War in the West

War in the West is a Southern California band led by singer/songwriter Erik Moe and drummer/producer Tom Johnson. Their sound has been described as “SoCal Americana” and hearkens back to the classic Laurel Canyon groups of the 60s and 70s, with nods to more modern influences like Wilco, The Shins, Radiohead, Oasis, REM, and The Replacements. Other than Tom and Erik, the personnel situation is fluid, with collaborators like producer Mikal Blue (Toad the Wet Sprocket, Colbie Calait, Jason Mraz), Dean Dinning (Toad), Carl Verheyan (Supertramp), Valerie Pinkston (Diana Ross band), and many other Southern California musicians.

Erik was a founding member of ‘90s Chicago Americana band The Rocket Scientists. In addition to his songwriting, he has written scripts for TV and film with credits including HBO’s Life and Times of Tim, Applewood 911, and numerous TV pilots. He co-wrote and co-directed the feature film No Sleep til’ Madison, starring Jim Gaffigan and is the author of the graphic novel Tales of a Young Urban Failure, published by Chronicle Books. His work as a copywriter in the advertising industry has earned him numerous Clio and Cannes Lions awards.

Tom hails from Colorado but spent time in Bloomington, Indiana, where he studied drums with session drummer and John Mellencamp band member Kenny Aronoff, and co-founded the Heartland Rock band The Brain Dead Hoosiers. While in Indiana, Tom released Heart of the Dream, a collection of songs he wrote and performed with the help of some of Indiana’s best-known musicians. He drummed with Avocat in Fort Collins, Colorado, before moving to California in 2013. His San Luis Obispo-based band Domestic Tiger won the Best Song and Reader’s Choice awards in the 2019 New Times Music Awards.

Tom is also an award-winning cheesemaker and founder of Bingham Hill Cheese Company. The company won 10 medals at the 2005 World Cheese Awards, and was judged “Best Blue Cheese” twice at the World Cheese Awards.

Grimsby Fan

As they released their initial batch of songs onto streaming services throughout 2020 and 2021, War in the West noticed something interesting in their Spotify data. While most of their fans were based in American cities, they had somehow managed to develop one particularly loyal fan in far-away England. This fan appeared in their data every day without fail and became a point of fascination for the band because of the name of his hometown. It was a name that seemed to have been conjured up by Simpsons’ writers: Grimsby. 

Grimsby? Erik and Tom enjoyed speculating about what life was like for their lonely Grimsby fan in what they imagined to be a bleak, northern fishing town with gray skies and medieval architecture. A quick glance at the Grimsby wiki page confirmed their suspicions about the place, so they decided to reward their fan by dedicating a song to him. Grimsby Fan, by War in the West, came out on July 30^th, 2021. 

Two weeks later, the story of their search to find and thank their Grimsby Fan became front page news in The Grimsby Telegraph. 

Shortly after, the band heard from veteran UK music manager Martin Yale (Joe Cocker, etc), who had read the Telegraph article, and they were soon signed to his Grimsby-based Montagne Entertainment company for representation in the UK and Europe.