We were lucky to catch up with Nick Galbincea  (Vocalist & Guitarist of Wake Magnolia) recently and have shared our conversation below.

Nick , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

I think over the past 3 years the most meaningful project for Wake Magnolia was first and foremost, surviving Covid as a band. A lot of bands called it “quits” during 2020, especially when no one was playing out. Second, it would be recording, releasing and promoting our first full length album, “Shadow Cast Light”. During this time, we were recording this record and took the down time from playing shows to learn more about the “business side” of music.

We learned how to promote our music via college radio (Shadow Cast Light was played on over 100 radio stations across the USA, including local stations 88.9 The Alternation, 107.3 Alternative Cleveland, and 91.3 The Summit), magazine article reviews (New Noise Magazine, Ghettoblaster Magazine & VENTS Magazine), music contests (Wake Magnolia was a national finalist in the 2021 Jack Daniel’s Battle of the Bar Bands presented by iHeartMedia and won best rock band in the 2022 Cleveland Music Awards), and licensing for TV (Wake Magnolia currently has licensing contracts with Discovery, MTV, The Real World, and NASCAR).

We really took the time to market and “get the record out there”, and for our first album we really thought it was well received. We’ve had interviews both locally and from radio stations and podcasts (91.3 The Summit, 105.5 WXTQ, The Part-Time Rockstar Podcast, Squires Station Podcast & Level Up Cleveland). As an underground/ DIY artist it is super important to put just as much time into marketing your music as it is to create the music. It’s tough, time consuming and draining, but ultimately if you want your music to be heard, it is necessary.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I really got into music when I was around 10 or 11 years old. I got my first guitar when I was 14 and haven’t put it down since. I immediately started learning all of the classic guitar riffs from Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, and so on. For me it was all about the guitar riffs. I started my first band when I was about 17/18 years old (2010) and eventually formed Wake Magnolia in 2017. Wake Magnolia is a two piece alternative rock band based out of Akron, OH who’s sound can be described as dirty melodic rock. We’ve played all over Ohio, usually between Cleveland and Columbus, but this year (2023) are playing out of state in Maryland, Michigan and hopefully more.

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

Now more than ever it is important that fans directly support artists as much as possible. By this I mean, showing up to shows (buying tickets), purchasing merch and sharing the artist via their own personal venues (social media, word of mouth, wearing a t-shirt). In this day and age, it is easier now than ever to create music and upload it somewhere for people to listen, but with this it’s even more difficult to stand out as a band/ artist. That is why the fan base matters so much more now. There are tons of awesome artists and bands out there, specifically in the Akron/ Cleveland scene, but without people showing up to shows, buying merch and representing that band outside of the venue, these artists will not grow and flourish.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

I think the most rewarding aspect of being an artist is seeing people’s reactions when you’re on stage performing and talking with them once you’re done playing. We just got back from playing a music festival in Baltimore, MD and I can’t tell you the number of people that came up to me, gave us compliments, shook my hand and even bought merch. Literally have never been to this state before and after playing met so many awesome people. I think one of the best examples of this that I can give is after we were done headlining Musica (Akron, OH) in early November of 2022, I was at the merch stand after our set and this couple came up and just showered us with compliments. The more interesting part was, that they were actually on their way to another venue to see another artist, heard us from outside, ended up coming to our show, having a great time and stuck around till it was done to talk to me, compliment the band, and buy merch. As an artist there is no greater compliment than that scenario, and I am very grateful for it.   

Contact Info:

• Website: https://linktr.ee/WakeMagnolia
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wakemagnolia/ https://www.instagram.com/wakemagnolia/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WakeMagnolia
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/channel/UCxPgMJ8h6VVbmUZfci1-aGA
• Merch Store: https://wakemagnolia.bandcamp.com/

Image Credits
Phots by Devon Keller