SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, July 28, 2023 (Gephardt Daily) — Chances are, if you’re a “Yellowstone” fan, you’ve heard the distinctive music of Shane Smith and the Saints.
In the third episode of the fourth season, Travis Wheatley, the horse trainer and trader played by series creator Taylor Sheridan, announces the music he is about to play to the passengers in his pickup truck. “Shane Smith and the f*ckin’ Saints,” he says as the band’s 2015 song “All I See Is You” begins. The episode itself is named after that very song.
The band were then featured again in the season five premiere, performing at Gov. John Dutton’s post-inauguration ball. After finding a 48-hour gap of free time in the middle of their tour, the band flew to Montana, where they recorded a total of three songs to be included in the episode — “Alex,” “Dance The Night Away,” and “Fire In The Ocean.”
The group members have made names for themselves as road warriors, playing over 100 shows annually to capacity crowds, and are currently on the road with headliner Dierks Bentley on his “Gravel and Gold” tour as well as headlining solo shows and playing festivals. They will play at USANA Amphitheater in West Valley City on Aug. 11, a Friday, along with Bentley and Jordan Davis.
The group’s sound blends key elements of Texas country, Americana, and Southern rock with soaring four-part harmonies. Its first album, “Coast,” was released in 2013, and two years later came “Geronimo,” followed by “Hail Mary” in 2019. In 2021, during the pandemic, the band also released “Live from the Desert,” which was filmed in various locations in Texas.
A native of Terrell, Texas, Smith made music a full-time pursuit after moving to Austin. A passionate musician and songwriter, he soon connected with Bennett Brown, along with other musicians, many of whom now make up The Saints. The group includes Brown on fiddle, Dustin Schaefer on lead guitar, Chase Satterwhite on bass, and Zach Stover on drums.
I spoke with Smith, who is the band’s lyricist and primary songwriter, by phone from the band’s tour stop in Emigrant, Montana.
He talked about how he became a musician and how the band formed.
“I started playing guitar when I was around 15 years old and it was just one of those things, I was just really drawn to it,” Smith said. “Once I started trying to learn, I never really put it down, and then I really got into, you know, listening to singer-songwriters. They’re really just much more talented songwriters than the average band you would listen to; guys like Hayes Carll, Adam Carroll, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Townes Van Zandt, a lot of these really inspiring songwriters. And it made me want to write, and over time, it just kept kind of snowballing into eventually, a career. Our fiddle player Bennett, he and I met at around 2009 and we’ve been at it together ever since. And the majority of our entire band has been together for almost a decade, and so we’ve been at it for a long time, and it’s only been the last like two years or so that we finally are catching some really big breaks, and we were doing it for a pretty long time before we started catching many breaks.”
Smith has said in a past interview that he is influenced by many types of music. “Absolutely, I think definitely I don’t pick and choose, you know, particular things when it comes to that,” he said. “I think it’s just, whatever hits you hits you and then you just kind of go off of that and try to try to create with inspiration.”
He also talked about what musicians he is being inspired by at present.
“I love all kinds of different music, you know, from bands like M83, Kings of Leon and like different rock bands all the way to a lot of younger songwriters that are coming out, Zach Bryan, Charles Wesley Godwin, and just a lot of different folks. But I never really get stuck listening to the same thing for too long. I feel like it’s always being mixed up and that’s probably a good thing and a bad thing, I don’t really know. But that’s just kind of how I operate.”
I also asked Smith what his tips would be for a successful life on the road.
“We did it in a way that was was pretty difficult,” he said. “Like, we never we never got with a record label, or really even, it took us a really long time to even get management. But as a result of doing that it kind of it taught us a lot on how to do things independently and how to make it work and be really lean not only as a band and musician, but as a company and as an organization, you know, and trying to make sure that we can pay off all of our bills without having to take loans out and things like that. And so I would just recommend, like getting out there, getting your feet wet, and trying. I mean, that’s just always my mentality, but a lot of people would recommend getting with a label and building a team and then trying to go from there. And I’m going to speak on behalf of our experience and I think that at the end of the day, I’m thankful that we kind of grinded it out just because it gave us, I don’t know, it kind of gives you a little bit of a callus to operate with and it helps you be a little more independent.”
