From the moment he saw his favorite band performing live on television when he was 12-years-old, Brooklyn-based musician Tomas Doncker knew a career in music was in his future.

That Christmas, his parents bought him a guitar and he’s been writing songs ever since. Countless A-list collaborations later, Doncker says he has learned there is no one way to write a song.

“I think you have to remain open to the inspiration revealing itself to you and not be afraid or shy to follow it,” he said. “You have to be able to go after the thing that tickles your fancy at that moment and get it to a point where you actually have a verse, a chorus, some chords, and let that live.”

Being open is what led Doncker to his latest project. After a meeting with playwright Roland Wolf’s sons, Doncker was inspired to create an album that would change people’s lives. With the hope to create a play that mirrors “Fela” and “Passing Strange,” a script is also in the works.

“’Passing Strange’ changed my life. I want to be a part of that kind of performance. Very soon after that I met the Wolf brothers. They gave me the script to read I thought to myself, ‘Wow, here’s my chance to create something in that way,’” he said.

The first step was making the album, Power of the Trinity.

“The tag line I’m creating is ‘From Brooklyn to Ethiopia,’ and obviously, everywhere in between. What we’re about, which is global soul, is soul music for and by everybody. It’s not just from Memphis. It’s from Ethiopia, it’s from Mali, it’s from Brazil,” he said. “There’s no mistaking soulful music. It doesn’t matter what language someone’s singing in. If it touches you, if it moves you, that’s it.”

Doncker continued to explain that songs don’t always have to be about real life to be relatable.

“It doesn’t necessarily have to be what you did. It can also be something you dreamt, it can be something someone said to you, it can be something you read. As long as it was internalized on some intimate level and means something to you, then it’s going to sound sincere,” he said.

One song, “Lucky Day” took years to develop.

“I walked around the streets of New York City singing the chorus of that song for seven years. I was singing it in a minor key because I was in a pretty bad spot at that time in my life. Not to be too mysterious, but I was living on the streets and taking a lot of drugs. I’m now 12 years sober,” he said.

Ten years later, while sitting in his apartment in East New York, the entire song came to him when he played a major chord.

“All of a sudden the rest of the song flew out. I wrote that song in about seven minutes, the whole thing,” he said. “I love that song because I know it comes from such a sincere, real place. I absolutely know that because I lived it.”

Having finished a tour in the West Indies and gearing up for multiple performance at Summer Stage, Doncker says his performance goal is “to burn the building down every night and have a ball.”

For more information, visit his Website.

This article originally was written for CBS.com.

Rascal Flatts have been making music together for over a decade. With eight albums under their belts, it’s nearly inconceivable that the popular country trio almost called it quits.

CBS Local caught up with Rascal Flatts at their film premiere last night (April 5) in New York. The band discussed their latest album Changed, which was released Tuesday, their film and future endeavors. Their eighth studio album and first LP with Big Machine Records, Rascal Flatts said the excitement of album release week never wears off.

“We’ve been more excited about this one then we’ve been in a long time,” Jay DeMarcus said. “We feel like we’ve got renewed energy and a resurgence of the spirit of what Rascal Flatts was about to begin with.”

For my complete review and interview, visit CBS.

A New Kid is back in New York City.

Currently on tour in the U.S. promoting his latest solo album, Unfinished, Jordan Knight of New Kids on the Block fame talked with CBS Local about his life as a solo artist and member of the iconic 90s pop group.

Knight got his start in New Kids On the Block as a teen in the 80s – and nearly three decades later continues to pursue a career in music. On a break from touring with NKOTB and the Backstreet Boys on their world tour, Knight discussed the difference between producing and releasing his record himself vs. the big production behind the New Kids.

“Doing something like an album, promoting your own tour, and doing your own label, that’s what I did with my latest album Unfinished, it’s a lot of work. You definitely have to be dedicated to do it and I was and I am,” he said.

“I think the best thing about it is that it gives you a whole lot of self-satisfaction. Being in the New Kids and doing big arenas and traveling the world, that’s great and that’s hard work too but compared to what I’m doing now it’s very cushy.”

