An Interview with Chuck Ragan

Photo by Lindsey-Byrnes

Chuck Ragan straddles the line between punk and folk. With Hot Water Music, he’s been an integral part of the Gainesville, Florida, punk rock scene that arose in the ’90s and remains with the band today.

Elsewhere, Regan has dived deep into his folk roots, releasing solo records like 2011’s Covering Ground and his most recent effort, Love and Lore. Chuck Ragan’s music is always worthwhile and truly memorable, whether through sheer punk rock fury or his expressive, contemplative solo recordings.

There’s plenty more to come on all fronts, which is why Chuck Ragan beamed in with us here at ClassicRockHistory.com to dig into the lot.

What keeps you inspired as far as new music goes?

I’ve lived the majority of my life surrounded by music and musicians. The majority of the people I know and work with I’ve met through Music, so naturally, much of the music around me is made by my dear friends and loved ones.

That said, I have a nine-year-old who loves a wild mix of all kinds of music from Turnstile to Taylor Swift, and more often than not he’s running the stereo. A lot keeps me inspired. There’s always something happening. There’s always something being created.

Who are your greatest influences? How do they remain within your sound, and how have you diverged?

I’ve said it many times before in previous interviews or sit-downs, but my greatest influence was and will always be my grandfather. He was the first one to tell me and explain to me that if I love to do something, I need to put all my heart and soul into it and never put it down even if it felt like the world was against me. My musical influences will always be with me because of my simple upbringing, which included a mix of Cajun music, bluegrass, and gospel until I discovered skateboarding and punk rock.

What kicked off the creation of your new music?

If you’re asking which songs began the process of the group of songs, which is how I’m taking your question, I’m not sure. I would have to go back and look at archives and timestamps and all that good stuff to go down that rabbit hole. Some of these songs began many, many years ago, and some of them happened fairly quickly. After a while, they all kind of gel together.

What does your songwriting process look like these days?

Usually, I’m always documenting voice notes, scribbles, melodies, and whatnot. They go down randomly at any time something comes up, or I need to get something off my chest or out of my head.

Those ideas sit in a bank until I make the time to sit down and dig through them. When I do that, usually, whatever I’m supposed to be working on reveals itself to me, and I head down that path. Again, sometimes, that process happens fairly quickly, and sometimes, it’s an idea that went into the bank over a decade ago.

Are there certain guitars that you gravitate toward?

Absolutely. I’m sure you know that every guitar, just as people, has different personalities. Different characters and energies. It always amazes me how you can pick up an unfamiliar guitar from somewhere and immediately start playing differently or something a little bit different than you’d never really played it before.

I believe there’s truly something to that. My mind can go pretty deep into the energies and songs that are left within a guitar after someone has taken care of it. We are all caretakers of these instruments, more or less. Someone will take over after our time.

If there is a guitar you love most, what’s the story behind it, and what does it mean to you?

Most likely, Dutchess. She’s a 1976 Les Paul Custom. She has been customized even further from the way I abused it at an early age and adapted to playing. If anything has changed over the years, I’ve definitely learned a lot more control. I still let my emotions completely run through me, and unfortunately, a lot of innocent guitars ended up exploding into walls and floors and being sent through ceilings.

Are there any sounds or production vibes you avoid?

I’m all for exploring anything and everything at any moment because we never know what our ears need until we search for it, but if I had to choose, I would probably say vibraslap or over-delayed vocals.

Which of your new songs best represents who you are today as an artist?

Quite possibly the toughest question I’ve been asked all year. I’m connected with all of them, and they all feel relevant to me still.

What’s the best song you’ve ever written? Have you done your best work yet?

I don’t know if that’s for me to decide, my friend. My goal with songwriting is to find the path or crack the code to the point where I put the hair up on the back of my neck or my arms. Understand that I’m not talking about getting the chills because the song is good or not.

I would like to think that I thought it was good. Otherwise, I should be doing something else. But when we’re talking about a song being good in general, that judgment isn’t mine to have. I need A song or even a line or paragraph to make sense.

I need it to be complete. I need it all to come together, and those moments when I crack whatever code I’m working on or find whatever meaning is there, and hair pops up on the back of my neck, or I get choked up, or my eyes swell up, I believe that I’m heading in the right direction. That’s how I look at songwriting and the therapy that I found in music.

Tell me about your gear. What goes into those choices?

As far as acoustics go, I play Martin guitars. For years, a D-28 and D-18 have been my go-to guitars on the road. As of late, I started using the Super Dread and that guitar has completely changed the way I believe I sound out there.

If I’m not mistaken, about 22 cubic inches more of airspace gives the guitar a much deeper sound at higher decibels. It’s just loud and awesome. When it comes to electric guitars, I have, more or less, Frankensteined some guitars that I love. Originally, put it together just to save my back and also to retire my older Les Paul.

What went into that?

Here’s the recipe: I took the standard Gibson double cutaway Junior reissues and bought a couple of those. I replaced the stock P90 with a Rio Grande baby bucker humbucker that is made to fit in a P90 hole. We replaced the stock tuners on it with Grovers.

We also replaced the stock bridge with the baby grand bridge made by Hipshot. They give a great sound, play well, and stay in tune, and I’m not super emotionally attached to them. So, traveling with them and shipping them is way less stressful.

Recently, a gentleman by the name of Randy King, who builds King Guitars, built me a guitar using the same implements that I just mentioned above. He had secretly talked to one of my technicians and engineers and found out the recipe that we use.

His work is absolutely exceptional, and so far, I’m extremely pleased with what he’s done. As far as I know, he built one for Chris Cresswell as well, and I can’t wait to see his. Lastly, we use a lot of Orange Amps, and my personal preference is a Rockerverb. As far as pedals go, it’s mostly MXR pedals of many types as well as some Universal Audio.”

What are your short- and long-term goals? How will you achieve them?

As far as short-term goals go, those are some more records that I’m aiming to finish. One is another record after Love and Lore on Rise Records, as well as more writing and recording with Hot Water Music.

None of us have a clue what the landscape of our music industry is going to look like in a year, much less a decade or more down the way, so who knows? What we do know is that people like us that were born when we were and grew up the way we did enjoy riding and recording songs and compiling them into a body of work that some of us old fogies call records.

I think we always do that. The long-term goal Is that I need to somehow figure out a way to build a recording studio at home. A place where my friends can come and stay on the property to write and record. Or other friends could use it as a riding getaway.

What’s the latest with Hot Water Music? How do you balance that versus solo?

The latest is this year is our 30th anniversary with the band. We just released a record called Vows on Equal Vision Records and are in the middle of promoting it as well as celebrating its 30th anniversary. The balance comes from planning a very, very long time ahead. Everything we’re doing right now is typically planned anywhere from one to three years prior.

What does your solo work offer you that Hot Water Music doesn’t?

Usually, it’s a style of music that Hot Water Music doesn’t necessarily do. That means there’s a lot less decision-making going on. In the sunset, there’s not as many cooks in the kitchen that have to get on the same page before we move in a direction.

Do you think you’ll ever stop making music? If you had to stop, would you be okay with that?

I don’t believe that I would ever stop making music. I need it as much as anything, really. I think what I could live without is touring, traveling, and living out of a bag away from my family. But then again, I’ve never gone too long without it, so maybe I’m not built to live it out.

What’s next?

When it comes to music, one of my biggest priorities right now is figuring out how I’m going to build a live-in studio on my property so that I can continue making music and be closer to my family.

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