Exposed Vocals just caught an exclusive interview with “LOOKINGDOOR”

LOOKINGDOOR is a rock duo of singer-songwriter & guitarist Barnabas Nagy and drummer Daniel Nagy. They started to make music together in 2005 and decided to form a band.

Due to both working day jobs and Barnabas working in the UK for 6 year the band was put on hold. Until now. Their Single, recorded in 2005 got a facelift and re-released in 2016.

Exposed Vocals: So tell us your story. Where did you grow up? What made you decide to become an artist?

LOOKINGDOOR: Me and Dany grew up in a small suburban town in Hungary. Our parents wanted us to play on musical instruments and so we were sent to the local music school to learn. Dany first got saxophone and then clarinet lessons and I got drums and then piano lessons. We then both dropped out but I started to play on my mother’s classical guitar on my own and started to play rock covers. After a couple of years I started to write my own songs.

Exposed Vocals: How did you come up with that name? What was your inspiration behind it?

LOOKINGDOOR: Our music engineer had a revelation at a church meeting with the word Lookingdoor. He told us the revelation and I asked him if he was so kind to give us his blessings to use it as the name of our band. He agreed.

Exposed Vocals: What do you think about online music sharing? Do you ever give your music away for free? Why?

LOOKINGDOOR: I think online music sharing is great but we have to differentiate between online streaming and mp3 downloads. In the beginning we made our single available for free download. But I don’t think we got out of this kind of promotion what we wanted. In general I think musicians should be paid for their efforts. We still make our songs available to be streamed for free on some sites like soundcloud but if you want to download our songs you’d have to buy it. We also give away bonus items on our gumroad and bandcamp store so it’s not just an mp3. Guitar pro tabs, lyrics and a behind the scenes video which was recorded at the time we made the single.

Exposed Vocals: Since everyone was a start-up once, can you give any smaller or local bands or artists looking to get gigs and airplay some tips?

LOOKINGDOOR: We still consider ourselves starting up but I think it’s important to put together a couple of good songs and invest in recording and releasing a good single. A good band website also helps.

Exposed Vocals: Do you ever make mistakes during performances? How do you handle that?

LOOKINGDOOR: We haven’t had a public performace yet, at the moment we’re still just starting out and focusing on promoting our music in the digital music world. But I can speak of our rehearsals. You make mistakes and you just roll with the punches I guess.

Exposed Vocals: Do you tour? Anything interesting happen on tour that you think our readers would enjoy hearing about?

LOOKINGDOOR: We haven’t been on tour yet but we’d like to.

Exposed Vocals: Where do you usually gather songwriting inspiration? What is your usual songwriting process?

LOOKINGDOOR: Many times I just sit down I start to play on the guitar then I make a mistake and from that mistake an idea pops up. That’s how it usually starts. Most of our music is about life and faith in God.

Exposed Vocals: Do you have a band website? What online platforms do you use to share your music?

LOOKINGDOOR: Yes, our band website is http://www.lookingdoor.com and we also use purevolume, reverbnation, bandcamp and soundcloud.

Exposed Vocals: What are some really embarrassing songs that we might find on your mp3 player?

LOOKINGDOOR: Nothing embarrassing there and we don’t have mp3 players! Haha! If we listen to music it’s either on our phone or on our laptops.

Exposed Vocals: If you were given half a million dollars and a year off, what would you do? How would you spend it?

LOOKINGDOOR: Probably move to a secluded area where we can record our album and fish at night. We love fishing and playing music.

Exposed Vocals: Any planned studio upgrades? What are you working with now?

LOOKINGDOOR: We have a very basic studio at the moment. An entry level M-audio sound card, an electric guitar, the drums and a dynamic mic. We really need to upgrade to record the album at home. We’ll need a good studio mic, we’re thinking about an electric drum set and a bass guitar.

Exposed Vocals: How do you find ways to promote your music? What works best for you?

LOOKINGDOOR: Word of mouth seemed to worked best so far but we’re testing the waters in online music promotion at the moment.

Exposed Vocals: If you could perform anywhere and with any artists (Dead or Alive) where and who would it be with? Why?

LOOKINGDOOR: Hope to perform at the Sziget festival in Budapest with Akos perhaps! He’s a Hungarian rock legend. Internationally, maybe with Nickelback or Linkin Park.

Exposed Vocals: So, what’s next? Any new upcoming projects that you want to talk about?

LOOKINGDOOR: We’re planning our debut album “Beginning”. We’ve got the songs but first we want to see if we can get enough fans with our single to justify jumping into such a big project.

Exposed Vocals: If you weren’t making music, what would you be doing?

LOOKINGDOOR: Well, running an online business, working on a homestead and fish!

Exposed Vocals: Do you remember buying your first album? Who was it? What was going through your head?

LOOKINGDOOR: It was one of my first purchases online and so I was scared but everything went fine. I don’t remember if it was Oasis or Linkin Park.

Exposed Vocals: How do you juggle the rest of your responsibilities while trying to stay ahead in your music life?

LOOKINGDOOR: That’s the hard part. At the moment there’s very little time for music. Dany is a full time elementary school teacher at the local school and I’m a freelance user experience designer and run my small online business on the side. That’s what we want to change with our single “Son Of Nothing”.

Exposed Vocals: What should fans look forward to in the next year or so?

LOOKINGDOOR: If we get a thousand fans sign up to our newsletter and get some traction on our Patreon page (https://www.patreon.com/lookingdoor) we’d like to record and release our debut album “Beginning”. Perhaps to play some gigs, too.