2008 Woodie Awards
A Life of Riley grabs big gig in New York
Adrienne Mauro '09
Issue date: 10/10/07 Section: Entertainment
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While homework, sports, and relationships are enough to dominate any student's life, a group of eight students has added touring the East Coast to the mix.
A Life of Riley, a band based in Bridgewater, N.J., formed while the members were still in high school. They released their first album, "Loud Underneath," in April of 2005. The album was not your typical local band's CD, as it sold over 1,000 copies in its first two months. The band was even able to pay back their printing debts within the first two days of release.
Unfortunately, as the band progressed to college, their collaborations occurred less frequently. Their second album, "The Resolving Note," took two years to write, while their first was written in only four months.
"Being in separate schools has made [the writing] process slower, but not any harder," said guitarist Mitch Cetuk,'09, of writing new material. "We love to play, but at the same time, we're all in school and we're where we want to be."
The boys' schools leave nothing to be desired either. The impressive list of universities attended by the bandmates includes Saint Joseph's, University of Delaware, Rutgers, Cornell, Berklee, and Tufts, with four of the band members in school for music performance, professional music, and composing. By attending such elite universities, you'd think that this band would be too stressed out to add regular touring to their schedules. On the contrary, the band's name itself extinguishes such accusations.
"If you're living the life of riley, you have an easy-going, carefree lifestyle," explained Cetuk. "Our band really tries to live with this in mind. No one in our band has more say than anyone else."
That seems like quite an accomplishment with eight band members.
The large stage presence of A Life of Riley commanded the attention of all the bar-crawlers at The Bitter End on this Oct. 6, with their trumpet, saxophone, keyboard, guitar, bass, and drum ensemble.
A Life of Riley, a band based in Bridgewater, N.J., formed while the members were still in high school. They released their first album, "Loud Underneath," in April of 2005. The album was not your typical local band's CD, as it sold over 1,000 copies in its first two months. The band was even able to pay back their printing debts within the first two days of release.
Unfortunately, as the band progressed to college, their collaborations occurred less frequently. Their second album, "The Resolving Note," took two years to write, while their first was written in only four months.
"Being in separate schools has made [the writing] process slower, but not any harder," said guitarist Mitch Cetuk,'09, of writing new material. "We love to play, but at the same time, we're all in school and we're where we want to be."
The boys' schools leave nothing to be desired either. The impressive list of universities attended by the bandmates includes Saint Joseph's, University of Delaware, Rutgers, Cornell, Berklee, and Tufts, with four of the band members in school for music performance, professional music, and composing. By attending such elite universities, you'd think that this band would be too stressed out to add regular touring to their schedules. On the contrary, the band's name itself extinguishes such accusations.
"If you're living the life of riley, you have an easy-going, carefree lifestyle," explained Cetuk. "Our band really tries to live with this in mind. No one in our band has more say than anyone else."
That seems like quite an accomplishment with eight band members.
The large stage presence of A Life of Riley commanded the attention of all the bar-crawlers at The Bitter End on this Oct. 6, with their trumpet, saxophone, keyboard, guitar, bass, and drum ensemble.
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