GEICO Travels With Blip Across America For Indie Web Series

Dave Holmes is an American television personality and American television critic (of mostly things like American Idol and X-Factor, but also occasionally Saved By The Bell) with an affinity for music. He’s a former MTV VJ, sometimes defender of KidzBop, and currently travelling in a presumably very well-insured car to a variety of venues around the country as he hosts an upcoming original web series from GEICO and Blip Studios.

Indie Across America is an eight-episode documentary series featuring Holmes and stories and concerts from the “most deserving, most passionate, most talented” indie bands he can find. The program is currently in production, filming interviews and sets in Boston, Philadelphia, New York, Baltimore, Los Angeles, and San Diego with a scheduled debut date for later this Fall.

If you’re within safe driving distance of one of the major metropolitan areas mentioned in the above and into bands you’ve heard about before your friends, you should definitely try to make it to a show. If not, stay tuned to blip.com later this year and catch all the edited action online.

We caught up with Vice President of Production & Development at Blip, Rick Rey to find out what you can expect to see on the program and how the original web series came to be:

Tubefilter: Tell us how the series got started. 

Rick Rey: Indie music and indie web series go hand in hand, and being big music fans at Blip, we set out to make a show that really celebrated the indie scene. We wanted to find a group of emerging bands with great stories that would resonate with our audience.

A lot of people don’t realize the original music they hear on their favorite web series are often from indie bands and artists. For example, our new series Revved Up features a kick ass soundtrack by Death On Two Wheels

TF: How’d GEICO get involved and how will the brand be represented in the series? 

RR: After a successful sponsorship last year with The Gauntlet, Blip had the chance to bring GEICO something fresh and authentic.

GEICO is supportive of indie artists and they recognized the value in reaching local markets around the country with a live tour. So, we decided to take the show on the road and target cities across the country that are known for their indie music scenes. At each destination we hosted a live performance at a music venue, and we worked closely with the GEICO street team to promote the event. We also had GEICO reps on hand at each venue to give out swag and show their support. (The GEICO glow sticks were a really popular item, and as a bonus they looked great on camera!)

TF: How’d you find the bands?

RR: We were lucky to have a great group of music experts and mega-fans working on this show. The director, Jason Goldwatch, has directed music videos for The Roots, Linkin Park, Jay-Z, Kid Cudi, Pusha T, and the list goes on and on. We also had the insanely talented Dave Holmes on board not only as a host, but also a producer, contributing ideas and lending his years and years of experience working with bands and covering music.

TF: Fill in the blank. One of the bands featured in the series will be the next ___________.

RR: Well, I think the beauty of this show is that these bands don’t necessarily aspire to be the next ANYTHING. They love to make music. They love connecting with their fans. And we’re really excited to help bring their stories and music to a big audience when the show premieres this September.

Photo by Brian Witkin.