Steamvalve Nation

Steamvalve Nation has invaded Chicago. Their objective: to rock! Guitarist and vocalist Terry “The Punisher” Tuccori was kind enough to answer a few of our questions.

Steampunks find inspiration in the past. Steamvalve Nation finds inspiration in classic hard rock. Where do the two meet?

Steamvalve Nation is inspired by classic hard rock, which just doesn’t stop there. We like to take it steps further, taking a fresh and modern approach to songwriting and sound crafting. We like to embellish and roll it into a fantasy, giving the audience much more than they anticipated. We use the theatrical Steampunk approach to engage the audience in a sci-fi fantasy adventure, to stimulate all the senses. So we find inspiration in the past, yet create an era of awe and mystery.

What can we learn from our rock history?

What goes around comes around; there is no such thing as originality. The only original element is the voice. If you really want to look at it, Amadeus Mozart was the first rock star, and Beethoven. The monarchy kept those guys, paying them royalties. They locked themselves in rooms for months writing music. They had multiple lovers on a daily basis, living as good as the royalty was keeping them, all in return for the gift of music.

On Reverbnation.com, you’ve been #1 locally, in the Top 20 nationally and Top 50 globally. To what do you owe the success?

Well recently we have been #1 Nationally and #3 Globally, That fluctuates, but we’ve been maintaining our #1 spot locally for awhile now. It’s about social media, and we work long and hard to get our music out there. We aren’t interested in what record labels have to say, we just want the whole world to hear us, and if someone can hear us and it shifts their day around and they say I like it, we’ve done our job. Yes, it would be nice to be compensated for it, everyone wants to be paid for their labors, but for right now the music is our gratification.

Your Reverbnation page points out that 50% of the sales go to the Keep a Child Alive charity. Can you tell us more about your involvement?

Unfortunately the involvement is not much, because it’s hard to actually sell music. We hope that changes one day when people become more interested in our music. We picked this charity because children are our future. If we don’t nurture and educate children, what sort of future will we have? The videos show children in Africa, with no parents and living in communities ravaged by HIV. But this is a worldwide problem and affects us all.

What does the future hold for Steamvalve Nation?

Steamvalve Nation is putting together a show which includes more “traditional” Steampunk musicians and actors, and hope to showcase this summer sometime. We are writing and getting ready to record next month, and just want to keep putting the music out to the world.

Bonus question: Do cultural or political ties hold the Steamvalve Nation together?

Absolutely not, we do what we want in the name of freedom.

Take a trip to Steamvalve Nation at http://steamvalvenation.com!