Waylon Jennings Meets ZZ Top | Buffalo Larry & The Rhyolite Sound
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There's something beautifully contradictory about Buffalo Larry. By day, he's a master stylist in Las Vegas, the kind of artist who's shaped the hair of everyone from Slash to Billy Gibbons. By night—or whenever the music calls—he's the driving force behind The Rhyolite Sound, a band that's been turning heads with a description so perfect it practically writes itself: "Waylon Jennings being backed by ZZ Top." It's the kind of comparison that makes you sit up and listen, and when you actually encounter Buffalo Larry's story, you understand why it fits.
Growing up on Harson's Island in Michigan, suspended between the mainland and Canada, Buffalo Larry developed the kind of rugged independence that informs everything he touches. He came to music early, learning drums from a genuinely surprising source—Vinnie Dombrowski, the lead singer of Nineties alt-rock outfit Sponge—and playing in his first band while still in high school under a band teacher who'd once played keys for Iron Butterfly. These weren't credentials that screamed "future country music innovator," but therein lies the magic of his journey. The Rhyolite Sound didn't emerge from Music Row or Nashville tradition. They emerged from Nevada, shaped by a man who approached both music and hair with the same philosophy: do it your way, do it well, and don't worry too much about what people expect.
I spent the first five years of my life naked and probably the last five years of my life mostly naked.
That philosophy extends to his day job in ways that reveal something deeper about artistic commitment. When asked about the challenges of juggling a thriving salon business with an increasingly demanding music career, Buffalo Larry doesn't shy away from the tension. He feels it acutely—the energy shift when his focus tips toward the band, the subtle resentment from his team, the knowledge that his salon career is what will ultimately fund his future. This is a man living in the real world, not a fantasy. He knows that the hair business keeps the lights on while the music feeds the soul. Most artists never articulate this friction so honestly.
But here's what's compelling: The Rhyolite Sound represents something worth the tension. Formed in Las Vegas in 2013, the band has been quietly building momentum by doing exactly what Buffalo Larry does in the salon—breaking norms and carving their own path. They're not trying to sound like anyone else. That "Waylon Jennings meets ZZ Top" comparison isn't a marketing slogan; it's a genuine attempt to describe what happens when honky-tonk grit meets blues-rock swagger, when traditional country sensibilities collide with something heavier, grittier, more contemporary. In an era of relentless genre categorization and algorithm-friendly consistency, that's radical.
I was a kid who didn't have a lot of options—I was kind of destined to be like a towny, not very ambitious.
What makes The Rugged Revival's conversation with Buffalo Larry essential listening is precisely this authenticity. He's not a full-time musician giving you the sanitized backstory. He's a working professional who hairstyles celebrities, runs a business, and steals time for the music that truly moves him. When he talks about his early days doing janky basement tattoos on friends, or about his dad offering him a union electrician apprenticeship that he politely declined, you're getting the real story—not a carefully crafted narrative designed to sell albums.
The Rhyolite Sound's ambition to break the norms of what country music can be matters more now than ever. The genre has become increasingly bifurcated, split between mainstream Nashville pop-country and the genuine outliers fighting to exist in the margins. A band that genuinely sounds like Waylon Jennings being backed by ZZ Top—that defies easy categorization while drawing from real tradition—deserves your attention precisely because they're not trying to fit anyone's template.
If you haven't heard The Rhyolite Sound yet, the full episode is essential. Buffalo Larry's story—from a Michigan island kid to a Las Vegas salon owner to the frontman of one of the most intriguingly described bands in contemporary Americana—is exactly the kind of real music discovery that The Rugged Revival exists to highlight. This is what independent music actually looks like: artists who work real jobs, who understand compromise without abandoning vision, and who keep carving ahead anyway.
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