Ryan Colton Music

Photo Credit: Andrew Thornton The first instrument I ever learned to play was saxophone. I  remember vividly when the music directors from the middle and  high schools came to my elementary school with some older  students to show my 5th grade class the different band  instruments that we had the option to learn if we choose to do so for the following year. I was immediately memorized when one  of the high school students busted out their saxophone and started playing a jazzy riff. I had heard lots of saxophone before that  by means of my parents record collections. But unlike the jazz  records most budding musicians typically gravitate towards for  inspiration, my knowledge of the instrument came more from a variety of pop or rock records I had been listening to since I could ever remember. The main riff to " Maneater " by Hall & Oates , the crazy solo in the bridge of " Urgent " by Foreigner , Dick Parry's solo in 7/8 time during " Money " by Pi

Being on the tail end of the Gen X demographic, I came of age during one of the greatest decades of music: the 1990s. My first introduction to " Grunge " was hearing the roaring guitars and crushing bass and drums that rattled through the common wall that separated my bedroom from my older sisters'. She was hip to what was cool with the new "alternative" music that would end up shaping my musical tastes and sensibilities into who I am today as a musician.  I grew up in a small town where at first, the local radio stations paid little attention to the new type of rock n' roll that was sweeping through the countries' teenage population. But I did have MTV, and MTV knew what was up. I typically would stay up late on the weekends to watch episodes of " 120 Minutes " or " Headbanger's Ball " so that I could stay abreast of all the latest and greatest that "Alternative" music had to offer. But as time went on, one of my favori

I'm happy to report that my first single officially available for streaming, " Gaslight " was released on September 22nd. This song came together in a bit of a whirlwind. My good friend and partner in crime in my cover band The Upside , Rick Mudd asked me if he could lay down some drum tracks at my home recording studio, Distilled Sounds . I had been listening to a lot of early 90's punk like Social D , Face to Face , and Bad Religion . I've always like the speed and aggression those bands had to their songs and even though the arrangements are fairly simple, they are catchy and have meaning to them. My sister has been battling brain cancer going on two years now and it's really taken a toll on her mentally and physically in the past few months. This created the perfect storm for a songwriting session and I quickly put together some scratch tracks so that Rick could record drums for me while he was here to work on his material. The arrangement came together qu