They call Los Angeles home, but what they’ve built sounds like it rolled in from somewhere far stranger - like a traveling show that doesn’t follow roads so much as it follows energy, appearing wherever the weird is welcome and the ordinary doesn't stand a chance.
Step right up - don’t be shy - slip past the velvet rope and into the flicker of a half-lit midway where the calliope hums and the night feels alive with something electric.
This is where Tommy Spase and the Alchemists set up shop, not so much a band as a full-blown spectacle, equal parts carnival, cosmic transmission, and beautifully controlled chaos. A swirl of color, character, and sound. Cloaked figures, cosmic drifters, alchemists with glitter on their hands and stardust in their lungs. It’s as much a visual fever dream as it is a sonic one - half rock show, half living, breathing illustration. You don’t just hear it… you see it unfolding in real time.
They don’t so much perform songs as they conjure them - like some strange carnival has torn loose from time and is now rolling through a neon-lit dreamscape, powered by steam, stardust, and something just slightly unhinged. If you tried to pin them down to a genre, you’d miss the point. This is music that shape-shifts.
At its core, their sound feels like a collision. You get flashes of carnival rock, theatrical glam, psychedelic swirl, and something that almost borders on operatic storytelling. There are moments that hit like a runaway roller coaster - loud, chaotic, electrified - and then, just as suddenly, the band pulls you into a slow, hypnotic waltz, like you’ve wandered into the quieter corner of a haunted midway. It’s controlled madness. Intentional weirdness.
And that’s the key. Nothing about Tommy Spase and the Alchemists feels accidental.
The band has been described as a “spasedelic, steam-powered carnival rock opera,” and that actually lands closer to the truth than anything else. There’s a theatrical backbone running through everything they do. You can hear it in the arrangements - the rise and fall, the dramatic turns, the sense that each song is less a track and more a scene. This isn’t background music. It demands your attention, like a ringmaster stepping into the spotlight.
But what really sets them apart is their commitment to atmosphere. There’s a Tim Burton - like quality to their world - dark, whimsical, slightly off-center. Their sound feels populated by characters rather than just musicians. You don’t just listen - you step into something. A universe where velvet-coated ringmasters, starlight smugglers, cosmic drifters, and carnival ghosts all share the same stage.
It’s theatrical, but not polished in a sterile way. There’s grit underneath it. A kind of raw, churning energy that keeps it from becoming parody. The band walks a tightrope between chaos and control, and somehow never falls.
That balance is rare.
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| The Carousel Cabaret - You can get a FREE copy at the link below. |
In a music landscape that often rewards safe repetition, Tommy Spase and the Alchemist lean hard into identity. They don’t smooth out their edges - they sharpen them. And in doing so, they’ve built something that feels alive. It's unpredictable... maybe a little dangerous.. yet perfectly safe.
It's the kind of sound that makes you feel like you’ve stumbled onto something you weren’t supposed to find.
Step into his website and wander a while - it’s a strange, captivating space where circus, magic, and conversation all unfold together.
Reaching out to Tommy through his website doesn’t feel like filling out a contact form - it feels like stepping onto a path that’s already in motion. You don’t just send a message and wait; you’re pulled into something warmer, stranger, more personal. There’s an open invitation baked into the whole experience, like he’s not just hoping you’ll write, he’s expecting it - and welcoming it. The responses carry a kind of genuine enthusiasm that turns a simple exchange into the beginning of a conversation, and before long, it feels less like artist-and-audience and more like the early stages of a friendship. Then come the surprises - free gifts, unexpected extras, little tokens that make the whole thing feel tactile and real. It’s not marketing, it’s not distance - it’s connection. And honestly, it’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen.
He is currently offering one of the band's most popular albums, “The Carousel Cabaret” for FREE. All he asks is that you pay for shipping and handling.
Somewhere between the smoke and the spotlight, I caught up with Tommy Spase himself - the ringmaster behind the madness. What followed was less an interview and more of a glimpse behind the curtain, where the illusion fades just enough to reveal something even stranger.
Before we get weird - can you tell readers a little about your musical background and what kind of music you make?
I grew up in a somewhat musical family. My Mom graduated with a degree in music and taught music. However, oddly enough, she never taught me directly. At one point she urged me to take piano lessons which I regrettably did not. I did however feel a calling to the guitar and taught myself how to play. I only had an acoustic for the first few years but upon seeing an electric guitar, and the thin body, I knew one day I would get one, which my mom really didn't want to happen. She, of course, ended up supporting my musical journey. As far as the kind of music I make, I describe it as Whimsical, Mystical, Theatrical, Cosmic Vaudevillian Rock ...or… Carnival Rock Opera.
Your sound feels like it exists outside of time - part vaudeville, part rock opera, part something harder to define. How would you describe it in your own words?
