Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Matt Larocque. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Matt , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

I’ve always been creative/artsy ever since I was a little kid. I always had good grades in school and never had an issue with classes like math or science, but I never enjoyed them. Often times my way of taking notes was just doodling in my notebook or writing song ideas out. Of course the only way to make money these days seems to be in the trades, medical, or engineering fields, all of which I find boring. So of course the things I am good at such as art, music, film, and design are all severely underpaid and practically require you to go viral before anyone will take you seriously or pay your worth, despite these things being everywhere in everyday life. But I’d rather do something I love than be miserable forever even though I’d have a little more peace of mind with some extra cash. I originally chose to be a graphic designer as it is the most likely way to make a career from art. Starting a band was always something I wanted to do and actually make a name for itself, but that is even harder to get famous with.

My band Plethora itself originally started as a joke intended to have just a one-off show, but the crowd reception we got made us want to continue on. As a band that does comedic rock/metal type music, making the crowd laugh and forget their problems for a night is more that worth it to me, because lets face it, this world sucks and we need those distractions to keep us going.

Matt , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I myself am the frontman, guitarist, and song writer for the comedic rock/kazoo metal/party folk band Plethora from Flint, Michigan. We’ve played all over Michigan including The Machine Shop, The Michigan Renaissance Festival, Harpo’s, The Token Lounge, and the Nordic Fire Festival to name a few.

The band presents itself as a group a heroes created at the dawn of time who saved the earth from evil with the power of the Almighty Kazoo. We then froze ourselves in magic ice to thaw one day when the planet needed saved again. Emerging from the ice in 2010 (when the band was officially created in real life) we discovered a land in need of warriors to liberate the earth from the terrorism of modern day music and lack of creativity. Our outfit style is a mix of medieval armor meets a modern day superhero suit, as heroes of the past basically just time traveled. They would have been perplexed by things such as the “merica memes”, US culture, and explosion of the superhero film genre, so they tailored their new look appropriately. It should be noted that we are not politically affiliated.

The band name Plethora originates from the idea that all of our songs range in many different genres. While typically based in rock and metal, other genres ranging from folk, edm/techno, symphonic, groove, blues, funk, and prog are used throughout, usually attempting to match the lyric content of the song. For example, our pirate songs use accordions or whistles to accompany the rock/metal styles while our song Cat Party uses dance and dubstep elements throughout. I believe this approach to songwriting and our overall gimmick definitely sets us apart from a lot of other bands. That and we also have 2 versions of the band so to speak, with an acoustic version that plays all our folkier rock stuff at renaissance festivals.

Almost everything we do is DIY. I myself do all of our graphic design for merchandise, website, and album art. We do have some assistance with filming live sets and music videos but I also edit those as well. For album recording, drums are tracked separately at Tuxedo Avenue Recording Studios in Roseville while I track the guitars/vocals/keyboards at my house. After tracking is done, I send it back to the studio for mixing/mastering.

As far as what we are most proud of, I would say its the fact that we’ve been around almost 15 years to this point and are still going strong. So many bands that were around when we started have all broken up. Heck even bands that started after us have also broken up, so it feels weird being the veterans in the area even though we are all in our early 30’s age member wise.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

Seeing the audience participating in our live show and laughing/singing along to every song. We have a wild stage show that involves props, stage dancers/stunts, and even giving food out to the crowd. You might find yourself in a rowing pit or digging fake holes to the beat of a song about mining dwarves haha! Having a successful release of new music/videos is also very rewarding after all the hours put in making it.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Sharing artist posts, videos, music… that’s all free to do and helps a ton. You can invite 1000 people per day to follow Facebook pages as well which is even better and takes 10 seconds. Social media algorithms really work against artists and hide your content behind paywalls, so the more organic reach and shares we can get will help break past that threshold. With music for some reason, there seems to be a ton of people who just hate new music and outright refuse to go see local bands/artists, despite those shows being cheap or free. I myself get bored of music and constantly need more new stuff to listen to. You can find all sorts of cool bands or artists on the Youtube suggested videos after clicking a band you like.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://plethoramusic.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/plethora_music/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PleThorAmusic1
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@PleThorAMusic1
• Other: Spotify

  https://open.spotify.com/artist/7DisMNxXFNUnJaSnozt0vf?si=Vr4WyAmmS5K3tSMW7Wxfzg

Image Credits

Hootsforce Photography
Roaming Roach Photography
Vince Pultorak