UNSUNG MAGAZINE_VERSE 007_OCT 2025_CALEB WILBOURN

CALEB WILBOURN

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A RAW, UNPOLISHED TEXAS TROUBADOUR

Curators WORD

PUBLISHER Indictus2 Holdings, LLC

CURATOR Casey Frank

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hen we launched Unsung® Magazine a year ago, we weren’t looking for permission. We were seeking purpose. In a world drowning in disposable noise that disappears the second you swipe, we wanted the opposite. Something real. Something tangible. Something you can throw in your bag, crease in half, spill a beer on and still pull off the shelf ten years from now. Evidence that the music in our backyard matters enough to ink onto paper.

And it does.

From day one, this wasn’t just about the artists. It was about the whole machine that powers live music - the engineers mixing and mastering, the photographers in the pit, the promoters shouting show dates into the void with little in return, the studios betting on raw talent and giving them room to grow and everyone in between. It’s the fans who don’t just “support local music” but live and breathe it. That’s the backbone.

That’s why Unsung exists. 78130 has always been loud. Now it’s got a voice on record.

VISIONARY Scott Foley PRINTING Sundance Print Centers

In our first year, we spotlighted The Roughstock, Tiffany Dawn, Trevor Underwood, Timberwilde, Austin Gilliam and The Well Fed Texans and Jessee Lee. How do you pick from a gold-plated reservoir this stacked? You don’t. It’s half gut, half gamble. We didn’t overthink it. We leaned in and the ones that pulled us closer - those are the voices we rode with.

Our sponsors amplified us. They believed in Unsung® when it was nothing more than a rough draft with no guaranteed return. They threw their weight behind local voices and pushed Unsung® out of the gate and into more hands, more homes, more conversations. Without them, the stories stay small. With them, they hit harder, travel farther, reach higher.

But growth changes the game. If Volume One was proof of concept, Volume Two is about building bigger.

We need more ideas, more writers, more design, more hands in the mix. If Unsung® is going to keep up with the stories, it can’t just be me and Scott - it has to be all of us. If you have interest, talent, or an itch to be part of something loud, the door is wide open.

@unsungtx unsungtx.com EDITORIAL OFFICE 1190 Gruene Road New Braunfels, Texas 78130 830-708-2411 info@unsungtx.com

And let’s be real: if you’ve been with us from the start, you know this has been a zero-return, passion project.

Every page, every photo, every late-night edit has been for the love of it. But love alone won’t carry the weight forever. We need more sponsors, more believers, more supporters willing to put their money where their mouth is.

Volume Two? Heavier. Deeper. Wider. Breaking new ground, uncovering more voices, pushing stories further than before. Unsung® is rising and we’re not slowing down.

Thanks for picking us up, passing us around and proving there’s still a pulse in print.

Unsung® was never meant to be safe. It was meant to be necessary.

Let’s keep it that way.

XO,

LET’S COLLAB We are excited to explore potential collaborations and would love your input.

If you have a favorite Unsung artist you’d like to see featured, a live music venue you frequent, or would like to spotlight influential behindthe-scenes individuals in the music industry, please visit unsungtx.com.

We look forward to hearing your recommendations.

CONTRIBUTOR TIFFANY FOLEY

Tiffany Foley is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Case Manager with six years in the Air National Guard and 24 years as a military spouse. Outside of work, you can find her soaking up live music, spending time with her cats, diving into a good book and tackling puzzles. ©2024 Unsung®. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the curator.

Information provided to Indictus2 Holdings, LLC is deemed reliable, but not guaranteed. The publisher will not be responsible for any omissions, errors, typographical mistakes or misinformation within this publication.

For permission requests, please write to the curator at info@unsungtx.com.

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THE GRAPHIC GUITAR GUYS Where ink meets wood

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SHANNON TIERNEY FLACK Three songs, no flash

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WHERE’S THE MUSIC?

Stay in tune with Gruene’s vibrant live music scene

SPOTLIGHT: COWBOYS & CADILLACS From rodeo dust to rooftop lights

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THE SCENE

A schedule of upcoming events featuring live music in the community

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HONORING VETERANS IN MUSIC Service, sacrifice and song

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CALEB WILBOURN

From open mics to open roads

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BACKSTAGE PASS: ALEX CARTER

The world makes sense when it’s turned up

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At Unsung, we believe the music community is built not only by the artists on stage, but also by the advocates, sponsors and community members who make the stage possible. From the beginning, our mission has been to shine a light on the people and efforts that too often go unnoticed. That’s why we created the Unsung Awards - to recognize those who embody the heart of this scene. These awards are our way of saying thank you and of making sure their contributions are celebrated as loudly as the music itself.

AND

BO BRUMBLE

GARY ROE

Artist of the Year

Advocate of the Year

Sponsors of the Year

Bo Brumble is the definition of what Unsung exists to honor. His music is rooted in authentic storytelling - songs that carry grit, soul and the unmistakable weight of lived experience. In an era of surface-level singles, Bo’s lyrics remind us why Americana Rock n’ Soul music exists: because it tells the truth.

Gary Roe has become an indispensable part of the New Braunfels and Texas Hill Country music scene. Through his social platform, @nb.live.music.today, Gary has tirelessly championed local musicians, venues and events, giving both established acts and rising talent the recognition they deserve.

This past year, his relentless work ethic has transformed hustle into momentum. From small bar gigs to bigger stages, he’s sharpened his presence, grown his fan base and proven himself a working musician in the truest sense. But Bo’s impact isn’t measured only in miles traveled or shows played - it’s also in the community he strengthens. Through collaborations, songwriter circles, open mic nights, philanthropic efforts and steadfast support of fellow artists, he embodies the spirit of lifting others while chasing his own path.

His live music lineups, photos, posts and updates have become a trusted daily source for fans eager to discover who’s playing, where to go and what’s happening across the scene. In doing so, Gary has created a living chronicle of the region’s music culture.

Unsung was built on the idea of celebrating the stories behind the music and that mission is only possible with partners who share our vision. Our Sponsors of the Year represent the very spirit of Unsung - champions who not only invest in our publication but also strengthen the local music community and the talent we highlight.

Grounded firmly in Texas tradition, Bo represents the next wave of artists poised for bigger stages. Naming him Artist of the Year is a nod to the trajectory he’s on and a celebration of this moment before the rest of the world takes notice.

By sharing stories, connecting fans with artists and consistently showing up rain or shine, he has strengthened the sense of community that defines our local music scene. His unwavering passion and consistency embody the heart of Unsung: lifting up the voices and efforts that might otherwise go unnoticed - and if they’re really lucky, he may give ‘em a slice of bacon.

San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo has long been a cornerstone of Texas tradition, creating one of the most recognized stages in the region.

Their support of Unsung amplifies the voices of emerging artists and connects them to one of the largest audiences in the state, bridging local talent with statewide recognition.

Portrilux has redefined the way music imagery is experienced, transforming photography into striking metal wall art. Their collaboration with Unsung has elevated our storytelling visually, gifting Unsung Magazine’s featured artists with metal prints of their cover - turning each feature into a keepsake worthy of the stage it represents.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the annual Turkey Fry, a tradition the Sisoian family built at Billy’s Ice to support the New Braunfels Food Bank. The Thanksgiving Eve Turkey Fry brought people together in a simple but powerful way: sharing food, raising donations and giving back to the community.

With Billy’s Ice closing its doors, The Villa is honored to carry the torch forward. Our mission is not only to preserve what the Sisoian family started but to expand it, reaching more families, drawing in new community partners and ensuring that this tradition of generosity continues to thrive year after year.

What began at Billy’s Ice now lives on at The Villa, moving into a new chapter of giving, fellowship and holiday tradition. Bring canned and non-perishable food items and join us as we aim for a $35,000 goal to benefit the New Braunfels Food Bank.

