A Year in Review: Love and Theft

We first introduced you  to music newcomers Love and Theft at the beginning of the year, since then the trio of Brian Bandas, Eric Gunderson and Stephen Barker Liles have been garnering quite the name for themselves in the music industry and nothing seems to be slowing down for these “runaways”anytime soon.

Opening for the world’s biggest superstar, Taylor Swift, in 2008,  their first single “Runaway”  charted as the highest debut single of the year-making it  their first Top 10 hit on the Billboard Mediabase Country Charts-their debut CD, World Wide Open-on which all of the songs were co-written by the guys- debuted on the charts, they spent the ladder half of this year with country superstar Jason Aldean on his “Wide Open” Tour, performed on The Today Show and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, and in the Spring of 2010 one of the biggest names in music, Tim McGraw, handpicked the guys to open for him on his “Southern Voice” Tour.  All of this simply adds up as the icing on the cake for the band as all of their dedication, hard work and passion for music have finally started paying off.  The road, for these musicians, wasn’t always paved with gold; they struggled to find a music label willing to sign them and kept working regular day jobs between it all. These struggles have only shown a stronger camaraderie  and more passionate music between the trio.

Before meeting in the songwriting community of Nashville Tennessee-Brian, Eric and Stephen lived seemingly normal lives for guys their age; all in their early 20’s, attending college and working everyday jobs in their home-states, until what would soon seem like a fated passion of music brought them together in the heart of Music City. Unaware of what was waiting for them, the three aspiring musicians dropped out of college and  essentially ran away-which is where their debut single got it’s name- to chase their dreams as individual musicians in Nashville where they were introduced to each other through mutual friends.   The chemistry was instant as their backgrounds and love of music bonded them almost as strongly as the distinct three-part harmonies they discovered while writing and singing together. After months of hard work and perfecting their sound Love and Theft was born. The guys decided that they all offered authentic, distinct and powerful enough vocals to share rotation of lead with their music, which in turn, placed them in a completely unique league in a sea full of talented hopefuls; however, finding a record company that was equally as thrilled as they were was a different story.  After showcasing for labels in Nashville, the band found that getting signed with their distinct sound was a stretch not many were willing to take, but with their talent and never-give-up attitudes, eventually the band was signed to Disney’s Carolwood Records-now Lyric Street Records. Soon following, teen music sensation Taylor Swift caught wind of Love and Theft and picked them to open for her 2008 world tour (not to mention also writing  a lovely tune called “Hey Stephen” for Stephen Barker Liles of the band). Since then, these three music makers have been stealing more hearts than just Taylor’s and with genuine talent, charm and charisma both on and off stage-not to mention good looks-it’s not hard to see why things have been soaring for the band. I recently caught up with the guys while they were on the road to talk about the past, present and future of Love and Theft.

First off congratulations on the great success of your debut CD, World Wide Open!

All: Thank you so much.

It’s been over 3 months since the initial release of World Wide Open, which made it into the Top 10 on the Billboard Country Charts and was the #1 download on itunes when first released, how does it feel to have everything you’ve worked so hard for come together and be doing so well?

SBL: It feels really good. It’s probably one of the coolest things of all time, I mean you never know what’s going to happen with your music, you just hope to make the kind of music everybody likes and we’re very very grateful to be received so well.

You are all very interactive with fans via Myspace, Twitter and Facebook, how do you feel the Internet has changed music for you and in general?

EG: It allows you to have such a close relationship with fans; before you couldn’t have had close to that relationship because like, if we’re in Nashville and someone is in Washington state, ordinarily you’d feel very disconnected, but with outlets like twitter and facebook you can make that person feel like they are totally apart of what you are doing. You can even make them feel like they are traveling with you by documenting stuff on your bus. It’s a really cool thing because it makes fans feel like they are more apart of what we’re doing so they don’t just feel like fans, they feel like they are contributing to the success of the band-which they are.

