Dan Koch is an American musician and podcaster. He hosts the You Have Permission and Pretty Good Vibrations podcasts and previously co-hosted the Depolarize! and Reconstruct podcasts. He was the lead guitarist, vocalist, and principal songwriter for the rock band Pacific Gold. He formed the band

Sherwood Sherwood may refer to: Places Australia *Sherwood, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane * Sherwood, South Australia, a locality *Shire of Sherwood, a former local government area of Queensland * Electoral district of Sherwood, an electoral district fr ...

with Nate Henry in 2002 while attending university at Cal Poly in

San Luis Obispo, California ; ; ; Chumashan languages, Chumash: ''tiłhini'') is a city and county seat of San Luis Obispo County, California, United States. Located on the Central Coast (California), Central Coast of California, San Luis Obispo is roughly halfway betwee ...

. Koch was originally

's drummer, but when drummer Joe Greenetz joined the band he switched from drums to guitar. Moreover, Koch transitioned into the rhythm guitar player. With the departure of Chris Armstrong, Koch switched into the role of lead guitarist. Dan Koch is a native of

Los Gatos, California Los Gatos (; ; ) is an List of municipalities in California, incorporated town in Santa Clara County, California, United States. The population is 33,529 according to the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is located in the San Franc ...

. He married Jaffrey Bagge on November 29, 2009. The couple resides in

Seattle, Washington Seattle ( ) is the List of municipalities in Washington, most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington (state), Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the List of Unit ...

. Dan has composed music for commercials and other advertising since 2012.

Band formation

Koch was friends with Nate Henry and Chris Armstrong while they were attending college in

. He began as the principal songwriter of

, but over the course of three full-length albums, the songwriting duties were shared with bassist/lead singer Nate Henry and keyboard player Mike Leibovich. With the band's addition of Joe Greenetz as the drummer this also inclined Dan to switch to guitar. Koch has a full beard, which led to the nickname "Beardy." He attended The King's Academy in

Sunnyvale, California Sunnyvale () is a city located in the Santa Clara Valley in northwestern Santa Clara County, California, United States. Sunnyvale lies along the historic El Camino Real (California), El Camino Real and U.S. Route 101 in California, Highway 1 ...

and graduated in 2001.

Present-day work

Dan has been a part of 3 side projects. One titled "More important than Music" being a blog originally set up on blogspot.com but later moved to worldpress.com account. It is mainly devoted to charity organizations. Another project, "I'll Beat You up" was set up by Koch and

's former guitarist Chris Armstrong. A free EP was released on thei
page
Koch is a studio member of Jonathan Jones'

We Shot the Moon We Shot the Moon, formerly known as The Honor Roll, is a band from San Diego, California featuring Jonathan Jones the singer of Waking Ashland, and originally, Dan Koch, and Joe Greenetz both from the band Sherwood. History The band form ...

. Koch also started a series of podcasts titled "Beards in a Band" with drummer Joe Greenetz in addition to the "Apples and Oranges" series started by lead singer and bassist Nate Henry and keyboardist

Mike Leibovich Mike may refer to: Animals * Mike (cat), cat and guardian of the British Museum * Mike the Headless Chicken, chicken that lived for 18 months after his head had been cut off * Mike (chimpanzee), a chimpanzee featured in several books and documenta ...

. He is currently playing for the newly formed act, Pacific Gold (formerly known as Wayfarer). In 2021, Koch released a new music project titled Havana Swim Club. Koch described the process of digital "crate digging" in this sample-heavy electronic music sound. Music blog EarToTheGround Music described the new album as, "lush, harmonic, atmospheric electronic music." He runs two podcasts: "Pretty Good Vibrations", which is devoted to the role music plays in people's lives; and "You Have Permission", which is mainly devoted to religion, especially Christianity, and how it reacts with the social sciences.

Interviews

{{DEFAULTSORT:Koch, Dan American rock guitarists American male guitarists Living people 1983 births 21st-century American guitarists 21st-century American male musicians