SPOTLIGHT: COWBOYS & CADILLACS

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THE SCENE EVERY SATURDAY IN

OCT

FALL-A-PALOOZA AT FLOAT IN

Join us this fall for LIVE music, art market, vintage shopping, pumpkin patch and all the festival shenanigans on the Comal River. $25. 9-9PM floatintx.com

OCT 9-12

GRUENE MUSIC AND WINE FEST

OCTOBER & NOVEMBER MUSIC EVENTS AROUND TOWN OCT 18

DIA DE LOS MUERTO FESTIVAL

A free, community-centered festival celebrating Hispanic cultural heritage with music, dancing, food and traditions in downtown New Braunfels. FREE. nbchamber.com

OCT 25

KEEP IT COUNTRY MUSIC JAM 2025

A multi-day celebration of Texas and Americana music, paired with Texas-made wine and beer, benefiting United Way of Comal County. gruenemusicandwinefest.org

Proudly partnered with Toddcoe Aviation, the 2nd Annual Keep it Country Music Jam at the New Braunfels Airport benefits Comal Conservation. The night features live music, raffles, a live auction, food trucks and a fully stocked bar. $35. comalconservation.org

OCT 18-19 GRUENE MARKET DAYS & NOV 15-16

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The event showcases nearly 100 artisans offering handmade goods and packaged Texas foods, with free admission, parking and live music. Visitors can also explore Gruene Historic District’s specialty shops, wine tasting, dining, river rides and more. 8AM gruenetexas.com

NOV 26

WURSTFEST

Join us for a unique annual celebration rich in German culture and full of Texas fun! Here you’ll enjoy good food, music, dancing, exciting carnival rides and games, German, Texan and domestic beer, special events and the finest in Alpine and Bavarian Style Entertainment. wurstfest.com

THANKSGIVING EVE TURKEY FRY & DRIVE

Proudly supported by the Sisoian family, the 20th Annual Turkey Fry & Drive at The Villa benefits the New Braunfels Food Bank.

Bring non-perishable food items and enjoy turkey plates with all the fixings, auctions, raffles and live music. 5PM drinklokal.com

HOSTING A MUSIC-FILLED EVENT? EMAIL INFO@UNSUNGTX.COM 12

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yellowdogstudios.com | (512) 348-7168 UNSUNG® | VERSE 007 | OCTOBER 2025 13

“WITH MOST SONGS, YOU SAY

EVERYTHING IN ONE LINE AND THE REST IS JUST FILLING THE ROOM.”

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aleb Wilbourn turned thirty this past June the way he starts most days - quiet, steady, on his own terms. He woke up and went for a hike. No party, no big deal made of it. Just boots on dirt, legs moving, the Hill Country morning waiting for him. It fits the man he’s become - clear-eyed, steady, certain of where he’s standing.

He grew up in Brownwood, Texas - “dead center on the map,” he says. The kind of town where you don’t really need a street sign to know where you’re going.

His family’s story was shaped by two things: service and music. His dad was “a pastor and schoolteacher on and off for most of my life,” and still preaches back home. His mom was the one who carried the music. “She had a beautiful voice… really great at harmonizing,” Caleb remembers. “She could just jump in with whatever was on the radio and sing along.” She played piano, read music like it was nothing, sat down with a hymnal and knew what to

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do. He pauses. “She was an awesome lady. She had this powerful presence about her.”

She passed in 2019, just after retiring, after years of illness doctors never really named. “It’s been over six years now,” Caleb says quietly. His voice dips, but the weight of it stays in the room. There’s a younger brother too. He chased movies instead of music, worked his way up from coffee runs to an office job on an animated series with a boss who had done Jimmy Neutron and Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. He spent time on The Chosen and its new spinoff, then moved down to Martindale with his girlfriend. Now he’s close enough for Sunday dinners and borrowed tools.

Their dad wasn’t the musician in the family. “But he’s a very creative person,” Caleb says. “A great public speaker. A good guy, for sure.”

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or Caleb, music started the way it does for a lot of kids - curiosity. Drums came first. He’d sit at the kit in his dad’s church after everyone was gone, sticks in hand, pounding out rhythms that filled the empty sanctuary. The guitar came later. “I had a few friends that had them and just, you know, kind of always grew up around music and I don’t know. I just wanted one at one point,” he says. “I got my first guitar in middle school. I started writing a little bit in high school and stuff, but it really wasn’t something that I made a big part of my identity or considered a career path.”

That same curiosity followed him to college. At Texas Tech in Lubbock, he drifted through majors - business, biology, “I think I just went to general studies for a little while.” He wasn’t chasing a plan so much as poking at possibilities, trying things on to see if they fit. Like a lot of people his age, he was searching for something that felt like a direction.The push came in a small way. “There’s

SPONSORED BY

CALEB WILBOURN this one moment at a party in college… there was like this song playing on the radio. And I was just singing along to it and this guy… was like, man, you can kind of sing. And I was just like, huh. And I never really had anyone tell me that before.” That stuck with him. A few weeks later he went looking for a stage.

“The first open mic I played was at the Blue Light, you know, which is [a] legendary venue,” he says. At the time, Caleb was working a day job and this stranger kept coming in. “You gotta come play,” the guy said, again and again. Finally, Caleb did. He played two originals, hands shaking the whole time. He didn’t realize he’d been holding his breath until it was over.

For a moment, he felt the weight lift off his chest. He went back the next week. And the next. “You kind of get involved in that whole scene,” he says. “And just kind of had some things happen that I was like, man, music is really what I’m supposed to do.”

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he leap from “maybe” to “this is it” didn’t come in some clean movie moment. It came because Caleb was broke. He was in Tampa - Ybor City, a district with bars stacked on bars - and he had nothing left. No ID, no phone, no money. He’d worked a festival down in Lake Okeechobee and had watched the street performers out there do their thing - play what they had, turn strangers into an audience, live on the tips. “Necessity kind of forced me into it,” he says. “I made like 50 or 60 bucks in like the first hour. That was pretty much the first money I’d ever made playing music before.”

The math was simple: open the case, play and see if people cared enough to throw something in. Most nights they did. Some didn’t. “There were definitely times of homelessness on the street, just me and my guitar,” Caleb says. “But you could usually make enough to keep going.”

A few thousand miles from Florida, he hit a harder night. Salt Lake City. A bench, a few hours of uneasy

sleep, then a cop shaking him awake. Hey man, we just watched this camera over here. Some guy just robbed you. Caleb patted his pockets. Phone - gone. Wallet - gone. Backpack - gone. The guy had left the guitar. “For a little bit I was like, I’m really screwed now,” Caleb says. No ID, no money, nothing to his name but that guitar. The thought that came next was the same one that had saved him in Ybor: I can make something happen. Luck bent his way.

Salt Lake police tracked the guy down within hours.

Caleb got most of his stuff back. But the lesson stuck. Out there, the guitar wasn’t just an instrument - it was survival.

“Busking is the hardest place you’ll ever perform,” he says. “You really get some thick skin. You learn how to project your voice. All the people I know that busk, they like have this certain powerful way of singing versus other people that just sing into microphones.”

It was an education you can’t buy. Every street

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corner was an audition, every passerby a critic. If you could hold them for a verse, you learned quick.

If you couldn’t, you learned quicker.

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fter the streets came the desert. Caleb lived in Terlingua for a stretch - far West Texas, south Brewster County, where the land burns hot in the day and cools off just enough at night to remind you it isn’t done with you yet. Out there, the sky is wide, the ground is bare and the music has nowhere to hide. “I don’t know another place with more great songwriters per capita,” Caleb says. He rattles off names: legends like Butch Hancock and working hands like Bill Palmer, the recording engineer who’s cut several of Caleb’s tracks. “When he’s up on a mic, the whole room stops.” The desert doesn’t care about polish. If you’ve got a song, you play it. If it’s worth anything, it’ll show. If not, the silence will eat it. You can hear that spareness in Caleb’s voice now - the lean lines, the country-Americana tone that says what it means and leaves space for the rest.

When the desert had done its part, he headed north.

Colorado summers became ritual. Small towns, big skies, calendars stitched together gig by gig. The first year was chaos. By the third, it was craft.

“Last year I booked 17 venues,” he says. “I had to contact over 300 to make that happen.”

The hustle teaches humility and the miles finish the lesson.

