Michael Winslow is not involved in what I’m about to say in any way. However, if he wanted to endorse us, who am I to say no? I am very excited to announce the creation/debut of my new Police tribute band, The Police Academy! That’s right, despite being more busy than I’ve EVER been in my life after college, I’ve teamed up with two friends to start a new band. 

   Being that I only play the drums, I will be portraying Stewart Copeland. A drummer I’ve idolized nearly my entire life. Playing my band rival Sting is Joshua Jones. One of these annoying assholes that can play every instrument. And not just sort of play each instrument, MASTERED each instrument. I’ve had the privilege of performing with him in Sgt. Pepper in our Beatles vs. Stones show. The guy is a monster musician, and I don’t envy the high notes he’ll have to sing in this band. Christian Hernandez is our band’s “middle child”, also known as Andy Summers. Yes, I’m in a band with yet another overly-talented annoying asshole. A guy who can play everything and is a consummate professional. He’s a rare breed in the music industry. And I’m very honored and privileged to be in a band with these two.

   The Police has been in my top 5 bands for as long as I can remember, and Stewart is in my top 3 favorite drummers. Here’s a man I have definitely stolen from been inspired by throughout my career. In the first recordings by my original band The Shade, you can hear the Copeland-esque drumming in pretty much every song.

   Funny enough, The Police Academy (hereby known as “TPA”) started as a joke when Josh, Christian, and I were on tour with Beatles vs. Stones. We were in Boca Raton, FL hanging out outside the hotel after the gig. After getting accosted briefly by a couple of drunk Florida people, we decided we were tired of the tribute world as it was. “LeT’s STarT oUr owN bANd!” one of us jokingly said, and thankfully we eventually landed on a tribute to The Police.

   Why The Police? Well, there are three of us; like the members of The Police, all three of us have roots in Jazz, and most of all, the music is great! It was either this or Rush, and I don’t feel like having to set up that drum kit every show. 

   The three of us decided to split up the band duties, and I took on the roles I knew how to do. Tech stuff! Website, promo, videos, all the fun stuff. Well, the stuff that is a lot of work in the beginning. For this band, I’m glad to do it all. And I’m learning new skills in video editing and web design. Building the show’s on-stage media was a long arduous process that I almost didn’t finish in time. Okay, I technically didn’t finish in time, but I finished enough to put the show on.

   After months of planning, building an entire show from scratch, and a grand total of 3 rehearsals, TPA had our debut show at Campus Jax in Newport Beach, CA. The event took place on Aug. 6th and did not go off without a hitch. Of course, we had tech problems that extended our sound check. Then some other tech problems occurred at the start of the show. But finally, at our third song, everything started working. I can’t tell you how happy I was when everything finally started to work smoothly. The audience was loving us, the band sounded great, and best of all, THE VIDEO WORKED!!!!