The path that Brooklyn’s Daniel Ingala took to release his first CD as electro-pop act Plushgun was anything but typical. Before penning even a note of his hyper-melodic synth pop, Ingala was preparing himself for a very different artistic future—studying at the New England Conservatory, attending college for composition, and scoring films. His musical life seemed destined to be more string section than sweaty nightclub. Until fate intervened in the form of a little ditty called “Just Impolite.”
“It was more serendipitous than anything,” says Ingala, who initially posted the song to his Myspace page in early 2007. “Before that, I wrote all sorts of songs, mostly along the lines of emotional songs with very genuine lyrics. [“Just Impolite”] was my first foray into the electronic realm….After I added the synths, I had this sort of unique sound and I decided to continue writing in that style.”
As a child, Ingala realized early on that he had a talent for music. Stuck between being a fan of popular music and having a strong love of classical orchestration, it took a bit of experimenting before he found his niche. And while his middle school Nirvana cover band soon fizzled, what stuck was Ingala’s knack for music composition.
“I was always a kind of weird guy,” says Ingala. “When I was growing up, I listened to a lot of Tchaikovsky. I can’t really explain why. I just really got into it, and before I took any music lessons, I’d figure out the stuff on an old Casio keyboard we had. And I always had a pretty good ear for orchestration—when the flute parts came in and when the violin parts came in. When I started to study piano, it became apparent that I was better at writing music than I was at actually playing it.”
So Ingala’s parents sent him to the prestigious New England Conservatory, where Ingala, still in high school, spent time writing music for orchestras. Post high school, Ingala headed to New York University, where he studied composition and focused on film scoring, before realizing he didn’t like taking direction from filmmakers and switched majors to political science. Upon graduating from NYU, Ingala found himself in musical limbo, nursing a short-lived aspiration to be a lawyer for the ACLU and, of all things, temping.
“I think a lot of people, after they graduate, go through that two-year slump of not really knowing what they should or will do with the rest of their lives,” says Ingala. “At that point, I considered myself out of the musical world. I was sort of looking for film scoring on the side. Then I sort of wrote this song [“Just Impolite”] and I realized how much I loved writing songs. So it was kind of a rediscovery.”
From its initial Myspace posting, the song took off. RagTag Productions picked up on the track and asked to use Ingala’s music in its popular web-television series We Need Girlfriends. A few songs that Ingala posted on Ourstage.com launched Plushgun to number one on the site’s Alternative Rock channel in January of 2008. With the increased attention came the inevitable fact that the music Ingala was creating in his bedroom by himself between coffee and television programs would soon have to be replicated live. People wanted to see it as well as hear it, which proved to be a challenge.
“That was a bitch, I’m not going to lie,” says Ingala, whose current live setup includes Ingala on vocals and keyboards, Taylor Armstrong on guitar, and Matt Bogdanow on drums. “We had to quickly come up with a live set, and rushing into the live thing is not always the best way to do it, because you have to figure out the right chemistry for a band, and figure out the right way to do things. We have great shows now, something that was lacking before, because we just didn’t know which direction we were going to take it.”
After a handful of EPs and continued blogosphere buzz, Plushgun has finally released its debut full-length album. Shimmering with synth textures that perfectly complement the emo-esque lyrical themes of love, anxiety, and angst sung in strong vocal melody, the album, Pins & Panzers has certainly been a long time coming.
“A lot of people in the industry look at the project and they’re like, ‘I’ve never seen anything happen this way,’” says Ingala. “Usually, it’s the other way around. Usually bands play live before they have anything recorded. A lot of it, I think, has to do with the digitalization of media, and how omniscient everything is. If something is good and something catches steam, it will sort of roll into all these different venues.”
Which brings us back to the serendipity of it all, something that Ingala realizes whole-heartedly.
“The funny thing was,” he says, “I never initially conceptualized anything. I’ve always been writing songs, and this was just one song that I wrote, ‘Just Impolite.’ And everyone around me was like, ‘You got to put that out there.’”
The rest, as they say, is history.
--Frank Valish [March 23, 2009]
Photo: Siobhan O'Brien
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Plushgun's Pins & Panzers is available now on Tommy Boy Records.
Plushgun Myspace
