They heard about the question: What's the deal with a swing band playing in the Graffiti Rock Challenge?
But members of the Neon Swing X-perience rose to the challenge, so to speak, by advancing to the finals of the multi-week extravaganza.
"We basically showed everyone who was like, 'I don't really know about this,'" says founding member Mike Urick. "We were hearing, 'Hey, man, that was cool. That was awesome!'"
As its name implies, the Neon Swing X-perience has a decided slant toward the Big Band sound of yesteryear, one that had a renaissance recently with the likes of the Brian Setzer Orchestra and the Cherry Poppin' Daddies.
Did I say recently? That actually was all the way back in '98, when Mike was a student at Greensburg Central Catholic High School and was talking with a classmate about putting together an act for a talent show.
"I said, 'You play trombone and I play trumpet. What can we do?'"
The answer was a Blues Brothers-style R&B revue, complete with the black suits. But rather than a one-shot deal, the musicians decided to keep playing together, and with swing music back in vogue for the time being, they figured they'd use a horn section to go that route.
Seven years later, Mike is the only one of that crew to have stuck with it the whole time. These days, he has a large contingent playing with him: Carly Litvik and Steve Tomkowitz on saxes, Carmen Marotta on piano, Wally Hunter on various horns, Joe "Wacky" Palaki on drums, Chris Stape on bunches of instruments, Ryan Kuntz on guitar.
NSX has a steady stream of gigs since the rock challenge, Mike reports.
"Graffiti kind of opened up a whole new crowd to us," he says. "We fit in well playing at rock shows. We also fit in well playing jazz shows."
The band varies its repertoire a bit according to the audience and venue, with more rock-oriented tunes for one and leaning toward the traditional route for the other. But one song everyone recognizes and responds to is the Glenn Miller standard "In the Mood."
"No matter where we're playing, we have to play that song," Mike says.
Along with gigging (and school for Mike, who's a full-time MBA student at Duquesne), NSX is working on recording its fifth CD, due for release in November. Mike is enthusiastic about how things are going, to say the least:
"It's going to be our best yet, no doubt about it."
A highlight is Carly's lead vocal debut on the standard "It Had to Be You." Other covers to be included are jazzy versions of Van Morrison's "Moondance" and Setzer's "Stray Cat Strut."
Among the originals is one called "Late for the Party," inspired by some suggestions around the rock challenge that the band missed the neo-swing thing by several years. Another is an updated version of Mike's "Big Bad Wolf."
"People just love that song, so we're redoing it for this CD," he says.
In the meantime, if you're interested in hearing NSX, its CD "No Turning Back" is available through the band's Web site.
(The photo is at the Hard Rock Cafe. I buried Mike's face behind a microphone, but that's him, along with Carly and Steve.)
1 Comments:
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