Mikey Wax
Getting new music is always a plus; so when Mikey Wax handed me the first copy of the new Holiday/Christmas album, And a Happy New Year, after his show with Graham Colton (place photo here) in Philadelphia, I was pretty excited to go listen. The album features six new tracks, three of which are written by Mikey, and will be released on November 6th.
Mikey and I sat down at his show with Graham to chat about his music and plans for the rest of the year. Check out what he had to say and make sure to click the link at the bottom to see photos from the show!
Arin: What got you interested in music and got everything started for you?
Mikey: I was like eight and my dad was a piano player, and so he used to rock out in our living room on the piano we had and I remember I used to sit under the piano while he played. I really enjoyed it. It’s probably the reason I’m hard of hearing in one ear already, but he taught me my first piece of classical music and I was never forced to take lessons, I was just really into it. I grew up listening to the Beatles and I wrote my first song when I was like nine or ten. So I don’t know, it’s always just been something I like to do.
A: Once you decided to make music into a career, how did the progression work for you since it’s different for everyone?
M: I went to school at Vanderbilt University in Nashville and I had… I wrote a bunch of songs there and I always knew that I wanted to do music, but I never thought that I was good or anything like that and then I finally had a couple songs where my friends were like, ‘Those are actually good songs, you should try and record them.’ So I went home right after I graduated and just recorded the whole first album and, lucky enough, one of the songs called ‘In Case I Go Again’ got featured on the homepage on YouTube and that got like half a million hits overnight and that just started everything.
A: In a similar sense, you had ‘Counting On You’ featured on So You Think You Can Dance as the vote-off song for the whole season, so did you notice a change in the fan base again once that happened?
M: Yeah, I mean that show reaches so many people and, through twitter and everything, you see people are like, ‘Heard your song’ or something, so it’s a great way for people to hear your music that you would have otherwise never reached.
A: What has this tour with Graham been like so far?
M: Graham… We hate each other, it’s just terrible… [laughs] No, it’s been amazing. Graham and I, we’re just having a lot of fun. We did four shows on the east coast and then we’re going to the west coast and doing LA and San Diego in a couple weeks, and we’re very similar in our way of touring. We both love Starbucks [points to starbucks cup], we both fancy frequent stops, and it’s just been fun. The crowds have been great; we’ve done like 100–200 people a night which has been fun.
A: What’s next for you after this tour and the holidays?
M: Well, I actually am releasing a holiday record/christmas record. I finally just got it; it’s in the car. I got sent the physical thing and so that’s going to be coming out November 6th, and I’m doing a couple music videos for that. I’m going to be doing a couple of the private house concert things that I got started with on the west coast; and then after the holidays I’ll spend some time at home, relax, maybe write some new music; and [then] January, we’ll see where it takes me.
A: Who are some people you would love to tour with?
M: Can I say Dave Matthews Band? John Mayer? As far as musicians that right now in my career I could realistically see myself with, I really like bands like Steven Kellogg [and] Green River Ordinance. I mean Graham was a guy I always wanted to tour with for a while. I just toured with Jon McLaughlin which was somebody I always wanted to tour with; Jon’s amazing. Some of those guys… I love a lot of the acts coming out of Nashville, as well as LA, so I mean there’s probably just too many to list. There’s so many good ones, I just wanna tour with people that love music and wanna play every night, and have good vibes, and everything like that and that’s Graham. We’re having fun.
A: Do you have any specific end goals with music?
M: I wanna write one great song. Seriously, I want one song that just lives on forever, that is my goal. If I can do that — well if anybody can do that — there is definitely success. I always said my dream ever since I was a little kid was to sell out The Garden — sell out Madison Square Garden in New York.
