Gettin' down to business with Love at 20

Most of the musicians I've come across all seem to share the same goal when it comes to their music. They want to be rock stars. They want to be successful. They want to be able to quit their day jobs and just tour the world, share their music to the world and sell millions of records. But when it comes to meeting this goal, that's as far as they go. They want to get from point A (forming the band) to point B (becoming a famous mega-millionaire rock star), but never think about what needs to happen in between to make that happen.

And most times, when you mentioned the business aspect to a musician, they are immediately offended that you would even insinuate compromising their art for money. But let's get real people, in order to be successful financially in any given career, you gotta have some business smarts.

Meet Mike Groener, lead singer, guitarist, front man, manager, main songwriter, the brain of Austin band Love at 20. With every step carefully planned and articulated, Groener has worked very hard in the short amount of time the band has been around to get Love at 20's name out to the masses. So does all work and no play make Mike a dull boy? Does it take away from the fun creative aspect of performing and producing music? Well with the numerous shows, press coverage, and blog posts Love at 20 has been receiving, I think it's safe to say that this guy is on to something.

I interviewed Groener a little bit before SXSW 2010, but life has been a little crazy since then for me to publish this in a timely manner. So some of the information might be a little dated or has changed since this interview. However, there are still some nuggets of information that just need to be shared.

All right, let's start by introducing yourself.

Mike: My name is Mike G. Been in Austin a really long time. Played with Clap!Clap! Then until now just a bunch of other bands. Nothing but a lot of great people in Austin and the latest project Love at 20 is the combination of all that stuff. So everything I've learned is kinda like a memoirs of such which I think I've mentioned before but the things that you learn about yourself, the things that you learn about music and how to write songs and all that that all comes to a head and that's what the Love at 20 record is. So done completely at my house. I flew my friend Ed Davis out and he plays with Juliette and the Licks, did for awhile played with Dave Grohl and stuff like that and he just did the drums two days. The rest of the record was recorded in two weeks, I think. I've been sitting on it for months and giving it to people seeing what they think and turns out that it works.

And you put the album free for download.

Mike: Yeah.

What kind of reception have you gotten?

Mike: It's been really, really interesting. It's everywhere you want to buy records. It's on iTunes. It's on Amazon and all that stuff but the thing is that unless you're a really large band, Muse, U2, Rage Against the Machine, something like that, it's really hard to get people to buy music that they've never heard of. So the benefit of having a record for free is that you can give it to anyone anywhere and they're still relevantly open to listen to it. So for example, our Twitter account, I'll just go and pick people that are tagging #nowplaying with bands that are similar to us, start a conversation, say "Hey, do you want to check out this record? Think you may like it." and just by that alone, we've managed to get what I would consider about 30% more downloads for the free records from everywhere around the world and they give me feedback. It's just really nice. I get to find out what songs they like, where they are. They spread it to friends. There's retweets, all that so Twitter's been a very good avenue for spreading the record and being able to just reach out to people and ask people to listen to it because there's no risk factor, just downloading a record. It's been highly positive thus far with people that really really like music and enjoy pop structures and melodies and all that kind of stuff. However, it's in some cases when I feel it's really pretty accessible that doesn't appeal to certain bloggers which is fine. It's not what they're about, you know, but that's been the group that's probably the most resistant to early adopting the record and post about it and stuff like that but for everybody that we can just consider regular people who likes music really pretty much enjoyed it. We're talking like worldwide so people from Greece, people from Spain, Mexico. There's a lot of people from Mexico and Brazil that have check the record out. It's really interesting. Just a really eclectic group of people and Twitter really is that one glue that brought everybody together.

Yeah, I checked out your Twitter before and I've noticed there's like "Hey, this person, you should check out this album." which is one after another. Some people might think that's annoying but considering I don't see that on my feed, I didn't know that was going on.

Mike: Yeah, that's the thing. If you're following us, I don't think you see the at-replies which is good.

Unless I've followed that person you've at-replied.

