Seth Yacovone: Guitar competitions are weird to begin with. I had been in the same one a year before and came in second place, winning some studio time. From there, I ended up getting help putting a band together and we had started to gig out. There was another guitar competition the next year, and I was in it again. I played a song I wrote called "All the Pain Through the Years" along to pre-recorded backing. At the time, my musical aspirations were pretty much the same as they are now. I'm so absorbed by music and I love playing so much that it's not even what I want to do, it's something I have to do. I need it. Trey being so supportive has been great for the band. It has let a ton of people, who might have never heard of us, let alone go see us play, be a little more open to checking us out. It's also a great encouragement to have musicians you have a lot of respect for tell you that you're doing OK.

It's easy to get bogged down and feel like you're banging your head against the business, so it means a lot.

The Stone Pony: Your press clippings are filled with accolades such as “prodigy” and “phenom” and comparisons to guitar heroes from the past thirty years.  How well have you adapted to the transition from a home-schooled kid practicing in rural Vermont, to a highly-touted international musician?  Are you comfortable with the increased fame and recognition, or have you felt additional pressures to live up all the attention?

SY: I don't really feel like I have adapted, so I guess not very well. Recognition is nice. It's a great feeling to see someone really enjoying something to which you've given everything you have for basically your entire life. People digging our band is the best reward. I definitely feel pressures, but not so much in the sense that I have to live up to the attention. It's more just the pressures that everyone feels having to survive with a small business. I am so incredibly lucky to have wound up in these amazing opportunities that have somehow allowed me to be able to be doing exactly what I want to do. It is strange the things people run in their heads about people they've heard about but don't know at all. But that is just human nature that has been built up. I'm kind of an extroverted introvert anyway, so I tend to back away and hide in corners when I'm not on stage.

The Stone Pony: Keeping on that theme, does traveling around the world give you a different perspective on living in Vermont? Are you more comfortable living on the road, or do you still enjoy being at home when you have an opportunity to do so? Have you found that your experience growing up in the part of the country that you did gives you a unique view on things, or a more global outlook that you find wherever you travel to?

SY: I had never left America except for Canada for a day or two until we first went to Italy. I think witnessing any country other than your own will change your perspective on life in general. By living and working in another culture for a month at a time, you can see the way things are the same and different in a different way than just being a tourist somewhere. I love Vermont so much. I've been a few places, not that many, but it's my favorite. It's what I know. Our management, which is based in Central New Jersey, wants us to move down there.  Jersey's great, but I'm a Vermonter. Our whole band was born and raised here. It gives you a unique view on things. Things are more spacious and slow up here. Things are more simple in a lot of ways. There are no billboards. I didn't grow up with cable TV, unlike most people my age. It gives you time to have to make your own fun, your own life. I enjoy living on the road, and though I enjoy being home, I also get very antsy and have to drive around all the time to keep moving. I get the shakes if I sit too still.

The Stone Pony: One of the more fascinating stories in your career thus far is how you ended up being booked on a tour of Italy. Can you retell that story for our readers? How many shows did you end up playing on your trips to Italy, and what plans do you have to return?

SY: We put this guy we know, Roy, on the cover of our second CD, Yessir!  The CD was sent by Leeway's Home Grown Music Network to a music magazine reviewer in Italy. Roy happens to look a lot like a famous Italian comedian. The reviewer looked at the CD and wondered what an American band was doing with this comedy dude on their CD. So he decided to listen to it instead of just putting it in a pile. He ended up loving the music and started reviewing us and he got the ball rolling by selling our cds in his shop and contacting a promoter to bring us over there. It was good fortune and luck that we ever were heard at all. We played around 15 shows each time we've gone over there. I'm not sure when we're going back, but I know it won't be before we have our next CD out.

The Stone Pony: You were quoted as saying that Italian audiences “find out about music, and it's not forced down their throats.” Can you elaborate on that statement, and what the attitudes are of the fans you’ve played for in Italy, as opposed to what you’ve found in the United States? Do you still feel the pressures of building a fan base at this point in your career, and is it odd that you may currently be more famous in a European country than, say, Ohio?

SY: Well, my quoted statement refers more to America as a whole than, say, the people who like our music; I mean, mainstream music. In this day and age, if you want to find music that isn't a commercial for toothpaste and silicon, it seems you have to hunt for it and find it yourself because the media isn't selling it to you. It's the same way in Italy -- though I find that music fans there are much hungrier. They aren't content to not find good new music. They look for it, and if they find something they like they need everything the band has ever done. They need to understand it and know about it. There are a ton of people like that still in this country, too, but they are far outnumbered by people who are willing to be satisfied with what they are given.

The jamband scene is a lot like the Italian music scene in the way that work is involved in following the bands. It's just more underground. You aren't going to hear the next great band for the first time on "The Ed Sullivan Show" anymore these days. We feel pressure to build a fan base. It's hard, with so much going on to entertain folks at all times, just in people's homes, to entice them to come out and spend money on a new band they haven't heard. It is strange that we are more popular in Italy than Ohio, but hey, we've only played two gigs in Ohio. We're working on it!

The Stone Pony: You’ve been open in crediting your band mates, bassist Tom Coggio and drummer Steve Hadeka, with being a vital element to the band’s sound and success. You went through a number of players in the band’s developmental years. How did you finally get to know Tom and Steve, and when did they become full members of your band?

