The phrase “New Year, New Me” is often a hollow motto people slap upon themselves on January 1 as an affirmation to support their New Year’s resolution. However, by late January this motto has fallen by the wayside.
That is, unless you’re Tom Hamilton.
In 2026, the man known for his work in bands like Joe Russo’s Almost Dead, Brothers Past, American Babies and Ghost Light, is now going by his name, and his name alone for the first time in his career. He’s reinvented his sound, working with Alex Farrar (MJ Lenderman, Waxahatchee) to create a grittier more personal record in I’m Your Vampire. The album, which dropped mid-January teeming with killer guitar work, huge harmonies, introspective lyricism and is a showcase for Hamilton’s pristine vocals.
We caught up with Tom Hamilton to discuss his brand new album, his first foray as a solo artist, his new radio show, killer guitar solos, and of course, Gritty.
You’ve been in so many bands over the years — Brothers Past, American Babies, Ghost Light, and of course you’re currently in JRAD (Joe Russo’s Almost Dead). What inspired you to go out on your own and record and then tour as Tom Hamilton?
Part of it was definitely Ghost Light. I loved that band. It was really fun, and it just kind of fell apart in an unceremonious way. That was my baby, you know? I worked on that thing 24/7 for a long time, and to have it kind of all just fall apart for reasons out of my control … I don’t really necessarily want to have that happen again.
My management team and my agent said “Dude, just go out under your own name.” But man, I fought this shit kicking and screaming … I was not down. I’ve always preferred to have a moniker, just one step removed from me to the people.
But man, my dad got sick and passed away…
So sorry man, I’ve been there.
Thank you. I mean, it’s just a rite of passage, right? During his illness and subsequently after his passing I did a lot of fucking work, a lot of digging in. I feel like I’m in a new era of my creativity. I feel I’ve found the next chapter of what I want to do for at least a little while. Like you said, I’ve been in a lot of bands. I just like working with different people. Creating art … it’s an addiction. And that’s where all the differing bands all come in. I get different things from different people, and there’s different outcomes from different collaborations. I feel like writing this record cracked something new open, which is really exciting to be deep into a career and finding new lanes.
When I put Ghost Light together, I had so much anxiety because that was my third band that I was the lead songwriter for. Brothers Past, was my first band out of high school, and then American Babies. Then with Ghost Light, I was like, ‘Man, I gotta find a third identity.’ I’m not just gonna keep making the same thing. It’s a new project, so I want to find a new identity for it. It caused me so much stress. Going into this project I just let creativity lead the charge. I didn’t stress about it. I didn’t go into anything with a preconceived … anything [because] I let creativity dictate the whole thing.
Midstream I realized what was happening. Me and my writing partner, Pete [Tramo], we found the lane. We found this thing that doesn’t necessarily sound like anything that we’ve done previously so far. That’s a great feeling, man.
In the press release, it was written that this record is “a 10-song suite wreathed in tattered-flannel rock & roll.” I could really feel that ’90s vibe, which is a bit of a radical departure from your previous work.
You know it’s funny. I’ve been doing a lot of press for this album. And that’s a common thing that a lot of people say, and it’s cool. I’m a child of that music, absolutely, but there was no nostalgia on our end.
Oh definitely didn’t feel like there was any nostalgia-bait here, but there’s definitely a grittier, grungier vibe. And the guitar solos, oh man, they were awesome.
[It’s] one of the things that made me feel good about using my name. I’ve made a lot of records over the years — two with Ghost Light, five with American Babies, and three with Brothers Past … and not one of them is a guitar record. Of all those records, there’s maybe two maybe-ish guitar solos. I always would get in my head about that. It’s weird being a guitar player sometimes. There’s a lot of assumed ego involved.
I would always make records and try to purposely avoid that shit. I realized that I would like to make a record where there’s some fucking guitar heroics on it. I feel like “Don’t Give Up On Me” was the first song that we did where it was like, “Oh, okay we’re gonna put a fucking guitar solo in this thing.” Or maybe it might have been “Kissing with Our Eyes Closed.” One of those two. It was the first thing where we were working it out. I kind of laid into something, and it was like, “Oh shit this is a good vehicle for that.”