One summer run cost him five van breakdowns. Friends stepped in, fans helped and the Texas Songwriter Relief Fund - founded by hit writer David Lee - paid for a new starter when he was stuck. “They paid a lot of money to get my van fixed,” Caleb says. “Got a new starter in there for me.” He plans a benefit now to return the favor.

The van itself is stripped down to essentials: seats pulled, twin bed laid flat, a short dresser strapped in with bungees, solar panel on top. Everything earned, everything chosen. Nights were spent on public land across New Mexico, Idaho, Montana.

Shower in the creek. Coffee on a camp stove. Sky

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“SO MUCH OF WHAT I LOVE IS New Braunfels. No apartments, no roommates. a little acreage, an Airbnb up front he helps CONNECTING WITH PEOPLE.” Just manage and space for him and the dog. Horses for a ceiling. Romantic until it wasn’t - when storms turned dirt roads into soup, headlights barely cutting the dark at 2 a.m., or when his dog, Seger, a terrier mix, ran into the trees long enough to test his patience and faith. “He always finds his way back,” Caleb says, half smiling.

lean over the fence. There’s a pool he gets to himself on quiet weeks. A storm tore through this spring - 80-mile-an-hour winds, trailers rattled, shade sails ripped down. Caleb shrugs it off. Seger didn’t flinch, so they were fine.

It’s a place that fits his work.

More venues, more nights, more people who’ll come out on a Tuesday. “There’s so many places where you can go see live music on a weeknight,” he says. He books three to four months out, stacking weekends, then filling the weekdays with Hill Country bars and patios. Some venues are slammed through the year’s end, some ask if he can play tomorrow. If he can, he says yes. The circuit is halfway to where he wants it - “another half dozen or so” venues would make the math right. The anchors are Willow Lake in Wimberley, River Rose Tavern in Canyon Lake, the Birdhouse in Gruene and The Villa - “the first place to book me in the area.” The rest he adds one handshake at a time.

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he approach is the same as it was back in Ybor: show up, play true, let the room decide. But he’s careful not to shrink down to just the local grind. “I don’t want to be known as just a local musician,” he says.

“But I would like to play more and more local places.” The balance is deliberate: anchor in New Braunfels, keep the road wide.

Colorado in the summer, Idaho and Montana when they line up, Arizona and New Mexico when the weather cooperates. If a oneoff makes sense, he takes it.

Sometimes a place picks you. Last summer at the 8750 Festival in Red River, New Mexico, Caleb was sitting at a table with a handful of Hill Country names - Dallas Burrow, Matt Kirk, Josh Grider, Drew Kennedy. “It was just a very like God moment of like, I need to move to the Hill Country,” he says. The next day, he acted on it. A post in a local housing group landed him on Purgatory Road, outside

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He’s blunt about the hunger it takes. “A lot of musicians aren’t hungry enough,” Caleb says. “I booked four or five new places within the last couple weeks and I took gigs from anywhere from 75 bucks to like $450 or so.” He’ll walk into a room and offer a Wednesday for tips just to get a foot in the door. It usually leads to a Saturday. Sometimes the gamble pays bigger than expected. “I picked the best paying gig in my career the other day. It’s in Waco… I asked more than I typically do and the guy was like, oh, I can give you even more than that.”

Most nights he drives home anyway. “Even if my show is like two, three hours away and I’m playing like nine to midnight… I’ll still drive home most nights. I can take, you know, a pound of Red Bull and get home at three in the morning.” It’s part stubbornness, part ritual. Waking up where your boots remember the floor. He makes it look simple, but there’s a creed to it. Say yes when it matters.

Say no when it doesn’t. Cold-call, email, shake a hand. Play the empty Wednesday for tips because it might open the Saturday that pays. Drive home at 3 a.m. Fix the van when it breaks. Ask for help when it’s needed. Always say thank you. That’s the code and he lives it.

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sk Caleb how he writes and he keeps it simple.

“Sometimes I’ll be driving and a line comes,” he says. “With most songs, you say everything in one line and the rest is just filling the room.” If you want proof, drop the needle on the title track of his debut record, Out West Now: And I swore those feelings would never end, but lo and behold, I was in my hole when I sobered up again. That’s how he writes. No polish, no filter. Just a lived-in voice telling a lived-in story.

Sobriety runs under everything. Caleb doesn’t dodge it. “A big part of my goal is normalizing being a musician, going out, having fun and not having alcohol involved,” he says. “I still spend just as much time in bars as I did before. I just haven’t had

a hangover or spent a dime on booze in a couple of years.” He laughs when he says it, but there’s steel in it too. A lot of musicians fold their life into the barroom myth. Caleb cuts the myth out but keeps the music.

When the connection hits, it’s physical. “There’s… a certain feeling I get on stage,” he says. “When I’m… connecting with people… especially with… a song that I wrote… it’s literally like a tingly body thing. It’ll happen… maybe every other show. But… you’d really know when… you’ve got them by the tail and… they’re… fully in the moment and there’s… nothing like it.” That feeling doesn’t come from studio walls. “I feel more pressure in a booth than on a stage,” Caleb admits. “So much of what I love is connecting with people.” Most of his recordings so far are just him and a guitar, with plans to flesh them out when the time and budget line up.

One of his staples came almost by accident. “Honky Tonk Hell” came out of a weekly songwriting prompt. The word was “dive.” Ten minutes later, he had a song. Now live, the crowd sings it back at him.

“Flashing Light Town” - started not with a line but a look. “I stopped in one of those towns to get some gas and the old gas station clerk, when I walked into this place, just shot me the dirtiest judgement look,” he says. “That kind of inspired me to like, write this song.”

Co-writing isn’t really his way. “Definitely a lone wolf,” he says. “I’ve done a bit of co-writing and it’s weird to me. I really like writing very personal stuff and I feel like whenever you’re doing that with someone else, it’s like… If you’re really trying to dig in to who you are and what you want to express, you got to do that by yourself, I think.”

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n paper, the personal file looks almost ordinary. In person, it reads different. He’s 6’3”, part of a family that runs tall. “My mom, she was 6’1,” Caleb says. “My uncle was like 6’6”. He played basketball at SMU.” Even his grandmother, now ninety-four, once stood nearly six feet. Height isn’t just measurement in that line - it’s perspective, a way of seeing further down the road than most. He doesn’t name his guitars or his van, but he does have strong feelings about airports. Not airplanes - the lines, the feeling of being trapped. He’d rather drive ten hours than spend two waiting at a gate. “Keeps my sanity,” he says.

Open his fridge and you’ll find pepper jelly.

“Tabasco jelly, specifically,” he says. “You can find it everywhere and it’s really good.” He spreads it on buttered sourdough toast. Hygiene? He laughs.

“Do you brush your teeth? Yes. Twice a day… when I’m not on the road.” Somewhere in the blur of his early twenties, he answered a Craigslist ad and ended up as the face of a teeth-whitening product.

The commercial ran forever - ESPN, ABC, random

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corners of cable. Strangers would stop him with that squinty look - you look familiar - but couldn’t place him. He was 22, short hair, saying yes to anything that paid.

Those yeses and nos shaped him. The yeses opened doors - open mics, busking, road runs, gigs that led to better gigs. The nos kept him alive - no to the bottle, no to distractions that would’ve pulled him sideways. He lives by a simple code: play the shows, fix the van, thank the people who help. And he does it all with Seger close by. The dog’s been with him through creek baths, desert nights and headlights cutting black forest roads. Sometimes Seger disappears into the trees long enough to make Caleb pray, but he always comes back. “He finds his way,” Caleb says.

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he near horizon is part practical, part hopeful.

Caleb’s staying put in the Hill Country - “I think so” - because the quiet and the calendar both work here. But he won’t shrink down to a zip code.

The plan is to keep the weekends on the road: Colorado in the summer, maybe Idaho or Montana when they line up, Arizona and New Mexico when the weather plays along. In December, he’s running with Hooks & the Huckleberries. At home, he wants another half dozen steady venues to round

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out the circuit. “That would make the math right,” he says. He’s ordered a new microphone, thinking about building a simple home setup to record, pulling from the dozen-plus unreleased songs he’s been carrying. Listening rooms, ticketed shows, maybe a benefit to pay forward what the Texas Songwriter Relief Fund did for him when his van broke down.

