlessly trying to learn all the songs. I was beating myself up because I didn’t get the last three songs that I was trying to learn, but I got in there and I learned some of the harmonies, and we had all started harmonizing together and playing, and they said that they knew within… they knew by the end of the rehearsal that I was probably going to be the guy.
So it was a very cool thing, especially to be told afterwards, but it’s always just like that, trying to… I don’t know, just kind of leaving me in the dark, like, “maybe we’ll lead him on a little bit, make him want it a little more.” But of course, after the fact, now that we’re all super close, it’s just like, “yeah, we knew.” [laughs]
So with that in mind then, did you actually do much of the writing on “Welcome to the Show” or was that album a little bit established already at that point?
It was very well established before I got in the band. Derek and Franco are the main writers of the majority of the songs. And of course there are some outside writers that they co-wrote with, such as Justin Hawkins [THE DARKNESS, who does a solo on “This Is for You”] and Keith Nelson [BUCKCHERRY] and some other guys, but they brought the ideas to the table and then they would get some help with fleshing them out. And of course, Dane wrote “Storm Before the Calm” and “Walking Contradiction,” and Chuck even brought in a riff for “Walking Contradiction.” So it was mainly all done by the time that I had joined the band. But I did do some of the lead guitar work in songs like “Time to Bleed” and “Classless Act.” Those songs, I came in and I did some guitar on.
What was it like to go from being a house band, to then going on the local tours, to then going on this huge stadium tour with all these big, massive names. What was that journey like?
There’s nothing really ever to prepare you for being in a venue of that size, like a stadium. We’ve always been so used to seeing everyone’s faces, so up close. It’s so much more intimate where, like if Derek‘s busking on the street, people are literally just walking by and he’s doing everything in his power to make sure that they stop and watch and hopefully give him some kind of tip. Of course, I did club stuff… everyone was in their own band before we had joined together and once all five of us had gotten together, we had started by just doing a weekly residency at this little restaurant called The Killer Shrimp in Marina Del Rey. We would play there week after week and, it was like a lounge. It was very dimly lit and we had to set up our own sound and, it was like warp-speed paying our dues. You know, even though all of us had kind of done all of the bars and the clubs, scraping by and hoping that anyone will look our way, but all that started maybe July of last… no 2 years ago in July, and so we had done that weekly thing and then we started playing in other places and then we got the offer to do the tour with DOROTHY. So that was our first time going… which was March of last year.
So we went around the country and that was our first taste of trying to figure out what touring life was going to be like and how we were all going to handle it. And it was very tough because, I mean, DOROTHY is still an upcoming band, even though she’s amazing and she’s even topped the rock charts at certain points within the last year. We were all living off gas station food and doing budget hotels and all that stuff, so just trying to save money wherever we can. But then to go from that to The Stadium Tour, where everybody is so well taken care of that… that professionalism and everybody being so… everything is so perfect for everybody. Everybody has their riders and their specific requests, all that kind of trickled down to us. So there was catering; we didn’t have to worry about food. We normally got a nice place to be our dressing room; we didn’t have to hang out in the van before the show. We always got sound-checked and we always got a place to set our gear and such.
So it was really an amazing experience, but I certainly still don’t believe that we even deserved something like that, even though we’re incredibly fortunate to have experienced that. And we learned a lot and, I mean, being around such well-established people in the industry, all those people in the bands – even the stagehands and the crew that have been with the bands for such a long time – to hear their stories and all of the things that they’ve taken with them from being on the road, it was really powerful to see that up close and personal.
Well, part of the reason we’re doing this interview is to try and get you guys over to Europe. So have you been to Europe before and, if not, is there anything that you’d really love to see or do over here?
The last time I was… I guess in that area was when I was in the UK. I went to the UK I think in 2014. I had gone over there and I had done a few performances, but basically I was just there to explore. The majority of the trip was just exploring the area, just doing the tourist things and exploring all these different places that I’ve only read about or seen movies about, but that’s the closest I’ve ever gotten to Europe. But I mean, the culture that I’ve assumed is over there and culture that I’ve read about being over there is something that I’ve always wanted to experience and I wanted to experience the food and the people and the venues and the vibe that comes along, like the audience/performer -vibe that’s there, instead of the way it is over here in America. I’ve always wanted to experience what that’s like.
I’m about running out of time here, so I’ll wrap this up with one more question, which is: if you could pass on one message to make the world a better place, what would it be?
Oh my goodness. Without sounding pretentious [laughs]… gosh, to make the world a better place… take time to take care of yourself, because life can get pretty busy and sometimes that busyness can get you off track of what you’re really doing it all for, so it’s important to take time to reevaluate and self-reflect and to think about the things that you do, day-in, day-out. Yeah, I mean, I don’t know what kind of position I have to tell anybody how to make their life better, but it’s important take self care and to take care of your mental health, your emotional health, and do things because you love doing them, not because you feel obligated to do them.
Well, thank you so much, we’ve just run out of time. It’s great to get to talk to you one on one for a change and I really hope you guys get over here sometime soon!
I hope so as well, that would be such a blast! And thank you so much for having me today.
Interview by Bear Wiseman
