An Interview with Dave Halchak
The Mile High Reggae Artist of the Month series puts the spotlight on a different local artist each month who we have selected based on their current contributions to our local music community, including artists who are playing shows regularly, releasing music, and performing in a variety of projects.
Dave Halchak is a Denver, CO, singer, songwriter, artist manager, and recording artist. He is the guitarist and lead vocalist in the Bob Marley tribute band, Wake Up and Live, as well as the guitarist and lead vocals in the reggae/rock/jamtronica band, Giant Walking Robots. Additionally, he performs all over the state as himself playing his own live looping solo act.
Wake Up and Live is currently performing a series of 6 shows across the state for their annual Bob Marley birthday celebration. We recently sat down with Dave Halchak to ask him a little more about himself, his bands, and the upcoming tribute shows.
I’ve been in Denver for about 13 years so it’s been a minute. I’m originally from New Jersey, though.
Did you do the music thing out there too?
I started playing guitar when I was like 13. Then when I was about 17 I kinda got the bug and started taking lessons and putting bands together.
They were pretty early into things. We would literally play in the church basement or at the school cafeteria and stuff. We were just high school kids, playing shows for our parents and friends, but that’s what got it all started.
What got you into reggae music and who were some of your early influences?
When I was in high school I had the Legend album and maybe one or two other Bob CD’s and maybe some Gregory Isaacs too. I was pretty heavy on the jam stuff, like Grateful Dead and Phish too. As I started growing up and got into my college years, I got into all these B sides of Bob Marley. Those are the roots of Wake Up and Live when it comes down to it. The B sides and stuff that people don’t know led me into the things we play now.
Tell us more about the Wake up and Live band.
It got started back in 2013 for Bob’s birthday. I had the idea for the band for a little while and it came together in the fall of 2012 where I was like, alright, let’s do Bob Marley’s birthday at Cervantes. So, I put the band together. At the time it was two guitars, drums, bass, keys, percussion, and three female vocals. So we played that show and it was awesome. People loved it. That was our first gig and we had a blast and then people started wanting us to play more shows.
Was it pretty easy to round up that many Bob enthusiasts?
It wasn’t easy, but I do have a lot of friends in the industry that I was able to get involved. I didn’t want to make anyone play something they weren’t into. There has got to be a certain level of enthusiasm for the music you play.
How often do you guys rehearse?
We try to get one a month in. If we don’t, we just have to trust that everyone does their homework and comes prepared. There are really 15 or more people involved now. We have backups for almost everyone too. The core group is about 7 or 8 people and of course with that comes a lot of variables. At this point, I have said to the band that it has become a family of musicians. Some play more gigs than others and some play less, but I try to keep the lineup consistent.
I started doing the original Bob Birthday show with Wake Up and live in 2013 at Cervantes and now we are in our 10th year. It has been at Cervantes most years but we did do it at the Bluebird in 2020 and then of course in 2021 we did a live stream.
My whole music life has been balls to the walls, play every gig, get in front of as many people as possible. Treat every gig as if it’s huge because you never know who is there. I never cancel gigs. But covid has changed all of that. I have had countless gigs of my own cancelled and countless gigs of the bands I manage cancelled. You have got to go into it with an understanding that everything might cancelled. You just work through it.
That’s gotta feel like getting your heart broken over and over.
Yea and your wallet stolen over and over. It’s tough, but it’s what we do. You work through it and you can’t get hung up on it. We are still working and practicing and learning new material. Something else that covid has impacted negatively is not just shows cancelling but the ability to go out and network. We can’t get hung up on it, though. We have got to roll with it and figure out how to do what we do in this new world.
Well this year we have 6 birthday shows lined up. We usually have some out of state shows too, but we didn’t do those this year because we are just being cautious of covid and everything. It’s still hard to get gigs and get people to come out with all of the variables that are going. But that’s part of the hustle.
What can fans expect to see at these shows?
The Cervantes show will be the 10th year we’ve done it now and we are from Denver. So the Denver show is kind of like the hometown throw down. We have Stylie on that show too and we have Ghost.wav, which has Nick from Project 432 in it. I think that is going to be their first show.
Stylie is great.
Yea, I did a track with Stylie a while back. We did a cover of Burning and Looting. So who knows, maybe I’ll hop up during their set and do that song with them.
I will go ahead and just include that video because it is sick.