Lubbock to Ybor to Terlingua to New Braunfels to Colorado and back again. Each stop its own beginning, each return a kind of arrival.

Farther down the road, the dream gets bigger.

“A campground slash RV park that’s kind of like a never-ending music festival,” he says. The idea makes sense for a guy who learned to make a living on a street corner - build a place where the music never has to stop. Offstage, his wants are just as plain. “I have a very specific image of the type of person I’m looking for,” he says. A partner, land, animals, kids running around. He grins at his own lesson learned. “Every time I meet a cute bartender nowadays, I’m just like, stop it, Caleb.”

Find him where it makes sense - onstage, most nights - and where it’s useful: @ CalebWilbournMusic on Instagram (his most active), TikTok, Facebook, Spotify and YouTube.

If you’re lucky, it’ll be one of those nights when the room goes quiet and the tingle shows up.

For now, the road is enough. The plan is the same as it was back in Ybor: drive, ask, play, repeat.

Because for all the miles and all the weather, for every night the guitar case looked like a hat begging for change, this isn’t about survival anymore. It’s about building something fulfilling.

The map is still being drawn: Brownwood to

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The road circles back to Caleb Wilbourn. Thirty now. A hike behind him, a show ahead, the day’s work in front. Seger waits by the van. The night’s wide open and a Tuesday needs a song.

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LENS ON LIVE SHANNON TIERNEY FLACK

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I first crossed paths with Shannon at Sturgis, South Dakota, in the pit after Mary Kutter’s set opening for Hank Williams, Jr. Even in the chaos of the stage, her approach stood out; methodical, meticulous and unwavering in focus. Shortly after, she reached out on Instagram with a request to use my lighting equipment for a Harley shoot with Mary. I obliged.

What struck me most was her drive and vision. Inspired by that tenacity, I invited her to interview with Unsung®. Young, enthusiastic and undeniably talented, Shannon is an emerging force behind the lens - one worth watching as she continues her rise. - Scott Foley

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he lights go down, the crowd roars and Shannon Tierney Flack raises her camera. Three songs, no flash and an ocean of sound to capture in a frame. She doesn’t just take photos - she lives them.

At first glance, her path into photography might seem accidental - a military kid with music in her blood who stumbled into a camera in college. But listening to her story, it’s clear her journey was less of a stumble and more of a natural progression, shaped by family, music and an eye for detail.

“I grew up in a military family. My dad was Air Force,” she recalls. “Dad was a pilot, mom was a violinist, so I was always around music. I started playing when I was three and photography didn’t come in until much later. It was my sophomore year of college when I started taking photography seriously.”

At James Madison University, Shannon arrived planning to perform, not photograph. “I started going there for voice, actually, instead of violin...I had always planned on being a performer. And when I was finally kind of faced with that reality in college it finally hit me that that wasn’t really the path in life I wanted.”

Her father nudged her toward what was already in her hands. “He’s like, Shannon you’re not doing photography, but you have a camera everywhere you go. Just try it.” She listened. “I graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Art, Photography Concentration and Entrepreneurship Minor.”

Her first taste of adrenaline came with the Marching Royal Dukes. “I worked as a photographer for JMU’s marching band and I loved capturing action.

That was my first time capturing people moving and, you know, having the stadium lights lighting them up and I thought that was so cool.”

I mean, stripping it back to complete basics and understanding your camera, understanding how everything works before moving into digital, I think is a huge help with thinking on my feet.” Her work reflects that foundation: saturated colors balanced by moody, high-contrast blackand-whites that show her fine art training.

Even her cameras carry personality. “My two 850s are Beavis and ButtHead and then my Z8 is Cornholio. Cornholio’s a little baby and he’s new and shiny, but Butt-Head’s definitely the old man…Cornholio I treat like a new Christmas present and Butt-Head would be like, Shannon, I know I’m old, take care of me.”

Her journey has already brought surreal moments. “The biggest to me was Ali and AJ at the Ryman. They were actually the first concert I ever saw in 2007 - not only my first show photographing the Ryman but also it being Ali and AJ was a crazy experience.” She’s also captured Greta Van Fleet at London’s Royal Albert Hall - nights that prove her name is a sure thing.

Through it all, her philosophy remains clear. “Don’t be afraid of no and even if you have to make your own way, just be confident in your knowledge and how you see the world. I think my favorite thing about photography is it’s as close as we’ll get to seeing the world from another person’s point of view and there’s room for everyone.”

When the house lights drop and the crowd begins to howl, she knows exactly what to do. Three songs, no flash.

To learn more about Shannon’s work or to connect with her, visit shannontflackphoto.com.

Images on the following pages courtesy of Shannon Tierney Flack.

That thrill carried her further, to an internship at Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts. “They took a chance on me. I didn’t have any concerts in my portfolio, but I think they saw enough with the marching band photos that I had...it was kind of just throwing me in the deep end and just figuring out how to do it myself.” Within weeks she was photographing Lyle Lovett and Fantasia. “It was a crazy experience, but also showed me that I could do this.”

Breaking in took more than talent. “I would have to send as many cold emails as I could, get to know different venues, different communications teams to get them to trust me, because I was this new random person that’s like, I’ll take pictures and they’re like, well, we don’t quite know.”

She soon created her own brand, Shutter Up and Listen, to let her work stand apart from assumptions about her age or gender. That independence helped her land her first full tour with rising country artist Mary Kutter. “Mary is the first artist who really trusted my vision. She told me, ‘Just do your thing.’ That freedom - to create without limits - was what I had been chasing.”

Tour life brought both demands and humor. “When the band sleeps, the content person edits. We don’t really stop,” she says. Still, she thrives in the chaos - dodging crowd surfers at a Beartooth show or sneaking a point-and-shoot into a Heart concert disguised in maroon pleather pants.

She laughs, too, at her guilty pleasures. “Roll of Ritz crackers really hates to see me coming. If you give me a roll that whole thing is gone, so I need like rations, okay?”

Her roots in film remain central. “Starting out with black and white film,

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Veterans In Music

HONORING

A

s Veterans Day approaches, I find myself reflecting on a life shaped by both service and sacrifice. I spent six years in the Air National Guard andfor the past twenty-four years I’ve stood proudly as a military spouse. Serving in uniform taught me discipline and duty. Standing beside my husband through deployments and long stretches of uncertainty taught me resilience and devotion - the kind only a military family truly understands.

And then came another chapter. When Scott retired from the Air Force, I watched him step into a new role behind the camera. He began dovetailing between genres of photography and photojournalism, documenting the human condition through emotion and truth. I’ve seen first hand how his lens captures both moments and meaning. That perspective, the blending of service, sacrifice and story, is what sparked the idea for this special section.

voices carry through guitars, harmonicas, drumsticks andmicrophones.

Their call to serve didn’t stop at the uniform, it transformed into something new, something just as powerful.

Through Scott’s lens, I’ve had the privilege of watching what happens when lived experience meets music. The result is healing, connection and a deeply human reminder of resilience. Military life and music may follow different paths, but both demand courage, both bring people together and both carry the weight of commitment.

To my fellow veterans: thank you for your service.

To these musician-veterans: thank you for sharing your truth through song.

And to our community: when you hear their music, remember the sacrifices behind it - the battles fought, the commitments honored and the strength it takes to keep moving forward.

I wanted to create a space that honored veterans not only for their years in uniform, but for the ways they continue to serve today - through music.

These 20 remarkable individuals once stood in formation; now their

- Tiffany Foley

SCOTT FOLEY Scott Foley served 27 years in the U.S. Air Force, retiring in 2015 as Commander of the 802d Security Forces Squadron at Joint Base San Antonio–Lackland. He led 600 personnel in protecting more than 72,000 individuals, AETC’s largest base tasking and the USAF’s largest non-nuclear munitions storage area in the continental U.S. A veteran of both enlisted and commissioned service, Scott entered the Air Force in 1988 and commanded at multiple levels, including the 96th and 633d Security Forces Squadrons. He deployed to Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait and Qatar, earning the Bronze Star, Defense Meritorious Service Medal and numerous campaign awards.