For my complete article and video interview visit CBS.

I witnessed Katie Moore live last September in Canada during the Emerging Music Festival. While going through my music collection recently I stumbled on her latest release, Montebello. Moore told me that the self-funded album took four years to produce with her friends and fellow Canadian musicians from rock band Plants and Animals. With emotive vocals showcasing her heartbreaking, yet relatable lyrics, Moore blends old country, folk, bluegrass and rock influences for a standout release.

Songs like album opener “Something On Your Mind” captivate the listener with her wavering vibrato and whispered vocals. Alongside impressive guitar licks, striking piano and fitting percussion, the song strikes a chord.

When she’s not performing her own music, Moore tours with friend and rapper Socalled.

“We were neighbors in Montreal and we shared a back alley. He lived in this basement apartment that everyone would go into through the kitchen window and hang out,” she said. “He knew that I sang and thought that it was country music. I like country music, I just feel like if you were into country music you wouldn’t call it that. It’s folky and rootsy. It’s a bit similar to rock country from the 60s with some organs and keys, but it’s nothing like today’s country music which is sort of like pop music.”

While she doesn’t classify herself as country, it didn’t stop Socalled from collaborating with Moore. He found the sample, “There is nothing so unusual about being a Jewish cowboy” and decided to make a Jewish cowboy song and enlisted Moore’s help.

“I wrote the words and I sang. That was the first thing we did together. The song is called “You Are Never Alone” and it became a hit in France because he’s on a French label and then he asked me to tour with him. I don’t know how it got to where it is today where I do most of the singing, but it’s pretty fun.”

Socalled later contributed to Moore’s release, playing piano on many of the tracks.

Moore says she gets inspired by things that people say. One song in particular she contributes to her guitarist.

“If someone will say something I’ll write it down. Our guitar player came over my house for rehearsal once and he’s known for his great expressions. He was really hung over and he said, ‘I can’t wake up every day like this, Katie.’ And I was like, “Wake Up Like This!” And I wrote a song for it.”

While she has her guitarist to thank for the song’s inspiration, Moore’s songwriting chops earned her the SOCAN ECHO Songwriting Prize, beating out nominees Arcade Fire, Austra, Handsome Furs, and PS I Love You.

“Wake Up Like This” showcases her country roots with slowed, raspy vocals, and title track “Montebello” has more of a R&B feel with distinct drum and organ elements, further exhibiting her versatility.

Never afraid to reveal too much in a song, Moore says music is therapy.

“If I don’t feel really strongly about a song it’s painful to play it again and again because it feels like a fraud. Sometimes if you’re missing a line somewhere and if I were to try to put in anything because it sounds good, I know that it’s not real.”

Having beat out Arcade Fire and continuing to tour, Moore isn’t slowing down anytime soon.

“I’m working on songwriting. I feel like in 15 years I’ll be pretty good. I’ve got a lot of work to do.”

For more on Katie Moore, visit her Website.

Though they only formed a year ago, Brooklyn-based Whale Belly has made a name for themselves.

Still experimenting with their sound, frontman Todd Bogin explained what concertgoers can expect from their live show.

“We craft this soundscape. We think of classical music where you’d see 45 minutes [of music] straight,” he said. “What we’ve been reaching towards is bringing that idea to indie music, that 45 minute musical piece that goes through different movements. Our movements are songs; 10 different movements within the 45 minute piece.”

Hailed as a band that “would make Woody Guthrie proud,” Bogin says part of the group’s success is that they’re all friends.

“We really are best friends. We’re super close and trustworthy of each other and we all value each other’s talents,” he said. “We’re not following any trend that’s going on right now. We’re not doing something because it’s cool or following a sound that will be dated in a few years. There’s something really heartfelt in us.”

For my complete article, visit CBS.

Well respected for his honest and heartfelt lyrics, singer-songwriter Griffin House is currently on an East Coast tour with friend and fellow musician Matthew Perryman Jones.

