Muddy Ruckus Carson Weatherby photo

It’s always fun to reconnect with artists I have interviewed before, and such was the case when I chatted with guitarist Ryan Flaherty and drummer Erika Stahl, aka Muddy Ruckus.

CONCERT INFO

MUDDY RUCKUS
TIME: 4-8:30 p.m.
DATE: Friday, July 7
VENUE: Thompson’s Point
ADDRESS: Thompson’s Point Road, Portland
TICKETS: free entry
PHONE: 207-747-5288
WEBSITES: muddyruckus.com, thompsonspoint.com

TIME: 6-7:30 p.m.
DATE: Friday, July 14
VENUE: Gardiner Landing 
ADDRESS: ME-24, Gardiner
TICKETS: free
PHONE: 207-582-7144
WEBSITES: muddyruckus.com, johnsonhall.org

TIME: 5 p.m.
DATE: Saturday, July 22
VENUE: Waterfront Park
ADDRESS: 61 Commercial St., Bath
TICKETS: free
PHONE: 207-442-7291
WEBSITES: muddyruckus.com, visitbath.com

This Portland-based, genre-defying duo has just released its fourth album, “Vacationland,” and has shows coming next month at locations in its home state of Maine.

I first connected with Flaherty in 2014 and then in 2019, when he decided to become a duo with Stahl while retaining the Muddy Ruckus name. Needless to say, four years is a little too long between chats.

The two agreed and I called them at home last month to learn more about what is happening in their lives. They had sent a link to the new CD, so I began by responding to the new music on it.

Q: I’ve been listening to the “Vacationland” link you sent and I find it’s tribal, it’s primal, it’s compelling, and the thing that got me more than anything else is that it’s very diverse throughout: There’s slow, melodic moments and then a jack-slap or two thrown in for good measure. It’s a really exciting listening — that’s what it sums up to, I think.
Flaherty: Thank you.
Stahl: Awesome, thank you!

Q: I have to ask: Is this representative of what you do live? I can’t imagine how just two people can create such a dense wall of sound.
Stahl: Yes, that was what we were going for: To make something that was more representative of what we are like live, even though it was not live. Obviously, we could do more in the studio with it than we could when we’re playing live. We were kind of lacking that in some of our previous recordings, so we wanted to really make something that we felt was more representative of how we play our live shows.
Flaherty: Over the years, we’ve been told by our fans, “You guys sound like a full rock band, but you’re only two people.” So, like Erika said, we just really wanted to come across more like that on this album. We do have a lot of diversity in our music, especially now that we’ve been together for almost 10  years. We started in more of a very folk-y kind of Americana realm, and every year we seem to get a little bit more electric. And bringing back our roots from when we were kids — the rock and the blues and the alternatives — so we also wanted to capture that evolution in the album and make it kind of like, for lack of better words, a journey when you listen to it.

Q: And I love that quality in an album.
Flaherty: This recording is like an album where it’s supposed to be listened to from the beginning to the end, and not just a bunch of singles that we threw together.

Q: Right! And that’s just it because it does flow beautifully. I mean, it reminds me of whitewater rapids: There are parts of it where you’re holding on for dear life, and then there are other parts when you can just kind of cruise — it’s a helluva ride, man!
Flaherty: Thanks.
Stahl (with laughter): I’m so glad you said that.
Flaherty: And I know a lot of it is pretty red-hot, and that’s because we are like that in our shows, but also we just wanted to keep things raw and not watered-down. When we recorded it — the guitar and the drums live — we were just like, “Well, that sounds real,” so we kept it that way.

Q: Excellent, you found a sound that really captures what you’re all about, I would say. Is that a fair statement?
Stahl: Yeah.
Flaherty: I think so. I mean, we did the best we could. There’s always more we wanted to do, and more we will do, hopefully, that will capture that even more, but I think we’ve come closer than our previous releases, for sure.

Q: Now, as far as concerts going on, what’s in the near future for Muddy Ruckus?
Stahl: Well, we have a show at Thompson’s Point Summer Sunsets Live series on July 7, and we’re also playing in Bath and Gardiner at their Waterfront Concerts series. We are touring throughout New England for the summer, and also, right now, we’re in the process of deciding some bigger tours in the Midwest and down South.

Q: When is that show in Gardiner?
Stahl: That one is on July 14. It’s a great spot. We played there years ago, but everything’s been kind of weird since the pandemic. Oh, and the Bath show is on the 22nd of July.

Q: I know that the new CD just came out, but I was wondering if you were working on anything new.
Stahl: As far as what we’re working on, Ryan, you want to answer that?
Flaherty: Well, obviously, right now we’re mainly focused on that new album. We worked on it for 14 months, so we are determined to push and plug and promote it as much as we can this summer. So that’s a lot of what we’re going to be working on, aside and in addition to playing shows. And then James Montgomery — he’s a pretty legendary harmonica player who played on the second song called “Long Time” — is going to be in a video with us that we’ll be shooting in June or July.

Q: That should be cool. Is there anything you two would like me to pass on to the folks reading this article?
Flaherty: Just that we’re releasing what we believe is our most relevant and strongest work. And again, going back to what we said about an album, that we’re just trying to bring that concept back. We hope that this will give folks an organic and maybe a desirable experience that isn’t being offered so much anymore in the music world.

Q: Erika, is there anything you’d like to add?
Stahl: Just that the community in Maine has really been supportive of us — and me, when I went through all my health issues — so we’re just very grateful for the community support here.
Flaherty: And there are a lot of people that donated money to us for the album. We couldn’t have done this without them.

Lucky Clark, a 2018 Keeping the Blues Alive Award winner, has spent more than 50 years writing about good music and the people who make it. He can be reached at luckyc@myfairpoint.net if you have questions, comments or suggestions.