Scott’s lifelong passion for photography began with his father, a photographer and shop owner.

Immersed in cameras from an early age, he carried that craft forward - ultimately merging it with music as official photographer of the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo, capturing the spirit of live performance.

Hometown: Amherst, MA | Current City: Schertz, TX Facebook: Scott Foley and Scott Foley Photography Studio Instagram: S_Foley_Photography and NB.SFPstudio Website: scottfoleyimagery.com

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NOAH PETERSON

Noah Peterson is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served four years as a Corporal and Saxophonist with the Marine Field Band at 29 Palms, CA. A graduate of the Armed Forces School of Music, he performed in nearly 1,800 shows during his service.

Jazz became Noah’s passion. His debut, The Noah Peterson Quartet Live at Biddy McGraw’s, reached 14 countries and was named a Downbeat Featured CD. His 2025 album, Coming Home to You, spent seven months on the JazzWeek charts and drew praise from Jazz Journal in the UK. Now based in San Antonio, Noah leads the Noah Peterson Duo/Trio/Quartet/Soul-Tet. Influenced by Sousa’s drive and storytelling, he continues to compose, perform and share music worldwide. As he says, “My music is real and meaningful. Every song has and is a story.”

Hometown: Billings, MT | Current City: San Antonio, TX Facebook: Noah Peterson Music Instagram: @petersonentertainment TikTok: @texasnoah Website: www.noahpeterson.com

JAY MORRIS

Jay Morris is a U.S. Navy veteran who served as an E-3 at Naval Base San Diego and Bremerton, WA. At 22, he picked up his first guitar, sparking a passion that would shape his future.

As a singer-songwriter, Jay blends country and folk melodies with stories rooted in real life. He has written alongside legendary songwriter David Lee and local artist Jessee Lee. Their collaboration produced “Mesquito,” set to appear on Jessee Lee’s upcoming album, as well as a new track, “Three Chords and a Lie.” Jay also writes deeply personal music, including “That Old Devil,” a song that reflects one of the most meaningful chapters of his journey. With every lyric, Jay aims to turn lived experience into connection, using music to capture both hardship and hope.

Hometown: San Antonio, TX | Current City: Spring Branch, TX Facebook: Jay Morris

DEE BARTLETT

Dee Bartlett is a U.S. Army veteran who served seven years as a Specialist/46Q Journalist with the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault). Music - especially piano - was her outlet during service, offering balance and peace.

Her journey began at age four when she wrote her first piano composition. After the Army, she picked up guitar, performing solo and with bands. In 2017, she released her solo EP Dee’s Nuts, written after losing her husband to service-related injuries. Collaborating with Mark Jungers and Adrian Schoolar, she used songwriting to navigate grief and reconnect with others.

Today, Dee continues to perform, including as the opening act for the San Marcos Veterans Day Parade, while working with 3 Bars /// on a project set for release in 2025. Her original “Mighty Oak” carries deep meaning, symbolizing resilience. Her message to listeners is clear: “Heal out loud.”

Hometown: San Marcos, TX | Current City: New Braunfels, TX Facebook: DeeBartlettMusic

RICH BURGESS

Rich Burgess is a U.S. Navy veteran who served six years as an E-3 aboard the USS Coral Sea (CV-43) in the Indian Ocean and West Pac. His duties included Flight Deck Control, Crash and Salvage, serving as a Corpsman to the Marine detachment and Air Traffic Control. Nicknamed “Doc Shit Happens,” his experiences at sea later inspired him to write and produce songs about the realities of battle and the struggle of coming home.

Rich’s musical journey began with violin in first grade, eventually earning First String and Soloist honors with the Junior San Antonio Symphony. Picking up the fiddle led him toward rock, blues and jazz - genres that still shape his sound today. Known as a “mercenary harp,” he has performed across San Antonio venues including The Cove, The Grove, The Dakota and Fitzgerald’s. With an album and short film in progress, Rich hopes to bring smiles, peace and connection through his music.

Hometown: San Antonio, TX | Current City: Bulverde, TX Facebook: PapaDoc Blues Instagram: @papadocblues Website: papdocblues.com

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CHRISTOPHER PATE

Christopher Pete is a U.S. Army veteran who served 25 years as a Lieutenant Colonel in Healthcare Administration, with assignments in South Korea, Germany, Japan and at USAMEDDAC in the U.S. After retiring, he returned to a lifelong passion - music - as a way to connect, inspire and share stories.

His love of performance began at age 10, guitar in hand, leaping off the fireplace for an imaginary crowd. Over the years, friendships, travel and cultural experiences shaped his voice and sound.

Today, Christopher delivers a powerful blend of Blues, Rock and Alternative. He has performed with Lemon Pie, Messy Jessie & The Doc, Thrill Theory and shared the stage with The Gary Sinise Band at Fort Sam Houston. He also collaborated with Frenchie at The Bubble in Austin on Thrill Theory’s latest record. His music is driven by honesty and emotion; one song especially meaningful to him is “Letters From Home” by the Pat Metheny Group.

Hometown: Topeka, KS | Current City: New Braunfels, TX Facebook: Christopher Pate Website: ourlemonpie.com and thrilltheory.com

LYNWOOD KING

Lynnwood King is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served four years as a Corporal, working as a Combat Lithographer, Camera/Layout Specialist and Hazmat Handler. His service took him from Camp Pendleton to Washington, D.C. and Okinawa, Japan, where traveling and meeting people from diverse backgrounds broadened his outlook. After the military, Lynnwood turned to music as a way to connect.

As frontman of Lynnwood King and the Revival, he brings blues, soul and gospel roots to life with electrifying performances that inspire and uplift. For more than three decades, he has toured and shared his music, building bonds with audiences through energy and authenticity.

Among his songs, “Hardworking Man” c arries special meaning, reflecting his mission to share hope, encouragement and connection with every listener. For Lynnwood, music is more than performance - it’s revival.

Hometown: San Antonio, TX | Current City: San Antonio, TX Facebook: @LynnwoodKing Instagram: @LynnwoodKing Website: LynnwoodKing.com TIKTOK: @LynnwoodKing

JOE GONZALES

Joe Gonzales is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served four years as an E-4, with assignments at MCRD San Diego, 29 Palms, Camp Pendleton, Camp Fuji in Japan and a deployment to Kuwait during Desert Storm. He worked as a Radio Operator, Logistics Specialist and in Covert Operations–Drug Interdiction. Music was his outlet throughout military life.

A lifelong musician, Joe began drumming and working as a roadie for his uncle, Mario Bustos. Today, he performs country with Jessie Bulock and The Couyons, though his deepest influence comes from rock. Music has also been his path to healing, helping him confront PTSD and offering strength to keep moving forward. A song especially meaningful to him is Disturbed’s “The Light,” a reminder of hope in dark times. Joe’s mission is to inspire others to write, play and connect through music.

Hometown: LaMesa, TX | Current City: Red Rock, TX Facebook: @joeggonzo Instagram: @jgonz0tx

JC MIZE

JC Mize is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served three years as a Lance Corporal, working as a Rifleman in the Marine Infantry. Stationed at MCB 29 Palms, CA, he deployed in support of Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. During that time, he saw how music could heal, unite and bring balance - a passion that has stayed with him ever since.

Today, JC is a guitarist and singer-songwriter whose Americana sound blends rock, country and blues. Most often performing solo, he occasionally shares the stage with his band. His songs draw from the road, the life he has lived and the people he has met, telling stories of resilience, love and the restless spirit of the open road. Grounded in honesty and grit, his music connects through truth and shared experience.

Hometown: Eastland, TX | Current City: Burnet County, TX Facebook: @jcmize Instagram: @j.c.mize Website: jcmize.com

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ANDREW KREITZ

Andrew Kreitz is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served eight years as a Sergeant, deploying to Fallujah in 2005 and Israel in 2008. As a TOW Gunner, Designated Marksman and Squad Leader, he found music to be a lifeline - leading cadences in Iraq, singing Third Eye Blind to lighten spirits and drawing influence from the Mexican music shared by fellow Marines.

