Double Vision is a hard rock band consisting of two sets of brothers. Rowan students, James and Ace Barnes, and C.C. and Danny Ford will be heading to Hollywood to perform a set at the iconic Whisky a Go-Go on their “New Jersey Vs. Everybody” tour. 

According to the press release, the band pays an honest homage to the great bands of the 80s, and their music will always embody the “New Jersey Vs. Everybody” mentality. 

Double Vision takes great inspiration from other Jersey artists like Jon Bon Jovi, and Tom Kiefer of Cinderell to explain what the “New Jersey Vs. Everybody” mentality means. 

“The New Jersey Vs. Everybody mindset comes from Jon Bon Jovi, Bruce Springsteen, and even Tom Kiefer from Cinderella. A lot of great bands, especially hair metal bands, came from this area,” said James and Ace Barnes. 

The band also explained how iconic New Jersey venues play into the mentality, specifically The Stone Pony in Asbury Park. 

“We have some legendary clubs here—take the Stone Pony in Asbury Park, for example. That place is known nationwide. There was also a club called the GALAXY in Somerdale, where Jon Bon Jovi, when he was our age, used to drive down and play, and where Cinderella performed before moving up to the Stone Pony. It’s all about identifying with where we’re from and the greats who came from here,” said James and Ace Barnes. 

Every band or musician has that one song that perfectly captures their sound and energy, whether through its lyrics, instrumentation, or hook. For double vision, they turn to their most popular songs as direction for new listeners. 

“New Tattoo is probably the most popular song that we have out. I would even say Rattlesnake Shake, that’s our second most popular. I mean, you pick one of those to get a pretty good idea of where we’re coming from musically, where we come from lyrically, and where our mindset is in genre and influence-wise,” said James Barnes. 

The band talked about their favorite songs to perform live and talked about mashing up an old classic with their modern track “April Fool.” 

“”April Fool,’ which is the closing track on our last record, kind of comes at a point in the setlist where it’s different than everything else we do. His bass solo comes through, and the set, so then he gets the crowd warmed up, with that, and then do a little blues jam, then we go into like this old Fleetwood Mac song from the 60s called “Oh Well.” It’s like a guitar rift thing. Then it goes into it drops off, and it goes into ‘April Fool,’ so it’s like this big, like block that kind of like makes the crowd go, okay, that was cool. I’ll wait there to do something else,” said Ace Barnes. 

It’s nearing a year since the release of the band’s second record, “Piece of The Action.” They have been performing the songs from the album, and have expressed some inevitable burnout, and the band is now putting most of their focus on entertaining the crowd with new music. 

“We do a lot of we try to do a lot of crowd work. A lot of the stuff in the new record is a lot of fun to play because the stuff from our first record were just so burnt out on the tour so we like put a lot of the energy towards doing the new stuff,” said James Barnes. 

To the band, playing a show at such an iconic venue is a dream come true. Artists like Janis Joplin, Guns n Roses, and The Doors have all played at the venue, and they are feeling all of the emotions that come with playing a show here. 

“Nervous, especially, all the emotions. It’s daunting, we know it was a pipe dream that we were gonna, you know, play the Whisky a Go-Go And it’s, it’s feeling a little too real now,” said James Barnes. 

Although nervous, the band finds comfort in the fact that their predecessors have played at Whisky, and feel a sense of home in playing in the venue. 

“You know, all of all these great bands that played there, that was their stopping ground, and it’s like comforting, in a way. Like going in there and being like, okay. Like, these people that like have like, you know, like built my chops on, like, have played there, so it’s a little comforting. It’s like performing in front of your family, that’s kind of how I think that it’s like,” said James Barnes. 

The band hopes to keep making music, and touring. They have a single coming out on April 18th, a cover of Hard to Handle by The Black Crowes. On the topic of recording another record, the band is going to gauge based on their performance at Whisky a Go-Go. 

“We’re gonna gauge that off of how we did at the Whisky. If we’re like, ‘Yeah, that was so great,’ it’s okay. And then we’ll do another record. We were like, oh, that was kind of shit. It’s like, okay, do we hang it up? Are we hanging up? You know? But yeah, there may be another record,” said Ace Barnes. 

Double Vision will take the stage at Whisky a Go-Go on May 22. 

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