SY: Tommy was the second bassist in the band. He joined on our 19th gig. He was the only person we auditioned for the job and it worked nicely. He's been in the band since July of 1996.  Steve was our fourth drummer and was again the only person we auditioned at the time. He joined in March of 1999. We were lucky to find each other. We have a chemistry together that you can't find by just throwing three good musicians in a room together. We play our instruments the way we do because of how each other plays. Our adaptive playing styles only have become what they are because of our collective playing style. We've adapted and changed so much since the band started. I think part of that is due to the fact I was 16 when the band started. There is more growth in a person from 16 to 23 than, say, 35 to 42. So those sort of changes are reflected, musically and otherwise.

The Stone Pony: You were recently quoted as saying that you “love and am most moved by music created up until about 1973.” Why use 1973 as the date in that comment, and does this mean you’d consider yours a “classic rock” sound?  How do you explain that while most comparisons of your music do refer back to legendary sounds from that era, they still refer to your music as innovative, fresh and ground-breaking? It is unfair to say that you’d consider most music being made today as lacking those qualities?

SY: I don't know why I picked '73.  Wasn't that year the Stones went bad?  I don't know, life "Post Exile" just wasn't the same. I'm just kidding. Keith is still great. I just feel like the music I enjoy most was made before then in general. It doesn't mean that some of the best music ever hasn't been made since or won't be made in the future. It's all personal taste. I would say our music is heavily influenced by classic rock. It is nice that anyone has referred to us as fresh. I think everyone is going to sound the way they sound no matter how hard they try not to. I'm a Seth Yacovone wanna be. I want to play as much like Seth Yacovone as possible. It's hard to do, but that's the process. The hardest thing to do is make something truly unique, but it's also the only choice as humans. You can't not be true to yourself in some way. Every snowflake is different, you know. We wear a lot of influences on our sleeves, in my opinion, but it's combining the influences, musical and otherwise, into your own stew that represents what you're feeling or what you want to express. That is the goal. I don't think we try to reinvent the wheel. We are a blues-influenced power trio, for crying out loud. I just feel most music these days is lacking heart, but what do I know? The musicians might feel it just as much as anyone but it's not jumping out of the speakers and making me feel as much. I like music that makes me feel something other than wanting to dance or sing along to the catchy melody. I feel like business people or the artists' wallets -- not the musicians -- are influencing too many decisions about albums. There is too much concern on making great product instead of making great music in the music business. Everyone has to eat and the rent is always due, but ...

The Stone Pony: You’ve talked about plans to record a new album as a follow-up to 2001’s “Standing on the Sound”. Anything you can share about the time-frame for recording new music, and when fans might be able to get their hands on a new recording? Have any songs been selected for inclusion on the new disc, and has a working title been selected?

SY: We are still figuring all this stuff out. We are in the process. I hope we'll have a new album out sooner than later in 2003. We have a ton of material to choose from, but we have a good idea what we want to record. The title is easily the hardest part of making an album and, no, we don't have one yet.

The Stone Pony: Some of the songs being prepared for the new album include lyrics written by Tom Marshall, who serves as the band’s management in addition to his work as a lyricist for Phish. How has Marshall contributed to the band, and what do you feel his songwriting brings to the music that you’re creating now? Are you comfortable working in a more collaborative environment, and have you found that your songwriting has been improving and maturing over time?

SY: Tom has sent me a few different lyrics he has written. I wrote music and rearranged and added to the lyrics for two of them. We have played one live, which is entitled "Dragonfly". I usually write alone, so it's interesting to work with others. I've written a couple songs with Tommy Coggio based on riffs he had written and I've written lyrics and the rest of the song from there. It's fun and lot easier when someone else has something you can build on, rather than doing it all yourself. I feel though that, for our band, I should write the majority of the lyrics and songs myself. For one thing, I enjoy it and am constantly writing words. I know that's Tom Marshall's department, but I also feel -- and this goes with my last answer about being yourself -- that for us to be the most Seth Yacovone Band we can be, I should write the majority of the words. That way, it's coming from my life, my experiences and my feelings. It just makes it come from a more personal view, and I can put more of my soul into it that way. Tom has his own style, which I really enjoy, but I hear Trey Anastasio singing his lyrics even when I read them, and I think I end up making the music too "Phishy." But that's another interesting challenge to make sure I avoid. I'm not opposed to writing with others, and I hope it continues to happen. But writing songs is one of the things I do. I can't say for sure that my songwriting is improving and maturing, but it feels that way to me. I started writing just to have stuff to play, but now I write because I've found it's an incredible way to express things that cannot be expressed properly by other means throughout the rest of my life. I'm at the point where I have to write just to feel like I can wake up in the morning.

The Stone Pony: The band has been announced as performing two sets at The Stone Pony on December 14th. How does the preparation for two sets differ from playing a single show? Is there new music that fans might hear, perhaps being prepared for the new album, at that show? Do you have any final thoughts on adding the legendary Stone Pony to the list of great venues at which you’ve performed?

SY: Playing two long sets is our preferred way of doing a show. It allows us all the time we need to do whatever we want to do. We can play longer by taking a break, and it gives us a chance to regroup if we're having an off night. It allows each set to have its own vibe, its own particular feel. We are constantly playing new, unreleased material as well as older, unreleased material at all our shows. I'm excited to get to play a full two-set show at the Stone Pony. Last time, we only had an hour in between two other bands, so this time we'll have plenty of time to stretch out and get comfortable. It's going to be a lot of fun.