After service, songwriting became Andrew’s way to heal and connect. His goal is simple: to share life experiences through melody and remind others they’re not alone.

His passion for music began early, when his parents introduced him to opera, classic country, rock and grunge.

He later refined his voice singing in church choirs and as a Cantor. Now a solo country artist and rew has performed at the Conroe and Bastrop Music Festivals and is preparing his debut EP. “God invented art to communicate emotion,” he reflects, “to help humans connect.”

Hometown: Amarillo, TX | Current City: San Marcos, TX Facebook: andrewkreitzmusic Instagram: @andrewkreitzmusic Website: andrewkreitz.com Tiktok: andrewkreitzmusic

DEBORAH (DEB) WESLOH

Deb Wesloh is a U.S. Army veteran who served 20 years as a Major in the Medical Services Corps, with assignments in Panama, Fort Knox, Fort Rucker and Fort Sam Houston.

After retiring, she turned her lifelong love of music into a passion and a way to connect with fellow soldiers and her community.

Deb began playing guitar at 12 and later volunteered with the Warrior Cry Music Project at Brooke Army Medical Center.

In 2019, she joined Soldier Songs and Voices, co-writing her first song, “You Can Go,” which was later featured in a cancer performance and a pharmaceutical commercial.

Her work appears on multiple Folk Now compilations and her duets with fellow veteran John Lowrance have aired nationally. She released her debut EP in 2023 and is now collaborating with Lowrance as part of Crossroad Creek.

Hometown: Prior Lake, MN | Current City: Bulverde, TX Facebook: Deborah Wesloh Instagram: @dwesloh Websites: debwesloh.com | crossroadcreek.com

CHUCK WIMER

Chuck Wimer is a U.S. Army veteran who served thirteen years as a K9 Handler with the Military Police. After his service, he found a new mission - sharing his heart through music. What started as a passion quickly grew into a career, earning him recognition in the country music scene with multiple award nominations.

With a deep voice and a gift for storytelling, Chuck’s music resonates across generations. Inspired by Charley Pride, Chris LeDoux and Garth Brooks, he blends classic country soul with a modern edge. His songs move easily between hope and heartbreak, proving the power of music to connect and heal.

Whether in Country, Americana, or Alt-Country, Chuck brings authenticity and emotion to every performance, making him a voice listeners won’t forget.

Hometown: Arizona | Current City: San Antonio, TX Facebook: Chuck Wimer Music Instagram: @ChuckWimer Website: chuckwimermusic.com

DANIEL (DAN) WESLEY WHITE

Dan Wesley White is a U.S. Army veteran who served with the U.S. Army Band. After his service, he pursued music academically, earning degrees that built the foundation for a lifelong career. For the past two decades, he has taught band, jazz and mariachi in South Texas, sharing his passion with students and shaping young musicians.

As a singer and songwriter, Dan has released music on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube and other platforms. His style blends Tex-Mex, Texas Swing and Rock, creating a sound that is distinctly his own.

Dan is also a strong advocate for veteran suicide awareness.

His song “22” was written to shed light on this critical issue, sparking conversation and offering support to veterans and their families. Whether in the classroom, on stage, or through advocacy, Dan uses music as a tool for connection, healing and change.

Hometown: Del Rio, TX | Current City: South Texas Facebook: Dan Wesley White Instagram: @Danwesleywhite Website: danwesleywhite.com

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ROBERT CARTER

Robert Carter is a U.S. Air Force veteran who served 24 years as a Master Sergeant, Superintendent, Commander’s Support Staff (3F571). His career took him to Minot, Spangdahlem, Nellis, Grand Forks, Osan and Lackland, with deployments to Al Udeid, Qatar and twice to Al Dhafra, UAE. In 2002, he toured with Tops In Blue, experiencing the power of music to connect across cultures.

Introduced to music in a storefront church, Robert grew into a versatile performer with tastes spanning R&B, soul, Top 40, country, rock and jazz. His career highlights include singing the National Anthem at the 2025 NCAA Final Four Championship and providing backup vocals for Gino Vannelli.

For Robert, music is a refuge - an offering of peace in a noisy world. Inspired by new sounds daily, he lives by Marvin Gaye’s words: “…only love can conquer hate.”

Hometown: Indianapolis, IN | Current City: San Antonio, TX Facebook: Mr.RobertCarter Instagram: @mr_robertcarter Website: robertcartermusic.com TikTok: @mr.robertcarter

RYAN ESPITIA

Ryan Espitia is a U.S. Navy veteran who served eight years as a Musician 3rd Class (MU3) and Petty Officer 3rd Class with the Fleet Forces Band at Naval Station Norfolk and the Navy Band New Orleans. His service shaped his professionalism and reinforced the power of music and networking.

From a family of professional musicians, Ryan has carried that legacy forward as a trombonist for Grammy Award– winning producer Gilbert Velasquez. He also performs with BexarBrass, San Antonio Transit, Rat King Cole, SA Jazz Orchestra and other ensembles. His repertoire spans jazz, rock, symphonic and commercial music - showcasing his versatility across genres.

Ryan finds inspiration in his peers, his community and the friendships built through music. His guiding belief is simple: “Music should always be for the community - for the fans who spend their money and time to see you!”

Hometown: San Antonio, TX | Current City: San Antonio, TX Facebook: Espitiadotcom Instagram: @DotCom125 TikTok: @DotCom125 Website: www.BexarBrass.com

JOHN SPEARS John Spears is a U.S. Marine Corps Reservist who served eight years as a Corporal and Automotive Maintenance Technician. His assignments included the 1st Battalion, 23rd Marines; the 4th LAAM Battalion in Hayward, CA; and the 4th Recon Battalion in San Antonio, TX. His service instilled a strong sense of duty and performing Taps at burial sites remains one of his most meaningful experiences.

Music has been central to John’s life since fifth grade, when he first picked up his stepmother’s cornet. Over more than 40 years, he has performed across genres and settings. A favorite memory is playing in a Tex-Mex band and today he performs with Tiny Jazz, Cloverleaf Orchestra and The Oompal Prime Time Jazz Orchestra. He also freelances as a sideman with artists such as Chris Cuevas and Woody Russell.

Hometown: San Antonio, TX | Current City: San Antonio, TX Facebook: Tiny Jazz Instagram: @tinyjazzband

RANDY GARCIA

Randy Garcia is a U.S. Army veteran who served 14 years - six on Active Duty and eight in the Reserves - as a Major in the Army Nurse Corps. His assignments included Fitzsimons Army Medical Center in Colorado, Fort Sam Houston in Texas and overseas tours in Seoul and Camp Humphreys, South Korea. While in Korea, music became his constant, performing with groups that kept him grounded through military life.

Randy’s passion for music began at age 12, when he first picked up an instrument. By 14, he had formed his first band and while living in Germany he toured Europe, discovering music’s power to connect people across cultures.

Today, Randy performs Texas country with the Chuck Wimer Band, with recordings and videos showcasing their sound. Inspired by his family and his “music family,” Randy believes music is the universal language and reminds listeners: “Embrace it, love it and see it live.”

Hometown: Felsberg, Germany | Current City: San Antonio, TX Facebook: RTC Photographics

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JP LANE

JP Lane is a U.S. Army veteran who served five years as a Specialist Combat Engineer, including a deployment to Afghanistan. After sustaining an injury, music became central to his healing, guiding him through recovery with guitar in hand.

His love of music began in middle school with drums and after-school jam sessions. Today, JP performs solo, focusing on Christian, Pop and Inspirational music. His career highlights include performing with Lee Greenwood, Aaron Tippin and Gavin DeGraw, as well as appearances at two Presidential Inaugurations, Lakewood Church and the Grand Ole Opry.

Faith, family and his fellow soldiers remain his driving inspiration. A song that holds special meaning to him is “Never Get Used to This” by Forrest Frank. JP’s message is clear: “My songs are more than a melody - they carry my testimony that faith can restore strength and purpose.”

