Breeders and Ampline side project R. Ring comes to Cosmic Charlie’s Saturday

As a pair of self-proclaimed recording studio stalwarts, Kelley Deal and Mike Montgomery knew what they wanted when it came to chronicling the new music they were making as R. Ring. In short, it was the total absence of compulsion to rush out an album.

That seems logical when you consider both artists maintain careers outside the duo. Deal, along with twin sister Kim Deal, continues to handle guitar duties for the long running alt-rock troupe The Breeders and lives in Dayton, Ohio. Montgomery works with the Cincinnati-area post-punk indie-rockers Ampline and lives in Dayton, Ky.

“I know this term is tossed around a ton, but it has been a really organic process,” Deal says. “So far, Mike and I have been super in sync together both with our schedule and our idea of what we’re looking for out of this duo. We both have our own full rock bands. We do that somewhere else. But this is a wonderful opportunity for us to explore songs and sounds and vocals. It’s been really fulfilling just doing that.

“We both have plenty of experience and time in a recording studio, so neither one of us were like, ‘Hey, let’s go record.’ I mean, that’s not new for either one of us. Recording for us is not this panacea. It’s not this big end result for me, the payoff. We really like the immediacy of making music with another person. We really got lucky when we bumped into each other and started working with each other.”

Deal and Montgomery got R. Ring off and running almost five years ago, letting only a few stray singles and EP tracks — some almost folkish in attitude, others corrosively electric — serve as the only documentation of their music. But a brief tour this winter that brings the duo to Cosmic Charlie’s on Saturday coincides with the big plunge: the construction of R. Ring’s first full length record which it is currently recording with the help of Earth cellist (and one-time Nirvana auxiliary member) Lori Goldstein. Drummer Leo DeLuca (one of a rotating lineup of percussionists Deal and Montgomery work with) and Goldstein will round the touring version of R. Ring that plays here this weekend.

“That’s kind of why we booked this little mini tour here,” Deal says. “We’ve got a lot of songs already recorded. Some things have been released on a single or a European EP and a lot haven’t been recorded at all. So we decided to bring all the songs together. It just felt right.

“When we were thinking about that, we thought about the next bit of recording we were going to be doing. That’s when Lori’s name came up and the idea of working with a cellist. So that’s what we’re doing. We’re having Lori on cello, putting her into the songs and seeing what happens. It should be surprising to see what she does.”

So what happens from there? Does the future for Deal and Montgomery include a heightened level of activity outside of work with their own bands?

“Well, the Breeders are definitely still a going concern. We’re currently writing and demoing for a new record with Jospehine (Wiggs, the band’s bassist since its formation in 1989) and Jim (McPherson, drummer since 1992), which is super exciting. But these things just take time. Mike and I, we’re musicians, so we’re always going to be doing something.

“Right now, I don’t see us stopping anytime soon. I think we’ll keep doing this as long as we can in some iteration or another. Even our idea of what we want from this is rooted in a kind of reality of what is the music industry right now. It’s a not like, ‘Well, are we going to make it someday.’ We are actually doing it for the love of the process of it, without looking for some sort of payoff. If people come to a show, we’re stoked. That’s awesome. But we’ll be there anyway, whether there are two people and a dog or a 100.”

This story was originally published February 18, 2016 at 1:24 PM with the headline "Breeders and Ampline side project R. Ring comes to Cosmic Charlie’s Saturday."