Mike: Right, yeah. Exactly but unless I forget, I would never hit them up multiple times. Usually it's always calculated out at a time or I'd do a max of 10 a day at once and it's usually no more than five because I don't want to spam people and make it look like that's all I'm doing. But it's really me and I'm actually out there trying to communicate with people and build those relationships. I always ask everybody that downloads the record if there's anything we could do for them because it is a mutual thing. I want to build those relationships to the fans anywhere and anyway that I can.

Can you imagine how that would have been without Twitter?

Mike: It would have been difficult. So we've been through the Friendster era and music industry didn't really embrace that because it was just learning how they could adopt social networking to use as PR. Then MySpace came and that was a really great source of music, PR, endless conversations and that kinda really tapered off so if it wasn't Twitter, I think it'll be something else whether it was on Facebook which has worked very well too. Though now that's a main source of information for everybody. There will always be something and you could say Google Buzz is the next big thing but yet that's not yet proved it's it's reason to be. It's interesting and I know what Google's trying to do and it's merely just a stone in the big large footstep for them to get into more media outlet so it makes sense.

I noticed at your debut show which was at the Independent with SPEAK and missions, you had a full band performing. How did you get that line up and why did you decide to get a full band?

Mike: Yeah, that's a good question. To preface this, I didn't know it would work live. I overlaid so much stuff. So for Smashing Pumpkins "A Midsummer Night's Dream," there's 60 guitar tracks. My Bloody Valentine, so much guitar stuff and you wonder if (live) could really be translated into that organic, simple, just dynamic live performance. I didn't know that it could. I didn't think it could. So I finished it and I just had the hopes that I would be able to adopt it to a live setting. Louis plays bass, knew him from Clap!Clap! We're good friends and he's just improved so much as musician in the time that I've known him. It was immediately the first choice and he was doing the Always Already and all that. This was "I don't know if this is gonna work." Louis is playing. Scott the guitar player, been in previous bands with him. Mark, all that stuff, you gotta try it. I didn't know if it was gonna work. We sat in a room, taught the guys four of the songs. We started playing it and I was thinking "Well this is different. This doesn't feel the same" but then the tighter and tighter we got, the more than it just translated perfectly. It became that kinda cathartic outlook for me that I was hoping that it would be versus sitting in a room recording vocal time and time again until you get it right. So I thought it wasn't gonna work but once we actually did it and jammed it out, for lack of a better word, that really worked out well. The show was exactly what I wanted to be from first note onto the record just all by myself in that little cerebral environment to doing that on stage. Was perfect really so I dunno if people liked it but got relatively good feedback about it.

I thought it was good because I heard the album so many times. It sounded like you said pretty close to the record for a live setting. I mean there's obviously some things you can't pull off just with the amount of people that you had.

Mike: Yeah, it's hard you know. For "Time to Begin," the track on there the chorus had... we recorded almost six to eight people in a room singing this chorus. That's very not feasible live but as I've been motivated by Radiohead and the Grammy's last year when they brought I think the USC band on stage with them to perform, I would like to bring in a little choir to perform that chorus. I think that'll be really cool if we could do that.

So with the other members, is that gonna be a permanent thing or was it a live setting type thing?

Mike: It's hard to determine. I'm a very very flexible person. I like having conversations about music and I'm open to people's ideas but at the end of the day, I'm very very focused about what I wanna do. So right now, the way things are working out, Mark is a wonderful drummer, exactly what I want. Louis is a perfect bass player, exactly what I want. Scott's a perfect... everything is exactly the all-star team that I wanted in the first place. So schedules permitting and the larger that we perhaps will get and more press, if everybody's able to make it work with the current variation, then we're definitely gonna keep it that way. But some of us have families... Not really but some of us, we're married. Some of us have full time jobs, all this stuff and so it's really really difficult to coordinate all that stuff.

And with the future albums, will it still be you as the main songwriter or do you think they'll be helping out with contributing as well?

Mike: It is a good question. A good idea is a good idea. So if Scott said "Hey, I got this guitar part that's really good." That's where his strengths is. We've talked about many times, he doesn't feel as a songwriter. He writes great parts so if he had a great part, it could somehow spawn a really really great song then of course, I'm gonna do it. So I'm open to it of course, but I think at the end of the day, it still comes down to me. Put my food down unfortunately.

