THE WAVOS :: Rocktronic Dance-Pop
Ride the wave, it's what you crave! Scramble up The Killers, Green Day and Depeche Mode, and you're getting a taste for The Wavos: rocktronic dance-pop with a chewy '80s alternawave center.
Biography
“Make no mistake, these guys are more than a cover band,” says the Sun News. The Wavos have a fantastic time playing their favorite songs by Billy Idol, The Killers, Beastie Boys, Depeche Mode, Green Day, The Cars, New Order, Devo, Blur, Ramones, Nine Inch Nails and so many more. Then they'll throw in a couple of original WAVOS songs and you'll just know it's a new wave band that you can't quite name... Or, depending on the venue, the band will treat its audience to a full set of their distinctively original songs. The Wavos play with their fans, not to them – the band dances with their audience of stars, putting out a 100% live, upbeat performance of all their favorite '80s/'90s/2000's new wave & alternative rock tunes with instantly-recognizable vocals over the signature interplay of guitar and synthesizer. And while they're happy to deliver a killer rendition of a Journey or Van Halen request, the band’s real strength lies in bringing out the underexposed gems of the underground dance floor. Remember Lawnchairs? The Politics of Dancing? The fans are requesting these most innovative pop rock tunes that they never heard before, including The Wavos’ original songs. And on Halloween, they get treated to a high-intensity dose of goth-rock classics from bands like Bauhaus, Ministry and the Sisters of Mercy. The band has been known to play for two and a half hours without a break, when dancing is nonstop. When their fans take a breath, the ear-catching sounds, crazy outfits, interactive visuals and multimedia lighting keep them engaged.
¿Dónde están los Wavos? Two members live in New York City and the third in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, but the band's hot spot is Virginia, midway on the eastern corridor that connects them. At The Otter House in Fredericksburg, and Martin's Downtown in Roanoke, 150 loyal fans pay to see them every two months, filling the bar and dancing ‘til closing time. At Spaghettifest, the yearly indie music and camping festival in Harrisonburg and Winchester, they've played four years in a row to hundreds of cheering college-age fans who can’t help jumping up on stage to dance with the band. The Wavos are growing two new fan bases in New York: a local and Columbia University crowd at the upper west side's Underground Lounge, and an ultra-appreciative music lovers crowd at the weekly goth event Absolution, on the trendy lower east side. In Myrtle Beach they've been playing to diverse local audiences at Drink!, The Basement and other venues, and in Wilmington NC they are regular performers at a popular hookah bar, The Juggling Gypsy. Myrtle Beach's Sun News KICKS! compares The Wavos to The Killers, Franz Ferdinand, Interpol and Bloc Party and says about their new CD, Wave Crazed EP, "it's really great to see a band like The Wavos continuing the New Wave tradition by combining both the classic and modern forms and crafting them into their own form of alternative power pop." The Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star says the CD "features seven delectably jagged tunes that are just as dance-inducing and original as the artists they [often] cover." DishMiss NYC calls The Wavos’ music "infectious and upbeat electro-driven pop and punk … you’ll just want to dance!”
A bit of history: the core of The Wavos came together on a supermarket loading dock where Joe and Tone worked in West New York, NJ, and solidified when Joe met Goredon at the Berklee School of Music in Boston. Their first band, The Privates, was a whirlwind romp through the New York metro area. Based in NYC’s lower east side, they were the house band at Great Gildersleeves, headlined regularly at C.B.G.B.'s, opened up for the Bush Tetras, Eric Johnson and Joe Perry and were featured in national publications Billboard and Variety and local papers like the Village Voice. Vibrant throughout the ‘90s, the band morphed into different styles and gathered a devoted following as a hard-hitting power trio while sharing the stage with national acts They Might Be Giants, Raging Slab, Masters of Reality and Johnny Thunders. In the 2000’s, from a couple of side projects – a goth quartet, electropop duo and all-‘80s cover band – it was a completely natural progression to The Wavos.
2011: The Wavos have released their first CD and are working on songs for a second release. The band is intently focused on touring, getting their message out as far and wide as possible. It's been a wild ride, from their beginnings as The Privates to their 2008 new-new-wave reformation, and coming full circle back to their powerpop-with-synth roots, they’ve never been happier than they are right now.
Instrumentation
Joe Bace - guitar/bass/vocal
Goredon Smyth - synth/bass/vocal
Tone Maul - edrums
Discography
Wave Crazed EP (March 2010)
Videos on YouTube (www.youtube.com/jagosmusic)