King youngblood

King Youngblood are skillful, socially conscious musicians with a ruthless stage presence. The band’s energetic alt-rock live shows and savvy DIY multi-media product and marketing have helped them build a strong following in the Pacific Northwest. If the stars align, they’re primed to break through nationwide. – Megan Perry, Music Connection

 

King Youngblood is focused on reclaiming the more aggressive side of alt rock music, specifically black fronted alt rock packed with strong song writing, a string section, a rogue classical cellist, some of the best electric guitar playing out there, pure AfroPunk attitude and an undeniably exhilarating live show.  Alternative Press calls King Youngblood “Seattle’s Alt Rock Princes” a description all of the music loving Pacific Northwest agrees. Founder and recent graduate from the University of Washington front man Cameron Lavi-Jones, along with, drummer Paul “Sticks” Stoot, cellist Chet Peterson, and bassist Samy Garcia have a singular mission: grab powerful guitar/cello/strings/drums alt rock by the collar and drag it into the willing arms of a fresh new generation of fans currently fueling the world-wide resurgence of the heavier side of alt rock music and the underground scene in the PNW that is fostering new music. The press agrees with affirming descriptions including AfroPunk Magazine declaring “King Youngblood’s skill at transforming a small phrase into a massive hook is at this point unparalleled in the world of heavier alternative music.”

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Their breakout 2022 year  was undeniably impactful with the noteworthy delivery of very strong songs including  Too Late Too Soon with a music video that premiered on noncommercial Seattle radio station favorite KEXP 90.3 FM.  The Seattle Times listed Big Thank in its Top 20 albums for 2022.  Big Thank, released with a resoundingly broad community celebration at the Crocodile’s Madam Lou room May 11, 2022.  King Youngblood filled the room with industry folks and fans excited to witness the honesty and depth of Lavi-Jones lyrics, vocal delivery and his band’s emotive live show. The next two years have been a wild DIY ride playing everywhere from SXSW, to Elsewhere to Bumbershoot and Thing Fest, to building their OWN festival with Black and Loud and all points in between.  

 

Lavi Jones says of the new album, “Outrun Your Shadow is a big introspective step for King Youngblood and me personally.  This album is less about change and more about what you gain and lose through the process of changing; the things you pick up and the things you are forced to leave behind as change claims itself in your life.  Writing these lyrics felt like the reflection of two mirrors facing each other.  It’s hard to avoid the consequence of self-truth when you dig in this deep.”

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Incessant touring, a graphic novel series brimming with SCI-FI and Alt Rock imagery with its own sound track called Afrothunda part one and two depicting King Youngblood as rockers and super heroes from “Planet Xenon drawn by the award-winning artist Maz Joachin,” more music videos and unique merchandise are all part of the cavalcade erupting from King Youngblood in the wake of their breakthrough album Big Thank.  The new album Out Run Your Shadow comes with a full line up of pre album release singles leading up to a late Spring release on DICE LAB records under the direction of label manager Grant McCallum (Death Cab for Cutie, Phantogram and other alt and indie rock Barsuk Records success stories where Grant comes from).  The new album is produced by multi-instrumentalist Lavi-Jones and Eric Lilavois.  “Shadow” and promises even deeper lyrics and melody than the previous album if that is even possible and a full-on string section filling out the mix in such a powerful way that the Seattle Symphony has now tapped King Youngblood for a collaboration at the historic Benaroya Hall with a full symphony orchestra in the next 18 months.

 

DIY and utterly independent, King Youngblood has performed for West Coast audiences and across the country promoting their music and their various social causes, graphic novels and signature Black and Loud Fest.  They are building from their origins: 200-700 size college house shows and are now up to 1500 to 2000 in attendance with headliner slots in theaters like the Neptune in Seattle, WA and the Bossanova Ballroom in Portland, OR.

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To further emphasize the point, Lavi-Jones founded the now going national Black and Loud Fest with Jack Daniel’s and Ariel Rider electric bikes footing the bill and Black and Brown artists sharing the light with King Youngblood.  Explains Lavi-Jones who is African American, “I wanted to find more alternative music oriented Black and Brown artists who look like me who are playing different art beyond the traditional “Black music” known as Hip Hop and RnB.  There is so much more for people of color to explore and produce.”

 

Out Run Your Shadow, goes deep into the human experience of owning where you come from and what you did to get there, even the dark places, while celebrating the proverbial journey.  This may be the band’s most personal project scaling from acoustic guitar with strings and vocal with the song Cameron’s Journal all the way up to some harder hitting songs like What You Know and All of Us Over Our Heads. “Cameron is writing songs, well crafted, pointed, intentional, hooky, melodic, emotional, cathartic songs; they could all be scaled to just his vocal and a guitar and hold their own or they could be produced all the way with a rock band and symphony orchestra.  At the end of the day, these songs hold strong.  The first time I heard them, I was singing them the next day in my car. THAT is great songwriting and in the music industry, we need more artists that write great songs.  Cameron is that guy.” Says producer Eric Lilavois who is also a national Trustee for the Recording Academy.

 

Lavi-Jones is also a second-generation Black/Jewish activist whose father, activist, and producer Maurice Jones Jr., was a member of the Black Panther Party and is the Program Manager at the community radio station, KVRU FM servicing South Seattle (the city’s most diverse district). Lavi-Jones spent the 2020 Covid-Pandemic summer writing songs and actively protesting within his Black Lives Matter community. He staged an epic teach in called This Ain’t No Picnic on the steps of the Seattle Police Department’s 12th precinct and memorialized it with “Yakubian Antics” (which scored best song and video of 2020 by Afropunk magazine while Home Is Only A House scored best song in 2021.)

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Beyond social justice activism, King Youngblood is openly and deeply involved with youth mental health issues having formed their own non-profit Hold Your Crown, in partnership with the King County Washington Mental Health Court and Pacific Northwest’s SMASH, working to break the stigma around youth mental illness. This is from the same band, who in the fall of November 2018, again in 2020 and again in 2024, received grants from the League of Women Voters to perform at over 80 high schools and colleges, registering over 3,200 new voters in 2018 and reaching over 100,000 young voters via online shows and promotions in 2020 and thousands more in 2024.  

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Through the music of King Youngblood, Lavi-Jones and his compatriots have boldly declared that unironic, melodic alt rock can stand tall as a vibrant medium of cathartic self- expression. Simply put, King Youngblood crafts beautifully crisp, deeply soulful, and elegantly strong songs. Their live show is off the chain.  In a world on fire, more of this please.