There is so much bullshit out there in the news, I decided to go full, double birds to the sky on this one. Luckily, music writers are not beholden to politics, fear-mongering, and corporate greed. Even in 2025, music still saves lives, and that’s wonderful.
Today, I’m here to tell you that seeing Broncho at the Crescent Ballroom on June 28, 2025, is an excellent idea, especially if cool indie rock from Oklahoma that leans heavily into the roots established by bands like Velvet Underground in the late 1960s and Jesus and Mary Chain in the mid-1980s is your jam.
In addition to hearing the aforementioned (and god-like) influences in their work, I was initially stuck on the playfulness of track four, “Get Gone,” on Broncho’s new record, “Natural Pleasure,” after dialing it up on a streaming service. It’s got this kind of disco thing going on with the synthesizer that co-producer Chad Copelin (Train, Avril Lavigne) deftly added to the song. It reminded me of the snarky brilliance of a band like Imperial Teen who crafts songs that become total earworms but have an attitude that says, “I don’t give a fuck if you like this. It’s great whether you like it or not.”
The thing is, though, after talking with Ryan Lindsey, who sings lead and plays guitar in Broncho, it is clear that they do give a fuck.
Broncho’s new record, “Natural Pleasure,” which came out on April 25, is the first thing I heard from the band, but it won’t be the last. It’s got a purity of soul (ugh, that sounds so bullshitty, but it is exactly how I feel at this particular moment) that landed on my brain perfectly after getting a little more insight into the band.
To be blunt, when I first listened, I wasn’t sure how I felt about “Natural Pleasure”. I liked it, but I wasn’t dragged into it as much as I was after speaking with Lindsey on the phone about seemingly everything except the record. That first listen landed more like, “This is cool, but what the fuck is going on here?”
During our phone call, Lindsey and I talked about having children and how cool it is when your children want to play instruments. How we got there, I have no idea, but it seemed like the forty-something-year-old Lindsey wanted to talk about his sons. It was refreshing to speak to a musician who didn’t go straight into autopilot mode and start talking about how the record was made or how excited they are to visit your town.
“People think we’re from London (referring to misconceptions about Broncho), which is funny because I speak in a bad British accent to my kids all the time,” says Lindsey.
While he is still relatively new to being a dad, Lindsey and his “girlfriend” (“I guess I should say, ‘Partner,’ I don’t know, that still sounds funny,” joked Lindsey) live in Tulsa, Oklahoma (perhaps the polar opposite of London) with three-year-old named Oscar and Rocky, who just turned one. The boys are already curious about their dad’s musical gear.
For some musicians, the idea of having toddlers, even your own, play your instruments might make the ol’ skin crawl, but Lindsey’s response to this notion made me fall in love with the guy a little bit.
“Both of my sons are already playing. We have a bunch of little instruments lying around, and I let them bang on my instruments. I just want them to be as comfortable as I am…(pauses) like, I’ve never been very precious about my gear and that probably haunts me,” says Lindsey.
If you’ve ever been around a musician obsessed with their music gear, you know how great it is to hear. As a musician who couldn’t care less about gear (except if it sounds good or bad), it was, as Jason Schwartzman’s character, Gideon, says in the film “Scott Pilgrim vs The World”: “Music to my earholes.”
This lack of preciousness about gear can be a problem, of course, and Lindsey went on to describe how he is often searching for gear while out on the road when something inevitably breaks down. This has led him to be devoted to smaller, more easily replaced amps. Take note, guitar players: bigger is not always better.
“I just kind of will find amps that I figure out how to get my tone. Then that’s my amp for a while until it breaks, and at some point, on tour, my amps were all just breaking. I started getting these little 12-inch amps, and they were very light. I would blow a speaker or whatever, and we just would find a guitar shop and go get their little amp they had. It helps with everyone’s backs and such not to be hauling around heavy amps,” says Lindsey, before adding:
“We’re all pretty ragtag when it comes to gear. We find (music gear) out on the road, and then we chisel away at them. We’re naturalists when it comes to gear, but I would like to think that we have good taste in trash, you know? Well, I mean, only good trash. My mom taught me about good trash pretty early on, and it’s really hard for me to get rid of things if they’re good trash.”
After hearing Lindsey speak with a refreshing nonchalance about going with the flow when it comes to his music gear (although he did speak highly of his Fender Princeton, a Randall 12”, and a little Vox Reverb), it helped me appreciate the tunes on “Natural Pleasure” that much more because while the record sounds great, it is decidedly not over the top in trying to sound like it is completely perfect. It is fuzzy in all the right places and definitely muddy in the way that “Psychocandy” by Jesus and Mary Chain made that perfectly okay to be.
