The Real creates alternative rock powerful enough to wake an audience of floor-gazers and with chops enough to force fellow players to look up from their drinks. They strip rock down to its most basic elements – voice, bass, guitar, drums – and have achieved something most bands never do by accumulating all their influences into a single ideal and forging a distinguished sound.

Dan (bass, vocals), Ryan (guitar, vocals) and Alex (drums) lit the fuse a few years back at an anything-goes jam session in the toxic ruins of Hunter’s Point Naval Shipyard in San Francisco, CA. Since then The Real has played across the entire Bay Area, building a fan base and developing an explosive live show gig by gig.

For a close approximation of their sound, imagine The Who Live at Leeds with Pink Floyd vocal harmonies, a touch of Tool’s atmospherics and some Primus improv all played with the raw, vintage tone of the White Stripes.