BIO
Vagabond Empire is an expansive new project by Sam Prestianni, a prolific songwriter, multidisciplinary artist, and former bandleader of acclaimed San Francisco "bluevelvetgrass" string combo Three Times Bad, whose music SF Chronicle called "ecstatic hoedown."
After the Plague, an album of powerful originals with selected tracks commissioned for SFPL's Bay Beats collection, is set to be released in early 2027.
Drawing on his mother's Appalachian roots in Tennessee, his father's Baltimore-Sicilian heritage, and the vibrant creative energy of the Bay Area, Vagabond Empire presents a massive stylistic range of American roots music that channels 100+ years of tradition -- from folk, blues, early jazz, bluegrass, classic country, rock 'n' roll, and more -- through a 21st century globetrotting lens.
Vagabond Empire performs as a one-man-band (vox, guitar, banjo) -- sometimes as a duo with SoCal bandmate JP Duboucheron (violin, drums) -- gigging throughout the greater Bay Area, up and down the California coast, in OR, WA, ID, and select East Coast cities.
Vagabond Empire is an expansive new project by Sam Prestianni, a prolific songwriter, multidisciplinary artist, and former bandleader of acclaimed San Francisco "bluevelvetgrass" string combo Three Times Bad, whose music SF Chronicle called "ecstatic hoedown."
After the Plague, an album of powerful originals with selected tracks commissioned for SFPL's Bay Beats collection, is set to be released in early 2027.
Drawing on his mother's Appalachian roots in Tennessee, his father's Baltimore-Sicilian heritage, and the vibrant creative energy of the Bay Area, Vagabond Empire presents a massive stylistic range of American roots music that channels 100+ years of tradition -- from folk, blues, early jazz, bluegrass, classic country, rock 'n' roll, and more -- through a 21st century globetrotting lens.
Vagabond Empire performs as a one-man-band (vox, guitar, banjo) -- sometimes as a duo with SoCal bandmate JP Duboucheron (violin, drums) -- gigging throughout the greater Bay Area, up and down the California coast, in OR, WA, ID, and select East Coast cities.
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ABOUT THREE TIMES BAD
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Epic "bluevelvetgrass" string band, Three Times Bad, and its scaled-down iteration, Critters, likened in Farce the Music to the Devil Makes Three and Shovels & Rope, were genre-bending groups that brought the "ecstatic hoedown" (SF Chronicle) of their live shows up and down the Pacific Coast for nearly a decade. Three Times Bad's American Sojourn record was named "Album of the Week" on Mike Morrison's AmericanRoots Radio for its "huge originality (and) mastery of their instruments." The group was a fixture on the regional festival circuit, including multiple runs at SoCal’s Ink n Iron Fest (with headliners Reverend Horton Heat, Iggy Pop, and Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings), NorCal’s Humboldt Hills Hoedown (with Brothers Comatose, Hillstomp, and Dead Winter Carpenters), and San Francisco’s Hillbilly Robot (promoter Shelby Ash’s infamous annual "Urban Americana Music Event"). The band appeared at many of the Bay Area’s top music venues -- Great American Music Hall, Slim’s, Bottom of the Hill, Brick & Mortar, Café du Nord -- and supported leading indie touring acts (Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band, CW Stoneking, Lydia Loveless, Old Man Markley, Larry & His Flask, Finland's Steve ‘n’ Seagulls) and world-class local groups (The Good Luck Thrift Store Outfit, Dirty Cello, Junk Parlor, Pine Box Boys, Mission Delirium, and many more).
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