Stealing Handshakes to perform at City/Chamber July 4 event

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Are we Nashville? There’s a new band hitting the scene in Pampa. Composed of two duos from former bands that called it quits, Stealing Handshakes is eager to get its name and music out there.

The members of the band Ryan Rivera (lead bass) and Nolan Burr (lead guitar/lead vocals) were together in former band “City Will Shake”, the band gained a good amount of attraction, leading them to a performance on Channel 4 News live in Amarillo before performing at a festival.

Rylan Hathcoat (guitar) and Daniel Garcia (drums) were also apart of another band together, “Crossroads,” the band had “City Will Shake” open for them, and after Rivera and Burr went on a three year hiatus, the two duos came together to form “Stealing Handshakes” in April of 2021.

“We opened for them, as a final show with our other band and after that Rylan and Daniel kind of just hit us up to jam.” Ryan Rivera said.

The name came about from an inside joke from Burr and Rivera in previous bands, no deep meaning just that the band needed a name, and they had a great inside joke that adds to the bands mystique.

“It was just something stupid Ryan and I would do.” Burr said. “After every practice with City Will Shake, we’d all go around shaking hands and we thought it was so stupid and funny to interject and steal someones handshake, that we just named the band that.”

The band performs original music entirely that each band member contributes to in some capacity.

With the majority set-list being original music, the band occasionally has one or two cover songs. The genre of the band is best described in a lot of words, it being a bit of everything with parts of alternative, indie, folk and, of course, rock. But the band leans more towards a 90’s sound, with a heavy backing of Blues. While being together for a year, the band is just now getting to perform.

In its time since being formed, the obstacles of work and home life, as well as band mates catching Covid, have halted the guys ability to get out and showcase what they have in store.

“I wouldn’t really pin us down.” Garcia said. “It’s a little bit of everything.”

The band has three shows under its belt, one show here in Pampa at The OCB, a show in Amarillo at Leftwoods and a show in Borger at Wizzards. For now, the band is just enjoying getting to play and do something they are all passionate about.

With any band, the dream is to blow up to the point it can become your full time job, and Stealing Handshakes isn’t shy of that dream either. Both being active with performances as well as promoting themselves on social media, the band is doing the ground work to help grow the dream.

“We’re doing what we need to do.” Rivera said. “We’re playing the shows, promoting, getting as much exposure as possible. The end game is of course this being our job, that would be cool.”

The band will be performing at this year Pampa 4th of July celebration at the Recreational Park. The celebration is hopeful to have a large turn out and get eyes and ears on the band that may not get the chance to hear them else where. The band got the gig in part of the killer sound they have, and Hathcoats mom for playing the role of manager and helping push her sons dream.

The band will get an hour long set at the park sometime in the afternoon, at this time they have one other show scheduled for Aug. 5 at 6 Car Pub & Brewery in Amarillo with Drake Fisher formerly of OddFellas playing an acoustic set before they take stage.

For now, the band hasn’t recorded and released any of its original songs but that isn’t out of the question. The former bandmates of “City Will Shake” have music out on Spotify that they have pulled over, the songs being “Glue It In A Song” and “Trails and Trials.”

“We want to release the original music, it can get expensive so we just want to decide on whether or not we want to try and record ourselves or go somewhere.” Burr said.

All information regarding performances, announcements and any other questions can be found and answered on the bands Facebook page Stealing Handshakes.