Between touring with his band Midnight North and playing a weekly show at Terrapin Crossroads with his father, Grahame Lesh has made a considerable dent in the jamband scene. Throughout the years, Grahame and his band have acquired a broad fan base, one that continues to grow as the band prospers. With two full albums and an East Coast tour under their belt, Midnight North is gearing up again to embark on yet another journey across the country, including several East Coast shows with Doobie Decibel System band. In late July, Midnight North will make a stop at Brooklyn Bowl to perform for the event Relix Presents: Brooklyn is CSNY, in which they will be accompanied by the likes of Tom Hamilton and Scott Metzger.

Only several days before the beginning of the band’s summer tour, Grahame spoke to us about the ongoing development of Midnight North, the significance of consistently playing at his family’s California venue, and the passion he has for CSNY that eventually led him to create a whole night dedicated to their music.

You’re going to be performing at the Brooklyn Bowl in a few weeks, have you ever played there before?

I have, not with Midnight North, so we’re really excited to get there. I played with the Terrapin Family Band and Phil Lesh and Friends. Even in London.

Why did you choose CSNY for the Brooklyn Bowl event?

We love the music, but it’s difficult with all of those vocal harmonies to pull off a lot of those songs. We’ve played them already and we sing them already and the vocal harmonies are what Midnight North is really into and what we hang our hat on, so we figured we’d try to pull off a full set of CSNY. We’re just really excited to do the Brooklyn Bowl. We’re working on all of these CSNY songs and the harmonies are really cool. Once you fall into these harmonies, the songs just take it. That’s just more me talking out loud than telling you something, but we’re just really excited, it’s going to be fun.

Also, alongside you, Tom Hamilton and Scott Metzger are going to be there that night, what’s your relationship to them?

We’ve played a few shows with them. We know them, we’re friends with them for sure. I know Joe Russo and all the other Joe Russo’s Almost Dead guys from further and it all kind of stems back from knowing Joey. We’ve played some shows with Scott in this band Wolf. We have some other shows with the American Babies but nothing yet, just plans. But we know Tom; he’s obviously an amazing musician. We’re lucky to have him come play, both of them actually.

Before the Brooklyn Is event, you’re going to be going on an East Coast tour with Doobie Decibel System, so how did that tour come together? How do you know the group?

Being in this music scene, or in this jamband scene we’re in, especially based in the Bay Area, we know all those guys from the Doobie Decibal system. We know Roger McNamee, we’ve done a couple shows with Moonalice. We have Jason Crosby, the other main guy from the Doobie Decibel System. We have Jason sit in with us; he’s local to the Bay Area as well. He does acoustic shows with Elliott, our other singer, and I sometimes. We just know all those guys really well. We were talking to Roger about doing a show together with either Moonalice or Doobie Decibel System, and it just kind of worked out to do those two weeks before the Brooklyn Bowl show. We’re going to be on the East Coast anyway and it just sort of all came together. It’ll be a really fun tour there; they’re a really great band. I mean, Roger and Jason have put together quite a line up with Pete Sears and Jay Lane and it’s going to be great.

How did Midnight North come together?

It was pretty organic. We were all in other bands, doing other musical projects, and we just sort of started playing, just jamming when those started to fall apart, probably about 4 and half years ago. It was Connor, our bass player, our old drummer Eric, Elliott, whom Connor knew, and I. Elliott had all of her songs, and I had all of my songs, so we kind of just put them together and they really fit nicely. That sort of became our first album that we recorded, which is called End of the Night, and that was sort of where we were at. We started playing a lot at Terrapin Crossroads in San Rafael and regionally in California and the West Coast and it sort of built from there.

So you guys play a weekly show at the Terrapin Crossroads, what has this done for the band?

The most important thing is that in all of our experiences, and the most important thing for any band is to play, just to play as much as possible. Especially starting out, you don’t gig everyday, you don’t even gig every week if you don’t really put yourself out there so this was a steady gig that we did. We just needed to put the time in and improve and find ourselves in the band when we were first starting out and it’s just sort of continued. We can take a month off and go tour around and then come back and have a Sunday night gig. We can be at home and still be playing music.

Do you feel it’s formed a sense of community among your fan base?

Not just our fan base. It’s definitely helped our fan base, there’s a great community there that I think really likes our music and comes out on Sundays, there’s a community there. But there’s also a community of musicians that forms, not just around our shows, but around Terrapin Crossroads in general, and the music scene we’re in, in the Bay Area, it’s kind of amazing, just the number of traditions that will just be around on a Sunday, that will come sit in with us. If it’s a Wednesday night, and Terrapin Crossroads doesn’t have a band to put on the bill, they’ll just throw a bunch of us together and say, “Go make music,” and we do, and it’s fantastic. Last night I played with Greg Loiacono from the Mother Hips, we kind of put together a band, and we did a bunch of songs we all happened to know, and it was amazing. So yeah, the Terrapin Crossroads scene, both I think for the music fans and the musicians, has been really kind of an incredible thing that felt really natural.

In 2015, Midnight North began to gain speed and play at more festivals and tour around the country, what did this do for the band as a whole?

For some of us this is our first experience really touring and that’s obviously going to be different, but I think as a band, it just helps us get tighter and helps us get closer and helps the music. We’re all great friends so that only helps us personally, but it also really helps us musically. Just being able to play as much as we can and really work on music night to night, it really does help everything. It helps everything sound better. I think we also started writing a lot of songs about being on the road, which is funny, because we haven’t been on the road that much. I guess we’ll see in our next album that we’re working on. It’s funny, you get just a little taste of being on the road and then all of a sudden we’re like, “We’re going to write road songs.”

So apart from Midnight North, are you still participating in other groups right now? Or are you mainly focused on Midnight North?

Well Midnight North has been my main focus for a few years now, but there’s always time to do more. Most of what else I do personally is with my dad, with Phil, or Phil and Friends, or the Terrapin Family Band, so I’ll do that, and at Terrapin Crossroads I’ll play with anyone if I’m free. They put together those schedules and just put bands together. Sometimes that configuration has never played together, but I’m always open for that. But it’s mostly Midnight North, and Phil and Friends, and Terrapin Family Band.

Do you ever think about doing any solo work?

Maybe, but Midnight North is kind of that, for me. Elliot and I do a lot of the writing for that, almost all of it. Everyone else kind of helps, but it’s either one of my songs or one of Elliott Peck’s songs. I would be into playing solo shows for sure, but Midnight North is really my focus when it comes to creating music. I haven’t really come across a situation where I write a song that doesn’t fit with Midnight North. I intend to just put them into the queue to working with them in Midnight North.