Today we’d like to introduce you to M.C. Armstrong.
Hi M.C. , we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Viva la Muerte was born as a fiddle and two guitars back in 2005. Over the past twenty years, we’ve expanded into a five-piece outfit, gone electric, released four albums, and performed in New York, Nashville, and all over the Southeast. In 2019 the readers of YES! Weekly voted Viva the best original band in the Triad.
Our music lives at the crossroads of rock, folk, blues, funk, and jazz. We call what we do psychedelic-Americana. Right now, we’re working on a new album, “Spirit,” which will explore the challenges of truth-telling and doing what the spirit says do in an age of white noise, tribalism, techno-feudalism, artificial intelligence, and forever wars.
Our singer-songwriter, M.C. Armstrong, worked as war reporter in Iraq, teaches creative writing at North Carolina A&T, and grew up in Winchester, Virginia. Patsy Cline’s mother was Armstrong’s babysitter. Like Patsy, M.C. loves crazy songs that dare to long. VLM is a family. We are Wes Allen on drums, M.C. Armstrong on rhythm guitar, vocals, and songwriting, Colton Strandberg on lead guitar, Nikki Trail on saxophone, and Jared Zehmer on bass.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Time and space are the biggest challenges for our band. How do you find time to play when everyone in the band works full-time? How do you create space for creativity when your culture wants you to outsource your questions and memories to AI? How do you keep your loving spirit alive when so many voices seem hell-bent on encouraging the opposite of courage, i.e. tribalism and silence?
Viva chooses not to comply with the paint-by-numbers templates of the dominant culture. Our band comes from all over the map. We don’t see our diversity as a weakness. We see it as a strength and we rejuvenate by playing together whenever we can. We feel that music is medicinal. We see music as the practice of peace. We like to have fun!
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
First album: All the Birds
Second album: The Eyes of Men
Third album: Storm Country
Fourth album: Stand for the Wild (Storm Country Live)
Fifth album (forthcoming): Spirit
Before we go, is there anything else you can share with us?
Here’s our press kit content: Viva la Muerte is a spiritual walkabout, from the front porch to the desert to the magnolia, thoughtful music that doesn’t forget to have fun. VLM was born as a fiddle and two guitars back in 2005 and is now a critically acclaimed rock band with two $10,000 Kickstarter campaigns under their belt as well as a successful first album, “All the Birds.” Praise for “All the Birds” came from a number of sources: “‘All the Birds’ is a great new album that certainly puts most of the boring folk music these days in its place. The album screams with creativity,” said Amplifier magazine. “It’s a beautiful piece of work, with pedal steel guitar, mandolin, piano and songs full of love, death and serendipity,” wrote Jeri Rowe of The Greensboro News and Record. Even west coast DJs like David Gans of The Grateful Dead Hour took note of “All the Birds,” Gans saying: “Very nice variety of feels and flavors here. Hearkens back to the ’60s in the best possible way. Armstrong’s voice brings to mind Jim Morrison but without the false menace.”
Pricing:
- $750 for a show within fifty miles of Greensboro
- $1,000 for shows between fifty and two hundred miles away.
- $2,500 for shows between two hundred and five hundred miles away.
- $300 for the Viva duo/trio to play a three hour set.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://vivalamuerteband.com/press-kit
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vivalamuerteband/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/vivalamuerteband/
- Twitter: https://x.com/VivaLaMuerteNC
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/vivalamuerte
- Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/vivalamuerte
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@vivalamuerteband
