Donovan Lyman considers going it solo

BY MIKE NUNEZ • FOR FLORIDA TODAY • September 26, 2008

Before moving to California, Blue Meridian was long regarded as one of Central Florida's premier bands. With four solid albums and a solo CD by frontman Donovan Lyman recently completed, Blue Meridian and Lyman are back in Central Florida for a series of shows that will remind audiences that they still are at the top of their game.

The band consists of Lyman (lead vocals/guitar), Chadwick Stienmetz (lead guitar), Scott Kinworthy (drums) and George Castells (bass). A staple in the Central Florida music scene for many years, the band has appeared nationally in Spin magazine and many more national and international publications. The band has sold more than 10,000 albums independently, quite a feat for a nonlabel artist. The band also has appeared as the opening act for such legendary bands as Stone Temple Pilots, Veruca Salt, Styx, Tonic, The Wallflowers, The Cult, Tantric, Finger Eleven, The Smithereens, Missing Persons, The Fixx, Edwin McCain and countless others.

I spoke with Lyman about his solo work, the band's upcoming CD and the benefit show for School House Rocks. So let's Shake, Rattle & Know: Donovan Lyman of Blue Meridian.

SRK: You had enormous success locally with Blue Meridian. What made you want to move to California to continue your music career?

Lyman: It was nice being in the music scene, and we did some great things here, but it wasn't the right launching pad for our career as Nashville or Los Angeles was. I was ready to put our music in front of people who could make a real
difference on a global scale.

SRK: Recently you have been doing more work as a solo artist. Is this more of the direction you see your career heading?

Lyman: I had completed four Blue Meridian albums when I started on the next one, and this album just took an unexpected turn. It began to creep further away from the Blue Meridian sound. I was much more hands-on with this record, and the band was less hands-on, so it always felt like a solo project anyhow. I always used to do random solo acoustic shows anyway, so it wasn't a big departure for me.

We have no plans for the band to break up though. We just finished a new record that will be out soon, so it would be pretty foolish to break up now. We have a tour planned to support the new CD, so things are going well.

SRK: Why did it take nearly four years to complete your solo CD, "Avalon & Babylon & Me"?

Lyman: That may be a hard one to answer, because I don't want to come across as pointing the finger at anyone or throwing someone under the bus. I would like to say that perfection takes time, but the truth is 90 percent of the record was complete for quite awhile, but there were parts missing. We added a cellist and filled in some gaps. It was an epic record with 18 songs and
over 80 minutes of music joined together with all sorts of creative segways.

It's a concept album. It was brilliantly mastered by Grammy-winning mastering engineer Joe Bozzi (for the U2 "Vertigo" CD). A lot went into the record, so I guess that's why it took so long.

SRK: How is the current Blue Meridian album "Skint & Shattered" coming along?

Lyman: The songs are all tracked, and I am just looking for someone to mix it. We have had a few studios offer to mix a track here or there to show us what they can do, but I haven't made a decision yet. We are just going to sit on the masters for awhile. I just put out the solo CD, so people aren't expecting a Blue Meridian CD to be put out so quickly afterward, so we are in a position where we can take some time with it.

SRK: With the unbelievable amount of accolades the band has achieved, why do you feel a major record label has yet to catch on to the band?

Lyman: I've been offered contracts before that I turned down. I was in radio for a long time as a program director, and I know that without a strong promotional push by the record label that signs you, it can actually destroy someone more than help them. I'm not about to sign something unless I know there is going to be a significant amount of money spent promoting and pushing our product. Without a push, you may just sit on a shelf and be dropped by the label without ever being heard. At that point, you become damaged goods and no one else will want to touch you in the business. I didn't want to be viewed that way or have that happen to us. Look at all the great bands that were coming out of Orlando, got a record deal and then were never heard from again. I didn't want that to happen to us.

SRK: Do you feel the music business has reached a point where a record label is no longer needed for a band to be successful?

Lyman: There are a lot of independent labels and self-managed bands that are doing well. The power of the record labels is more money and influence than anything else, but record labels only amount to a very small percentage of the music that is out there. The American public is catching on to all the places where you can go to get great music and retailers understand that more than ever. Independent labels have a better chance of succeeding now than ever before. A record label isn't the only way to get known or be heard.

SRK: What can you tell me about the Oct. 5 School House Rocks benefit show you are doing in Orlando?

Lyman: It's a cause that is very close to me. The benefactor is The Foundation for Literacy for Children in America. My family is very involved in this. My father, Dr. Donald Lyman, father passed away about a year and a half ago, and he had spent his entire life helping learning disabled children.

After his passing, my mom (Nieves Lyman) and sister (Jennifer) picked up the torch. When my father's health started to fail, my mom had to become the breadwinner, and she started a Montessori School where she could keep my father's legacy alive, and implement a learning program that my father had started.

