The band's homage to Virginia may be a bit misleading. Alexandria, Virginia began as a section within the original borders of Washington, DC until things heated up between the North and South just before the Civil War. If DC is Chocolate City, then Alexandria is the white cousin buried way back in the family tree.

Virginia Coalition is made up of four friends who met in the T.C. Williams High School music program. Their school was where the inspirational fact-based movie "Remember The Titans" took place. The movie documents the integration of black and white students on the school's football team in 1971. "By the time we got to T.C. Williams [years later] there were 75 languages and 56 different countries represented."

Every member of the band can play almost every instrument. They sing just as well as they play and every one of them writes. Their collaborative song-writing style creates the textured, sometimes eccentric, and always melodic songs that have allowed Virginia Coalition to stand out. Jarrett Nicolay comments, "everybody writes and plays most instruments; we are never at a loss for new material," adding, "it is also great that we can all contribute to making the songs 'stage ready.'"

Virginia Coalition's live show is a larger-than-life party that has helped the band garner a rabid fan base who affectionately call them "VACO." It was also Virginia Coalition's extraordinary live show that got them signed to New York City based label bluhammock music. Based on a tip from a friend, the founders of the label came to a show to check them out. "Then they came back a second time, then they kept coming back until we got signed. That's pretty much how everything has happened for us. " Ottinger said. "All the success VACO has is due to people passing the word around and saying good things." Word of mouth is how they sold 35,000 records and it's how they won the 2003 and 2004 Washington Post Reader's Choice Award for Best Local Band.

In the spring of 2004, VACO entered the studio with acclaimed producer Matt Wallace (Maroon 5, The Replacements, Train) . "Matt was great at helping fine-tune the songs," says Nicolay, "it is pretty obvious that he has made many awesome records. His input really made the whole process easy, and made the end result something we are all extremely proud of."

On January 6, 2006, the band recorded their first live album at a sold-out show at the 9:30 Club in Washington, DC. The album was released on September 9, 2006. They are hoping to showcase the energy of their live show as well as take their listeners on a journey that shows their evolution as musicians, and introduce themselves to new listeners while serving up the stuff that their loyal following loves.

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