Modern Me scores a direct hit

Adam Lamah is the frontman for Modern Me, a six-piece indie-rock band from Fallbrook that’s been compared to the 1975. In an attempt to get radio play for Modern Me’s new single, “Waters,” Lamah called 91X program director Mike Halloran.

“[Halloran] told me to put up a video on their website to try to get chosen as the local band to open for Blink and Pierce the Veil at the Wrex the Halls show,” Lamah says. “I told him I already applied for that.” The video posting didn’t get Modern Me on the Wrex show or radio play. “I don’t think [Halloran] actually listened to the songs.”

Because Lamah got a Wrex ticket for Christmas, he went to the December 11 Valley View Casino Center concert and took Modern Me CDs into the show with him. “I thought maybe I’d see some 91X people there.”

He didn’t, so he flung them toward the stage.

“I threw one at Jim Atkins of Jimmy Eat World. It hit his guitar. I think he was kind of pissed. He threw it back out into the crowd. Right after that the 91X crew came onstage. I aimed it right at Halloran. It ended up hitting him right on the nip.”

The direct hit paid off.

“He said to the crowd, ‘Whose CD is this? I’m gonna play this on the air tonight.’ Right after that I emailed him and asked him if he was really going to play it. He emailed me back two hours later saying he was giving it to his assistant and to swing by the station the next day and we’d talk.”

Lamah obliged. “He didn’t promise anything, but he gave me a full tour. I got to meet everyone. He said, ‘This is the kid who hit me with a CD.’ A couple weeks later I get an email from Hilary [Chambers, 91X music director] who said that they were going to make us the Local Break for January.”

The 91X Local Break artists get a couple spins a day all month long. Mrs. Magician, Dead Feather Moon, and Midnight Pine were some of 2016’s Local Break artists.

“It feels like someone in San Diego finally threw us a bone,” Lamah says. He says the lack of local love has focused him on moving Modern Me to L.A.

“It just seems very hard to get love from local venues.” Lamah says that except for the Soda Bar’s Cory Stier, “They don’t seem to want to help local bands.”

And among those local bands, Lamah says, “There’s a lot of cockiness...bands don’t seem to want to engage with each other that much. But when we play in L.A., it seems like bands pour into us and they want to help each other. Here, when you tell people you’re a musician trying to get signed, they look down at you, like, Good luck, loser. You should be going to college. It seems like you get more encouragement in L.A.”