A limited amount of “Rhode Island / Southern Massachusetts 2014 Compilations” will be given out each day of The Vans Warped Tour. To acquire one just ask anyone working at the SelfMade Co. Tent.
War Games singer, Kyle Therrien and bassist, Andrew Calheta are heavily involved in Warped Tour each year, regardless of whether or not their band War Games is. Every summer since 2009 the two musicians work for War Games clothing sponsor SelfMade Co. selling merchandise at the brands tent at The Vans Warped Tour.
“It’s a great way to keep ourselves busy with in the music scene and industry. We performed once on the ‘Kevin Says Stage’ in 2009 and then we did a 22 day stint of Warped performances on the OurStage.com Stage in 2012 but whether the band is playing or not you’ll see us out there” says War Games Frontman Kyle Therrien.
This year will be no different. Andy and Kyle will be working the rigorous full US tour in the middle of summer. Andy will do the first half right up until the Mansfield, MA. date on July 10, then from there Kyle will be taking the reins and finishing the tour off, right up until August 3. Since their band has no involvement with Warped this year, Andy, Kyle and the rest of War Games began brainstorming ways in which they could make the singer and guitarist involvement in the tour benefit their band in some way.
“After stumbling upon some good ideas, we then began to brainstorm ways we could not only benefit our band, but some of our favorite local Southern MA / Rhode Island bands as well” -Kyle Therrien
“Normally when asked to do this type of thing for Warped Tour we always say no. It can be a very saturated market and a challenge to give a car away to these kids, never mind a CD. Anything you hand them most likely will end up on the ground as soon as they walk around the corner. However in this particular case it’s Andrew and myself distributing the music. We have been doing this for over five years now. Over the years we have observed and learned what it takes to get these kids to take home the record and listen to it. All it takes is talking to kids and spending time on each and every one we distribute the CD to. Our methods of talking to kids and promoting at Warped Tour have successfully helped us to gain the fan base we have. Still to this day we have kids approach us at Warped who met us on our first year working on the tour in 2009 who have been devoted fans ever since, which is truly heartwarming and rewarding. Our main goal is to gain some exposure for our local scene on a national level and what better platform than The Vans Warped Tour. -Kyle Therrien