The Story of Musicbox
If you read my previous blog ‘My Photography Journey’ , you know that one show lead to my discovery of local music. One of the earliest shows I saw was when I was still in High School. My best friend at the time brought me along to Six50, a Christian run event in the back of a church. They would book local and touring bands as well as play movies and sell snacks. It was there that I first saw Maryland pop-punk band Underscore. I was a teenage girl and thought the boys of Underscore were cool and cute and made sure to meet them after their set.
I started going to every Underscore show I could at rec centers and high school auditoriums. Through them I discovered other bands local to DC, Maryland and Virginia such as Army of Me, Stars Hide Fire, Silent Film and Thin Dark Line. It was a cool scene of people with tattoos, piercings and dyed hair. At the time, I wanted nothing more than to be like them. There was a girl in the scene who who known for handing out her own mix CDs outside of shows. I thought this was a cool idea and figured there must be some way I too can help promote these bands, who at the time I assumed were on the brink of fame.
The first thing Musicbox ever did was pass out flyers. My mom, brother and I would stand outside venues like 930 club and The Ottobar handing out slips of paper announcing bands upcoming shows. The staff at 930 club tolerated us, as long as we picked up every flyer discarded on the ground at the end of the night. We met a lot of cool people on the stoop of the 930 club which lead to several new working relationships. My mom became acquainted with the venue staff and owners at The Ottobar, 930 Club, Fletchers, Recher Theatre, Rams Head Live and Sonar to name a few. She then offered for us to hand out flyers directly for the venues.
It wasn't long until my mom and I were attending multiple shows a week. We offered bands a place to stay when they were in town and Underscore even used my bedroom as their practice space. Around this time is when I began doing photo at shows. I had absolutely no idea what I was doing but I would share them with bands to use on their Myspace pages.
Musicbox began to grow and diversify. Instead of just promoting shows we started booking them. We originally went by ‘Musicbox Promotions’ but eventually changed the name to ‘Musicbox Entertainment’ since we no longer simply promoted shows. The very first show we booked was for my 15th birthday party. It was at a small venue called My Brothers Place in Waldorf, Maryland. In total, there were 8 bands including Underscore and multiple touring acts from Los Angeles and New York. We later went on to book shows at The Ottobar, Fletchers, Sonar and other local venues. Musicbox also expanded out of Maryland and DC into Northern Virginia. We frequented venues like Jaxx and Providence Rec Center, where I once saw The Plain White T’s. Musicbox was booking bands like The Maine, All Time Low and We the Kings when they still had trouble getting people to come to their shows in small high school auditoriums.
Then things expanded even further beyond the “DMV” area and we started working with Ryan Wapner in Altoona, Pennsylvania. Once we realized the scene was much larger than just our area, we began working with festivals like Flipside, Park Rock and even Warped Tour. One year we followed the Warped Tour and I photographed several dates for the Alternative Press Magazine website.
Musicbox always had a myspace page but when things started getting more official we made a geocities website. The main idea was to promote bands and help them find shows to play. We then began adding the venues and bands we worked with to our website, making it somewhat ‘exclusive’. We even began working with record labels and magazines, passing out stickers and promo CDs. We created our own street team, offering fans free tickets, supplied by the venues, if they wanted to help us promote. We got Musicbox t-shirts printed and a giant banner we would hang on the stage of shows we promoted or booked.
Somehow, my mom even managed to get us sponsors. If your band was ever booked on a Musicbox show then you probably remember two things: free chipotle and rockstar energy drinks. We had a giant mack-truck pull up in front of our house and unload palettes of the drinks for us to give away to bands before Rockstar was a well known brand. Chipotle sent us free burrito coupons and catered shows before anyone had ever heard of them. They even sent my mom a plaque naming her an official Chipotle brand ambassador. It was ridiculous - and it definitely made us popular with the bands on our shows, who most days would eat gas station food on the road.
I started getting as many photo passes as I could through bands, venues and the other connections we had made and posted the photos on the Musicbox website. I also did interviews with bands and cut together terrible quality videos in iMovie. This added exclusive content and another reason for fans and bands to visit our site and want to work with us.
*Interview with The Cab
In 2011 I moved to New York and started working full time. Myspace was no longer the center of peoples lives and no one had raccoon stripes in their hair anymore. Everyone seemed to grow up and move on from the scene. While I no longer had time for Musicbox, my mom carried on the legacy for several years. She continued to book shows and hold street team meetings. What I think a lot of people at the time didn’t realize is that while I was the ‘face’ of Musicbox, my mom was the one doing all the actual work. I would hang out with the bands and take pictures, but she would be the one talking to the venue owners, record labels and magazines. She is the one who drove me to all the shows and none of it ever would have happened without her. So here’s to you, Musicbox Mom. Without her, I wouldn’t have any of these memories to cherish and who knows what my life would have been.
