Sean "Halfway Ray":
Vocals & Rhythm Guitar---
Black Chris:
Vocals & Drums---
"Master" Nate Ledgerwood:
Lead Guitar---
Rick "the Aircraft" Carriere:
Bass---
Justin Sielsch:
Sax & Smiles---
Influences
Bargain Music, Sublime, Bad Brains, Ween, Jacob Miller, The Wailers, Johnny Cash, Barrington Levy, Damian Marley, Cochino, The Ramones, Black Sabbath, Buck Owens, The Clash, The Gladiators, Eric Pruitt
Chico's band most likely to crash your party, drink all your beer, pinch your stash, and steal your girlfriend.
Watson 349 was started after Sean "Halfway Ray" McFadden and the "Black" Chris Hanson got 1st place in the Songwriter's Guild songwriting contest in March of 2006. From there, the two put their heads together and decided to bear down and find the perfect band. Sean and Chris, both have great knowledge in both writing and performing songs, and have an unmatched chemistry on-stage. Their success as a band is always going to be constant as long as they are there. Over the next couple years, Chris and Sean banged out hit after hit, until they had an arsenal of songs they had as a band, and songs in which they could cover. Plenty of songs to rock any house, bar, party, or stage. In the Spring of 2008, Sean and Chris asked Nathan Ledgerwood, also known as "Master Nate", to bring his flexible and potent guitar leads to the mix to provide a more "rocky" feel. This addition was not only phenominal, but necessary to fill out the high end of the"full" sound that they were looking for. So for four or five months, they went with two singers, two guitars, drummer, congas, and bass. Watson was taking form and trying to "build their army". In June, the band's bassist graduated and moved up North, and that left a void in the bottom end of the "full" sound. With only weeks before their next gig, they scurried around looking for a bassists to temporarily fill in for the show, until they could find a permanent replacement. So the band went to their local crowd and asked some fellow musicians if they could fill in as an honorary member of the band for a show. Rick "the Aircraft" Carriere was quick to fill the roll. Rick, being a guitar player for 14 years, was no stranger to jamming with other people. Rick had been playing in garages for several years by this time. After their conga player left the band, Watson was open to the addition of their friend Justin Sielsch on the alto sax and smiles. Sielsch played alto sax in high school but hadn't picked it back up until the insistence of Sean that he could add to some of their songs with his sound. Watson now has a very sturdy foundation of talented, eager musicians to build their structure of sound. With everybody coming from backgrounds of different genres of music, the sound that was coming out of "the basement" was in no way like anything else they have heard or played. Watson blended the styles, being sure not to disrupt the magic that had been laid down before in the prior years of Watson. Today Watson 349 is a fine tuned band that , hopefully, has many of hits to come and many of shows to play. Watson 349 plays for the fans. Anyone can start a band, but only fans can "make" a band.
