Q&A with Houston Local Indie Band Midnight Beverage

Midnight Beverage is taking over the Houston scene with their fresh summer singles and the fun energy. Recently, they played at Warehouse Live along with several other Houston bands. Their set was amazing, well rehearsed, and very high energy. It was one of the many highlights of the night. Now, Midnight Beverage looks to the rest of their summer, as they discuss new concerts, singles, and more plans to come.

ORB: How was the experience of playing at Warehouse Live?

JD: Yeah, this was our biggest show yet. We had previous experience playing White Oak before, but Warehouse, you know, the stage and the whole venue itself was much bigger. So we prepared like a bunch. We just rehearsed a lot, you know, worked out some cool production ideas…It was just a fantastic show. And we put on a performance that we definitely earned.

Dakota: Yeah, as JD said, it was definitely a bigger show. It was cool treatment. The greenroom was crazy. It was his own separate building. So it kind of spoke volumes for the type of venue it was. There were a lot of great artists out there like some of my favorites… Elevator Days and then April Company is like a cool newer indie jazz band that I really like. So it was really cool to play with other bigger artists in Houston.

Aiden: It was pretty riveting, like super exciting. Probably the biggest thing I’ve ever done. I’ve only lived in Houston for like a year. And like, yeah, I mean, these dudes have been fucking badass.

ORB: For Aiden, why did you move to Houston? 

Aiden: Music baby. Well, it’s the closest big city to where I’m like native from from Brazoria County, like the surfSide area. So it was like the closest, you know, place to home that’s popping off with indie music. And I gravitated towards it. And then I met Dakota and then now we’re here.

Isha: What drew you to Midnight Beverage?

Aiden: Well, like I said, I moved to Houston specifically to do music. And I’m really big on trying different kinds of music and like trying a little bit of everything. And indie rock has been getting a lot of buzz. And after I met Dakota, and I’ve seen what they’ve been doing I followed him on Instagram and I was like yeah, these dudes are like, pretty cool. Really like what I’ve been looking for. And then Dakota was like, we might be needing a new singer maybe. And he just kept me in mind because he has seen me perform a couple times on my own. Texas has always been known for country you know and like Southern rock and all that. So getting a part of a Houston indie scene. That’s just so exciting. It’s just it’s been everything I was hoping it would be for sure.

ORB: What influenced your two current singles?

JD: I would say that the singles we have out there are mainly influenced by The Strokes absolutely from like a songwriting, a songwriting kind of capacity. The same thing with The Cure, you know, they can have the formula on like just great catchy rock songs. So, we definitely have that in our repertoire, sonically seems like and like the way we’re playing, I would say like, The Backseat Lovers even like as late as The Smiths, especially on “Farewell“, Dakota and I are really big Vacations fans, so that one’s very like Vacations coded, especially. And honestly, ever since we got Aiden in the band, we’ve been seeing Cage The Elephant vibes, just because of how great his voice sounds and how similar it is to the bane influences.

Dakota: So a lot of our music just depends on a song and we try to attract different demographics. But pretty much all of our songs can have some kind of message no matter how high or no matter how low, see what I did there. [For] “Farewell”, I just had the progression in my repertoire for quite some time. And so JD and Dennis helped me finish it. So that’s how I released those but we got more singles coming soon.

ORB: How would you describe your sound as a band?

Aiden: Electrifying wizardry of the sonic youth.

Dakota: I’d say I’d say like, we all have different inspirations, but also very similar. For example, I like blues rock. I know Johnny Mars is one to JD’s biggest inspirations, but a really good middle ground that me and JD have found and as far as musical interests and writing styles, we really both enjoy The Strokes. Like we both know every record of every song. We definitely try to try not to take too much from The Strokes, definitely still try to make everything our own. But a lot of inspiration comes from that as well.

JD: Yeah, if you had to sum it up into one word, I would say that the music we’re making right now is contemporary indie rock with a throwback to 90s alternative rock, you know, like, especially with Aiden’s vocals.

Dennis: Swagalicious.

Aiden: But for our shows and the originals that we do play that we have yet to record. There’s definitely some of that grungy-ness in our music.

JD: So yeah, our stage presence is something we take a lot of pride in, you know, because at the end of the day, a lot of our stage presence you see is influenced by how we are in rehearsal. You know, we have a lot of fun. I mean, we absolutely love what we’re doing. And, you know, when you have a rhythm section like Dennis and GB over here, it’s you know, that kind of makes it hard not to get up and dance when you’re playing along.

