Today we’d like to introduce you to Experience.
Hi Experience, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Our story starts in 2014 with 2 brothers and their best friends jamming in a basement in Essex, MD. The 4 of us were obsessive about music since childhood and reached our early teen years with a fierce ambition to do something about it. Before we’d even settled on a name, we began to get offers from family friends to play backyard parties and were luckily taken under the wing of our drummer’s teacher’s band, The Drunken Uncles, and got our first taste of playing in bars well before we were allowed to be in them. We decided on the name, Experience, based on a song written by our former bassist and singer, Phoenix. Over the next 12 years we would continued to establish ourselves in the local Baltimore scene. Our style evolved from prog rock to classic rock, to psych rock, jam and everything in between. The core of the band consisted of Dylan and Jason Kendall and long time friend, Aaron Donahue with a different cast of bassists over the years, but we have settled on a relatively new line up featuring bassist Aidan Brown and keyboardist, Nick Young. By relentlessly gigging throughout Maryland, we’ve built a cult following of people who have a penchant for authentic rock and roll that harkens back to the golden era of the late 60’s-early 70’s. While we do have original music, we’ve been more widely recognized for our cover material and our resurrection and interpretations of rock deep cuts.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
The most difficult part of this band has honestly been maintaining the energy and focus to keep it going. With the previous revolving door of bassists, all of the members having other music projects outside of the band, and all the usual and sometimes unusual curveballs that life tends to throw at you, there were times we weren’t sure of what our future would hold. Even when we expected it to, the band simply wouldn’t die. Fortunately, the one factor that has been a major force in keeping it going is the demand from fans, promoters, bar owners, and other bands for us to keep playing live shows. We’ve been blessed to be embraced by such a supportive community who we feel sometimes believes in us more than we believe in ourselves.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
We’ve built our identity on being a band that plays what we want how we want. We’ve pushed the limits as to what you can get away with being a bar band and found a way to make it work. We try to capture the spirit of raw explosive rock and roll that relies heavily on improvisation. We’ve always stayed true to that since day one. It was never really been about what’s popular or what could get us more engagement on TikTok or Reels. It’s music for music’s sake.
What are your plans for the future?
At the moment, we’ve got a busy summer ahead of us with plenty of outdoor bar and festival gigs. Oddly enough, after all these years, we still haven’t officially released any music, but we’re hoping to change that soon.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/experienceofficialband?igsh=bGd0dmllN2xrczlp&utm_source=qr
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/1HQtDApgTB/?mibextid=wwXIfr