Hometown: Green Bay, WI | Current City: Canyon Lake, TX Facebook: JPLaneOfficial Instagram: @JPLaneOfficial Website: www.jpsjourney.com TikTok: JPLaneOfficial

JACQUE PECHULS

Jacque Pechuls is a U.S. Air Force veteran who served ten years as a Technical Sergeant, specializing in programming and cybersecurity for Command and Control Systems. Her career took her to Ramstein AB in Germany, Randolph AFB in Texas and HQ SOUTHCOM in Miami.

While music had always been part of her life, the Air Force gave Jacque her first stage - singing and playing with a rock band for fellow service members. She went on to perform for troops at Guantanamo Bay, Ecuador, Honduras and Colombia, experiences that built her confidence and fueled her passion for performing.

Today, Jacque plays keyboard and sings with The Percolators, bringing versatility across country, rock, R&B, jazz and classical. After a 20-year break, she has returned to the stage with renewed joy, inspired by local musicians and her fans. For Jacque, music is both connection and purpose - captured best in her favorite song, “My Sweet Lord.”

Hometown: Live Oak, TX | Current City: Cibolo, TX Facebook: Jacque Pechuls Instagram: @jacque_tx Website: thepercolatorsband.com

JUSTIN SKIBITSKY Justin Skibitsky is a U.S. Air Force veteran who served 24 years as a Senior Master Sergeant and First Sergeant.

Beginning as a medic, he later spent seven years as a Military Training Instructor, with assignments at Holloman, RAF Lakenheath, Lackland, Travis, and Kunsan, along with deployments supporting New Horizons, Southern Watch, and OEF/OIF. His service and travels broadened his musical perspective.

Justin’s love of music began at age four, leaping on furniture to KISS and dressing as Gene Simmons for Halloween.

Over the years, he explored rock, blues, and outlaw country, eventually graduating from Guitars 4 Vets in 2025. He now performs solo and with Strings of Strength, a veteran band that fosters connection, healing, and growth.

His message is simple: it’s never too late to follow your passions. Justin’s songs reflect life’s struggles and joys with honesty, creating connection through shared human experience.

Hometown: Pittston, PA | Current City: Spring Branch, TX Instagram: @stwillie12

BART CROW

Bart Crow is a U.S. Army veteran who served four years as a Specialist M1A1 Tanker at Fort Stewart, GA. Encouraged by his first roommate to learn a new skill, he bought a $150 Hohner guitar, a Mel Bay chord book, and a Robert Earl Keen songbook—launching a passion that has driven him ever since.

Music runs in Bart’s family: his grandfather played in bands, and his father was lead guitarist in a Top 40 country cover/ dance hall band in the 1980s. While rooted in country, Bart’s songwriting is shaped by a variety of influences, including rock. His career highlight includes performing at the Grand Ole Opry.

With the Bart Crow Band, he approaches every stage with honesty and gratitude: “I’m real, and I take nothing for granted. Every gig, every fan is a privilege.”

Hometown: Maypearl, TX | Current City: Austin, TX Facebook: Bart Crow Instagram: @BartCrowBand Website: www.bartcrowmusic.comm TikTok: Bart Crow

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laughs. “Show’s starting and I’m like, I’m not hearing myself, so I start pushing buttons. ‘Ha ha! Now guitar.’

Nineteen more buttons.”

The first time Alex Carter figured out sound could build a world, he was in sixth grade, sitting in music class, messing with GarageBand. “The teacher would instruct us to see what we could come up with,” he says. “And I would sit there and I would loop songs all the way together in class. I just had a knack for it. They’re like, what the fuck, we told you to do a 16-second little jingle and you just did a three-anda-half minute song.” He grins, like he knows he was already breaking the rules. “I always liked composing music… there’s no rules in the sound world. I mean, there are basic rules - now I know that.”

The kid who colored outside the lines became the guy who makes order out of noise. But it wasn’t a straight line. Alex grew up in a Cuban family that moved a lot - Southern California to Boise to San Jose and eventually D.C. The house was loud and so was his head. Then came the first big crack: his grandmother, his favorite person, died in front of him when he was six. “It gave me this morbid realization about death,” he says. “I had anxiety about it for twenty years. It opened my brain to the real world.”

Instead of shutting down, he started needing to know why everything worked. Water droplets, ice crystals, the particle that gives mass to the universe.

“Everything that happens in my life, my brain wants to understand it,” he says. The notebooks piled up.

There were a couple anchors in the storm. His dad, Dave, made music feel possible - weekend trips to Guitar Center, mix CDs, the gentle nudge when Alex dropped out of community college and joined a band. And then there was Marty, the soldier his mom brought into the picture after the divorce. He didn’t sidestep into the family; he jumped right in.

release.” He laughs at himself. “It’s funny because I like loud music. But when you’re running sound, you gotta know. There are standards.”

Honing in on sound started about a decade ago, in a back bedroom at his buddy Perry’s house. Perry was a dubstep guy, sitting at a laptop stacking beats from nothing. Alex leaned over his shoulder, wideeyed. “I was like, okay, this is kind of fucking cool.”

They cleared out Perry’s late grandfather’s room, turned it into a studio and let the ghosts listen in. Alex swiped Ableton onto a computer and fell straight down the rabbit hole - layering, mixing, mastering.

His new playground.

He’d always been like that. “Since I was a little kid, I’d see someone doing something and think, that looks interesting - I’m gonna try it.” He tells a story about eighth grade. New school, no friends, thinking he was about to get bullied. Then a kid named Ryan invites him over. Ryan rips “Crazy Train.” Alex counts the frets - two, four, two, one - and stumbles through it. A rivalry sparks. “Eventually he laughed and said, ‘I’ll play rhythm; you take lead.’ In my head I went, I won. I beat Ryan.”

Texas came in 2022. No friends, no crew, just open mics - five, six nights a week. “I just wanted to get to know everybody in the music scene.” Daven [Klein] texts him: Hey, wanna run the open mic at The Meridian in Buda? $60 every Sunday. Alex had never run sound before in his life. He said yes anyway.

His mom, Sara, an award-winning journalist turned Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, taught him resolve and fearlessness. Between the three of them, Alex learned the same thing over and over - when the world gets loud, listen.

And then came the shove. “My band played this one gig at The Villa and then Jess [Culaciati] texted me asking me to run sound a few days later for Midnight River Choir and Zach Talbert and the Silver Lining.”

He freezes, reliving it. “I literally sat there staring at that text. So anxious. I’d never run sound for a full band like this.” He tries to calm himself down in the bathroom - his safe spot - then shows up, hands on faders. “I didn’t even know how to run the wedges then. Luckily Joe [McCabe] was here that one day and he helped me set it up.” In between sets, he pulls George from Midnight River Choir aside. “‘Yo bro, I ain’t gonna lie to you. This is my first time ever running a full band and you guys just got back from Red Rocks.’” They came off stage saying it sounded good. “They may have just been nice,” Alex says, “but it worked and sounded great.”

“My mom got me my first guitar my freshman year,” he says. “And I never was able to stop. I’d sit there eight hours a day, four years straight. That was my

That’s how it’s been - trial and error, trial again. “I recently had to use an analog board at one of my own shows and I frickin’ hate analog boards,” he

Easter 2011, a grenade in Afghanistan blew that life apart, taking Marty’s sight. At Walter Reed Medical Center, Alex braced for tragedy but met a fighter. Alex almost quit guitar right then - life felt too heavy - then made a decision that still shapes him: he brought the instrument to Marty’s bedside and played so there’d be something good to hear. Years later, when Alex brings new ideas to him, Marty still catches details most miss: “Do you hear that thing in the middle? It’s a little too loud.”

What makes him stand out isn’t just the tech. It’s the way he deals with people. “I don’t argue. I listen to what the band wants and make it happen. They’re the ones onstage. My job is to make their night easier and the audience’s night better. Formal training’s cool, but ears and empathy matter more.”

That’s something he learned at Trader Joe’s. Early days, bad managers almost wrecked him. Later, on meds and in management, he figured it out. “People give you their best when you give them yours.”

Ask him about local bands and he starts naming names like tracks on a playlist. The Roughstock “their stage plot is intense, so many moving pieces.”