“Cool,” for example, is one that I have gone back to you on several occasions and hit the repeat button. It starts with some nice, noisy percussive bits from drummer Nathan Price, and it devolves into this slippy, pop-tinged brain fryer. If you’re inclined to psychedelicize, this is a pretty good soundtrack and it contains some great dad lyrics, too:
“Clap your hands and fold them/Hug your kids and hold them.”
Speaking of the lyrics, Lindsey is not one of those singers who tries to beat you over the head with his ideas. The songs on “Natural Pleasure” are not particularly wordy or even easy to sing along with. Only a few listeners can hit the notes Lindsey hits, for one thing, and how many people are truly invested in the music to sit there and read the lyrics while listening anymore? If you are so inclined, though, you will find some very cool stuff. “Original Guilt” offers what seems to be a take on growing up in a religiously conservative area of the world. I love driving through Oklahoma, for example. The people are nice and the scenery is kinda pretty in a way that desert dwellers can appreciate, but it doesn’t scream indie rock mecca, either.
Weirdly, Lindsey claims to have always been drawn to Phoenix, though.
“I remember always wanting to play Phoenix,” says Lindsey.
I couldn’t help but interrupt with a “Really?” and then a “Why?”
“I just love the name and all the imagery. I’d always seen the (mythical) Phoenix. In my mind, before ever even going there, I was like, ‘that’s a place I wanna play.’ So, when we started playing Phoenix proper, it felt really good to me on a personal level,” says Lindsey.
Lindsey also fondly remembers Broncho’s first appearance at the Yucca Tap Room roughly a decade ago.
“We used to play this place in Tempe when we were first playing Arizona. This dude goes, ‘Hey, um, I play didgeridoo. Do you mind if I sit in with you guys?’ I was like, ‘Sure,’ so this dude played didgeridoo with us for a couple songs at the beginning of our set. We were pretty punky then. It was the tour for the first record (2013’s “Can’t Get Past the Lips”), and it was extra perfect to have a didgeridoo on stage,” says Lindsey.
Sadly, there are no didgeridoo parts on “Natural Pleasure,” but after a few weeks of being on the road playing the songs, Broncho should be firing on all cylinders by the time they hit the stage at the Crescent. Lindsey seems excited to get back to Phoenix, but as much as he loves it here, it is clear that he is happiest at home in Tulsa.
“I just wanna be with my guys all the time. Phoenix is the last stop on the first leg of the West Coast tour, and then we come home,” says Lindsey.
Today, I’m here to tell you that seeing Broncho at the Crescent Ballroom on June 28, 2025, is an excellent idea, especially if cool indie rock from Oklahoma that leans heavily into the roots established by bands like Velvet Underground in the late 1960s and Jesus and Mary Chain in the mid-1980s is your jam.
In addition to hearing the aforementioned (and god-like) influences in their work, I was initially stuck on the playfulness of track four, “Get Gone,” on Broncho’s new record, “Natural Pleasure,” after dialing it up on a streaming service. It’s got this kind of disco thing going on with the synthesizer that co-producer Chad Copelin (Train, Avril Lavigne) deftly added to the song. It reminded me of the snarky brilliance of a band like Imperial Teen who crafts songs that become total earworms but have an attitude that says, “I don’t give a fuck if you like this. It’s great whether you like it or not.”
The thing is, though, after talking with Ryan Lindsey, who sings lead and plays guitar in Broncho, it is clear that they do give a fuck.
Broncho’s new record, “Natural Pleasure,” which came out on April 25, is the first thing I heard from the band, but it won’t be the last. It’s got a purity of soul (ugh, that sounds so bullshitty, but it is exactly how I feel at this particular moment) that landed on my brain perfectly after getting a little more insight into the band.
To be blunt, when I first listened, I wasn’t sure how I felt about “Natural Pleasure”. I liked it, but I wasn’t dragged into it as much as I was after speaking with Lindsey on the phone about seemingly everything except the record. That first listen landed more like, “This is cool, but what the fuck is going on here?”
During our phone call, Lindsey and I talked about having children and how cool it is when your children want to play instruments. How we got there, I have no idea, but it seemed like the forty-something-year-old Lindsey wanted to talk about his sons. It was refreshing to speak to a musician who didn’t go straight into autopilot mode and start talking about how the record was made or how excited they are to visit your town.
“People think we’re from London (referring to misconceptions about Broncho), which is funny because I speak in a bad British accent to my kids all the time,” says Lindsey.
While he is still relatively new to being a dad, Lindsey and his “girlfriend” (“I guess I should say, ‘Partner,’ I don’t know, that still sounds funny,” joked Lindsey) live in Tulsa, Oklahoma (perhaps the polar opposite of London) with three-year-old named Oscar and Rocky, who just turned one. The boys are already curious about their dad’s musical gear.
