On a wet and snowy night in Philadelphia, I lounged on comfy couches with three long-haired, headband-donning, bracelet-wearing musicians. Instruments were being tuned up, serving as our background music as we were chatting. But this was no ordinary Saturday night in Fishtown.

I was hanging with the guys from Magic Giant , Austin Bisnow, Zambricki Li, and Zang (Brian Zaghi). At only 5:30 PM, their pre-show energy was already zipping through the air, as visible and powerful as a lightning strike. Guitar riffs from a soundcheck somewhere bounced off the walls of the empty mezzanine in The Fillmore and we all raised our voices instinctively.

“Find your edge,” they agreed. We were discussing tactics for breaking onto the music scene as a new artist, and they were insistent on the importance of finding your craft and honing it. Not only are they multi-faceted on stage (taking on the violin, viola, banjo, guitar, harmonica, cello and more), but they also bring an articulate thoughtfulness to everything they do and say. The band has a purpose, to say the least.

This folk-pop trio is anything but ordinary, growing up in separate parts of the country but coming together in 2014. Surprisingly, their unique sound wasn’t readily available to audiences until 2017, when they finally released their debut album, In The Wind.

"It's actually real now...it's like we created a painting that you can hang on your wall. It's tangible," Zambricki gushed about their success after their album release last May, which they recorded the summer before last.

“In between festivals we would find cool places to record,” he recalled. Much of the album was recorded outside, in unique places such as inside the trunk of a Redwood tree.

They suddenly became a massive success after they made their rounds at music festivals throughout the summer such as Firefly and Arroyo Seco. The band cites the latter as their “audition” for Coachella, where you can catch them this April in Indio, CA. Billboard even named them one of the 10 Awesome Bands Playing Coachella 2018.

When I asked if there were any other projects for 2018, I was met with three enthusiastic nods. "Yes, yep, totally," I could tell they were thrilled to be gearing up for the year ahead.

"We just released a music video for a song called Shake Me Up!" lead singer, percussionist, and cellist Austin exclaimed (a shameless plug).

"Yeah, and there's a few more that we want to do videos for, Hideaway and Celebrate [The Reckless]. We also just recorded an acoustic album in Florida. We played two festivals, and in between them we booked a studio and did a record in like, five days," Zambricki said, seeming still surprised that they accomplished it.

The acoustic album stemmed from ideas that they’ve been playing around with in their pre-show VIP, the skeleton of which we were sitting in. Guitars were strewn across the 5 rows of empty fold-up chairs, soon to be filled with super-fans eager to hang out with their favorite band members in an exclusive setting before their set later tonight.

"It’s just about finished, and it'll be released in April," he confirms.

The first time you listen to Magic Giant, you can't help but think of Mumford & Sons. Zambricki knows why: "It's the banjo. But we're not influenced by them. Even if you were rapping and you had a banjo you would still get compared to Mumford & Sons."

Their true inspirations are a bit quirkier: "Bands like Queen, The Strokes. It feels weird to say we're not referencing anything because everyone's referencing something, but when we record a song and I hear it, to me it just sounds like us, it doesn't sound like anything else," Zambricki continued.

He likened the trio coming together as "creating a spirit animal." They wouldn't achieve the sound they have without what everyone brings to the band. "With the three of us, we find our own voice."

Truthfully, that's quite the feat to accomplish.

Zang, who plays guitar, bass, percussion, and sings backup vocals for the band, empathized with the struggle of getting started as a musician, and he had some advice: persevere.

"Write as much as you can, play as much as you can, keep working until you really love what you're doing. Often at the beginning, you're wondering like why can't I write a song or why can't this work out, why doesn't this make sense? You just gotta keep doing it. Even when you're still finding things that you hate."

Austin looked at him with a smile, and said, "I love that."

These guys are certainly genuine if nothing else. My attempt at professionally extending a handshake was met with a big hug on three separate occasions from each member of the band as they came to meet me. It suddenly felt silly to be anything but genuine in return.

As I was getting up and ready to head out, I overheard them excitedly discussing a fan getting a tattoo of their lyrics down the street. "We should go!" they kept saying, mentioning that while a lot of fans get similar tattoos, they never get to see it happen.

"It might be good on social media," Zambricki said as an aside. Never forget the brand.