Columbia band brings music to The Money

By Jessica Pickens

 pickensj@thejohnsonian.com 

Full Color Footage performs at The Money on Oct. 6. The Columbia-based band recently released an EP, “Tough Luck, Kid” in August. Photo courtesy of Full Color Footage.Two Books-A-Million baristas, a “paper-and-ink jockey” at Office Depot and a house painter all combine to form the band Full Color Footage. 

Drummer Matt Crumpton and lead singer Mario McClean met at Books- A-Million three years ago and have played together for the past three years. 

“We have had a lot of lineup changes over the past couple of years,” Crumpton said. “We officially played our first show as a quartet on New Year’s Eve (of 2010).” 

Since the Columbia-based band’s first show, the group has played all new material. 

“This year, we have had all new material and collective ideas,” he said. 

The band doesn’t place themselves under one genre, but a mix of Indie, “a touch of pop and rock and a hint of jazz.” 

“Our music style is kind of hard to explain,” said bassist Scott Smith. “We all have very different musical influences which come together to form a unique sound that varies greatly from song to song.”

Smith said the four band  members do not have one musical influence in common. 

“Mario does all the lyrics, but usually what will happen is one of the band members will bring an idea and we go from there,” Crumpton said. “We throw our collective stuff together and it ends up different than it started.” 

Recently, the band has picked up several gigs, playing in a battle of the bands at the New Brookland Tavern in Columbia and the upcoming October Festival in downtown Columbia on Oct. 23. 

Crumpton said the band wants to take their career as far as they can go.

“We are going to keep writing songs and playing them for people until people no longer want to hear what we have to say,” Smith said. 

Money is not something the band has to worry about. Full Color Footage has its own bank account that it uses for band costs.

“The money we live off comes from our day jobs. We use the money we earn from shows for gas, CDs and T-shirts,” Crumpton said. “Making the account turned out to be the best idea we’ve ever had.”

The band recently released an EP in August called “Tough Luck, Kid,” and they have received positive feedback from audiences.

Full Color Footage is surprised by the audience following they have received.  

“It’s humbling and amazing that people get that into our music,” Crumpton said. “Something that we have created means that much to somebody.” 

The band hopes to travel and play more outside of Columbia. 

“We have built a loyal fan base and are looking to push boundaries of where we play,” Smith said. “We hope to do a small Southeast tour in the near future.”

Full Color Footage is playing at 8 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 6, at The Money.