Tour wise, things have been panning out well as you guys opened for Taylor Swift in 2008, Jason Aldean this year and starting April 2010 you guys will be opening for one of the most recognizable and respected names in music today-Tim McGraw-which is amazing.

EG: Yeah, we’re thrilled, it’s a dream come true because we are huge fans of his.

SBL: It’s really a huge opportunity, Tim McGraw is one of our biggest influences-we all grew up listening to him-and the fact that he himself asked us to go on tour with him, I mean, we just thought that was cool and we’re very excited.

You guys got the opportunity to host the pre-televised CMA Awards this year correct?

SBL: We did.  We got to give out a lot of radio awards, we gave Taylor (Swift) the Video of the Year Award and what was really cool was when we got to give Kix Brooks-of Brooks and Dunn-an award and when they announced the award I was like, “He doesn’t know it yet, but Brian’s being kicked out and Kix Brooks is the new third member of Love and Theft.” We thought it was funny, some people didn’t really get it, but we got a kick out of it.

Did you guys have any star-struck moments?

EG: Well meeting anyone that you’ve idolized is incredible, but being in that element and being considered apart of the country music family is just so much more. We got to sit right behind Kris Kristofferson.

SBL: I was so nervous to even say anything to Kris-that was probably the highlight of my night-I kind of flipped out.

There was a significant gap in timing between when you guys were picked up by your label to the time you were actually signed. In that time period you guys went back to working regular day jobs; do you think it made you guys work harder and have more appreciation for where you are now?

EG: It gave us a huge appreciation for everything we are doing now-we’re working harder now than we’ve ever worked in our lives- and we’re working for something we absolutely love. Getting to play music as a job doesn’t really seem like a job because we love it so much. Having to go back to work waiting tables, valeting cars and construction definitely made us appreciate having the chance to live our dreams; we appreciate being blessed and being given the gift of music and pursuing a career that hopefully we can do for the rest of our lives.

You recently released your music video for the second single off of your debut CD- ”Dancing in Circles” did you get to have any creative input in the filming?

BB: We actually had a lot.

SBL: We got together with Kristin Barlowe-who did our first video for “Runaway”-and we were really familiar with her so we got a lot of input from her, but a lot of it was our idea too. We’re really so excited about it and choosing to do this song because it shows a different side of us, our music and who we are. The video shows a lot of people from across the world and old footage from the WWII days.

The song itself is really fantastic because anyone can relate to the pure and kind of “Golden Rule” message it sends; when I first heard it I sat back and thought about those types of things.

BB: It’s one of those things like, everyone knows you’re supposed to treat people the way you want to be treated, but very few people -ourselves included-actually do it all the time. It’s the “easier said then done” type of thing. The song sends a message of something we all need to be reminded of.

You recently launched your official site- www.loveandtheft.com -how excited are you to finally have that up?

EG: It’s really nice to be able to tell people “Go check out our website” ,we don’t have to guide people to the free Myspace site, which they still can, but we have something official. We’re thrilled to have that to show all of our Internet contacts.

You guys are young and fairly new to the scene and have had a lot of success in a short period of time. You’ve already created a lot of buzz -whether people are talking about your talents or young girls gossiping on your attractiveness-is there ever a time where is all goes to your head?

EG: I think we hold each other accountable,  if any of us feel like we’re getting ahead of ourselves or getting big heads, we’ll be the first to bring it up and bring each other back down to ground level.

SBL: Also I think as Christians, the lord gives you a humble heart when you’re walking with him.

So what’s next for Love and Theft?

BB: Gosh, a lot of things, the biggest thing on our plates right now is “Dancing in Circles” and trying to share that song with radio and as many people as possible.  We really want to help that along and I mean obviously the Tim McGraw tour, I think we’re all pretty much ready to go for that right now.  We’ll try to just keep things focused in  those directions for a while and keep our fans updated through our site on anything else going on in the new year.

Check out tour dates and keep up with the band @  www.loveandtheft.com .

*By Candace, who is uncommonly happy at 3 a.m.-weird!

 

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