For those who don’t know, I The Mighty are a progressive/indie/alternative rock band from San Francisco, California. The four-piece consists of [left to right] drummer Blake Dahlinger, guitarist Ian Pedigo, vocalist Brent Walsh and bassist Chris Hinkley.
They’re currently on The Misadventures Tour with well-known rock band Pierce The Veil. This tour in particular is an extremely anticipated and long-awaited tour, mostly because "Misadventures" is the first album Pierce The Veil have released since their 2012 album "Collide With The Sky." It’s also a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear "Misadventures" in its entirety. In other words, fans are starving to bite a piece off this unique experience.
It’s no surprise that I The Mighty have been chosen as direct support for the band on this tour. Blake, Ian, Brent and Chris are easily some of the most talented, hardworking and sincere guys in the music industry. They’ve been making a lot of waves recently and are quickly proving that they’re becoming the next big thing.
I was at the New York City show on The Misadventures Tour and had a chance to talk to Brent about their current tour and their band life. You can read what we talked about below.
Can you explain your band’s name?
Well, "I The Mighty" came from a song. If you listen to our first EP that we ever released, it was called “Hearts and Spades." There’s a song on there called "I The Mighty Defeatist." At the time Ian and I were just an acoustic duo by the name of Breakpoint, which is a pretty terrible name. We were getting signed to this label called Talking House Records and obviously we needed to figure out a name one, ‘cause Breakpoint was a bad name and two, because there’s one band in the U.S. and one band in the UK that already have that name. So, "I The Mighty Defeatist," that song title came up as a suggestion and then we just dropped the “defeatist” ‘cause that sounded kind of cool.
What made you want to start a band?
Ian (our guitarist) and I have been playing together since we were 15. I never had the intention of starting a band but I was always singing and stuff when I was a kid. Basically, because I’d known Ian for so long he always knew that I was an aspiring singer I guess, or I just sang a lot, so when he started a band with our buddy David who played drums and they needed a singer, Ian approached me about it and I was like, “Alright, why not?” After doing that for like six months I wanted to learn how to play guitar so I could start writing songs and whatnot.
Why do you make music?
It’s the only thing I’ve ever really wanted to do. Pretty quickly after starting it when we were 15, and by the time I was maybe 17 or graduating high school, my parents figured out that that was the only thing I really wanted to do with my life. I dunno, it was never really too much of a choice for me. There was one point where I was in college and I always excelled in school; I enjoyed school a lot. I was going to Cali State Hayward and I had like a 4.0. I was trying to really decide what I wanted to do with my life. Our current manager at the time was like, “Look, when you get out of college, what are you gonna do?” I was like, “Probably play in a band,” and he was like, “Alright, well then stop wasting your time now and start building a fan base rather than building a fan base four years from now.” So I took that advice and I dropped out and decided what to do.
Alright, now I The Mighty has a pretty unique sound. It’s one of those bands I can listen to, and even if I don’t know a song, I can recognize that that's an I The Mighty song. Who are your inspirations?
I think we all have a lot of different inspirations. I think they probably change all the time. I just discovered the band The Dear Hunter about two years ago and they’ve probably been a really really big influence on me since I discovered them. When we first started the band, Ian and I were both really into this local band called The Matches. I don’t know if you remember that band. They broke up like, six years ago. They’ve been doing some reunion shows and stuff. Turns out, now we’re like homies with them and their guitarist is my producer for my solo record and all this really weird serendipitous stuff.
That’s so funny.
Yeah I know, life is weird, but they were a huge influence on us early on. Coheed and Cambria have definitely been my personal biggest influence over the years. Taking Back Sunday and The Used- a lot of the emo world was really influential on us back in the day. We all have different influences that change all the time. More recent ones will probably be like, Pierce The Veil. After Selfish Machines, that’s one of the reasons we went with Mike Green who produced Connector, because he produced Selfish Machines and I’ve always loved that record and the way it sounds and that was pretty much the main reason we went with Mike. So yeah, Pierce has had an influence on our sound. ISSUES has had an influence on us for sure- that’s another newer influence, but again, they [our influences] change all the time.
Speaking of Pierce The Veil, can you talk about your current tour with them?
Yeah, it’s been really fun. I mean, you know Pierce The Veil is a really big band and we’re playing not the biggest rooms, so every single show is sold out. Most of them sold out in the first few days they were put on sale. It’s been fun. They’re like, really really sweet, humble dudes, so it’s always more fun when you go out with a band- especially a band that’s like their stature- and they’re just like, they’re down. They kick it, you know, we use shared green rooms and stuff half the time and it’s always nice and it’s always really inspiring when you go out with a band of that caliber and that stature and just see that they haven’t really changed at all from where they were climbing like, six years ago. That’s always influential on us too. The first day of this tour, they called a tour meeting. We figured it was to go over a bunch of stuff and they ended up just giving us a bunch of pizza and a bottle of booze for each band and were like, “Yo, we’re like really stoked to have you guys out on this tour. We love your bands. Let’s have a great time.” Those kinds of things are stuff that we really pay attention to and we try to take influence from because we wanna be that band when we do a headliner. We wanna do stuff like that. It really instills the right vision and vibe for the tour and builds comrade so immediately. Things like that are really awesome.
