roycesbio

Royce, that’s me, the resident wise guy, guitarist unextraordinaire (I just made up another word, leave it up to me to de-evolve the English language), and flailing singer/songwriter. I was born on a cold winter’s morning in Honolulu, Hi (Queen’s Hospital to be exact) at some ungodly hour, so began my life-long relationship with a strange sleeping/waking pattern. After being born, I was raised in Pearl City, making me the ONLY member of this band who can say I’m a local boy, born and raised. I guess I was born with music somehow built into my person. I’ve been told that whilst in utero, my mom took her class (and me, involuntarily) to the Honolulu Symphony. When the performance started, I responded. There’s almost no instance when music is not present during my day. In the car, at work, BBQing outside, late at night, right now, even while I’m asleep I have some active music source. Who ever invented the MP3 deserves a Nobel Prize.

Early on I would randomly hit the keys on the piano (pounding really); creating what some would call a cacophony, while others would classify it as post-modern composition. Based on the photographic record, I actually got my first guitar somewheres between the age of 4-8, not really sure, but I remember not being able to play a lick. Maybe if I had learned it one string at a time…In 4th grade the music teacher at Iolani (that’s where I went to school from kindergarten to 12th grade) transitioned from the recorder to the ukulele. I got tutored by my mom on a Duke Kahanamoku ukulele. Then in the 6th grade, I took up the cello, played that until I graduated, making me a classically trained musician, I suppose.

The real hardcore music making began in my junior year. It was about that time that the Ka`au Crater Boys were HUGE, and everybody and their brother was walking around with an uke at school. I had finally grown out of my glam rock/Guns and Roses/Metallica phase and really discovered the beauty of Hawaiian music. So began my first band, me and three other guys (whose names have been withheld to protect the innocent) got together, started jamming and then performing. Since four ukes don’t a good sounding group make, two of us (one of us two being me) transitioned to guitar. So having picked up the guitar for the second, and more successful, time in my life, we played the school variety show, covering a KCB song. In my senior year we got to play at our homecoming game after party, and we not only got to open for KCB, but we got to go on stage and join them for a song. There were other gigs, and eventually, we all went our separate ways in no small part due to a thing called college. Oh yeah, thanks to the cello and being part of Iolani’s concert orchestra, I get to say I performed at the Sydney Opera House and Carnegie Hall (in fact, I got to play guitar and sing Dennis Kamakahi’s Pua Hone at Carnegie Hall with a full orchestral backing). But that’s enough with the gloating.

The college years; somehow I ended up going to UC Davis, where I learned to play more than just Hawaiian music. A little blues, some rock, and the start of my appreciation for a certain Dave Matthews Band. I still remember the cardboard “coffin” my dad constructed so that I could have my guitar shipped to Davis. After graduating from UCD with an EE degree, I moved out to the Silicon Valley and started working. After a few years of having no one to jam with local style, fate had me run into Junyah, and the rest, as they say is history.

My heros (musically speaking):

I’ll listen to pretty much any genre of music. Beyond Hawaiian, my CD collection ranges from classical to the Eagles, Diana Krall, Pink Floyd, flamenco, Van Halen, Miles Davis, and of course Dave Matthews Band. After making four mentions of Dave Matthews one would begin to think I’m a big fan. Let’s just say I would skip a friend’s wedding to see a DMB concert. I can remember hearing the drumbeat and riff to Ants Marching in ’95 and thinking to myself, “How does one get a guitar to do that?” It took about 6 years for me to figure that out. But Dave isn’t my only hero, I wish I could make guitar sing like Santana, wail like Clapton, and scream like SRV. As far as singer/songwriters go, Dave, Adam Duritz, Roger Waters (he’s a little off, but I think all good songwriters are), Sarah McLaughlan, Bernie Taupin, as well as newcomer Anna Nalick (that girl has got talent). And on the Hawaiian front, no one beats the Makaha Sons. No one. Oh, and Roland Cazimero is one badass guitarist. I would pay anything for 1/128th of their talent. I’ll spend the rest of my life feebly attempting to emulate any of these guys.

Any rate, that’s enough about me. The fact that you’re reading this means that you’re on our website and have taken an interest in what we’re doing. And if you enjoy listening to our music as much as we enjoy making it, our mission is accomplished.

Thank you nui loa, mahalo very much, and DRIVE FAST!