Well yeah, it was your...

Mike: Yeah, it's my baby, you know. Every piece of it has went through what we could consider rigorous quality control to make sure it sounded a certain way or that it came off a certain way, that it was pitched a certain way. Even our emails, the way we write them to people. I mean I'm very particular about how we write. This is a business. This is a brand. So gotta control those things.

I saw at the debut show also you guys were all dressed up. Was that for Valentine's day or is that gonna be a reoccurring thing?

Mike: No, that's part of it for me. In addition to me feeling that treat a band like a business and of course, art's hard because you don't wanna make art a commodity but there is a good balance between being creative and taking things seriously and being professional. I like to dress up. I think everybody looks really good when they dress up. It creates this kinda formality to it in a different kind of tone for us. So it's absolutely my intention to all photo shoots will be black outfit. It's definitely the way that I wanna carry on. I kinda think of it as a neo-Madmen look. So when we do the albums and what we talk about and all that, I think it should reflect how I feel about martini's, women, modern music and all that.

So you'll be doing photo shoots with the band?

Mike: Um, so that's another good question. There is a line. Everybody that I'm working with I really appreciate and they're really close friends. However, sometimes I think that the idea of the band and having people try to post in pictures and coordinate all this is incredibly passé. I just don't like it and in the sense, it clouds what the brand can be for the band. So it's possible that I'll just do all the photo shoot stuff and it's not me being egotistical or be wanting to have more control of the things. I just don't want to clog up what I consider a very right now pronounce brand name that hopefully will be larger and will be able to get control on it's own. So it's an interesting thing. Some people might think I'm being really self-centered about it but it's not that. There's different reasons, motivations behind it.

You gave me one video to post on the introduction interview and then there's another one that was posted. I think the plan is overall four?

Mike: Yeah four. So the idea is that there'll be four vignettes short films that are part of an overall larger short film that hopefully for SXSW next year, we'll have a short form short films filmed, edited and then submit that. But it's again, music video performing in a video dancing around singing with a guitar being again what can I possible have to say on the subject, you know? I'd rather just pay homage and film a little short film that has a little tiny plot than dance around with a guitar and sing around.

Who are you producing those videos with?

Mike: So a couple of my close friends, Charles, Matt and Kevin, not musical guys. They're never really musical guys but they were always really keen on aesthetics, design, and film so Benberry Media which is this other group that I play a role in for however I can help with the multimedia for clients, but essentially what it is we film events, we write scripts, we film movies, we do live sound, all those kind of multimedia things. They're good friends. I trust their tastes so it was really easy to bring them in and say "Hey, let's shoot these videos." and at the same time, hopefully bring the Benberry name in a little bit forward too. So I directed two of the videos but the rest of the people are film fans that understand old stuff and they like it. They appreciate film and all that. So close friends you gotta always take advantage of, cooperating with the people that you love and their talents and catering to those. So that's why we didn't have to spend thousands of dollars doing videos because we just "What are you doing tonight?" "Nothing." "Well let's go take the camera and let's go and shoot." It's really fun too.

It's kinda like a spontaneous thing?

Mike: Yeah.

Well the first two I saw came out really well.

Mike: Oh thank you. Yeah. Well the cool thing too if you're in Austin, Spiderhouse has three different, distinctly different landscapes and backdrops and the coffeehouse so we filmed there. We filmed behind the Paramount Theater. Just random places around town and somehow, we managed to get timelessness and modern settings and obscure looks and very direct looks. It's really cool. Austin is such a very varied place. I like it. I love it here. You can always find someone to rally with and "let's write a song." "Let's film a movie." It's a great place to do that.

What else is in the future for Love at 20?