On this album you worked with Alex Farr, who worked with MJ Lenderman and Wednesday. Can you talk about how you came to work with him and what he brought to the record?
Man, Alex, dude, what a great guy. [Pete and I] spent X amount of time writing this record. We basically got it down to 20 songs in all in varying stages of recording. But, we’d been working on it forever. It took us a year to write this shit, and then we started recording. We made most of the records here at my studio. So when everything’s in the house and there’s not a lot of outside stimulation, it can kind of get a little fucking wonky. Your vision gets a little fucked up and you lose perspective.
So my manager, the sage advice from him was kind of getting out of Dodge, going somewhere else to work and get some outside perspective. We had eight tracks done, eight of the 10 songs were in some form of recorded. There were still two songs left that we had to start building, and I thought this was a great fucking idea. So he talked to Alex, and obviously, I knew those records from MJ Lenderman, Waxahatchee, and Wednesday. I love the guitar sounds on that shit, man. He’s just great. So we just booked… we had 10 days down there at his studio called Drop a Sun, it’s in Asheville, North Carolina.
They have this little studio apartment that is attached to the studio, and I just went down by myself with no other players or anything. We just worked together. We went through the stuff I had and we’re fine-tooth combing what we already had. Then we recorded the basic tracks to the two songs that we couldn’t figure out in Philly. He brought in these two incredible musicians, this drummer Kevin Rumley and a bass player named Dave Hartley, who’s in The War on Drugs.
We just fucking did a lot of work down there, buttoning up on things, and just making shit better. And that’s just what Alex does. He makes everything better, he has great ideas. His studio’s fantastic, it sounds incredible, and it was just such a positive experience. I hope to get back down there when we start working on the next thing, and make sure his fingerprints are on whatever else we’re doing. He’s a really, really supportive producer. He’s just so artist-friendly. He told me, ‘I’m here to help you in making the record you want.’ He’s just such a gem.
Those guys you mentioned won’t be hitting the road with you, so can talk about the army that you have assembled, your new band that you have backing you up on the road.
My bass player is this guy Taylor Schell, who was in that band Turkuaz. He was the dude in that band. He joined Ghost Light at the end there. We just really hit it off so when Ghost Light went away and wanted to keep working together. On keys is my friend Tom McKee; we’ve been playing together since 1998. He was in my first band Brothers Past. We did Brothers Past together for a long time, and then when that stopped, we took some space. You start playing with somebody when you’re 19 after a decade or so, we took a little time apart. We reconnected during COVID, and that was really positive. It’s been really nice to reconnect and have a bud with that kind of history.
Sometimes you need a brother from the past. Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Yeah, lobbed it up there.
Sometimes you gotta just take it.
I’m not here to fight it, man. And then on drums, we have this new drummer, his name’s Nick Paternostro, he’s a young guy from right outside of Philadelphia. He’s just been a fucking monster for us, man. He also loves improvising, but he’s not coming at it from The Dead or Phish necessarily. It’s more krautrock like StereoLab. It’s been incredibly cool to have that kind of energy meeting with the tie-dyed energy of my history.
For the first time, I’m bringing a backup singer out — this lovely woman named Rachel Cole. She’s new to the fold. I grew up in a big harmony household and all my records are pretty thick with that stuff. In making this record there’s a lot of female vocals on it. Raina [Mullen], my bandmate from Ghost Light; she’s all over this record with the high harmony stuff. When it came to touring, Raina’s got her own gig and she’s doing her shit, so we knew we had to bring a female with us to get those thick, thick harmonies out there.
I’m stoked. It’s the first time in a long time where I feel like I can just go and make art and not worry about any of the other shit. I really believe in this record. I don’t think there’s any bullshit in there. I’m excited to bring this intentional music to people and see how they respond.
You mentioned tie-dye, so I gotta bring up your new show on The Grateful Dead Channel on SiriusXM (Channel 23) called Going Down the Road. Tell us about how the show came together and what it’s all about.
It was pretty accidental, to be quite honest.