She has outgrown the school and she recently purchased an old Baptist church building so she could expand the scope of the school and be accessible to more kids in need. This benefit will help with the costs of renovating that church and making it more suitable for a school.

This benefit will take place in the old church with the altar serving as the stage area. It's the perfect setting for this show. We started out with four or five bands playing over a three-hour period, but now we have over 16 acts and the event will go on from 1 p.m. to about 10 p.m. We have great acts such as Jeff Howell (WTKS-FM), Dagnese, Christian Wilson, Mark & James, Chris McCarty, Bryan Malpass, Dish and more, hosted by celebrity emcees Michele Wright and Supa Dave (WJRR).

Local spotlight: Blue Meridian

Lead singer Donovan Lyman tells us the difference between Orlando and L.A.'s music scenes

By Paul Hiebing
July 17, 2008

The average life expectancy of a local-indie band can be measured in months, sometimes less.

So when an Orlando band like Blue Meridian survives well past a decade it means something must have gone right. Kept alive by lead singer Donovan Lyman after his move to Los Angeles, Blue Meridian kept their alt-rock roots solidly intact thanks to the L.A. lineup of guitarist Chadwick Steinmetz, bassist George Castells, and percussionist Scott Kinworthy (who does double-duty as a Blue Man in Las Vegas). While preparing for a return tour of Central Florida with the original lineup (Dean Pichette, Kevin Kirkwood and Manny Rivera) Lyman took some time to chat with Metromix Orlando about the difference between Orlando and L.A., being indie in today's music scene, and how to handle an earthquake.

You have said that Blue Meridian was formed "just for fun." Could you elaborate on that?

It didn't seem like anything unusual at the time, just to get together and make music because of how much fun it is to do that. But I realized years later, when bands were springing up like weeds left and right, they would contact me and ask if they could open for us and I would ask them some questions. And I found that so many of them had these delusions of grandeur, like "Within six months we'll be signed," that kind of thing. And that's when it first occurred to me that that's not why we got together. I remember we rehearsed every day for three months – that's when I turned to my bass player and said "I think we're ready for a show" and he said "You mean in front of people?"

What do you attribute to your longevity?

I guess when there's momentum, and when you notice opportunities and cool things are happening for you, bigger and better every time, you know with each passing month or year you're being asked to do things that you've never done before. When I moved to Los Angeles it was the first time I ever had something to prove, and I was anxious for the challenge of seeing how long it would take for the cream to rise to the top of a city this size.

Would you say your move was a success?

The only thing I didn't anticipate about what it would be like being an unsigned band in Los Angeles is it's got nothing to do with the competition, it's got nothing to do with how many bands are out here. The challenge in Los Angeles is developing a fan base, getting people to come to your shows. I had someone tell me the first few months I was here, that drawing an audience of 80 people in Los Angeles is equivalent to drawing an audience of 500 people in a place like Orlando. That's the most disheartening part about it, all these people, you know 20 million people in the metro area, and it's so hard to reach the same numbers that we're reaching in Orlando.

Is there encouragement for indie bands in L.A.?

L.A. is a famous music scene because we've got some world-famous clubs here. But as far as it being a great place for a band to come up it's really not. The thing is, almost every major venue here is booked by outside promoters. It's not as hands-on as it is in Orlando. They care more about booking acts that can draw crowds so they can make money rather than putting together sensible bills. I mean, we've been sandwiched between a country band and a hip-hop act before.

You have four albums with the band and one solo, what are you planning on doing next?

We actually made a fifth record with the band. The longtime lineup from Orlando drifted to the wind when I went to Los Angeles, so I started up another band when I got out here. So what we've done for the last year is record the fifth one with the Los Angeles lineup. We tracked thirteen songs and they're currently being mixed and we're really excited about it. It's going to be called "Skint and Shattered" which are a couple of terms we got from touring Britain. Skint means broke, and shattered means tired. So I guess it means after all this time we're still broke and tired.

What does being indie mean to you?

Not long ago the term wasn't used, you're either signed or unsigned. And now with all these labels going out of business like Tower, and all these places have gone bankrupt, for the first time ever bands are not looking at a major label contract as the end-all. There's certainly the possibility out there now to making a decent living being an unsigned band, keeping all the profits for yourself instead of giving 85 percent of it away. I sell a pretty respectable amount of music every week, actually, so my only wish is that we would take to the road and tour more cities.

How was that earthquake the other day?

I've been out here for four and a half years and that was the second one I felt. The first one was actually about three years ago. I guess I was closer to the epicenter that time. The tremor lasted for a good ten or twelve seconds and rattled everything in my apartment. But the one from the other day was minor in comparison. The first thing that occurred to me once it started to shake was "I'm on the first floor, this is a pretty old building – I need to get my ass out to the courtyard." It actually ended before I was able to get to the front door. I was in my underwear anyway, so it, uh, wouldn't have been a good thing if it continued and I burst into the courtyard with all these old people and children out there.