Awesome. So how are Pierce The Veil fans different from other fans of bands that you’ve toured with, like Hands Like Houses?
I think the genre at least is close enough to where the fan base has sort of crossed upon it, but at the same time, we’re kind of getting a weird experience because this is an underplayed tour. If you think about who is the demographic of their fan base that’s going to buy tickets immediately the day they come out, it’s teenage girls basically. If they were playing a 5,000 cap room there would be a bunch of other types of people there. People like my age and probably a lot more guys that will discover the tour or maybe buy tickets two weeks or a month after they go on sale or maybe buy them at the door. In my generation, that’s kind of something that we would do a lot more, but because it’s an underplayed tour and they’re playing small rooms, the demographic that hopped on these tickets immediately and sold out the shows are teenage girls, and that’s one demographic that I don’t think we’ve ever really played so much in front of. I mean, obviously that’s part of our demographic too but our demographic has typically been more of like the college kid scene, so that’s been kind of different for us. It’s cool, but it’s been a different thing when we’re trying to get a mosh pit going and they’re not really the crowd that’s going to mosh.
Yeah, I was laughing so hard at the show ‘cause we couldn’t make one.
We had a little from our fan base that were moshing super hard.
Yeah but it just closed up so quick. It was kind of like, secondhand embarrassment. Like, is this really a mosh pit?
Yeah. No, so that’s cool. In a way it’s really cool ‘cause we’re playing in front of a lot of new people. I mean, I think we thought that there would be a little more crossing between fan bases but we’re definitely playing in front of a lot of people. There are a whole bunch of people, that have no idea who we are which, in a way is harder. It’s a little harder to get them going when they’re not familiar with you, but at the same time it’s really cool ‘cause that’s why we’re here; for exposure and to play in front of new people. It’s been different but those Pierce The Veil fans are there for Pierce The Veil, that’s for sure.
Do you still get nervous when you go on stage?
There’s always a little bit of nerves, but it’s definitely not the same as it used to be when we started out. When we first started like when I was in high school and stuff, I was a pretty insecure kid. I had like a bunch of acne and I had a lot of insecurities. Music was always my release and it still is to this day by far, my therapy and my release, but back in the day when we first started, I would be shaking. I would almost puke before we would go on stage. I used to get really really bad anxiety. I dunno, I The Mighty as the four of us has been a band for almost eight years now. That’s a lot of shows and a lot of touring to get used to it. If I was playing a living room in front of my family and my close friends, I would be much more nervous than playing on a tour where we’re playing in front of three to five thousand people. There were a couple nights on tour where I had like, no nerves at all. I don’t really get my own body because I feel like I don’t know why I get so nervous to play in a living room with an acoustic guitar in front of like 12 people but not at all to play in front of, you know, a Madison Square Garden show.
I mean, you get used to it. You probably already are.
Yeah, it’s weird. I do get nervous still, but it’s like, there’s never really too much reason behind it. I feel like it’s just random. Some shows I’m nervous, some shows I’m not.
When you guys performed at Irving Plaza on Wednesday, I don’t know if you know, but there was actually a shooting in that exact venue a few weeks ago.
Yeah, we had heard that because we got there and the security was like really really tight. Every time we went in and out of the building, we had to go through security check, even us being on the tour and stuff.
Yeah, that’s why we had so much trouble setting up this interview. I wasn’t allowed to go backstage. Meanwhile, I’ve been able to do stuff like that all the time with my other interviews. It was just this one show in particular where security was just acting so crappy. Even when we were walking into the venue, their security system to check us in was completely different too. Plus the last time I went to that venue was I think April for an ISSUES show.
Well, there was the shooting at the venue so obviously that particular venue upped their security. But then after Orlando and stuff too I think they’re just really starting to tighten up everywhere.
Yeah, it’s a good thing too ‘cause I don’t know how the hell a gunman was able to go backstage and into the VIP area.
Yeah, it’s pretty insane.
Do you want to talk a little bit about violence or your thoughts on the recent violence that’s been going on?
Yeah. I think I’m in the camp with most other Americans who believe that we can’t keep having the NRA buy politicians out of gun reform talk, because there are more shootings in America than there are days of the year and that number is exponentially climbing. When someone who’s a known ISIS affiliate or sympathizer has the ability to walk in and buy a semi-automatic rifle, I think it’s pretty apparent that we have lots of gun issues that need to be reformed. It dives more and more into how corrupt our politicians are and how easily bought they are by a company like the NRA that makes millions of millions of dollars from very easy to buy politicians, but there are people like Bernie Sanders that are raising awareness of that and I think other politicians are starting to wake up and stand up for what’s actually right and not just be bought, so hopefully this Orlando shooting can be the catalyst. I know there’s been a lot of other mass shootings that I thought were going to be the catalyst that didn’t end up being so, but I feel like it seems like people are a little more fired up right now than they’ve possibly ever been on the issue, so yeah. I’m just hoping that it wasn’t completely in vain and that we can actually get some common sense, gun law reformation, because I think it’s hard to argue that we need it. The whole, “They’re taking our guns,” argument is just complete conservative NRA propaganda and people need to wake up from that so we can actually build towards something better.