SoulTwang - “my all-time favorite band to work with.

Bill Caisse came off stage and said, ‘This is the best live sound I’ve ever had.’” The Alli Mattice Band - “Alli might be the best female vocalist in town. She’s got soul for days. She’s a dream to mix.”

Alex is 29 and still restless. “Being honest? I have no fucking clue where I’ll land. I want to do everything in music - write it, make it, live in it.” He hates planes, so he drives. He thinks about legacy sometimes. “If there’s one thing I’d pat myself on the back for at age 96, it’d be this: I tried to be the best blend of Alice and Atah - curious, joyful, generous - and to leave people a little lighter than I found them.” Alice was his dad’s mom, the flower child who drew hundreds to her memorial. Atah, was his mom’s mom, who taught him love outlives loss. He wears the lyric on his skin.

Maybe that’s the real signal path: a sixth-grade GarageBand loop that keeps evolving, a hospital bedside where music kept a promise, a text that felt like a dare, a night when Red Rocks veterans told him he nailed it.

He doesn’t pretend to know where it all lands, but his compass is simple: “I want to do things that excite my brain,” he says. That’s why he stays restless, why sound has never been just knobs and faders.

Every mix is another chance to chase the spark, to push past routine and into something rousing. It’s why a kid with a notebook full of questions found his home behind a soundboard - the thrill of cracking a code, of figuring out why something works and then making it work better. And he can’t help but share it.

“When you start to understand the small things in the world, it’s really interesting,” he grins. That curiosity spills out of him in flashes - he’ll light up, toss out a “Did you guys know this?” like a kid showing off a magic trick. Shrug and he’ll shrug back, still grinning - because to him, it’s all “cool as shit, man.”

UNSUNG® | VERSE 007 | OCTOBER 2025 39

THE VILLA

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UNSUNG® | VERSE 007 | OCTOBER 2025

Fast Movin’ Trio 7pm Caleb Wilbourn (Unsung Verse 7 Release) 7pm Damon Curtis 5pm File 13 8:30pm Ryan St Clair 5pm Culture Jam 8:30pm Buddy Vargas 3pm Caleb Wilbourn 6pm Jake Gardner 5pm Percolators 8:30pm Luke Leverett 5pm Jackie Not Marilyn 8:30pm Myles Smith 3pm Bill Caisse 6pm Jeff Wood 5pm Alli Mattice Band 8:30pm Jeff Vaughn 5pm Stephanie & Southern Drive 8:30pm Keith Hickle 3pm Caleb Wilbourn 6pm TBA 5pm Tiffiny Dawn Band 8:30pm Damon Curtis 5pm The Roughstock 8:30pm Geo Jo Marsh 3pm Ty Dillon 6pm Caleb Wilbourn 5pm Culture Jam 8:30pm Bobby Beal 3pm Zoe Allan 6pm Fast Movin’ Trio 7pm Percolators 8:30pm Jackie Not Marilyn 8:30pm Buddy Vargas 3pm Myles Smith 6pm The Public Servants 8:30pm Jeff Wood 5pm TX 46 Band 8:30pm Geo Jo Marsh 3pm Caleb Wilbourn 6pm Luke Leverett 5pm Alli Mattice Band 8:30pm Jake Gardner 5pm Brian Taylor and the High Society 8:30pm TBA (Friendsgiving) 3pm Kyle Garrett 6pm Jeff Wood 5pm The Roughstock 8:30pm TBA 5pm Tiffiny Dawn Band 8:30pm Buddy Vargas 3pm Bill Caisse 6pm

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UNSUNG® | VERSE 007 | OCTOBER 2025

There are some really cool designs that I’ve seen over the years and it is fun and never know what’s gonna pop up next.”

O

In a town better known these days for breweries and wedding barns than for a guy cranking out guitars that end up backstage in Nashville, Scott has carved out his own lane. “Dripping Springs is a great community to be in. It was more a life evolution to get there than a planned purpose for my business. The Texas music scene has always been really supportive. Some of my first customers were Randy Rogers Band and Josh Abbott Band. At one point, I did think we would relocate to Nashville, but as our family continued to grow and our roots got deeper, I found a way to make Nashville business work from Dripping Springs. Over the last 13 years I’ve probably been in Nashville 50+ times. It’s a town that I love, a town where I have great friends, but Dripping Springs is where I’m proud to call home.” n a backroad outside Austin, in the Hill Country town of Dripping Springs, guitars come to life in a way you don’t see onstage. In a workshop where ink meets wood, Scott Friedeck has built a business out of a simple road-warrior epiphany.

“It started when I was on the road with some touring musicians,” Friedeck says, leaning back with the calm of a man who’s been at it long enough to know the rhythm. “They were asked to sign a guitar and you couldn’t really tell whose signature it was. I grew up around the sign shop and my brain immediately thought if we had their picture on the guitar, you would know whose signature it might be.”

That thought turned into The Graphic Guitar Guys, a company that takes an artist’s image, their brand, their moment in time and burns it into the very surface of the instrument. The result isn’t just a guitar - it’s a piece of history you can sling over your shoulder or hang on a wall.

The work itself is less romantic than the idea. “This varies from project to project.

A lot of the people I work with already have a design team in place that we can just send a template to. That being said there are times that we are sent artwork and arrange it to fit so that none of the important pieces are cut off by the components of the guitar. Once we receive the approved art, we print the graphics. From there, it goes into the production line and when it makes it to the table, we pull the correct guitars, install the graphics and then hand trim every guitar. Once the guitars are complete, we pack them up and put them on the cross dock for UPS to pick up at the end of each day.”

If that sounds like production, it is. And that’s the point. “We are more of a mass production where mini art guitars are one of ones. I don’t see this as being a negative or positive, it is just different. What we produce is more of a commemorative piece of a musician’s career. It could either be for a certain tour, a certain album, or anything that they may be interested in promoting.”

That difference has carried his guitars into the hands of legends. “Some of the more meaningful guitars that we produced are from those musicians that I grew up listening to. Reba McEntire, Brooks & Dunn, Merle Haggard and George Strait.

The irony is Scott himself isn’t a player. “I took a semester of Guitar in college at Southwest Texas State University. I buy a lot of guitars, I can play some chords on guitars, but I have many friends who are professionals. I do not call myself a guitar player because I cannot touch their playing with a 10 foot pole.” What he lacks in chops, he makes up in vision - and in reverence for the players who have turned his instruments into heirlooms.

That reverence has attracted not just artists but brands who understand the power of music as an image. “I have had many people over the years reach out for guitars. Musicians, music venues, record labels, merch companies and even some large brands like Jack Daniels, Coca-Cola and Dr Pepper have come to us to order guitars.”

He’s not done growing either. “We are very, very, very blessed to have the customers we have. That being said I’m always on a quest to gain more. In the next few years, I have to work directly with a factory to produce our own brand guitars. I hope to continue to grow and keep being able to hire local employees in Hays County.”

The way Scott sees it, every guitar that leaves his shop is more than a sale.

It’s a ripple. “Every guitar that you purchase is a win win win. First of all you get an amazing collectible to cherish and commemorate your love of a particular artist. The artist are able to continue to grow their brand, tour and promote their music and keep the music scene alive and well. For me, I’m able to provide for my family, offer jobs and opportunities for multiple families in Dripping Springs and surrounding areas and contribute by supplying guitars that can help raise funds at local charity events.”

What started with a blurred signature has grown into a business that turns memory into matter. From one-off guitars auctioned for local nonprofits to hundreds of custom wraps for major artists and festivals, Scott Friedeck has proven there’s no order too small and no vision too big. Album bundles, VIP packages, wedding guest books - he’s carved out a niche where music, memory and art collide. And ever since, he’s been filling orders full time for musicians who want their guitars to do more than play - they want them to remember.

Building on Our Legacy, for the Future.

For 76 years, the Rodeo has been a proud champion of Texas youth.

Thousands of students supported in STEM and Agriculture.

From Ag Science to Ag Robotics, the Rodeo is investing in tomorrow’s leaders.

Let’s build on what makes San Antonio Strong.

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