“We’re both going to be playing acoustic sets. That’s kind of rare for both of us because we generally either take a band out or have some kind of accompaniment with us,” House said. “We’re looking forward to stripping it down and having some conversation with the audience just playing solo.”

House moved to Nashville in 2003 to pursue music. Since then, he’s been traveling the country and moving audiences everywhere with his confessional and relatable music. I chatted with him before the start of his current tour to find out more about his songwriting process, the stories behind the songs and what’s next in store for Griffin House.

It’s been a while since your last release, has your songwriting process changed at all?
I think the songwriting process has remained the same. Life affects the subject matter. But in terms about how I go about writing, it’s the same way.

Does a song come out better when it’s based on real life or fantasy?
There’s always a little bit of both. A lot of the true stories that I’ve written have been based on real life and then they’ll take maybe a slight fictional turn for the sake of the song, to make the song work better. That’s usually how I go about it. I think a lot of times when you talk in first person people assume that it’s autobiographical but that’s not necessarily always the case.

Are you ever afraid to reveal too much in a song about your own life?
I’ve never been afraid to do that. I think in the beginning when I was writing, I used that more often. I think it was almost extremely confessional and revealing in a way and I think that’s part of what made the songs stick; their vulnerability. It’s a very tricky thing to do. Anybody can be vulnerable and say, ‘This is how I’m feeling and this is who I am.’ If you don’t do it in the right way it comes across as very trite. It’s something I’ve had to learn to work around but I also think that maybe I don’t hold back as much but I’m more conscious of what I’m doing.

Is there a song that means more to you now than when you first wrote it?
“Better Than Love” is a song that has turned out to be something that I play almost every night. At the time when I wrote it, I didn’t really want to write any songs that dealt with love or relationships and it just came out of me. It wasn’t what I was intentionally trying to go after. I was making a record in California with some of the guys in the Heartbreakers and some other really good musicians and I was trying to make more of a rock & roll record.

I wasn’t really all that excited about recording that song. Even when we w ere recording it, I just wanted to get it over with. It turned out to be one of my best songs for sure and one that I think has meant a lot to a lot of people. It just goes to show you that a lot of times the artist has no idea whether or not what he is creating is good. He or she may think that they’re creating the best thing in the world and it turns out to not be so special and other times they don’t think what they’re doing is anything and it turns out to be something really valuable.

“The Guy That Says Goodbye to You Is Out of His Mind” is one of my favorite tracks on that album. What is the story behind it?
That song was written in a way that was inspired by a girl that I just wanted to take out. We were out on a semi-date together and joked around that she’d marry me if I wrote her a song so I went home and wrote her a song. It was something that started obviously with a sense of humor but it really ended up incorporating a lot of heavier things that were going on under the surface too. It started out as a joke and then it took a multifaceted turn after a while. That song came out of nowhere. That was the same story, I didn’t know what I had until I played it for somebody else later and they said, ‘Oh man, that’s a hit song.’ I had no idea.

I was reading the stories behind some songs on your Website and “Heart of Stone” sounds like it was written subconsciously and after you wrote it you figured out more about your life. Does that happen a lot?
What happens is, a lot of times I see how maybe in my subconscious or underneath the surface I really know what’s going on but I won’t admit it to myself or maybe I’m in denial. So, when I write the answers all come down on the page but I might not see them until after, way after. Maybe a year down the line I’ll look back and go, ‘Oh I really knew what was going on I just wasn’t admitting it to myself in my conscious brain.’

How is the music scene in Nashville different from the rest of the country?
I think there is a sense of community here. First of all, it’s a smaller city so it’s become over the last six or seven years more densely populated with musicians so it’s easier for everyone to know one another. There does seem to be a sense of community. Everybody moved here to make it and a lot of people don’t mind helping each other out along the way and becoming friends and working together. While there’s always probably competition going on, maybe the Southern hospitality thing plays into a little bit where they don’t mind helping out a little bit.

