By Susan San

What do you think of when you hear the name Nick Smaldone? The sophomore at Westborough High School describes himself as “funny, unlucky, problematic, and positive”. Outside of just school work, Smaldone participates in many activities such as volunteering, student council, and contributing to helping the environment. Although all of these things play a big role in his life, one of the biggest things that he focuses on is music.

Last January, Smaldone received an email from a music blog and booking agency called Boston Hassle with which he now works voluntarily. The agency aims to make the music scene more inclusive to all ages. Smaldone helps out by inputting content on the website, which informs people of the bands playing in nearby venues. In his own words, he says “the main goal is to open up our own venue of all ages, all the time, but as of now, we are just working to get more small bands out in the public eye and to make shows a safer place for everyone involved.”

Smaldone plays a variety of instruments, including guitar, saxophone, recorder, drums, and a little bit of keyboard and bass. When at home, he spends most of his time practicing these instruments and improving his music skills. He also says that “skill level and speed don’t matter when you have a meaningful song. A good song should wow someone not because how intense the solo was but how it made the listener feel.”

He likes to listen to “a lot of indie, contemporary, local bands and classic rock music,” which is not a common answer amongst many high school students. Smaldone says that the music he listens to helps give him opinions on social and political issues that he might have not realized before. It also makes him a more stable and happy person. “I see a lot of peers get really stressed or sad or angry or just upset with life in general and I feel music is what takes those things out of my life.”

His biggest music inspirations are Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein simply because “they’re funny and they make great music,” according to Smaldone. On top of being a musician, Smaldone shows a big interest in being a comedian. He believes that both occupations are essential to making people happy and thinks that making people smile is what is most important. “Whatever you do, create the world around you that you wanna live in. I think a lot of people have a dream at a young age, get set on that and it’s like anything else wouldn’t be an option. But in reality there are a lot of ‘next best things’. For every comedy writer, there’s 3 video editors, or similar jobs that would be just as fun.”