Just to set the record straight, the Runarounds are a real band. But there’s also a fictionalized version of the group on an Amazon Prime series also named “The Runarounds.”
The show, created by Jonas Pate (Netflix’s “Outer Banks”), follows a group of recent high school grads chasing their dreams of becoming rock stars.
Actor Will Lipton plays guitarist/singer Charlie Cooper in the teen drama. Lipton, who appeared on the soap opera “General Hospital” for six years, said he feels like the show, which debuted in September, is somewhat mirroring real life.
“Yeah, it’s kind of trippy for sure. I feel like me and my character are a little bit different, but as far as storyline stuff, it’s very similar,” he said. “We’ve had shows that have been like episode eight, where we’re playing for all the marbles, either we make it or break it. That has happened to us multiple times throughout real Runarounds history. We’ve played some crazy places. We’ve played some backyards. We’ve done all of the above, and so it’s cool. I think Jonas says it best: The real-life band is a little bit ahead of the fictional band, so our real life footsteps will kind of seep into the show for inspiration, so it feels authentic and grounded.”
The real-life band kicks off “The Minivan Tour” on Thursday in Dallas, with most of the dates sold out (much like their fall tour). That includes a Feb. 15 show at Mr. Smalls Theatre in Millvale, with The Back Alley opening.
“It’s gonna be a little bit of mayhem, a little bit of adventure,” said Lipton, who’ll be making his first visit to Pittsburgh.
The latest single from the indie rock band — which also features Axel Ellis (guitar/vocals), Jesse Golliher (bass/vocals), Jeremy Yun (lead guitar) and Zende Murdock (drums) — is “Chasing the Good Times,” which was co-written and produced by Cage The Elephant guitarist Brad Shultz.
“It’s a song about not getting too lost in the stuff that doesn’t matter,” Lipton said. “I think there’s a lot of opportunities for people in any walk of life to forget what’s important. That song is just about making sure to stay on the right track and keep the people that you love close by, and maybe losing your way is a part of the process. But it’s a really fun, rockin’ tune with a little bit of a somber undertone. I think it’s worth a listen.”
In a Zoom conversation last week from Los Angeles, Lipton spoke with TribLive about their live show, the TV series and more. Find a transcript of the conversation, edited for clarity and length, below.
With this tour, what’s the reaction in the band about all these shows selling out?
It was pretty insane. We announced the tickets during our first leg. So we were all together in the bus kind of watching the numbers, and we were blown away with the response. It was pretty unreal. We were headed to a 150-cap venue in North Carolina hearing that we sold out New York two nights. We’re very grateful and very lucky and also incredibly amped to be embarking on this next chapter.
A year or two ago, you probably could never have imagined this happening, right?
No, there’s various stages to this whole project that we’ve been a part of. And obviously we had big goals for once the TV show came out. But I mean, out of the gate, everyone has been so supportive and excited about the band’s journey. It’s a privilege. Fans are the best.
What have the shows been like so far? You were out on tour in the fall, what’s the crowd response been?
It’s always been something different every night, like all the venues we’ve been playing have been so unique. The common denominator is the excitement from the crowd and the excitement of the band as well. Just like maybe a year ago, we’d play some of the songs we play now and no one knew a single word, and now people are singing along. They’ll know if I mess up a lyric or not, which is good. (laughs) It’s good. It keeps me accountable.
What have been the songs that have gone over the best with the crowd?
The crazy thing is that there’s not really an outlier of one that hasn’t gone well. The people that come, they know the whole album, which is so cool. If you look on the streams and stuff like that, there’s clear winners, but when you go out and ask the audience, I’ve seen people in clips posting online going up asking people what song they’re most looking forward to, it is such a scattered answer, which is the coolest thing. One of the things we tried to accomplish with the album was make sure there’s kind of a different song for everyone. Everyone can have their own personal attachment to different tracks.
How about “Senior Year”? I imagine that probably has some good crowd response.
Totally, totally. The songs that appear earlier on in the season — “Senior Year,” “Funny How the Universe Works” — they’re such big songs. And it’s cool, there’s a lot of people that have come up afterwards saying how much that song has meant to them, they’re entering their senior year of high school or college. It’s a song about transition, and I think that’s what a lot of the people relate to that come to our shows. It’s such a cool experience having everyone sing along for the “oh oh ohs” and stuff and going crazy. It’s great.
Is there a message that you want people to take away from the show, from the music, from the band?
Yeah, there’s a lot. I think one of the key themes from the television show is follow your dreams, which has been said a million times a million different ways. But I think our show does it in a really cool way that’s very authentic to the band’s real story, where it was just kind of like a pipe dream for a while, and it finally worked out and we get to do all these cool, awesome things. I think also one of the core values of our show and what we’re about is doing it alongside people that you love. Chasing the dream doesn’t really matter if you’re not with your homies and with your loved ones and surrounded by like-minded people that are on a similar trajectory. It’s cool, we’ve had a couple people come back to different concerts and they’ve made friends with people at the concerts and they plan on going to see this one together and stuff, even though they live in two different places. So it’s really cool. I think we just try to foster a bit of a community. It’s really rad to see that all come to fruition.