It’s changed a lot since I moved here. When I moved here in 2003 I literally felt like one of the only people doing what I was doing which is an alternative style of music in Nashville, just a songwriter with a guitar. There were a lot of people in the country world and Christian world doing that but I felt there were only a handful of people doing what I was doing. Now, since I’ve been touring over the last five or six years I’ve come back to Nashville and have seen hundreds or thousands of people who have flocked here from all over the country to start doing music and I think it’s really had an influx of a lot of people since I moved here under that demographic.

How do you stand out being one of so many?
I don’t try to at all. First I moved here and tried to play as much as I could and tried to stand out as much as I could. Now I’m not on the scene at all. I’m actually not even that social. I have a routine where I go and I work on my hobbies that I do in my spare time. I’m a dad and I spend time at home with my wife and I do some yoga. When I go out on the road I’m in front of people. I don’t really mix it up in Nashville a whole lot.

What do you wish you knew before perusing music?
I don’t know. I was very green when I got here. I didn’t really know anything about the music business. It’s easy for me to look back and say, ‘If I had this bit of information then I would have done this differently.’ There’s really no telling where that would have taken me. It’s not like you can know what would have happened if you would have made a different choice. You just know it would be different. A lot of the learning I’ve had, I’m thankful I moved down here a long time ago and I’m still playing music and still enjoying it and still making progress. I can’t really ask for anything more than that. It’s been good.

What can fans expect from you in the next few months?
Well, I’ve been doing this for a while now and I’ve been thinking about maybe compiling a “Best of” record that has 10 or 12 songs that are maybe the most popular ones. Putting them on a record and re-releasing that so that other people can hear my music and have a better idea of what I’m about and what I’ve done over the last decade. That might come first before a brand new record. Maybe there will be a new song on that or something. That’s just an idea but that can very well happen.

What’s going through your mind while you’re onstage performing?
Sometimes you’re a million miles away in the middle of the song. You just get lost and forget where you are for a minute. A lot of the songs have been played so many times that you’re really on automatic. I try to think about singing the words and hitting the notes. It’s pretty simple. I try not to think about anything else other than what I’m doing at the moment and not get ahead of myself, what I’m going to say next or what happened a few minutes ago. It’s a good exercise in really being in the present moment and that’s usually when performances are the best, when you can do that well.

For more on Griffin House and his current tour dates, visit his Website.

On any given night in New York you can stumble into a venue that’s hosting a hip-hop dance party, rappers or a live band. But, have you ever seen a tap dancing rapper that combines all three?

Meet Benjamin Ryan Nathan.

He’s a performer that combines all his skills into one performance, and he’ll hit the East Village Thursday night for a performance.

“There’s always that reaction, ‘You tap and you rap? What does that look like?’” Nathan admits. “There’s a lot of intrigue around that because people have had so much exposure to tap as children. And then to see it again as an adult and see it in a different way that’s not in a dance class, in a venue that’s onstage with popular music, it’s interesting.”

Combining rap and tap is a long process for Nathan, which often begins with lyrics.

“I write lyrics whenever it comes to me, a lot of times it’s on the train,” he said. “I create structure of the song first and then once I get together with the rest of the band and they’re writing their musical parts I’ll bring in the beats and see where that fits. It’s an experimentation together starting with the lyrics first.”

As with creating a song, Nathan’s routine is always getting tailored to his surroundings.

“Often I have to bring my own floor with me. It’s about figuring out what the space constraints are, how much I can move around, how it will be audible with musicians. My first question always is, ‘Will they have a wood floor?’”

Nathan didn’t want to audition when the National Dance Institute came to his school in the fourth grade. Today, though, he can’t imagine what his life would be like without dance.

“I definitely wouldn’t have become a dancer or a filmmaker if it wasn’t for this program in particular. It helped me get outside of myself and be able to get onstage in front of a community,” he said.

While Nathan admits there were challenges over the years, one being that it’s never easy being a young boy taking dance classes, he said he has always been an individual.