For some musicians, the idea of having toddlers, even your own, play your instruments might make the ol’ skin crawl, but Lindsey’s response to this notion made me fall in love with the guy a little bit.
“Both of my sons are already playing. We have a bunch of little instruments lying around, and I let them bang on my instruments. I just want them to be as comfortable as I am…(pauses) like, I’ve never been very precious about my gear and that probably haunts me,” says Lindsey.
If you’ve ever been around a musician obsessed with their music gear, you know how great it is to hear. As a musician who couldn’t care less about gear (except if it sounds good or bad), it was, as Jason Schwartzman’s character, Gideon, says in the film “Scott Pilgrim vs The World”: “Music to my earholes.”
This lack of preciousness about gear can be a problem, of course, and Lindsey went on to describe how he is often searching for gear while out on the road when something inevitably breaks down. This has led him to be devoted to smaller, more easily replaced amps. Take note, guitar players: bigger is not always better.
“I just kind of will find amps that I figure out how to get my tone. Then that’s my amp for a while until it breaks, and at some point, on tour, my amps were all just breaking. I started getting these little 12-inch amps, and they were very light. I would blow a speaker or whatever, and we just would find a guitar shop and go get their little amp they had. It helps with everyone’s backs and such not to be hauling around heavy amps,” says Lindsey, before adding:
“We’re all pretty ragtag when it comes to gear. We find (music gear) out on the road, and then we chisel away at them. We’re naturalists when it comes to gear, but I would like to think that we have good taste in trash, you know? Well, I mean, only good trash. My mom taught me about good trash pretty early on, and it’s really hard for me to get rid of things if they’re good trash.”
After hearing Lindsey speak with a refreshing nonchalance about going with the flow when it comes to his music gear (although he did speak highly of his Fender Princeton, a Randall 12”, and a little Vox Reverb), it helped me appreciate the tunes on “Natural Pleasure” that much more because while the record sounds great, it is decidedly not over the top in trying to sound like it is completely perfect. It is fuzzy in all the right places and definitely muddy in the way that “Psychocandy” by Jesus and Mary Chain made that perfectly okay to be.
“Cool,” for example, is one that I have gone back to you on several occasions and hit the repeat button. It starts with some nice, noisy percussive bits from drummer Nathan Price, and it devolves into this slippy, pop-tinged brain fryer. If you’re inclined to psychedelicize, this is a pretty good soundtrack and it contains some great dad lyrics, too:
“Clap your hands and fold them/Hug your kids and hold them.”
Speaking of the lyrics, Lindsey is not one of those singers who tries to beat you over the head with his ideas. The songs on “Natural Pleasure” are not particularly wordy or even easy to sing along with. Only a few listeners can hit the notes Lindsey hits, for one thing, and how many people are truly invested in the music to sit there and read the lyrics while listening anymore? If you are so inclined, though, you will find some very cool stuff. “Original Guilt” offers what seems to be a take on growing up in a religiously conservative area of the world. I love driving through Oklahoma, for example. The people are nice and the scenery is kinda pretty in a way that desert dwellers can appreciate, but it doesn’t scream indie rock mecca, either.
Weirdly, Lindsey claims to have always been drawn to Phoenix, though.
“I remember always wanting to play Phoenix,” says Lindsey.
I couldn’t help but interrupt with a “Really?” and then a “Why?”
“I just love the name and all the imagery. I’d always seen the (mythical) Phoenix. In my mind, before ever even going there, I was like, ‘that’s a place I wanna play.’ So, when we started playing Phoenix proper, it felt really good to me on a personal level,” says Lindsey.
Lindsey also fondly remembers Broncho’s first appearance at the Yucca Tap Room roughly a decade ago.
“We used to play this place in Tempe when we were first playing Arizona. This dude goes, ‘Hey, um, I play didgeridoo. Do you mind if I sit in with you guys?’ I was like, ‘Sure,’ so this dude played didgeridoo with us for a couple songs at the beginning of our set. We were pretty punky then. It was the tour for the first record (2013’s “Can’t Get Past the Lips”), and it was extra perfect to have a didgeridoo on stage,” says Lindsey.
Sadly, there are no didgeridoo parts on “Natural Pleasure,” but after a few weeks of being on the road playing the songs, Broncho should be firing on all cylinders by the time they hit the stage at the Crescent. Lindsey seems excited to get back to Phoenix, but as much as he loves it here, it is clear that he is happiest at home in Tulsa.
“I just wanna be with my guys all the time. Phoenix is the last stop on the first leg of the West Coast tour, and then we come home,” says Lindsey.
Safe travels, dude. Thanks for keeping it real.
Broncho plays the Crescent Ballroom on Saturday, June 28, 2025. Doors open at 7 p.m., and showtime is 8 p.m. General admission and bleacher tickets are available here. This show is 21 and over. No opening act is listed.
