Everyone knows the standard rock and roll set up: drums, bass, a couple of guitars, or maybe a guitar and a keyboard. The Crash Kings have successfully fought that model since 2006. The trio creates high-energy music with just drums, bass…and keyboards.
Based out of Los Angeles, the trio is made up of Tony and Mike Beliveau (Tony's the vocalist and keyboardist; his brother plays bass), and drummer Tommy Roslak. The band got its name in part from the way its members first spread the word about their music.
“We came up with the idea to find some parties that were going on in L.A., and we wanted to try something a little different and bring a little set-up and kind of crash the party,” says Tony. “We’d show up, and we would know the people at the house, but they didn’t know we were coming with instruments, so we’d kind of crash their party.”
Tony explains the other reason for the name: growing up on the East Coast, he and his brother mostly used public transportation to get around. When they moved to L.A., they suddenly realized they would need cars. “We ended up kind of getting a little wild on our cars and getting in accidents, or near-accidents,” Tony says. “It was my brother’s idea, and we looked to see if the name had been taken on MySpace and it hadn’t. We thought, ‘This could be good for us. It’s kind of a fun name.’”
Whatever the name, the band’s music is undeniably fun. Its most recent single, “Hot Fire,” was used for a Mountain Dew television commercial featuring Dale Earnhardt Jr., which propelled the band’s music in the millions of homes. The trio also created a video titled “Evolution of Guitar—With No Guitar II,” which demonstrates how the band creates their music as they play a variety of covers, including tunes from AC/DC, Queen, Led Zeppelin, and The Beatles. Viewers will notice that one of the keyboards has a “whammy bar”—it’s actually a clavinet with a whammy bar, which plugs into an amp like a guitar, and has guitar pickups and 60 strings inside. This strange instrument is one of nine in the world, and helps the Crash Kings get their unique sound.
The clavinet was featured more on the band’s second album than the first. “The way my brother plays and overdrives the bass is, in a lot of ways how we get away with not having guitar,” Tony says. “The clavinet is sort of like the icing on the cake.”
The band, unlike most, puts the piano center stage, and uses it as a leading instrument. “A lot people don’t give the piano as much credit as it deserves in terms of being such a large and big sounding instrument,” says Tony. “The clavinet is a fun part of the band, but we don’t look at it as what makes this band original and different.”
Now that Roslak and the brothers Beliveau are working on a third album, they’re excited to be touring and visiting St. Louis again. “The last time that we played [in St. Louis] I just remember being aware that the crowd was very respectful and very quiet during the quiet moments, and very responsive at the ends of songs,” Tony says. “Sometimes you get a crowd that’s really kind of rowdy, and you get to a slow part in the song, and you kind of hear people talking, and in St. Louis I remember acknowledging the crowd for being so quiet, and it was really cool. They were really engaged and a really fun crowd.”
After their show in St. Louis, the band will continue on through Texas and Arizona, and then back home to work on their future album, newly inspired.
Crash Kings play The Demo at 8:30 p.m. on Sunday, April 6. The Demo is located at 4144 Manchester Avenue. Doors open at 8 p.m. on the night of the show, and tickets are $10, $12 day of show. For more information, visit thedemostl.com.