“I think I’ve learned from a young age that people are going to judge what I do. It’s just a question of really pursuing what matters. To me, I feel like tap is in my blood and I can’t not do it,” he said. “I’m always tapping, whether it’s tapping my fingers, or tapping my feet or tapping in my mind. It’s just how I express myself. I tap because I love it but I also tap because I have to.”

At the end of his first year dancing he performed onstage at Madison Square Garden with 1,000 other kids from New York Public Schools. He loved dancing onstage so much he decided to stick with it and soon discovered tap.

“I would go to jam sessions with older tap dancers at Swing 46. It was encouraging and supportive. Everyone would come and dance,” he said. “The other way I learned tap was by just watching. I would get my hands on any video tape on great tap dancers and just watch it again and again in my room and try to copy the steps.”

As a teen he started rapping and once college came around, Nathan decided to combine his tap and rap skills.

“I started a band in college called Ben Tap Soul and we started to experiment with how we can bring the tap and rap together with musicians. Instead of hip-hop beats behind it, there is actually live music being created with all of these elements.”

Additionally, Nathan has started to loop his tapping into his live band performance, providing an entirely new element into his live show.

“It’s great. I love to push the envelope. It’s important to keep pushing new ideas and surprising people and bringing it to a new audience and level,” he said. “It’s always been important to use the skills I have in a positive way. I call it conscious rap. There’s a Hasidic saying that music is the language of the soul. When you put music out there, it’s speaking people’s language and it’s important to know what you’re putting out.”

Ben Tap Soul performs tonight at Alphabet Lounge at 8 p.m. For additional tour dates in February, visit their Website.

Over the summer, I caught up with Canadian-based rock band The Trews after an intimate performance in Brooklyn. “I find playing in the living room more nerve-racking than playing in front of 30,000 people,” frontman Colin MacDonald admitted after their set. “Playing in front of 25 people in a living room, you can really feel the eyes on you.”

After their set, the band filled me in on their songwriting process, what it’s like performing to American audiences and learning from the bands they tour with like Kid Rock and Robert Plant. Be sure to catch them tomorrow at Mercury Lounge. For complete tour dates, visit their Web site.

Their fourth album, the standout Hope and Ruin, is a departure from previous studio albums as the band wrote and performed everything live. A more organic process, The Trews spent time recording at The Tragically Hip’s Bathouse Recording Studio. Located on the shores of Lake Ontario between Toronto and Montreal, the band lived in and wrote the album at the converted mansion.

“We were just trying to catch lightning in a bottle, just playing until it felt right,” MacDonald said. “Bathouse has a tree house kind of vibe, it’s a good hang. It has a pool table, record collection, woods in the backyard, lake in the front yard. It’s a really cool place to focus for a band, to get out to the country and really focus on the task at hand. It’s really informal. We’ve recorded records at places that have felt a lot more clinical.”

For this record, the band went into the studio for the first time without songs completely finished. “The Dreaming Man” was written over coffee with their producer after jamming on a D riff.

“We had a great little melody and great little jam and I found some lyrics for it from some other song I had. It was done that night and recorded,” MacDonald said.

Songwriting isn’t always that easy though, guitarist John-Angus MacDonald explained.

“Sometimes songs are more fully formed upon delivery than other ones. For the most part, we want to have music that you feel something from,” explained MacDonald ‘s brother, John-Angus. “I don’t think the lyrics have ever come first for us. It’s mostly just a feel, melody, groove or riff and we either shoehorn or Colin comes in with lyrics that are more fully finished than others. Lyrics can be painful. If you don’t get them right away, it could take a while.”

Colin went on to explain that songs often come from what the title dictates.

“A song like ‘Hope and Ruin,’ came from a magazine cover somewhere. I saw hope and ruin and thought it had a nice ring to it, ‘I’m going to sing that over this song. What does hope and ruin mean to me?’ It’s as simple as that. If a song comes in 15 minutes chances are you have a pretty good song on your hands. Sometimes I write from personal experience, sometimes I write from other people’s perspectives and make it sound personal. It’s not always just about me.”

