The Philadelphia area is home to many music greats. From solo artists like Jim Croce, Patti LaBelle, and Lil Uzi Vert to groups like Boyz II Men, Hall and Oats, and The Roots, Philly’s musical talent runs remarkably deep.
Over the last near-decade, one band that has not only risen to the top of local notoriety, but gained worldwide recognition is Mt. Joy.
Three albums and several tours after its inception, Mt. Joy is once again returning to Philadelphia, headlining at The Mann Center on Friday, Sept. 20. In addition to their show, the band will feature a non-perishable food drive in partnership with Sharing Excess, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit that uses surplus food as a solution to scarcity.
Ahead of their upcoming show and food drive, Matt Quinn of Mt. Joy sat down with Metro Philadelphia to discuss the band’s history, playing in front of his home city, and the opportunity to partner with Sharing Excess once again.
How does it feel to play in front of your home crowd?
It’s one of my favorite things to do. People ask us ‘What’s your favorite venue to play?’ or ‘What’s the bucket list?’ and we’ve played at some cool spots. And so there’s ones, like Red Rocks, that come to mind. But for me, honestly, and I think you being in Philly, you know this, you grow up an Eagles, Sixers, you know, a four-for-four fan. You’re a fan of the sports teams. You see how people in the city support, once they get behind something, there’s really nothing [better]. I’ve gotten to travel the country; there’s not many places that support their own like Philly does.
It’s already surpassed what my dream was. Even Johnny Brenda’s or something was the initial dream. If we could just pack out a bar, that would be so cool for me. To see where it’s gotten and to be headlining [at] The Mann, for me, there are other cool things on our calendar, but that’s the one I look forward to the most.”
The name itself, ‘Mt. Joy’ — is it a Lancaster Township thing? What was the inspiration for the name of the band?
Funny enough, my mom’s actually from Mannheim Township. It could have been related to that, but actually, Sam, the guitar player who I met in high school, lived out near Valley Forge National Park. He technically lived on Mount Misery, and we used to go over there and play music.
Honestly, when we were starting, we had pretty humble beginnings here. We didn’t know that it was going to become this big name that was going to be really important. We just thought we’d pay homage to where we used to jam together, but our music made no sense being called Mount Misery. So there’s a Mount Misery and a Mount Joy, [which are] kind of hiking trails in Valley Forge Park there, and we just sort of fudged it.
So you mentioned Sam; you both went to Conestoga. Did you discover there that you had this shared passion? Or did you kind of come back to it together later in life?
Yeah, we met in high school. [We] both were kind of making songs and just kind of got together that way. Sam’s brother is actually who I was friends with in high school, and [he] introduced us. Then we went to different colleges, and I don’t want to say we lost touch, but we weren’t in the same area, we weren’t playing music together as much.
And then—really just by fate, years later—we both ended up in Los Angeles for work and life reasons. Neither of us was chasing the music dream in LA or anything like that, but we just kind of ended up there, and I didn’t really know anyone, being from Philly. He didn’t really know anyone [either]. So we were getting together on the weekends, and after work, just putting these songs together. And next thing we knew, we had something going.
You’ve seen a ton of success, surely more to come, and now you’re headlining at The Mann. Is it surreal?
Yeah, we still talk about [it.] We found our bassist, Michael, on Craigslist. It’s not like we were [on] ‘American Idol’, and we had a panel of professionals preparing us for life. We were just making tunes and trying to find people to fill out the band, and we got really lucky with that. We were able to put together an incredible band with Michael, Jackie, and Sotiris. It’s been a wild ride. I never would have thought that I’d be having a conversation talking about headlining [at] The Mann.”
You [also] have a food drive going on at the show. Is that right?
Yeah, we did this last year at The Mann as well, and we’ve done it at a few other shows. I think pretty much all of our shows, this summer at least, we’ve teamed up with Sharing Excess, who do a great job here in the city and a lot of other places, connecting excess food with people who suffer from food insecurity.
It’s an amazing charity, and we really love working with them. Obviously, beyond the really cool work they do, finding excess food and getting it to the right people. At the shows, [we] do a pretty basic food drive, where we put some incentives into… You will not win a fighter jet, but you’ll certainly have some fun incentives.
How did that opportunity present itself? What about Sharing Excess stood out to you?
Waste is something that I’ve thought a lot about. We’ve talked about [it] in the band how much gluttony goes around, whether [while] eating out at restaurants, and I’m not taking a shot at restaurants, but you see how much food gets wasted. And then I have friends who farm in Pennsylvania.
I’ve been sort of educated on how important [it is]. One of my friends farms food, and his wife works at a food bank, and it’s something that I think people take for granted. There are so many amazing charities, but I think there’s a basic humanity to making sure people have food, and we have enough food, in my opinion, to make sure that people don’t go hungry.
Mt. Joy will take the stage at The Mann Center on Friday, Sept. 20. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit mtjoyband.com
