By Zac Taylor
Managing Editor
Jon, Ryan, Aaron, Jeff, & Carlo
Power-Pop-Punk Quintet Westland has been trailblazing all across the west coast and elsewhere, making a name for themselves on the national scene. How did they make the leap from jamming in high school and meeting at Berklee to getting some notable sponsorship deals and slots at major festivals? Hard-hitting drummer and Berklee alumnus Carlo Ribaux brings The Groove up to speed.
The Groove: Did you all meet at Berklee? Tell me a little about how each band member was courted into being an official member.
Carlo Ribaux: Ryan (guitar) and Aaron (vocals) knew each other from Arts Institute, where Aaron was studying. They teamed up with different members before they finally met Jon (guitar), Jeff (bass) and me (drums). Aaron and Jon knew each other from High School in Pennsylvania. I met the band after I replied to an ad they put on the bulletin board in the basement of the 921 building. And finally we found Jeff after we put up an ad on Craigslist. Jon and me are the only members that went to Berklee.
G: Did you finish your degree here?
CR: Jon’s got a two-year degree in communication from his community college. He dropped out of Berklee after three semesters. Aaron stopped studying at Art Institute after one semester. Jeff has been playing music with different bands (such as Time and Distance) after he graduated from high school. Ryan had different Jobs after High School and I studied at two different music colleges in Switzerland before I came here and studied one semester at Berklee. I originally planned on going to Berklee for one year and then going back to study in Switzerland. Bottom line—none of us actually has a degree, except for Jon.
G: Did you already start getting your repertoire and press kit together while still in school, or did most of the professionalism start afterwards?
CR: I think it was a fluent development. We all worked hard for the band as we were still in college, but obviously we had more time for it once we dropped out. This is what we dropped out for.
Westland Drummer Carlo Ribaux
G: How did you score all those endorsements? How much free stuff do you get?
CR: Jeff had some of the contacts, like Role Model Clothing, because he’s been touring with bands for quite a while. Others, like Orange, we made through our Management Company JCP3. And some finally just happened, like Amp Energy Drink. We met some Amp-girls who handed out free drinks in the street and gave them a CD. I think most companies are willing to support you as soon as you are playing big enough tours, because they want to have their name seen. Most of the time it’s not necessarily about how talented you are, it’s more about how many kids come to see your shows and who you know. Every endorsement is different, sometimes we get a percentage, sometimes we get something for free. We got more than 20 cases of Amp Energy Drink, some t-shirts and headphones from Amp and every band member got a certain amount of Role Model clothes for free.
G: Do you all feel like Berklee prepared you well, with regards to composing, performing, marketing, and the overall lifestyle of being a touring musician? What do you wish you had concentrated more or less on while you were here?
CR: I think Berklee and the music colleges I went to in Switzerland helped me a lot in becoming a good musician. Going to those schools broadened my horizons a lot, which I really enjoy. Though I have to say that I think if you want to be a touring pop/rock musician, you don’t necessarily need to go to a music college first.
What I really wish would be more emphasized as a drummer is playing to a click. It sounds really simple, but it’s really not. There’s a whole art to that, especially if you still want to sound natural and not like a machine while you’re playing on a click. Also a lot of pop/rock acts use clicks live, not to mention all the studios that do so.
G: What’s next in the pipeline for you guys? Trying to get an opening slot for a bigger band? Get a song in the next Zac Efron movie?
CR: Ha. We actually just got contacted by a licensing company that wants to pitch our music to TV stations and stuff like that. We don’t plan on doing a buy on though. There’s a lot of stuff happening, different companies, lawyers and sometimes labels contact us via Myspace every other day. Our management company JPC3 also has a licensing deal for our CD going in Japan. If that goes through, we’ll tour Japan next fall. And we plan on shooting a music video for our single “Don’t Take it Personal” with Scott Coulver, who has worked with bands such as Panic at the Disco and Hello Goodbye. So the future looks quite bright at the moment. But you never know what’s happening next in this crazy business.
G: Any wacky stories from the road?
CR: Ha ha, there’s a lot. For example today we played at a high school and the kids went crazy. We had to sign everything: books, shoes, arms, cell phones, pieces of pizza and even foreheads.
G: From having played with more established bands and touring around the country, how has your perception of your specific genre changed, as well as how you view the music industry as a whole?
CR: We’ve learned a lot from different bands. I think touring is more or less the same for bands in all genres, only the crowd you promote to is different. I think it’s important to know who exactly you play music for, who’s your target audience.
What we found out about the music industry is that everybody wants to make him/herself look bigger than he/she actually is. At Berklee, they tell you that the music industry is all about connections. That is absolutely true!
For more scoop on the band’s adventures, visit <Myspace.com/Westlandmusic>.
