Back in 2015 a group of five friends in Rome, Georgia decided to do what a lot of high school buddies decide to do… they formed a rock ‘n roll band. Happens all the time, all across the country. Heck… probably all across the world. I remember doing it way back in 1970. You may have heard of the band I was part of? We called ourselves Sunza Torq.
Just joshing with ya. We really did try to form a band, but nobody outside the four of us ever heard of us.
Just one of many differences between the “band” I was a part of, and the band that TJ Lyle, Riley Couzzourt, Zach Everett, Bristol Perry, and Logan Tolbert put together. They called themselves The Georgia Thunderbolts. They independently released their first album in 2019, followed by an EP in 2020. After catching the eye of Mascot Records executives, they released their first major label album in October of 2021. And on August 23 of this year, they will drop Rise Above It All, their follow up album on Mascot Records.
Touring in support of that new album, The Georgia Thunderbolts will be playing Denver’s Marquis Theater on Wednesday, July 31, and Oskar Blues Grill & Brew in Colorado Springs on Thursday, August 1.
Earlier this week I spent a little over half an hour on a Zoom call with TJ Lyle, lead vocalist for the band. If you’ve seen any of the band’s videos or been fortunate enough to catch one of their live shows, you’d likely be a bit surprised at Lyle’s off-stage persona. On stage he’s… well, he’s the frontman of a rock band. Animated, emotive, and sometimes a bit brash. Exactly what we all expect and want from the lead singer in a rock ‘n roll band. Offstage he’s laid back, polite, humble, and remarkably thoughtful. By his own admission, he’s a shy person, who is perfectly happy to not be in the spotlight. He’s a bit of an old soul, who has a tremendous amount of respect and love for a broad range of bands, artists, and musical styles.
We talked about the band’s roots, the new album, and their rather meandering road to where they are today. Oh, and we talked about that whole being shy thing, and how challenging that has to be when you’re an on-the-rise rock star. Read on…
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RW: TJ, I’d like to start our conversation by asking you to set me straight on how this band came to be. I’ve read different accounts, and while I wouldn’t say they were wildly different, they do differ on some of the details.
TJL: We all grew up really close to each other – Logan and Zach were neighbors, and the three of us all lived within a mile of each other. And as we were coming through high school, we all took an interest in music. Logan was actually going to college to be an airplane mechanic, and he’d been playing music for a long time. There was a local place up here (for this interview TJ was at home, gearing up for the band’s upcoming tours) where they did live open mic stuff, and we started going to that. That’s actually where we all came together for the first time. We jammed on an old classic rock song and just hit it off right then. We didn’t actually put the band together right away – it was sometime later when the band Riley, Zach and Bristol were playing in needed a singer, and they called me up. I mentioned that we should see if Logan wanted to join to play guitar. And that’s how it came to be.
RW: So, are you one of those guys who has been singing and performing since he was like, four years old? Or did you begin your musical journey later in life?
TJL: I never really started singing until 2015 or 2016. I didn’t come from a musical family. You know, my mom and sisters and my dad sang in church but nobody in my family ever played any instruments. When I hung out with Zach and Logan, I thought it was really cool that they actually played instruments. So I started singing, and I just loved it. I quickly figured out that I really enjoyed it, and it made me really happy. But it was a challenge because I was really shy. I’m still really shy. I’m not an outspoken person. I’m a guy who likes to sit back and analyze and try to hide as much as possible.
RW: Wow, that’s kind of tough for a guy who’s the frontperson of a rock band.
TJL: Yeah, everybody in the band would give me crap about that, telling me that I needed to do more and be more outgoing. I do the best I can, and I work hard day in and day out to try to be better, both in terms of being outgoing, and in broadening and improving as a singer. That’s why I listen to such a wide variety of music. I love hearing the dynamics of each different kind of singer. I mean, from swing music to soul music to scat and even big bands. I’m really into tone… that’s a big thing for me.
RW: I read that a couple of people who really influenced you were Ray Charles and Paul Rodgers from Bad Company. On one hand they are very different types of singers, but they both have that soulful, bluesy foundation to their singing.
TJL: Oh, yeah. And then there’s a lot of others, like Wilson Pickett, James Brown, and Bobby Womack. And then there’s Sam Cooke. A few years ago I was listening to Rodgers, and it hit me that a lot of his phrases and runs were clearly influenced by Sam Cooke.
RW: Let’s shift gears and talk about the band’s journey from those early days in Rome, Georgia to where you are today… touring internationally and getting ready to release your second album. At what point did you guys realize that this was more than just five buddies getting together to have fun playing music?
TJL: There was a period where we had to evolve. At first, we were a cover band, but we wanted to write our own songs. As we were copying Skynyrd and CCR and Bob Seger, it started to kind of develop into more of our own sound. But it was nothing very original, and we wanted to be original so bad that we couldn’t stand it.
Things took off for us when we met Richard Young of the Kentucky Headhunters. We were playing a show with them up in north Georgia, little nowhere town, Summerville, Georgia. I mean, just in the middle of nowhere. It was an agricultural festival… a big farmer’s thing. Richard heard us play and invited us to cut a record with him.
He took us up to Barron County, to Glasgow, Kentucky, to his friend David Barrett’s studio. That’s how it all happened. It was a wonderful, wonderful blessing to meet Richard because he pulled so many strings for us. I mean, it was crazy. It just goes to show that you never know what’s coming, or when it will happen.
