Rob Davis ‘Rides The Wave,’ Makes More of His Own Music

By ROB DUGUAY
Posted 1/15/25

For the Cranston singer-songwriter Rob Davis, 2024 was a big year. He played a ton of gigs across Rhode Island and Massachusetts while also opening for mainstream country acts like Locash and Matt …

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Rob Davis ‘Rides The Wave,’ Makes More of His Own Music

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For the Cranston singer-songwriter Rob Davis, 2024 was a big year. He played a ton of gigs across Rhode Island and Massachusetts while also opening for mainstream country acts like Locash and Matt Stell. He also released a new record and got to collaborate with a bunch of different musicians. With this going on, it’s safe to say that Davis has even bigger plans for the next 12 months.

One of his first stops of the new year is Friday, January 17 at Moonshine Alley located on 52 Pine Street in Providence at 9pm.

We recently had a talk about what made him want to pursue music, his latest EP that came out last year and what he wants to accomplish before this year comes to a close.

Rob Duguay: What made you want to pick up a guitar and start writing songs? What made you want to become a musician? Do you come from a musical family, was it a friend or was it a specific record, band of musician that you’re a fan of?

Rob Davis: I started officially playing guitar  when I was 10. I was going into middle school, there wasn’t really much to do and my folks told me that I needed to do something. I did sports outside of school, but I signed up for band. When I went to go get a pair of drumsticks to be a percussion player, I remembered I had a guitar sitting in the closet that I had gotten from my grandparents. My mom then suggested I sign up for guitar lessons. It’s kind of been a spiral ever since.

My uncle plays guitar, he was in a band in Pawtucket forever. My sister was a really good singer in theater and did all that stuff. My little brother is a really good drummer too so it’s kind of all in my circle.

Rob Duguay: As a solo musician, you perform at different establishments all over Rhode Island. These gigs are usually three hours where you’re playing a bunch of covers or a mix of covers and originals, so how do you prepare yourself for performing for that much time in front of an audience that is usually dining, drinking or doing both?

Rob Davis: I try to read the room. The songwriting thing is kind of new to me, I didn’t really start coming out of my comfort zone and writing songs until about two or three years ago. I’ve definitely doubled down during the last year or so and I’m looking to do more of it going forward. For my gigs now, I sprinkle in more of my original stuff either if somebody asks for them or if I feel that I can slip one in and if I get a clap or two I can say “Thanks, that’s one of my songs.”

If I get people tapping their feet to something, sometimes I can tell if I have a country crowd, a rock crowd or a folk crowd and I got a pretty diverse setlist that I can pull from at a moment’s notice, which is cool. It just varies from gig to gig.

Rob Duguay: That is wicked cool. You also have the Rob Davis Band, right?

Rob Davis: Yeah, that’s a cover band but we’ve been doing some fun stuff. I got two horn players, so we’re doing a good mix of old school rock & roll, but I try to keep it creative as well.

Rob Duguay: You just put out a new EP last year called “August”, so what was the experience like making the record? Did you do it by yourself or did you do it at a recording studio with a producer?

Rob Davis: I’m good buddies with Cody Nilsen, who is new in Providence. I became friends with him within the last year and a half or so. I was sitting on about 12 or 15 songs that I had written and did home recordings of. I sent it over to him saying that I wanted to do something with some of this, but I didn’t know what to do with it and I didn’t know how to get started. Being around some pretty professional people, I didn’t want to make something and put it out there for the sake of doing it. I knew what I wanted it to sound like, so I went to Cody because he is a pro and he pointed me in the direction of a studio out of Rockland, Massachusetts called 37’ Productions.

Sean McLaughlin over there is the engineer and Cody produced it, so I basically gave Cody these rough sketches of these songs and they were done for the most part. Cody helped me with my puzzle pieces, we put them together to get the product that we got and I’m really happy with how it came out.

Rob Duguay: That’s awesome, that’s really cool. 2025 just started, so the possibilities are endless. Following the release of last year’s EP, what is the main thing that you’re looking to accomplish this year?

Rob Davis: I’ve actually been working on an acoustic EP that I’m hoping to have out in a few weeks. It’s another five songs and they’re pretty stripped back, so the production as far as big drums, guitar solos and all that fun stuff is going to be pretty raw. That one is going to be called “Offseason” to kind of piggyback off of “August”. I live out on Block Island for four months out of the year and it was kind of the inspiration for some of these songs. I work at Captain Nick’s Rock-N-Roll Bar all summer, and it was the inspiration for the song “August” while being about what the month of August felt like to be on Block Island.

It’s that grind, grind, grind and finally there’s that breath of fresh air at the end where you can enjoy the summer and also realize that summer is coming to an end. With that, when you work a seasonal job, I had this vision that it would be really cool to write a song called “Offseason”. I had this collection of songs that didn’t quite fit the bill for the first EP, and I wrote some more songs that have more of a mellower vibe. I’m finishing it up and I don’t know if I’ll do a full-length this year because those things are expensive to make and I’m paying for it all out of pocket. I’m looking to do two more singles in the spring, I’ll probably just ride the wave and I’m looking to do as much of my own music as I can.

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