Rudolph Llanes began playing clubs at the age of seventeen in his home state of Texas. He was brought up to the sounds of Motown, The Beatles, and all the jazz that his father, a professional drummer, was listening to at the time.

After fronting a locally successful rock and soul outfit during his school days, Rudolph decided to leave his birthplace and set his sights on the city of Austin and its notorious live music scene. It was there that he became aware of the “singer-songwriter” genre and recorded a 10-song demo called “Custom Tex”. On the demo, Rudolph wrote, produced and engineered every song himself. He enlisted the talent of his right-hand man, bassist Manuel “Meme” Ponce III on two of the ten tracks. Soon after the recordings, Manuel left Texas and settled in New York City to study and hone his craft. It wasn’t long before Rudolph came calling ready to perform in and around The Big Apple. Upon reuniting, Rudolph and Manuel began performing as a duo.

The music they pe