I think it’s crap too, but then again, if someone wants a gun to do something like that, they’re most likely gonna find a way to get one.
Probably, but most of these mass shootings done ARE done by guns that are bought legally. Did you see that thing on CNN? They had this 13 year-old kid go around. They filmed him trying to buy cigarettes, alcohol, dirty magazines - obviously he gets denied from all those ‘cause he’s 13, and then he walks into a gun show and buys a semi-automatic rifle in 38 minutes. 13 year-old kid.
That’s disgusting.
You know, at 13 you’re pretty much a little psychopath anyway. How easy would it be for someone so mentally unbalanced as a 13 year-old kid to go buy a semi-automatic weapon and shoot up a school? If a 13 year-old kid wants to buy a semi-automatic weapon, and he’s not able to do one legally, he probably isn’t gonna get one. I don’t see a 13 year-old kid being savvy enough to find one on the black market. It’s that kind of s**t that pisses me off.
This world definitely needs so much fixing, and it can only begin with us.
Yep.
Alright, What was your craziest tour moment?
This one time we were on tour driving through Wyoming on a stretch of Highway 80, which is the most dangerous stretch of the country and well, there’s been a couple different stories for this. One was when the first time I was driving, and I’ve never driven through snow in my entire life. We’re trying to drive through and literally, a giant blizzard hit in the middle of our middle-of-the-night ride. I ended up going from 65 miles an hour down to like, eight miles an hour. We’re still fishtailing off the road and there are flipped over semi-trucks and basically, it took us six hours to get an hour down that freeway and we almost drove off the road multiple times during it, but we couldn’t stop because if we would’ve stopped we would’ve gotten snowed in. So, there was that, and maybe flash forward two years later. Blake is driving the exact same stretch of the highway in the middle of the day this time, and we’re driving through another blizzard and it’s gettin’ pretty dicey. We kind of swerved off the road at one point. Chris is like, taunting nature and he’s like, “Is this all you got? Is this all you got Wyoming?” And as he says that, our driver side window breaks somehow and falls into the door. Yeah, so right after he’s like, taunting this blizzard, we have no driver side window at all. It just fell into the door. That made the drive a little more cold. And probably the only other thing I can think of is one time we had a fireworks fight in the middle of the desert. We were actually shooting bottle rockets and stuff at each other, which was really dangerous but pretty fun.
Oh, I’ve done it before and it’s pretty fun.
Yeah, it’s pretty great.
Okay, what’s some advice you’d give aspiring musicians?
My biggest piece of advice would be: Don’t expect things to happen overnight or easily. I’ve been doing this for 13 years and we’re still not nearly where we want to get or hope to be. I just remember thinking when I was like, maybe 19 years old or when I was 18 and I first got signed to a record label, thinking that, “Oh yeah, by the time I’m in my late 20s I’ll be successful and be making money and tour the world.” To a small degree, we were starting to reach that, but at the same time, it’s a really, really long process. You gotta build a fan base one person by one person. That takes time to do and it takes a lot of work and a lot of diligence on your part to not get weighed down when the music industry is a fickle b***h, which it’s a fickle b***h pretty often. My only other advice would probably be to always make music that’s genuine to yourself because when you start making music that’s disingenuous or maybe not what you wanna spend your time being passionate about, then it’ll get old really quick.
Right, I don’t know if you know the band Set It Off?
Yeah, those are our homies. They’re our label mates too.
So I was talking to Austin [ex-bassist] and he was telling me like, “I’m not even into pop punk or punk rock anymore. I don’t know why I did this for five, six years.” He’s a rapper now. I was just like, “Why would you get into it if you weren’t all for it,” you know?
I mean, a lot of people get into it thinking like, oh, you know, being in a band can be fun. If you get the opportunity to play music for a living and you can actually make money doing it, it can be a fun job even if you’re not necessarily passionate about it. The fact is, in a field like ours, there isn’t this really easy path to making a lot of money. When it is more like, people have started a band in their garage and they’re playing rock music, and it’s not something that’s being built or fabricated by a producer or by Hollywood, I feel like it is important to be passionate about it because it’s gonna be a slow climb and there’s gonna be many, many tours you come back from and you didn’t make very much money at all, so you better love what you’re doing ‘cause you’re gonna have to figure out how to live poor for a little while.
Right, it’s never about the money if you’re into the music, to be honest. Okay, so last question: Why should anyone check out I The Mighty?
Because we’re a mix of a lot of different genres, so I think a lot of people will find something they like out of it, and I think we’re pretty good! I think that for a lot of people, if you give it a chance you’ll like it. There’s a lot of over-saturated music out there and we try really, really hard to make something that is genuine and that is unique. We’re proud of what we make. I would encourage someone to just give it one spin and if you don’t like it, who cares? If you do, tell some friends about it and come out to a show.
On that note, make sure to catch them on The Misadventures Tour if you can!
In the meanwhile, you can check out their music video for “Slow Dancing Forever” below. I’m warning you: this song and video will hit you pretty hard even if you’re not one to get emotional.
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