American Cream

I've been spending a lot of time out on my new town of Las Vegas. Trying to fully understand what's so magical of this place and what it has to offer. I'm pretty sure I have the shopping, great resturants and shows down. I started to get into the music scene here, back home in Columbus I knew all of the upcoming bands and here it was a little more challenging.

Vegas is home to some great ROCK bands.... THE KILLERS.... Imagine Dragons. Panic At The Disco. It's slowly becoming the new "Music City" I would say. One band I discovered was American Cream (Thanks Life Is Beautiful). My blog is all about giving the "Next generation" some shine and this is a name you're going to remember and thank me for.

I was blown away and mouth was full on the floor (Swooning to the max). I would say, expect the unexpected with them. You think you're getting one style of rock, but it's reinvented and mondernize. It's a mixture of everything and they have captured the true spirit of rock n roll.

All I kept saying in my head was, "I'm listening to the future rockstars of music". - BuzzNet

He doesn't say, "I want to love you."

He says, "I want to l-UGH!-ve you."

It's a moment of affectation on an album full of as much.

American Cream singer-guitarist Vince Pangallo emotes freely in an elastic voice on the song in question, "Your Landslide," a starry-eyed come-on.

His band's debut EP is a radio-ready exercise in well-manicured pop rock that's polished, professional and, at times, a little unpredictable.

That changes, though, on "You Can See," a propulsive rocker with decidedly more heft and drive.

"Things weren't exactly how you'd thought they'd be," Pangallo sings on the tune to American Cream's credit. - Las Vegas Review Journal

Before their set at Downtown Brew Festival, local rock band American Cream sat down with the DTLVmusic team to talk about the band’s history and sound, their future plans, and the DTLV music scene. They’re playing Life is Beautiful on the second day of the festival (October 27th) on the Red Bull Sound Select stage.

DTLVmusic: How did you guys start playing music together?

Tyler Jones (lead guitar): Vince [Pangallo – vocals/guitar], myself, and Jake [Wagner – bass] knew each other from playing baseball back in the day. After that we all went and did our own thing, and none of us knew that each other played music at the time. I came back from college and Vince had a recording setup at his place, and I happened to play guitar, so we started recording some tunes. We thought it’d be a good idea to start playing some shows since we had enough music. We needed a bass player and Jake and I were writing songs on the side so it was like “Why don’t we just put it together?” So we started slowly adding pieces—a couple people went in and out—and we eventually picked up Charlie [Gott – drums] and just pretty much solidified the four of us and ditched the old band name.

DTLVmusic: What was the old band name?

Tyler: Red Wine Rewind. We pretty much just got drunk every night and came up with that.

Charlie: The experiment was “How much could we drink every night and still be able to play our instruments?” [laughs]

Tyler: After that, we started to get our shit together and started going for more of a rock and roll vibe as opposed to before when we were kind of a pop rock type deal targeting a younger demographic. We were just trying to copy a lot of stuff we thought was big.

Vince: We had no idea what we were doing.

Jake: I was brewing a home brew kit called American Cream Ale. We had kind of a deadline for trying come up with a band name and we had over a hundred names at least, so we just went with American Cream.

Vince: It’s still alcohol-oriented. We’re trying to keep a theme here.

DTLVmusic: Yeah it must have been some good beer!

Jake: Oh it was awful.

Tyler: We kind of just settled on the name by default.

Vince: It works because we like America and we like cream.

DTLVmusic: Do you have any new material in the works?

Vince: We’re doing some recording right now and we’re probably just going to throw together a demo for the festival and then produce it a bit more when we have more time.

DTLVmusic: If you had to pick one song to show people to introduce them to your music, which one would it be?

Vince: It would be one of the new ones we’re working on now called “Monster.”

DTLVmusic: What was the best show you ever played?

Tyler: As American Cream, I don’t know. If we went back to our old days, I’d say it was probably our first show ever. It was at a UNLV tailgate.