In fact, often the songs fans most relate to are not about him.

“If you can write a song form someone else’s perspective and still feel it, that’s important. You can’t just keep wining about your own situation over again. You have to broaden your emotional pallet,” he said. “Sometimes you write a song that predicts your future, which is weird. Maybe it’s a self fulfilling prophecy. You write this great breakup tune and you’ve broken up four months later. I don’t know what that means, maybe it’s you asking for it. From time to time, a songwriter can tap into something that has yet to happen to him or her.”

Having toured with everyone from the Rolling Stones and Robert Plant to Kid Rock and Nickelback, The Trews say they learn something from each act they perform with.

“As soon as I’ve done my set, I’ll go grab a beer, park myself side stage and watch the entire set of the bands we’re playing with,” MacDonald said. “We just got off tour with Kid Rock and that guy is one of the greatest rock performers out there right now. I watched his set every night and he was incredible. We opened for Robert Plant a few years back. It’s incredible. It’s always a thrill to open for bands you admire.”

Having been called “the greatest rock band of their generation,” The Trews continue to expand their fan base in the United States and Australia. While performing throughout various cities in Canada always feels like home, the band admits there is something special about U.S. audiences

“This is taking nothing away from our Canadian fans, but there is a real sense of diehard devotion that we get from the fans that we gathered here from the States,” MacDonald said. “It’s there in Canada too, but I guess I’m more struck by it because the numbers are generally smaller. To see them follow us from city to city in these small clubs that we’re doing in the States just emphasizes how much they really do believe in it. That’s cool because we’re not as well known down here. Americans, if they decide they like you, they’re lifers.”

With the goal always in mind to make music they want to listen to, The Trews continue to grow their fan base worldwide.

“It’s an ongoing process,” MacDonald explained. “We’re always trying to make the best possible music that we can make. If it’s something that I want to put on when I’m hanging out at home, then I’ve succeeded.”

Catch The Trews at Mercury Lounge Wednesday night. For more, visit their Web site.

Six years ago Chris Cubeta decided to move to Brooklyn to pursue music. Using money from his savings and wedding presents, Cubeta built his studio, GaluminumFoil Studios, with the help of friends, band mates and family members.

“It all went into the studio in the hopes of being able to sustain us and give us a chance to live in New York and so far it’s been alright,” Cubeta admits. “It’s definitely a labor of love and we try to make it comfortable. I think most people appreciate that.”

When he’s not acting as engineer and producer for other artists, Cubeta is busy making music with his own band, Chris Cubeta and the Liars Club. A mesh of rock & roll and heartfelt lyrics, Cubeta says the group’s latest release is one he’s proud of lyrically.

“I started doing a lot more reading [of] existential authors over the last few years. So, I’ve been dabbling a bit more in abstract and how it relates to my personal feelings and emotions,” he said. “I’m trying to combine the abstract outer body experience with very personal things and putting those two things together and hoping that something interesting comes out of it.”

For my complete interview with Chris Cubeta, visit CBS. He performs tonight at Mercury Lounge.

What do you get when you cross Carrie Underwood with Carrie Bradshaw?

The Vanity Belles, a New York-based music act making waves on the local scene.

Both Carrie Welling and Jessi Rae Waltz grew up in musical families, so it comes as no surprise that the duo joined forces a year and a half ago. Making a name for themselves in the New York music scene, the band’s self titled EP garnered a mention on iTunes as a New and Noteworthy release earlier this year.

A blend of country roots and city influences, the Vanity Belles define their music as Cosmo-Country. Welling said the initial vision for the band was to be a crossover country act in New York embodied by two small town girls with big city dreams.

“If you combine Carrie Underwood, Carrie Bradshaw and Carrie Welling of the Vanity Belles than you will understand Cosmo-Country,” Waltz said.

“It’s like Dolly Parton wears Diesel,” Welling added.

For my complete article, visit CBS. Be sure to catch The Vanity Bells live tonight at Rockwood Music Hall Stage 1.