The band sort of started out of “Outer Banks” so how long did it take for the band to feel like a “real” band and not just put together?
So originally the band was put together for the purpose of doing a TV show separate from “Outer Banks.” That was in 2020. We all got cast together. We did our own different kind of auditioning processes. I was with Jeremy, who I’ve been playing with since I was like six, so we auditioned together, and then we did “Outer Banks” maybe two years in, as kind of an introduction to what Jonas Pate’s film sets look like, meeting the crew that we’d be working with, and understanding the hours they do and just the whole rundown. It took a while to get to the show part, but I feel like the band stuff came pretty immediate. We started writing as soon as we could. It was kind of difficult because we were in different corners of the country, but when we would come together, it felt really magical and we would get a lot of stuff done. We’d have some good times, and we did that for four years, leading up to the actual filming of the show.
Were there ever any doubts about whether this could actually work out?
Of course. We’re young kids, and there are many things going against us. Covid didn’t help. The fact that “Outer Banks” was in production made it difficult to find a slot for us. And then there were the several strikes that happened within the film industry. So it was very like, man, maybe this won’t make it the finish line. But belief and faith and following your dreams is what the show is all about. We made it happen, and it took a village, but I think we made something really special. And we’re excited to continue on that story.
Have you seen a lot of creative growth within the band?
A hundred percent. I think I was 17 when this all started. The rest of the boys were like 18, 19. We’ve lived a lot of life since its start, and we’ve learned from each other. We’ve learned from just growing up. Our tastes have developed. I definitely consider myself a very different musician than I was when I was 17, and I have the boys to thank for it, for sure. I think we all really complement each other. We come from different musical backgrounds, but finding a way to mesh it all together allows us to learn from each other and continue to explore different sounds and different things that we wouldn’t really just have in our brain without each other.
RELATED
• Pittsburgh local music spotlight: Buffalo Rose
• Interview: Deraps guitarist/singer Jacob Deraps on 1st U.S. tour, Van Halen influence and more
• 2026 Pittsburgh area concert calendar
You have some acting experience, so what was it like to watch the rest of the guys sort of learn on the fly what acting is all about?
It was a privilege for sure. I mean, I was still learning stuff along the way too. It was a very different medium than what I was used to, but we had an amazing acting coach, Russell Blackwell, who helped us during the time of pre-production. We were in this special effects warehouse on this lot, and we had a little folding table. We did a bunch of acting exercises and stuff, and watching the rest of the boys just dive in, totally game to just learn and soak up information like a sponge, it was really cool because I’ve loved the craft for a long time, and so watching people kind of fall in love with it before my eyes was very special. They did a great job.
Before you did the show, had you ever watched any shows with fictionalized bands like The Monkees or Big Time Rush, anything like that?
The Monkees are iconic. I was a kid when Big Time Rush was a big thing. I remember being, I’m like, I want to look like James, like that guy’s cool. (sings Big Time Rush’s “Boyfriend”) That one’s a banger. I think “Daisy Jones & the Six” is the most recent, contemporary example of music in a series. One of the things that I think makes us stand out is the fact that we are an existing band outside that writes our own music. We’re functioning on our own. We’re just trying to do the thing, and the TV show’s just another means of storytelling through the music. So it’s been cool, but it’s also quite an honor to join the pantheon of legendary TV bands.
When people come to the live shows, are they expecting Will or are they expecting Charlie Cooper?
Yeah, that’s something that we were very curious to see leading up to the release of the show, like how people were going to react. I think it’s a mixed bag, but I was definitely expecting more people to say Charlie, but the fans that come to the show are very invested in the real band, too. So I get more Wills than Charlies at the show, which is cool, because I’m not Charlie when I’m performing on stage. I’m me. It’s cool that people want to follow along for the journey outside of the band. I think that’s quite a privilege. And I’m totally fine either way. I go by Charlie, I go by Will, you can call me whatever. But it is cool that people are invested in us, the real humans.
What are you hoping for the future of the band?
Shoot, I mean, isn’t it every little rock star’s dream to go all the way? I wanna be playing with these guys for as long as possible. Hopefully we get to get another crack at another season. I think that would be really cool to show the band’s evolution fictionally and then also get to gig it live in real life. I think they’re such incredibly talented kids, and we’ve come so far. I’m really, really excited to see where we go from here. I was expecting to get to this place, this next tour, many years down the line, and now we’re here. So, star’s the limit. I wanna see what we can get together and do.