We always try and do some mountain towns. The Belly Up show in Aspen was in December, but it ended up getting cancelled for a venue exposure. So we are trying to reschedule that one. But we got Steamboat at Schmiggity’s and that one is always fun because it’s a big two set show. And it’s sold out the past two years we’ve done it. So hopefully it safely packs itself out again this year. Then we got the Moxi Theater up in Greeley and we haven’t done that before. We are doing Bob’s actual birthday, February 6th, at 10 Mile Music Hall in Frisco, CO. Then we are doing Cervantes on Feb 11th followed by Brues Alehouse down in Pueblo, CO, Feb 12th which is a great spot. We have done Pueblo once before and it was awesome. Some of the shows we are still working on some openers so those will be announced.
Tell us about Giant Walking Robots.
Yea, so Giant Walking Robots started in 2019. I wanted to have a band that was, you know, a lot of the original music I write is reggae based and reggae rock, but I wanted to incorporate jam band elements and electronic elements and what they call “jamtronica” kind of vibes.
I think I heard that word from you when we interviewed you about the EP.
Yea. So it’s just taking the songs that we write and twisting them into something else. Very much from like the Grateful Dead, Phish, STS9 kind of world, where it is just improvisation and jumping off the cuff. It kind of throws people off sometimes because I think maybe they expect it to be just straight reggae.
Tell me about the show you just booked with GWR?
That’s a perfect example. We are playing Cervantes in the big room on Saturday March 5th and it is, it’s an electronic show with a band called Evanoff and Casual Commander which is Kevin from Sunsquabi who are doing some pretty big things in the electronic world. So you know, it is sometimes tricky for me as the manager and song writer of the band to decide what shows make sense for us to play. So we do play reggae shows, but just like that show, that band we are opening for is electronic rock. I see us as like a modern day reggae rock version of Pink Floyd. Pink Floyd was rock, but they were psychedelic and so many other things, even electronic. So it is sometimes hard to pin down what exactly the band is, but we are also just kind of looking for people that are open minded about music.
Yea, I mean I don’t say it is a reggae band but it definitely has reggae roots which we then twist into something completely different.
Well, if you listen to our EP, that was very much intentionally made to be more of that. “That” meaning a straight up reggae rock EP. That’s generally what I push for radio play too, because those songs are shorter and more radio friendly.
But GWR is much more about the live performances?
Yes, it is very much about the live performances. I don’t think you are going to fully experience Giant Walking Robots without seeing us live . That being said we are going to be releasing a live album that we recorded. But you know we started in 2019, but we were gigging for about 8 months before shit hit the fan. And now it’s like we haven’t really been able to get out there and show people what we do.
“That community aspect is super important. Since day one, it was always about trying to build a community of people that love the music and love hanging out with each other.”
How many COVID Tests do you have to take for all of these shows?
It’s kind of become a regular part of my life with playing in these bands and having a baby at home. My job is getting out in front of people, though, and I have to always be thinking about keeping myself and my family safe.
That’s a good answer.
Props to her. It’s just a matter of being self-aware and asking myself what can I do to help the family when I am not playing gigs. My mind has changed and it sounds cliché, but as soon as you have a kid, things just change. Priorities change. My priorities are providing for my family and pulling my weight as a father, but I also have to stay present in writing songs, and practicing, and playing gigs.
Tell us about your solo act.
I started that way back after seeing Keller Williams, who does looping. He was one of the first guys I saw doing it. So I started very primitively doing the loop stuff and now it has evolved. It is live looping. Nothing is pre-recorded. It is all on the spot.
“I have had some awesome solo gigs recently. In 2021, I played the Levitt Pavilion for the Cool Vibes Reggae fest and I got to play with The Wailers at The Colorado Chautauqua.”
Is your solo stuff reggae?
With my solo stuff it is mostly a reggae rock vibe. I always say “Rock Reggae,” though, because I know I am not doing like an Earthkry or a Don Carlos set. I am doing my spin, which leans a little more rock.
I do both. I do a lot of Bob Marley because I just know so much Bob Marley from being in Wake Up and Live.
Oh, I don’t know. Probably at least 50 ha.
Yeah definitely. Very excited about all the Wake Up and Live shows. It’s my favorite time of the year is Bob’s birthday because we just get out and get to play his music. Playing his music is just such a trip because it’s so deep and so many people relate to it so I consider it an honor to get the opportunity to play it live for people. So I am really excited for the birthday shows right now. Especially just because I am really in it right now. I am promoting them and practicing for them you know? It’s just that time of year for me where it’s Bob heavy. But I am also really excited about Giant Walking Robots stuff and trying to get back into the studio and release more music. We have a live album that we expect to release in the first part of this year.
So that album is already recorded and just waiting to be released?
Yea, its just being mixed now. But we want to release more studio stuff because we have been writing a lot. Our new drummer is writing music and he really brings a different voice to the band and we want to get that on record so to speak. So definitely more recording for the Robots crew. More gigging for the Wake Up and Live Crew. And I am definitely trying to play more solo stuff too because I just love playing.
