Get the latest Syracuse news delivered right to your inbox.
Subscribe to our newsletter here.

When James Dawson, Jeremy Lanuti and Josh LeViseur played music together in high school to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic, they never imagined their trio would grow into a five-member band that stayed with them through college.

“(Playing music together) started as our outlet during COVID, and then we eventually started playing shows,” Dawson said.

Mimicking Mars originally only consisted of Dawson on guitar, Lanuti on vocals and LeViseur on drums. Once the three arrived at Syracuse University, they met Grant Harding and Rob Wilhelm.

After meeting through a university rock ensemble, Dawson encouraged the two sophomores, who are studying jazz and commercial music, to audition for the band. Harding and Wilhelm now play keys and bass, respectively.

Bobby Malone is also a rotating member of the band. He lives in Orange County, New York, where the band originally formed, but drives up to play bass when Wilhelm can’t make it to a show. When the other band members are home on break from school, he plays with them since, aside from Wilhelm, they all live in Orange County.

Last year, the group performed at Redfest. This year, they are headlining Saturday’s show. Harding said the band enjoys playing festival shows because they get to meet and interact with other musicians. Lanuti said it’s also a good opportunity to play more of their originals.

“We go into it and we’re like ‘Let’s just play the music we want to play,’” Lanuti said. “It’s not like it’s a party where we have to cater to a certain sound.”

A big part of Mimicking Mars’ brand is their live shows. Dawson said the shows speak more to the band’s character and, though they release music online, the performance aspect is where they “show off.” For this reason, Lanuti and others are excited to showcase their talents at Redfest for another year.

“We’re there to be Mimicking Mars for 55 minutes. So that’s what we’ll show them,” Lanuti said. “The best example of Mimicking Mars for 55 minutes.”

The band played their first live show together at Redgate, now Dazed, in February 2024. Their next gig after that was Al’s Wine and Whiskey near Armory Square.

Lanuti said being at SU and performing in the Syracuse area has exposed the band to audience members from various age ranges. Because the music scene at SU is so large, Dawson said it’s helped the band thrive and gain inspiration.

The name of the band, Mimicking Mars, comes from a controversial topic in the music world. People debate whether or not John Williams, who wrote the music for the Star Wars movies, took inspiration from Gustav Holst’s symphony “The Planets,” specifically Mars, because of how similar the works sound. Hence the “mimicking” portion of the band’s name.

But, Lanuti said, “the short answer is it sounded cool.”

The band was not always as organized as it is now. Dawson and Lanuti said it took them a while to figure out their sound. Originally a “cheesy pop-rock cover band,” they now understand their sound better and write many original songs that fans like, Lanuti said. They have come to identify more with the indie rock genre.

Harding was previously in jazz quartets and quintets before coming to college, and he never had experience with a rock band until Mimicking Mars. He said being a jazz musician has made it easier for him to adapt to things quickly, allowing him to better fit his sound with the other members.

Wilhelm had prior experience with being in a rock band, but agreed that the jazz background helped him build and add to Mimicking Mars’s existing sound.
“At the end of the day it’s not like rock musicians and jazz musicians,” Wilhelm said. “We’re all just musicians.”
The band’s ability to collaborate and mesh their sounds applies to lyricism, too. Lanuti said the band’s songwriting process usually goes quickly. Typically, Lanuti or Dawson will start writing lyrics or come up with melodies. When they present it to the rest of the band, they workshop it and make it better by working off of each other and considering each other’s ideas.

The members acknowledged that balancing school work and being in the band is difficult. Dawson admitted that he’ll often procrastinate on his school work by doing work for the band instead to feel productive.

Lanuti shared similar sentiments that because of the band’s popularity, they’re often booking shows, and while it’s a positive thing, it’s also very time-consuming. But, they keep up with it because it’s their passion, he said.

“We make it work because we love it so much,” Lanuti said. “If we hated it, then we would choose not to do it because it would be way easier.”

Lanuti is graduating in a few weeks, but he remains certain about the band’s future. They plan to play together at least once a month since Lanuti will take visits to SU from Orange County.

“We don’t want to slow down,” Lanuti said. “We’ve committed a lot of time to this, so we like to think that there’s only better things on the horizon.”

Published on April 24, 2025 at 12:56 am
Contact Irene: iclekaki@syr.edu