RW: So that would have been your self-titled EP from 2020, right? Before that, you independently released a full-length LP called Southern Rock From Rome, in 2019. So your timing was impeccable… getting what appeared to be your big break just in time for COVID to smack all of us upside our heads.
TJL: Yeah, I guess, you know, in some ways, maybe it worked out because we all had to take a deep breath. We all had to back away. It gave us some time to reevaluate pretty much everything. Your attitude kind of changes and then your mentality starts to change. You realize that this could all be gone in a second. For me, the big thing was realizing that there’s too much negativity going on. I mean, why not try to spread a little happiness?
RW: Let’s talk about the new album, which is scheduled to drop on August 23. It’s called Rise Above It All, and so far, there have been four singles dropped. You cover a lot of genre ground in those four singles… a nice country rock tune, a couple of heavier tunes, and the most recent, “Crawling My Way Back To You”, which is a beautiful, mellow song on which I think you’ve done your best vocal work to date. What else can you tell us about the new album? Specifically, is there anything on it that’s going to really surprise us?
TJL: Well first, thank you so much… that means the world to me. There’s actually a story about that song. We were working on the new album, and our manager told us we needed one more song.
I had just come home, and I was going to my nephew’s soccer game. I remember on the way I was listening to the radio, and an Alabama song came on, and I was singing to it. It was “The Closer You Get.” So at the soccer game, I was sitting there with that song in my head. And on the way home the song “Crawling In My Skin” by Linkin Park was playing on the radio. So I got home, and I started playing around on the guitar, singing that Linkin Park song but to the Alabama melody. Now I was like, ‘Wait a second.’ So I put the capo on and started playing chords. And before I started singing the first word, I put my phone down and hit record, and then ended up singing the whole song, just like that.
I kept working on it, messing up the chords, but I kept singing and finally got it figured out enough to take it to the guys in the studio. There’s a picture of us on Facebook somewhere, all sitting around in a circle working on that song.
Anyway, to answer your question about anything surprising, yeah, there is one song that’s really different. It’s a cover of an old blues song called “It Ain’t Easy.” It’s a really soulful, swampy blues song. I mean it’s like old Mississippi Delta blues.
RW: I want to read a quote that I picked up off your website attributed to you about the new album. You said, “When you cut back on being a tough guy, more emotions can come through. And you hear that on this record. This album travels all musical genres.” Can you elaborate a little bit for me on the “cutting back on being a tough guy” part?
TJL: Yeah, I think for a lot of men today, and even back in the day, you keep a lot of stuff bottled up. I think they keep a lot of emotions to themselves, and you know, they’re working 60 or 70 hours a week, trying to raise a family, doing what they have to do to provide for that family.
And the tough guy thing goes for women too. And you know, it’s okay to let go sometimes. You don’t have to be like that all the time. It’s okay to just let go. It’s okay to show your emotions. It’s okay to break down. Everybody needs to shed some tears and to have a cry every now and then.
In my opinion, the best way to get in touch with your emotions is to stop being so hateful. And stop being so driven to the point where you put your blinders on, and you’re on such a fast-paced track to one place, but you miss everything on the way.
If you can just kind of reel it in a little bit and realize what you have going on while you’re in the moment. And, you know, be happy. Don’t be so uptight.
RW: The last thing I want to touch on before I let you go is the heaviness of some of your music. Being a Southern Rock band, you guys get obvious comparisons to Lynyrd Skynyrd, The Allman Brothers Band, etc. There’s a lot of validity in those comparisons, but for my money you guys are frequently a lot heavier than most of your Southern Rock brethren. I go back to a song like “Can I Get A Witness,” which is probably my favorite song on the Can We Get A Witness album. That song has a seriously heavy underlying riff. Where does that come from?
TJL: A lot of the guys in the band love heavy music. Personally, I’m a big fan of stuff like Soundgarden and Audioslave. Some of the other guys in the band love real heavy music. You know, Metallica and Pantera and Slayer and stuff like that. I’ll tell you, when you’re trying to sleep in the back of the bus, it’s sometimes not too comfortable.
But there are all kinds of influences coming through. I’m also a big fan of the Beatles… I love the melodies and stuff.
RW: Pretty much all of the writing credits for your original stuff lists all the members of the band. With so many different influences, how do you guys manage to make that work?
TJL: First of all, I write a lot. I’m writing all the time. I’ll write for weeks and weeks until I have some material I want to take to the rest of the band. Logan and I did a lot of that together for the last record. We sat around and just hammered a bunch of stuff out. Then we’ll all get together in a room, and we all play what we have for each other. Sometimes different people will work up different parts to go along with what we have to start with. Guys are trying different licks to see how they fit. And we play and let it all come together.
RW: You’re playing in Denver and Colorado Springs on back-to-back nights at the end of the month. Is there anything you’d like to tell the folks who will be reading this article, in advance of those two shows?
TJL: I’d just tell them to check out the singles that are out there from the new album. I think there might be one more single left, and then it’s time for the album.
Lyle and his Georgia Thunderbolts bandmates will be playing two nights in Colorado at the end of July and beginning of August. On Wednesday, July 31, they play the Marquis in Denver. On Thursday, August 1, they play Oskar Blues Grill & Brew in Colorado Springs. Best place to get tickets is through the Tour Dates page on the band’s website, at https://www.georgiathunderbolts.com/tour-dates. I’ll definitely be at the Denver gig, and just might make my way down to the Springs as well. You really should consider joining me… if you’re even remotely interested in some good old Southern Rock, this is a band that has to be on your must-see list.
Story by Rick Witt www.rickwittphotography.com
Photos courtesy of Jim Arbogast