Charlie: I wasn’t even in the band yet! [laughs]

Vince: As American Cream, I would say it was the Life is Beautiful showcase that we did. It was pretty cool and there was a really good turnout.

Tyler: We played a show at Beauty Bar that was really fun. It was extremely loud. I guess with the really fun ones you don’t really remember the details, unless you just remember something breaking or somebody passing out or throwing up onstage.

Vince: That never happens. That’s a myth. That’s only in the movies.

Tyler: We came close a couple times though.

DTLVmusic: How would you describe your sound to someone who had never heard you before?

Vince: We like to use the word “organic” a lot because we pretty much just write our songs while jamming together. Someone will kind of mess around with a riff and we’ll all just attach onto it and branch off and snowball from there, so it’s just raw and organic. Sometimes we like to do some really funky stuff and stuff that doesn’t even sound like American Cream.

Charlie: We don’t use synthesizers or anything so it’s kind of just straight-ahead rock and roll.

DTLVmusic: How did you all get involved with Life is Beautiful?

Jake: I was put in charge of getting the showcases together, so initially with Craig Asher Nyman (head of music for the festival), we put together a list of catalyst bands we wanted to reach out to and have headline the shows. We ended up playing the first showcase with bands like Rusty Maples and Same Sex Mary. Those shows were kind of like tryouts for who was going to make the festival lineup and we made it.

DTLVmusic: What do you guys think of the local music scene?

Vince: I think it’s growing. It was never this big or interesting or capable or drawing as many people as it does now. Especially with all the renovation going on Downtown and all the cool venues, a lot of people are just going down there.

Tyler: There hasn’t really been an attractive, realistic place for bands to play the last couple of years. It was nice when Jillian’s was around because right when we started we were able to hop on - DTLV Music

This four-piece rock band offered a solid mix of classic rock revival and today’s indie rock. Along with local bands Rusty Maples, Same Sex Mary, Play for Keeps, Coastwest Unrest and the Perks, American Cream kicked off the debut of the Life is Beautiful Downtown Las Vegas Music Showcase.

Frontman-rhythm guitarist Vince Pangallo moved like Mick Jagger and sang rock n’ roll like it was a lullaby. Lead guitarist Tyler Jones made the girls wish they were the ones being strummed. Bassist Jake Wagner and drummer Charlie Gott provided a solid foundation for their music.

American Cream’s six-song set consisted of three songs off their self-titled debut EP. “You Can See” provided a psychedelic rock feel. They slowed things down a bit with “Center of Everything” and picked it back up again with “Barefoot Mistress.” With their interaction with the crowd and their visual immersion into their music, this is definitely a band to check out live. - Vegas Seven

The music industry today is dominated by horrible songwriting, simple, repetitive beats and lyrics, performed by generic, replaceable pretties. The studios run by major labels, eliminates the human element to pump out what they consider 'perfect', when its anything but. Alas, in this fine nation and here in the volley of sin, there are pockets of talented, real musicians who still pour their heart and souls into actual creative art. American Cream is one such band, one who inhaled the passion and quality of the classic rock N roll generation, exhaling with a blend of modern indie and a hint of southern for a chaser. The Vegas based four-some takes lime to develop its music, its art, uniquely allowing songs to grow into their own through long, almost daily, practice sessions.
American Cream is lead by vocalist and rhythm guitarist Vince Pangallo, Tyler Jones on lead guitar, Jake Wagner on bass and backing vocals and Charlie Gott on drums and also backing vocal duties. What started out as just some friends jammin, is now a full fledged, creatively tenacious rock n roll band, ready to fake that next step in an every changing industry. Already playing at some of the best live music venues in Vegas playing mostly covers (which was a large part of funding the recording costs) and also with well known acts playing originals, the band is looking to make its own mark with a new 5 song EP releasing before the year is out on 12/12/12 via iTunes. If you are in Vegas, they will be celebrating with a pre-release show at the Lounge inside the Palms Hotel & Casino on November 3rd. - We were able to catch up with the bassist, Jake, for a fancy exclusive interview. See link. - Smash Magazine