I am glad that you mentioned the Timeless feel of it. It is always felt that way to me as well. There was a point in my musical journey where instead of being so wrapped up in my influences that the songs, and music I wrote emulated a certain sound, the songs started writing themselves, so to speak. They truly do come from somewhere else. So the sound is rooted in the tapestry of “people’s music” as it evolved through the human experience, like old gypsy folk songs or spiritual music from the jungle. But it doesn't escape the influences from my early days as a rock guitar player.
Do you write songs like traditional musicians… or do they start as characters, scenes, or stories first?
I can't speak to how traditional musicians write songs, but as I mentioned before they, more often than not, write themselves. At some point I will get an inspiration, or a nudge, or feeling to grab the guitar and then I will quickly stumble onto a musical phrase or a riff and it will strike me as something special. Other times, a turn of a phrase, or a few words, will grab my attention and it's like a little bell goes off and I know it is great lyric, or the lyrical thrust of a song, or the title of a song. Then there is a phase of developing the song and, of course, a creative dance between my own songwriting craft and allowing it to present itself. Oftentimes I jot down these little inspirations on a voice memo and don't come back to it for weeks or months only to listen to it again and have my mind blown as to where that came from. Ultimately, it is a spiritual experience.
Your world overlaps heavily with horror, steampunk, and the unexplained - what personally draws you to the paranormal?
Ever since I can remember I've had a fascination with the Paranormal. In my younger years I was way into UFOs, extraterrestrials, Sci-Fi, the unexplained and the mystical. I have heard my music categorized as being associated with "horror" as a pop culture genre but it really isn't. "Horror" to me, is more about terror and fear and victimization and that couldn't be farther from the message of my music. The interesting thing about the steampunk thread is that there was a point in time when I gravitated towards the aesthetic of brass and copper gadgetry from some vintage form of technology that I didn't really understand where it was coming from. This was before I knew there was the term "steampunk" or an entire movement. When I discovered this, I realized I was tapping into the same stream of consciousness that others were. I have a sneaking suspicion that this is some kind of unconscious memory of living in the time of Tartaria, if that was indeed a real thing. But when I did discover “steampunk” I really loved the aesthetic and how far people were taking it, but I came to realize that my music actually did not qualify as steampunk music. There are actually rather defined guidelines to what makes steampunk music, “steampunk” and my music is firmly rooted in the rock band template. And although there are hints of the steampunk aesthetic in our fashion style, we don’t take it nearly as far as true steampunk enthusiasts.
What was the inspiration for you to write "Things that go bump in the night"?
Besides the obvious? It is simply a song that, on one level, celebrates a very Halloween-like, pop-culture human fascination with ghosts stories and the like, and on a deeper level, puts forward the esoteric truth that what we experience in the third dimensional realm is only a small part of the entirety of reality. One of the core messages of my music, in general, is that we are spiritual, multidimensional beings having a human experience.
Do you see your music as storytelling… or as a way of channeling something stranger?
Well, as the saying goes, truth is stranger than fiction. On the storytelling side of it, I very much sing about the journey of life. The ups and downs, the struggles... the victories and defeats. In that, I aim to inspire hope, courage and comfort. On the “stranger” side, I would say I am definitely channeling esoteric truths about the spiritual nature of being incarnated in the body on the material plane in this journey of life…and all that comes with it.
Have you ever had an experience - paranormal or otherwise - that influenced your sound or performances?
At this point in my life, I have done so much spiritual work on myself, that the spiritual realm is a constant influence. Even bringing the music and songs into existence is a sacred mystical experience most of the time.
Tell me about a weird experience you've had while on tour.
I have had plenty of experiences with technical glitches that made no sense, had no reason to happen that forced me to make due with an alternative solution, only to find that the gear worked perfectly at a later time in another place. It can be quite annoying and troublesome.
There’s something about old carnival music and the paranormal - they seem to live in the same space. Why is that?
I would venture to say vibrational resonance. There is/was so much enchantment around carnivals. Early carnivals were all about mysticism and the “uncanny”. Fortune tellers and mediums and freak shows must have really challenged reality to early carnival audiences. That psychic energy still exists in the collective unconscious, I bet. Then throw in the warped, slightly out of tune music…
A lot of the paranormal is rooted in place - forests, old towns, forgotten roads. If you could perform in any paranormal hot spot - Area 51, Stonehenge, etc, where would you choose?
Probably somewhere like the pyramids in Egypt or in Chichén Itzá. Maybe the Bermuda Triangle. I was fascinated with the Bermuda Triangle when I was a kid as well.
If your band had existed 100 years ago, do you think people would’ve seen you as entertainers… or something stranger?
Well, if we were rocking electric guitars and full band configuration, they’d probably think we were time travelers. Maybe we really are….
Now Playing: A Funky Space Reincarnation - Marvin Gaye
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