EDITOR’S NOTE: The Daily’s Brittany Burden spoke with two of the members of The Nefarious Double Clutchers, a folk band from Shawnee.

Noted as the band that brings together “real music for particular people,” The Nefarious Double Clutchers features Bryon White, lead guitarist and singer; Joel Mosman, guitar and banjo player; and “Buffalo” Rogers, accordion and mandolin player. This folk band, straight from the heart of Shawnee, brings together an entertaining mix of traditional sounds with a modern twist. By the end of the show, The Double Clutchers will have you smiling, clapping along and greatly enjoying their style.

Q: Where are you guys from and how did you meet each other?

Bryon: We’re originally from Shawnee, and Joel and I took guitar lessons from the same country picker named Gary Turley, and that’s where he and I met.

Joel: Bryon moved me out to Oklahoma City about a year ago and we’ve been playing ever since. We met “Buffalo” Rogers on the Oklahoma City local music scene while he was playing with his own band called Buffalo Fitz.

Q: When did you decide to pursue music?

Bryon: During high school, I really enjoyed golf and thought I would be playing golf up until college, maybe professionally. Then I started playing at Shawnee’s local coffee shop, The Bean and Berry, and made some very good tips. It kind of took me from there, nothing is better than enjoying your job—I didn’t want to do anything else. So I chose music over golf.

Joel: Music has always been a part of my life. As a child, my mother made me take piano lessons, which I hated at the time, but today I thank her for it because ever since I’ve always had some kind of instrument in my life. When Bryon moved me out to OKC, he really got me into the performance side of it. I learned 30 songs in a week, and decided that I didn’t want to do anything else but perform music.

Q: How did you guys come together as a band?

Bryon: We’d been playing together as the Red Dirt Band for about a year, then Joel said one day, “Wouldn’t it be cool to start a bluegrass band?” So, we bought a resonator and a banjo and made it happen.

Q: How would you describe your music?

Joel: There’s been so many different genres. This band is really a big compilation of everything that we’ve learned from playing in other bands and listening to all kinds of music. We like to take old music and make it a little modern which really gets the crowd going. People that wouldn’t normally listen to bluegrass — if we can call ourselves a bluegrass band — have come to our shows and really enjoyed it. We play traditional music and we keep that tradition alive. It’s an amalgamation cause we listen to every kind of music.

Q: How do you want your music to affect those who hear it?

Bryon: I always thought writing songs, for me, has always been about what others get from it. I want it to be something open for interpretation.

Joel: We do a lot of writing, and I try to manifest my thoughts on paper. I want people to hear our music and learn from it. I want people to get out of it an opportunity to learn from us the way we have learned from the music we’ve listened to and the people we’ve played with. Everyone that you play with rubs off on you somehow, and we want our audience to hear that in our music.

Q: What’s the hardest part about writing music?

Joel: It’s hard to write a song Bob Dylan hasn’t done already.

Q: Who are your musical influences?

Bryon: Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, Don Conoscenti, Ellis Paul, Neil Young, Steve Earl, Motown such as the Funk Brothers, The Band, Lester Flat, Bill Monroe and Carl Perkins.

When they are not rocking out to oldies and bluegrass tunes, the Double Clutchers are currently working on a new album one which will be, according to Mosman, “a real collaborative experience—the real deal—a mixture with other people we’ve played with and a real experience.

-Brittany Burden is an english senior.