ORB: For GB, how did you get introduced to Midnight Beverage?

GB: Yeah, that’s a fair question. I was busking under 59 and I needed a ride. No, I’m just kidding. No. So Dennis and I actually play in a different band called Madera. It’s a little bit harder rock. And so Dennis started with Midnight Beverage [and] I kind of helped them. I was like their “associate producer”. So Dennis would bring me the songs like when they were mixing it. And so I have that self proclaimed producer ear. And I was like, “Okay, what is that vision that y’all are going for?” And so I helped them out in the studio. So then when we did the single release party, for “She Said It First”. And so I ran sound for them that night, but then a week after that, they’re like, “Hey, by the way, our old bass player’s leaving, we need you to fill in because we have a show next week”. And it was supposed to be temporary, but it’s been eight months. So that’s basically how I was asked to join the band.

ORB: How has the music scene changed over the years?

GB : Great question. No, it’s funny that you asked that because I’ve seen it evolve. Like live music is live music, especially in Houston. So going back to your questions like is Houston known for rap? Yes, the DJ Screw click came from here. So that’s what put it on the map. Right. But when you go further back, you get things like ZZ Top and those types of things. Some people will claim Blue October, those types of bands right, but what I’ve seen, like over, it’s been just generational. So as you go from the 90s to the early 2000s, where all the bands are sounding like disturbed and tool, then now it switches over to the indie rock but the premise has always been there whatever type of music that you listen to, has been here you just got to find some has been underground, but things like KTRU, and 90.1 has always been independent. 

Dakota: There’s a lot of Houston talent like I said, like Elevator Days, April Company, VORTXZ, and Orion 224. We haven’t been together a year yet, actually, so if you would have told me a year ago that we would have been doing these things out about you’re lying. So I hope that growth continues to grow and escalate and increase… I’m grateful for the things that we got to do.

GB: The bands like VORTXZ that just moved up to Austin. Vosotros is really big in the Hispanic scene. And then now with Spotify, TikTok and things like that, you have a lot more selection, whereas before it was more underground and it was more word of mouth. And so that’s what makes it wide open. That’s the beauty of Houston.

ORB: How has social media changed the way you market your music?

Aiden: I blame TikTok. JD’s our social media marketing guru.

JD: I’m in charge of promoting our TikTok and some of the Instagram posts and the reels. TikTok is probably the biggest thing that’s changed how musicians market themselves, because it’s the fastest growing social media platform and the biggest for music discovery. So having to market your music in a way where you get to get people’s attention in the first like, two seconds really, has changed the way we market our music. We don’t compromise our image, or our sound, but at the same time, it’s more about how can we make something great that also catches people’s attention. It could be like a guitar solo or a riff or like a great vocal melody that just catches someone’s [attention]. A lot of people want to dog on social media for it, but I personally really enjoy it. Because I mean, if this was like, even 10-15 years ago, this interview wouldn’t be happening. People would not hear our music and what we have to offer if it wasn’t for social media. So yeah, it’s definitely influenced exactly how we market ourselves.

ORB: What does your songwriting and songwriting process as well as your music creation process look like?

Dakota: So basically, this is a very collaborative band, it can be anywhere from the bass player to the vocalist to the drummer, we all have our individual roles, but somebody will come with an idea. And then we’ll expand on that. For example, if I have a guitar idea that I can’t finish, or I just can’t picture, either Dennis’ll hop on drums and we’ll figure out what we want. And then compositionally, usually me and JD will work out the guitar parts, and then Aiden’s newer but we definitely try to give him all control of lyrics melody, we just help them with cadences. But other than that, I’d say it’s a very collaborative band, but everyone has their individual roles.

JD: Typically…the harmonic structure of the song will come from either Dakota or I. For example, “How High” that that process started with Dennis, like, like Dakota said, it’s a very, very collaborative band. I mean, no one person in the band has less than 20% of a stake in it. Not one of us would come in with a song and then everyone just goes along with it. Yeah, we experiment a lot with things like, the songwriting process and such. It’s basically very collaborative.

ORB: What are some upcoming things y’all are looking forward to?

Dakota: So Dennis’s point I know that we are trying to really push as much music as we can this year, that’s something that we had to learn through the process of getting better at recording faster. We don’t want to by any means put too many songs out there at once. But that is a big direction that we’re trying to go in. It’s just to get music out there. 

See Midnight Beverage perform on July 19th at White Oak Music Hall. They will be supporting Elevator Days and Sad Allen, two other local indie bands. Buy tickets here.

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