By: | July 26, 2024 | Features | Monmouth County
By Ray Schweibert
There are copious cases of show-business sorts launching side pursuits – often to stoke a passion or fill some recognized void – and winding up parlaying those ideas into extremely rewarding ventures. Sammy Hagar’s side hustle was tequila, Sting became a successful wine czar, and the late Jimmy Buffett turned the laid-back, island-inspirited lifestyle into a multi-faceted conglomerate.
Alex Levine of the veteran New Jersey rock band The Gaslight Anthem also fits that mold. Levine, the bass player and backing vocalist for the New Brunswick-based foursome, honed his skills as a hair stylist in part to have something to fall back on in case playing music professionally petered out. The Gaslight Anthem has been around since 2006, recently returned from a second tour of Europe this year alone, and – with Asbury Park gigs on Aug. 15 and Sept. 15 already sold out well in advance – has a rabid and expansive fan base locally, nationally and internationally.
His band’s success did not leave Levine’s skills for sprucing up heads and faces high and dry, however. In the course of scores of concert performances over the years, Levine noticed that most backstage courtesy areas for artists were the same old song and dance – largely snack or libation zones – but nothing to help make musicians in the middle of an often grueling tour look and feel more refreshed.
“In my head, cutting hair was always a backup plan because playing music isn’t always a great way to count on making a living,” says Levine, “so I wanted to have something in my back pocket just in case.
“As the band got successful, I started utilizing cutting and styling hair, and the entire vibe of being a barber, as more of a hobby. As it progressed, I just got deeper and deeper into it and that’s around the time I realized there should be barbershops backstage.
“There just never seemed to be many things that were useful backstage – there’s only so many Red Bull and vodka tents that an artist needs – so that was kind of my foot in the door, and throughout the years I gradually got into it more as a barber/hairstylist and kept building on it.”
Levine started by setting up pop-up barbershops at music festivals around the country where The Gaslight Anthem was among the performing acts. He named the business Idle Hand Collective, and eventually grew the operation to include permanent structures on both the East and West Coasts – in Bradley Beach and San Diego.
“As I was touring, I just realized that there just aren’t that many opportunities to get a haircut on the road,” says Levine. “We launched the Idle Hand Collective traveling barbershop about seven years ago, and then, after Covid, decided it was a good opportunity to open brick-and-mortar. So we have one in Bradley Beach and we have one out in San Diego as well. The one in San Diego also has a bar and an event space, and at the one in Bradley Beach we’re building out an event space with retail. So it’s a barbershop and we also market vintage clothes. We now have two barbershops and are looking to open up more as we progress. It’s been a pretty crazy ride.”
The event spaces at Bradley Beach and San Diego will primarily be used as performing areas for local musicians seeking to get newly released material out among the masses.
“The event space is sort of a play on how the old record stores would have bands come in and do signings, Q-and-As, and usually acoustic live performances to promote new records,” Levine says. “It used to be a big concept at local record stores, but not too many places to do that kind of thing any more, especially since many record stores are struggling just to survive.
“(Hair styling) will be the shop’s bread and butter, but we’re going to sort of incorporate live performances into it too. Local artists are always looking for ways to get their music out there, and we feel that it really works well with the aesthetic of what we do.”
So, to answer the question you are all likely asking yourselves: Yes! You can get your hair cut by an actual rock star simply by booking an appointment with Alex at Idle Hand Barber Shop in Bradley Beach (provided he is not on tour at the time).
Loud, live and local
The Gaslight Anthem has two major Asbury Park gigs slated for mid-August and mid-September, sandwiched inside of an aggressive tour schedule. The first N.J. performance is
5:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 16, as part of The Stone Pony Summer Stage series at 913 Ocean Avenue, where they will be joined by indie rock bands Pinkshift and Joyce Manor.
The second show is part of the two-day Sea.Hear.Now Festival at 1300 Ocean Ave., on Asbury Park’s North Beach. Performances run from noon to 10:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 14 and 14. Levine and his bandmates – who also include lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist Brian Fallon, lead guitarist and backing vocalist Alex Rosamilia, and drummer Benny Horowitz – are scheduled for Sunday’s slate, which is headlined by a group they have interacted with often throughout each of their respective careers – Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band.
When The Gaslight Anthem released the third of its six albums in 2010, “American Slang,” Springsteen joined the Anthem on stage during its promotional tour at the Asbury Park Convention Center. On the Anthem’s most recent album, 2023’s “History Books,” Springsteen sang on the album’s title track.
“Bruce has joined us a few times over the years,” Levine says. “We played the Glastonbury Festival in England in ’08 and he joined us there. It’ll be nice to play the same night and at the same fest as the E Street Band. We can’t wait. It’s going to be a once-in-a-lifetime situation.
“It’ll be a great time but also a little crazy since we’re on tour. We’ll be in Virginia the night before, then Jersey, then the night after in Rhode Island. So we’re just sort of stopping through at home. But we’re really looking forward to it.”
Levine says that the Anthem enjoys a solid and expansive fanbase almost everywhere it plays, routinely selling out venues, but notes that the landscape in general for touring musicians is vastly different now from how it was as recently as two decades ago.
“Being in a band today I think is a lot different, perspective-wise, than maybe 15, 20, 30 years ago – basically any time before music videos and MTV disappeared, and streaming and social media became the main means that bands get their new material out today,” he says. “And social media never really was our thing. Regardless of that, we’re still able to sell out many of the same venues as some of the bands that have been around a lot longer than us, so it's been pretty nice.
“We’ve always been that band that’s been a bit under the radar, but our fanbase is honestly one of the most amazing, most loyal fanbase you could ever have. And that’s how it should be. All the great bands like the Grateful Dead and, along that genre, Phish, have relied primarily on their amazing fan bases. And then you’ve got other big indie bands that have never really broken through to the, quote, mainstream, like Wilco or My Morning Jacket – these are bands that have huge cult-like followings that are with them no matter what they’re doing, where they are, what they’re putting out.
“We’ve been lucky enough to have a fanbase like that, where they’re really invested in everything we do and all of our ventures, side projects, whatever it may be. They’re in it for the ride.”
The Gaslight Anthem
5:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 16
The Stone Pony Summer Stage in Asbury Park, 913 Ocean Ave.
The Anthem is joined by indie rock bands Pinkshift and Joyce Manor
StonePonyOnline.com/Summer-Stage
TheGaslightAnthem.com
The Sea.Hear.Now Festival
Noon to 10:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 14 and 15
Asbury Park North Beach, 1300 Ocean Ave.
Saturday's lineup features Noah Kahan, The Black Crowes, 311, The Revivalists, and several other acts. Sunday's lineup features Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, The Gaslight Anthem, Trey Anastasio Band, Norah Jones, Kool & The Gang, and several other acts.
SeaHearNowFestival.com
IdleHandBarbershop.com
