Avalon Landing formed “over some silverware and a tablecloth” at Alice’s Kitchen Restaurant in Buffalo, New York. Ten months later-- and 2,000 miles away-- the band played its first show at The Bunkhouse Saloon in Las Vegas, Nevada. Since then, the band has been gaining notoriety for their unique harmonies and onstage presence. We recently caught up with vocalist/guitarist Mike Vargovich to see what he hopes listeners get from their music, his favorite gig, and where you can see Avalon Landing next.
What do you hope listeners will get from your music?
Anything really. Music does so many different things for so many different people. For some people it's just entertainment, something catchy to sing along to or something to tap their foot to. For others it can be a real emotional experience. I'm down with either. We do write "pop" songs, but there's a lot of ourselves in those songs. Lyrically and musically, there's no bullshit. They're honest. I think people can hear that and react to that. It's always been my contention that a pop song doesn't have to mean nothing. People hear a catchy melody and write it off, but I think what we're doing can go beyond that. For me the best compliment is when someone says they really related to a song and it helped them in some way. It's really cool, you know? I've always said since the first song I wrote that I'm not interested so much in changing the world or starting any revolutions with music, but if I can help someone through a rough day of any kind, to me that's a huge win.
What’s the best gig you ever played?
We've been insanely fortunate in our short history to have some great opportunities. Long story short, we moved to Las Vegas from Buffalo, NY for the sole purpose of starting this band. Being in a new city, and the "Entertainment Capital of the World" no less, we've been so amazed by the welcome we've received. Perhaps it's the easy answer, but it's hard to choose one as the "best". Mere weeks after we all got here we were able to play inside the lounge at The Palms Resort, as well as Palace Station Resort for a Gibson guitar showcase, then we played on the main stage at House of Blues a week later. Playing those venues so early, we had to come together quick. We really had to find our groove as a band on stage and essentially grow up in front of an audience fast with little to no rehearsal time. That's how we came together. It's been nothing but great opportunities and gracious support since. We're very lucky. As far as our best show playing wise, I think they are getting better with each one and right now I feel on top of our game and ready to really hit strides in our live show this year. Huge thank you to Sonicbids as we had another show at House of Blues this month that was one of our best for sure.
How has social media affected the way you market/promote your music?
I think most bands would agree it's invaluable for staying in touch with the people who support you as well as making new connections with people you otherwise never would've reached. It makes that part easier for sure. It's important, though, not to fall into the trap of social media and understand that while you can send an event invite on Facebook to 1,000+ people, it can be just as beneficial to go out on foot (whether you have a show that night or not) with some CD's or fliers or whatever and talk to people about your band. One is easy; one takes a little bit more balls. I think if you can bring both those elements together, you can really build a strong community online for your project. We'll go out and promote our band to anyone who will stop and listen. Then it's cool to see those people pop up on our Facebook page or Twitter page and become active in what we do. From there you just continue to build those relationships and watch it grow. Obviously, being able to then share everything that's going on with your band through status updates and tweets is a huge luxury we have today. It's an instant connection with people that give you instant feedback. Also being able to connect with the people booking the shows through Sonicbids is another huge advantage for bands nowadays. If bands are still resisting the use of social media in what they do, that's silly.
What’s a creative way that you interact with your fans? Live? Online?
For starters, it's important for us to remember that we don't think of the people who support us as "fans". That's a sterile, impersonal word. We call everyone "friends" because that's honestly how we see them. As a band we're super grateful for everyone who supports us, whether we knew them prior to Avalon Landing or not. Moving forward, and keeping that idea in mind, we definitely will continue to do things that will help us interact with our friends. Every last Saturday of the month we do an acoustic show at The Beat on Fremont Street. It's a coffee shop/record store/bar that is housed in a building full of art studios. A lot of times at other shows when we're playing full band there's time constraints and lots of loading in and out of multiple band's equipment and it can be really difficult to really just hang out. At The Beat, it's just us hanging out playing some songs. We did one last week and played for a little over two hours. Half the time we played songs and half the time we joked around. It was a lot of fun. That's something we'd like to continue for as long as possible because it's a great opportunity for people to come and feel like their really getting to see us as the goofy people we are. If we can continue to build as a band and still maintain that monthly stripped down "hang out, play some songs, and be silly" event, it will really be cool for friends of our band to be a part of.
Beyond that we have a lot of ideas to make personalized copies of our releases. Our current release is a strictly digital album titled "Demos, Dead Ends & Do Overs" and we've been playing around with cool handmade packaging that people will be able to have. For our next release in 2012 we want to really expand that idea and have a whole collection of unique personalized items at our shows so people can really have something that shows how much we appreciate their support. When we interact with people online, we love to help promote them. We're all in this together. Everyone's trying to do their thing and if someone helps us out or supports us we absolutely love the chance to return the favor and support them as well. It again really creates a strong community. You can't do it alone.
What’s your next big gig coming up? When/Where?
We're excited to play at UNLV, the college here in Las Vegas. It will be our first time on campus and we're excited for the chance to play for that crowd. It's a benefit show on February 17th inside the Student Union Ballroom with some other cool bands. It's going to be a lot of fun. We're also excited to play at Cashman Field, the baseball field in town, for "Big League Weekend" on March 17th and 18th. Both of those shows are all-ages, which can be difficult to come by here in Las Vegas. The all-ages scene is something we want to be a part of so all-ages shows are very attractive to us.
Outside of shows, our other focus for 2012 is to write and record the next Avalon Landing record. We've written and demoed a few songs and we're beyond excited with what we've come up with so far. We're taking what people have heard of us up to this point and really building on it and we already can't wait for people to hear what we're working on. This release will be available both digitally and in a hard copy when it comes out, whereas our current release "Demos, Dead Ends & Do Overs" is strictly digital on iTunes.
If people want to check out our music, our current release "Demos, Dead Ends & Do Overs" is streaming online in it's entirety at www.purevolume.com/avalonlanding and can be purchased on iTunes.
Check out more on Avalon Landing here.
