This fall, student rock band Pizza Delivery plans to take its musical talents beyond Lafayette and tour other colleges in the Lehigh Valley.
“It’s exciting because I really enjoy playing to different audiences,” bassist Max O’Rourke ‘26 said. “Going to a place where you have no idea what the crowd’s gonna be like is really fun and exciting.”
Pizza Delivery plans on playing shows at colleges like Lehigh University, Muhlenberg College, Dickinson College and Moravian University.
“I have cousins at Muhlenberg,” singer and guitarist Benny Putnam ’24 said. “Max has connections at a couple of other colleges.”
During fall break, the band, which also includes singer and guitarist Tommy Henschen ‘24 and drummer Christian Festa ‘24, traveled to the University of Vermont to play a show, the first time it had ventured outside of the college with its music.
“Over the summer I was with my friend … he’s a senior at the University of Vermont,” O’Rourke said. “His housemates are in a band together and so he was like, ‘You could just open for them.’”
“It was so fun,” O’Rourke continued. “I knew I’d never seen any of these people ever again, so I was bouncing around and having fun … my friend’s housemates, their band was really good, so it was fun to open for them.”
Putnam also feels that the band’s experience at the University of Vermont was formative to the members’ desire to play at other schools due to the fun and unique experience it was.
“The crowd, I mean, there were tons of people,” Putnam said. “It was like a basement show. That’s tons of people. It was such a good energy and cool. We just had fun.”
The band, first formed in 2021, has only ever played shows for a Lafayette audience until recently. According to band members, touring for the first time was a memorable and valuable experience – one they hope to repeat.
“[University of Vermont] was pretty far. It was like a six [or] seven hour drive, and we probably wouldn’t do that again,” O’Rourke said. “I have a friend at Dickinson and so sometime in November, we might go up and play [there].”
In addition to the excitement surrounding playing at different colleges, Putnam hopes that more students will start playing music together, even if they don’t already know each other.
“There’s so many people that don’t know each other that want to play music and have overlapping interests that don’t know it,” Putnam said. “So it’d be really awesome to see more people get together and play what they want.”
