Growing up in Sacramento, the members of Dance Gavin Dance saw their fair share of bands coming up through the ranks in the '90s and two of the band's members -- drummer Matt Mingus and guitarist Will Swan -- tell The Music Experience's Squiggy that two of California's finest paved the pathway to their musical starts in this edition of Gear Factor, powered by Sweetwater.

Drummer Matt Mingus credits fellow Sacto rockers Deftones for his initial interest in becoming a musician. "I play drums, but it was a guitar riff that really inspired me," says Mingus. "It was probably the moment I heard Around the Fur, 'My Own Summer.' The guitar riff... that was like, 'Oh my god, I have to play rock music.'"

He credits his brother-in-law for introducing him to Deftones music, which led to him also investigating the band's first album, Adrenaline. "That sold me on playing this style of rock music," says Mingus, who adds, "My drumming today is credited to Abe [Cunningham]."

As for Swan, his musical start comes a little further up California's coast with Bay Area giants Green Day. "The first concert I went to, and I was 12 years old, and I went to see Green Day. Billie Joe [Armstrong] came out with his guitar like this and did this stupid pose for like a few minutes. I was like, 'You can do that when you're in a rock band? That's possible? I want to go onstage and do dumb shit like that,'" recalls Swan. "So just the experience of seeing Green Day for the first time and my first show was just so mind-blowing and cool that there was really nothing more I wanted to do than that."

These days, Dance Gavin Dance are following in the footsteps of the bands who influenced them. The band's eighth studio album, Artificial Selection, was released just last year and is available along with their other albums at the band's merch site. The group kicks off 2019 in Australia, with some North American stops coming later in the spring. See their dates here and for all your gear needs, be sure to check out Sweetwater.com.

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