Mike: I look at Google as a source of innovation as I do with Apple and Amazon and things of that nature. But lots of people that I talk to that play in bands, they don't think that those conservative models to develop your own strategies as a band, but it's quite contrary. For example, Google developing these other technologies. Google Voice for example. The Buzz. They're going to at some point start being their own cellular provider. I don't know if they've ever said that but I feel it's gonna happen. But anyways, they're really divesting their talents into other areas and so for us, I kinda wanna use their advancements to think well how can we adopt this new technology too? So for me, what the immediate plans are in a general sense is to incorporate Google Voice into our relationships with our fans in effect be able to text one another, not like mass texting but one on one relationship building. I wanna do that. I also want to develop more fan interaction about where our shows will be, what songs we'll play in a sense like they would be voting for what we do so that they feel that they really have a say. Because there's nothing more frustrating... Here's an example, Fugazi played back in I would say 2002 - 2003 at Emo's outside and they're a very spontaneous band but they are completely isolated from the audience. Now they have this great energy but it's hard to say that they really engage the audience. And that's something that, although I loved the way the show sounded and I loved performance, I just didn't feel like I was part of it. Whereas conversely if you look at Dave Bazan for example, Pedro the Lion, those shows, it's almost uncomfortably personal in that connected with him. So I want to have a nice balance between those two things that if you like the music and you have something to say, you have a suggestion that I want to hear it. I'm not better than you because the only reason the band would exist, our art would exist is so that we can share something with people. They don't like it and they think we're being too pretentious or too self-centered, then we need to do something about that. So it's more immediately about getting larger fan base and really engaging them and asking them what what they want.

I saw you had a song on the Real World?

Mike: Oh, so one of the nice things you can do with a PR release is since I've and Louis had been in Clap!Clap! too is that you can incorporate some of those other milestones that you had in previous acts and that was something that Clap!Clap! had played on The Real World.

Oh yeah? The Austin one?

Mike: The Austin one. Yeah, they played at the Coldtowne Theater, whatever is next to I Love Video on Airport. Yeah, I don't think it was called that at the time but yes, they played there. So it's an interesting bullet point and I also feel it counts because you really do have to inflate your PR press. You just do and it's not like we couldn't do it now. Still could if we wanted to but I've worked with people that are Top 12 American Idol finalists. The Sword is, you know, we're good friends with them and they went off to do bigger and better things so you meet people and say this is who I know and this is who I've worked with. I'm really proud of that so it's a nice accomplishment.

That's all I needed to ask you. Anything else you wanna add that people need to know about?

Mike: So SXSW is interesting because we had started talking about the record, I think I sent it to you in October and it wasn't released until January for all intensive purposes. So it was pretty big block there for three months and we had show offers for Free Week at Emo's but we weren't ready yet. We'd just been practicing. So it's hard because there really is this demand, if you will, for music in Austin for a time that would be appropriate to really ramp up and hit the most exposure and SXSW may or may not be that opportunity for local bands. But I think it's really hard to say, it's like I wanna see Soundgarden. I wanna see Muse. All the rumors. That I can catch any of these local bands, I think you mentioned this awhile, I can catch them any other time. So I think for us although, we just missed that momentum that really launched into SXSW and playing a lot of shows. We met a lot of good people in the past few months and I think that the next six months to 12 months that's really where we're gonna come through and you'll start seeing more about us. So we've already had a really good blog coverage already. Probably like four major blogs have covered it and then with this 3rd video, another blog will be releasing that interview and stuff so it's planned. It's just you gotta go at it but I hope that people enjoy the shows and they realize that we wanna share the music. It's not about creating this veil of pretension or acting like we're too good. It's not about that.

Well I saw that debut show after you guys were done, all of you went out to the crowd "Hey how was it?" or "How you doing?" You were out and about meeting everybody.

Mike: Yeah, I mean it's hard to create art and not want to know what people think about it. Maybe that's the being insecure or feeling vulnerable or whatever but whatever it may be there's no point in doing it unless I can share it with someone else. If someone says "I get that. That makes me feel the same way." That's good because I thought I was the only one and that's really what's important to me. So I hope that the way we view the band, the way we view our strategies trying to move forward is different than our peers and that our music can break the not any like political boundaries or emotional boundaries or anything like that but maybe different types of people can like it. So that's probably the most important thing for me. People actually listen to it and don't judge it beforehand. We're used to doing that.