A brief chat with Andy Hamilton

Yellow Scene: When did you start playing solo, and what was the mission?

Andy Hamilton: I’ve got a full band behind me with this project – I’m just going by name to give me the freedom to bring people in as I need them. But let’s see – I’ve been writing for this band unintentionally for the last five-ten years. I grew up listening to country music, but always wanted to play rock ‘n’ roll. I guess it was about two years ago I finally recorded and released one of my country tunes and it spurred some interest with people around town. I decided to give it a shot. This band as it is has only been together for about a year now.

YS: Describe the sound…

AH: Putting a label on music is such a daunting task because inevitably you’re going to alienate somebody, and somebody’s going to take offense that you’re calling yourself something if you don’t fit into some cookie-cutter mold. We like to think that we’re some type of honky-tonk. I just call it Rocky Mountain country. It’s so different than what’s coming from Nashville, Texas, or anywhere in the south. We’re doing our own thing.

YS: Have you played UMS before?

AH: I’ve played with maybe a dozen different bands at UMS. I’ve played for the last seven or eight years. UMS is a blast. It’s by far my favorite music festival. It’s always a good time.

YS: What do you think of the current state of the Denver scene?

AH: It’s changed so much over the years, and it has it’s ebbs and flows of good bands and then times of lulls. All of a sudden there’ll be ten or eleven great bands pop up out of the woodwork. Right now, it’s really grown and there are more venues opening up that are helping deal with the capacity. I think that’s a great thing. There are a lot of new musicians coming into town, and it’ll be interesting to see what happens with them.

YS: What can we expect from the set?

AH: It’s going to be a hell of a time. We’re just working on a record right now so there will be some new tunes that we’re throwing out there. We’re still a really new band, so we’ve developed a following but I don’t think that we’ve got a real strong fanbase as of yet – we’re building it up and building it up. We played UMS last year with this band, and the people got wild. They were really into it and dancing. We’re just looking to have a good time.