SPANKIN NEW SESSIONS - Delta Spirit

To check out the full session on MTV Overdrive, click here!

Do you have the spirit? These boys from San Diego do and they\'re stripping back to prove it. Come experience the Delta Spirit.

"A girl three rows in front of us on the plane was editing photos, naked photos of her and her friend. Everyone else was asleep and we were hammered watching this nude Photoshop show, we were like WHAT! They were very nice, peaceful shots, you now early morning, light coming in through the blinds, almost classy," guitarist Kelly Winrich told MTV rather matter of factly. And that\'s how our conversation started, discussing porn on a plane.

Something the world is starting to notice is that Delta Spirit don\'t hold back. Not in their conversations. Not in their music. And when they performed the Spankingest of Spankin\' New Sessions recently, we found out why the vibe around this Californian band is so crazy positive.

Their first offering, \'People Come On\' is a dirty southern American rock track. A stick in your head kind of tune, it\'s like a mash up of Beatles classic \'While My Guitar Gently Weeps\', Robert Johnson\'s soulful 12 bar blues and harmonica melodies.

The next piece of Delta pie, \'Strange Vine\', is a smile-inducing track from \'Ode To Sunshine\', their recently released debut album. A sixties swing feel combined with the smoky, lived in voice of singer Matt Vasquez, turns this tune into a delicious unplugged desert, complete with all the trimmings.  

Improvised instruments anyone? The fellers rock out the found object band on \'Trashcan\', the groups first single in the country. Playing suitcases instead of drums, maracas and clapping sticks, the band stripped back and turned up the spirit. The Delta Spirit.

On the back of their debut album \'Ode To Sunshine\', the San Diego boys have been touring like mad men, including gracing our shores with a gig at Splendor In The Grass and a nation wide support with fellow Indie darlings Cold War Kids.   

Livin\' large in true Californian style, the boisterous gents seem to take everything as it comes, no matter how unusual. The tale of how Delta found his Spirit sounds like a web of lies, from the naming of their band (after bassist Brandon Young\'s uncle\'s Taxidermy store) to finding their charismatic front man in the wee hours of the morning.

"Matt [Vasquez] took a train down to San Diego for a change of scenery, and there was a tunnel by his house that he used to play under at two in the morning when the sound was really big. That\'s when Brandon was walking by and heard him. It sounds like a bunch of bull shit but" Winrich shrugged.

"It wasn\'t even a band when we first started. We were jamming basically, we played at a bunch of house parties when we were first starting we didn\'t even know if we were going to be a real band and we just thought it would be kind of fun," Vasquez said. "We were always in bands that would limit what we could kind of do, you know? And so this band was the idea of us not to limit anything. We knew what we didn\'t want to do, and everything else was up from grabs," he added.

With a directionless direction and a DIY attitude, the band set about making a name for themselves in the tough American market.

"For a long time we did everything ourselves so you know, we had been touring for over a year before we signed to any label. We just kind of did our own thing for a long time until we were at that point were we really needed a little bit of extra help with distribution," bassist Brandon Young explained.

Now signed with Aussie label Dew Process (Living End, The Grates), the boys have a little more time on their hands to concentrate on the more important things in life, playing shows and getting their music heard.

"If we played for like 2000 people or 5 people it doesn\'t really matter, as long as we\'re playing," Young concluded.

But the question on everybody\'s lips: What exactly is the Delta Spirit?

"Its like when God said to Abraham \'I am,\' that\'s our music," Vasquez explained. Young disagrees. "It\'s more like when Sonny Bono said \'Hey Cher, you\'re a whore, I\'m going skiing,\' and then he died." Jeepers. Either way that\'s some powerful music.

By Keely Kovacevic