He explained that the band does still have a tour bus, but they also fly to certain dates.
“It just depends, typically, we’re flying for like the beginning of a run, and then we’ll fly out and we’ll just kind of meet the bus wherever the bus is. The bus right now has been out for the last like, I mean, I would say almost two months or so, for the most of the most part; it’s just kind of stayed out somewhere around the country,” he said. “And then we will fly in and out and meet up with it and then do some shows and then fly back, and while we’re flying back home to try to get some off time, the bus and our driver Randy will be taking off to wherever the next one is.”
Smith also spoke about having the band’s music featured on “Yellowstone,” and the fact that they’re actually named by cast member and show creator Sheridan.
“Yes, ma’am, so the guy that says it in the episode is Taylor Sheridan and that’s his cameo role that he wrote in for himself,” Smith said. “And he’s the creator of ‘Yellowstone,’ and ‘1883’ and ‘1923,’ all kinds of different productions. And apparently, he was a fan of ours and has been for for a while, and we just weren’t aware of that. And so he wrote that in the script from what we’ve understood. It was really an amazing opportunity for us. It helped us out so much and we’re just incredibly grateful for it.”
I also asked Smith what the pandemic was like for him as a musician and songwriter.
“It was very… to be honest with you, being able to be home for the first time in a long time was just completely invaluable,” he said. “And that was amazing. During the pandemic, especially like the first year of it, it was just like, when you go from what we’re used to doing to that, it’s almost like immediate panic and then all of a sudden, it’s like, oh my God, this is incredible. Just getting to be home was kind of invaluable. It was amazing. And then following that, though, it was obviously, it’s just very scary and you don’t really know what kind of income you’re gonna have from month to month. And, you know, we were fortunate to be able to have help with like the PPP loans from the government, but we we also just got really creative with our merchandise to try to really just step that up. And we also, we do a lot of live stream concerts on Facebook.
“And we also in the middle of the pandemic, went out to West Texas to film a live album called ‘Live from the Desert’ but obviously, with no audience at all, it was just us going out there with a film crew, some generators out in the middle of nowhere, but we did it as a live stream. And as a pay-per-view event, and so that was us trying to make a more, just a cooler, bigger, cooler, more grandiose, live stream, than we were doing on Facebook, and so we did that. You know, people can go on YouTube and see some of those videos off of that and they can also go to Spotify or wherever to listen to it from start to finish. Anyways, but that was a really neat thing and it helped us a ton. We’re able to sell a ton of those pay-per-view tickets and make our money back on the investment and have a really cool product coming out of it.”
Smith also spoke about what else is on his bucket list to achieve.
“Like a massive bucket list item was for me, it was not only slaying Red Rocks [Amphitheatre in Colorado] and headlining Red Rocks, but selling it out,” he said. “That was something we were really fortunate to be able to do this past May, and that honestly, that was a huge one for me. Just because there’s just a total magic to that place, and you just can’t recreate it and can’t recreate the energy that is there in that one spot. You know, whenever you’re putting on a show like that and it’s all people that are just eager to be there and so excited and happy to be there. It’s just, it’s pure magic. So, you know, that was a massive goal for me. Honestly, I think a huge goal for me is just being able to pull off this career in a way that’s balanced, where we’re able to have families and maintain our personal lives but also maintain our careers and continue to grow. Because that’s, I mean, if we’re being honest, that’s the most difficult thing that anybody doing this could accomplish as being able to find balance with all that. And so I think that’s kind of my objective right now is just trying to make sure that I’m steering our ship and leading our camp in a way that that it leads to that outcome. We’ve got a new record that we’ve been recording and we’re almost finished with, you know, there’s just a lot that’s that’s in the works right now. That’s really exciting, but it’s like an overarching goal.”
More information and tickets for the concert with Dierks Bentley at USANA Amphitheater are available here.
