Rivet Gun was originally conceived as a fictitious band trying to find their way out of downtown NYC’s ‘shit-hole bars’ in the off-off-Broadway musical Negative Space, whose debut was unceremoniously canceled in March 2020 due to the onset of COVID19. The band members were hired guns - legit Broadway pit and session players hand-picked to back protagonist Wilma Rivets, a power-voiced front woman with an attitude and an affinity for slam poetry. Thanks to COVID, the music they had brought to life never made it out into the world, until now. Two plus years of wearing masks in studios and sending demos and tracks around have materialized in the band’s first self-titled album. Rivet Gun adds modern flavor to the counter-culture lyricism of Jim Morrison and Bob Dylan, served on a bed of snarly guitar licks and fleshy organ swirls. They are true urban gourmets, stirring the pot with irreverent socio-political views and raw sharings.
Sounds Like: The Pretenders, Aimee Mann
Rivet Gun Bio
Rivet Gun was born from the off-off-Broadway rock musical "Negative Space", cancelled on opening night in 2020 due to COVID-19. Converted to a screenplay with original songs and lyrics, the script was a semi-finalist in the Big Apple Film Festival. Members of Rivet Gun bonded during production of the show and refused to be cancelled.
The band are a NYC-native wrecking crew of legit Broadway pit and session players handpicked to back power-voiced front woman Wilma Rivets. As the band's name derives from Rosie, the iconic purveyor of feminine strength, the original rhythm section was also anchored by women drummer and bassist, with token male guitar and keyboard players.
As the story goes, Wilma hailed from Akron, Ohio, rubber capital of the world and home to her hero, Chrissie Hynde. Wilma's first band was a Pretenders cover band called "Steel Belt", which morphed into Rivet Gun in the 90's when she moved to New York's Lower East Side, incubator of attitude-laden original rock. Several songs evoke that time and place.
COVID provided Rivet Gun the opportunity to quarantine in the studio and record the songs from the show along with similarly minded new material. Their self-titled first album, released in 2022, unabashedly takes on current socio-political challenges like the environment, humanity, and cultish, truth-challenged politics. The single "Hanging In The Flame" continues to attract thousands of listeners and followers on Spotify.
Rivet Gun's latest single and EP, "Rosie", released on Pearl Harbor Day, is both a tribute to and troubling highlight reel of feminism since The War. Rosie has struck a chord with twenty-something's as evidenced by 400+ streams per day on Spotify. Other songs on the EP flex the band's range and appreciation for multiple rock-induced genres and eras.
While the bandmates are young, Rivet Gun's music sympathizes with multiple decades, from 70's, Stones-inspired riffing and twanging through 80's and 90's CBGB-spawned alternative rasps, to 2000's rap-laced fusions and mellower acoustic grooves. True urban gourmets, Rivet Gun adds modern flavor to the counter-culture lyricism of Jim Morrison and the post-beatnik troubadours, served on a bed of snarly guitar licks and fleshy organ swirls.
Rivet Gun's songs almost always originate as poems with sharp edges or softness already built in. The meter of the lines tend to emit melodies, chord shapes and riffs that buoy words and phrases. Instrumental breaks and bridges appear like veering off the main road for a snack or to glimpse a vista or last drop of a sunset. Sometimes, songs germinate from a spoken line that is unintentionally musical, like "there is only one failure for you and that is not to be true", the chorus on "Clenched in Hell's Teeth".
The band is grounded in the belief that as musical styles come and go, re-branded as 'classic' or 'retro', sampled and derived into other forms, lyrical content and melodic poetry have always been where the rubber meets the road. Rivet Gun also respects the throwback concept of an album, traditionally a linear tour through a rich landscape of sounds and topics instead of a singular voice.
More studio music is planned in 2024, including more songs off the Rosie EP. Rivet Gun also looks forward to videos and live performances.