That’s how the best stuff happens.
I did a guest spot on the Grateful Dead channel two years ago. Then my manager who at the time we were pretty fresh in our relationship so he was kind of still getting to know me — who I am and what I do. He was like, ‘Hey man, that radio spot … you’re pretty good at that, you know?’ I like to talk, what can I say? He just kind of floated the idea of, like, “If I could get you a show, would you want a show? ” I was just like that seems so unlikely. I said, “Go ahead, get me a radio show on Sirius.” Thinking nothing would come of it. Then, I don’t know, six months ago he was like, “Hey! We got it.”
So it was cool … but what the fuck is the show? And what are we trying to do on it? Like I said, I like to talk [and] I like to get into it with people. The first episode I had Chris Thompson from Vampire Weekend [and Taper’s Choice] as my guest, and it just felt great. We just talked and by the end of the interview I have a producer at the station say ‘Bro, this is the show, man. You’re a good interview and that’s what we’re gonna do.’ So that’s what we’re doing. We’re just interviewing people. This month’s comes out [as of the interview] this week, actually. We had a pivot because we lost Bob Weir.
I was gonna ask you about that, too.
Yeah, it’s tough.
He just seemed like a great dude.
Dude. It’s pretty fucked up. He was the guy that was like, ‘Oh yeah, he’s gonna live to 100, for sure.’ Nuclear war happens, it’s gonna be, like, cockroaches and Bob Weir. So, losing Bob we had to pivot, and so this month’s episode is gonna be kind of like a wake for Bob. I just reached out to some of my buds, we all knew him, and we just talked about him a little bit. [We had] Joe [Russo] from JRAD, and, Don Was, and Bob’s old manager, this guy Matt Bush, who managed him for 20 years. I just did little short little interviews with each of them just to remember Bob and have them tell some stories about him. It’s gonna be a good show this month. I’m excited, man. It’s just a cool thing [and] it’s not something I ever thought about doing in any real way.
You got the voice and personality for it. You really do
I am the luckiest fucking guy. My entire career is the least likely thing in the world. I’m just trying to enjoy it as it’s happening. This show is for a year, you know so I’m just gonna enjoy this year, and I hope they renew me, and just kind of keep going.
I’m just gonna close out on a positive for you. 2026, we’re less than a month into it. Let’s forget about all the negative stuff in the world that’s happening at this point, because holy shit. What are five things you’re super stoked on for 2026 that put a smile on your face when you wake up?
These shows, man, this tour. There’s a thing and this isn’t a shot across the bow of any other form of touring. I’m not saying I don’t enjoy JRAD. But when you’re doing the clubs, you’re in the van and you’re driving around the country on these long-ass tours. Dude, there’s a camaraderie and an intimacy that happens — a bond that is so fucking unique. You’re like this little gang, like a little posse, and we travel town to town. It is such an incredibly unique experience.
And I haven’t had it in a while. It’s been four years since the last Ghost Light tour, and since then I’ve just been doing the big boy tours [with JRAD], which are fucking awesome, don’t get me wrong. But it’s different, and the thing I’m just really looking forward to for most of this year is is really based around touring and that camaraderie and seeing this country
I wish people traveled more. We’re all just trying to get through it, you know? And we’re all just trying to get through each day, and get through each week, and getting to experience that, to experience America … I feel so lucky to be able to do that, and to have the perspective that that brings.
Also … I hope the Philadelphia Flyers have a better season. I hope they have a good draft. This summer I’m looking forward to what happens with them next season. They weren’t supposed to be good this year, so I’m not even worried about it. I’m a huge Flyers fan so that’s something I’m also looking forward to.
You got the best the best mascot in the world.
And the thing is, man, before Gritty, we still had the best mascot in fucking professional sports with the Philly Fanatic. I’m just saying, in all of pro sports, Gritty is by far the best man. What a huge swing they took, bringing that guy into existence, and it’s unbelievable.
And they’re just like, let him be as batshit as possible.
Oh, dude, it is funny as fuck, man. That’s the only thing they’ve gotten right in the last decade, though, so I’m hoping the ship gets righted.
