The True Tunes Podcast

David Bunker, who currently serves as the chaplain of Judson University's Music Business and Entrepreneurship program, and has a long history as both a music industry leader and as an artist and song…

Tyson Motsenbocker is quite an anomaly. He's a young, hip songwriter/artist who crafts alternative, modern-sounding pop (in the tradition of Postal Service or Death Cab) with obvious compositional in…

What good is music, anyway? Is there something happening in the arrangement of certain melodies, harmonies, rhythms, and lyrics that might actually have a meaningful impact on hearts and minds in the…

Tom Willett's roots go back to the counterculture of the 60s. He played bass in one of the earliest "Gospel Rock" bands (Sons of Thunder) and worked alongside artists such as T Bone Burnett, Tonio K,…

Bill Mallonee has been lauded as one of the 100 greatest living songwriters by Paste Magazine and honored by Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Billboard, and more. Before “Americana” was even known …

Ken Mansfield has been "in the room" for several major cultural watershed moments. After a meteoric rise through the ranks at Capitol Records in the 1960s, where he worked with artists like Lou Rawls…

After being affiliated with Bon Iver, Hiss Golden Messenger, and Megafaun – and releasing a series of his own acclaimed solo projects, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and producer Phil Cook surpri…

On this episode, we are joined by keyboardist and songwriter Ojo Taylor, guitarist and writer Gym Nicholson, long-time lead vocalist Sim Wilson, and drummer Gary Olsen of the Orange County rock band …

Few artists have committed to the ethic of apocalyptic – even gothic – Americana as completely as Colorado’s David Eugene Edwards. From his early work with The Denver Gentlemen and 16 Horsepower to t…

In memory of our friend Michael Bloodgood, we revisit a conversation we recorded with him for the Electric Jesus Podcast in 2021. With roots in the Jesus Movement, but a career that really took off i…

The Prayer Chain is the only band that ever appeared on the cover of the old print version of the True Tunes magazine twice! Though their original run lasted only six years, the band has reunited a f…

The musical highways and byways of this great land are littered with the bedazzled corpses of countless, failed, one-shot rock bands. How many of them, though, would be able to enlist the support of …

The original Woodstock Festival happened once. The Cornerstone Festival, however, gathered an unlikely and diverse group of rock and rollers from around the world to two different pieces of land 29 y…

Not everyone walking St. Paul’s Boulevard makes it out alive. No one survives it unchanged. This mythological road plays home to a haunting cast of characters, and our guide on this episode of the Tr…

In the conclusion of our conversation with Michael Roe we talk about one of JJT’s favorite 77s songs in great detail, along with the birth, evolution, survival, and impact of The Lost Dogs, and the h…

On this special @45RPM episode we continue our exploration of the life, music, and legacy of Michael Roe by checking in with some of his closest friends and compatriots. We hear from his 77s bandmate…

Very few artists have accomplished what Michael Roe has over the last forty years. Between his work with the seminal rock “laboratory” (The 77s,) his membership in a veritable supergroup of unknowns,…

On this special "from the archives" edition of our @45RPM podcast, we re-visit excerpts from two episodes from 2020 that had a profound impact on the direction of the show. Artist, songwriter, produc…

Aside from being one of the most exciting indie hip-hop artists around, Jason "Propaganda" Petty is an academic, an author, a poet, and a lover of great coffee. Join us as we talk through his idea of…

In this second installment of our conversation with poet, author, teacher, and pastor, Steve Scott, we listen in on a conversation he hosted in JJT's home a few years back. Following up on the theme …