by | December 30, 2025
All Hail, The Hails: A Gainesville Band You Can’t Miss
The indie-rock band The Hails is taking notes from Tom Petty while producing a sound that’s all their own.
Head-nodding tracks fill the festival tent on a sunny Tallahassee afternoon, mixing rhythmic guitar chords, warm vocals and lyrical vulnerability. Lead singer Robbie Kingsley clutches the microphone, soulfully singing the words, “I like it when you go / But I love it when you stay,” with a nonchalant expression on his face despite the almost-tangible energy of the fast-forming crowd in front of him. Festivalgoers at Word of South dance in the aisles, bounce in the front row and spill out from the tent onto the green hill, all clamoring to get closer to The Hails. Born out of Gainesville’s college scene, the band, which includes Kingsley (lead vocals), Franco Solari (guitar, vocals), Dylan McCue (guitar), Andre Escobar (bass) and Zach Levy (drums), carries the swagger of garage rock while toying with the scrappy sounds of indie alternative. Lately, The Hails have been making a new album—dropping in 2026—and recently wrapped up a tour across the Southeast, where they tested new material and mingled with fans. Flamingo caught up with Kingsley and Solari before a recent show to talk about their origins at the University of Florida, pre-show rituals, Tom Petty’s influence and new music on the horizon.
The band formed during your time as students at UF. Did living in Gainesville impact your sound?
ROBBIE KINGSLEY: In Gainesville, there is a great sense of pride in Tom Petty and what he stood for and the artist he was. I think we’ve followed a similar path where he started in Gainesville. He ended up going to LA and making it big. We have that same hope and dream and that’s still a path we could follow. There is a vibe of the alternative Florida scene that I like being a part of, because it’s a complete 180 from what any outsider thinks of Florida.
FRANCO SOLARI: It’s very different from the LA and New York music scenes. In Florida, I feel like people don’t really care how they’re perceived—in a positive way. There’s a lack of pretentiousness in Florida’s music culture that’s very different from major cities.
RK: Being one of those alternative Florida bands is something I take pride in, because I’m just trying to show something different from what you might think.
What is the story behind the band name, The Hails?
RK: I had an ongoing list of names I thought were cool. One day, on one of those UF football posters, I saw “All Hail, Florida Hail,” which is part of the alma mater, I believe. I became fixated on the word hail. Then I was like, “Let me just throw an ‘s’ on it,” you know, like the Kinks or the Strokes, and that was pretty much it. It sat on my phone for, like, a year, and then I liked it so much that I kind of waited until I felt like I had a band that was worth using that name for. I presented it and, literally, no one said no.
Now two of the band members live out of state. Does that affect your songwriting and recording process?
FS: We’ve only now just cracked (the code) this past summer. We’ve been struggling with it for the past five years. We wrote a new album this summer, and we rented a house (in South Florida) and the guys lived there for three months. Robbie and I would fly down for a week or two. We had the living room with the drums set up and mic’d, and guitar amps and everything. We would just jam for a few hours and leave the recording going and then go back and look at what we had and flesh out the songs. It was a blast. It felt like we were back in Zach’s room in Gainesville.
What is your favorite city or venue to play in Florida?
RK: I mean, it’s always kind of Gainesville by default. I did always like playing at The Wooly. I thought it was a fun room. Tampa’s been fun. We always play at Crowbar, which is a classic. Last year, we got to open for Flipturn, and we played at Revolution (Live) and Jannus Live, which were two massive venues. I had seen Arctic Monkeys at Jannus Live way back in the day. That was a fun, full-circle moment.
How do you hype yourself up for a show?
RK: We take it easy. It’s more like trying to find everyone. Someone will be at the bar, someone’s in the bathroom, someone’s across the street getting pizza. All the hyping up I need is that moment of walking on and seeing the people.
FS: I’m definitely more structured. If it’s up to me, I’ll have a cup of tea, do vocal warm-ups, then usually listen to one playlist and try to end on the same song right before we go out.
What’s the craziest thing that has happened to you guys on tour?
RK: The craziest thing on tour was (when) we got straight-up robbed.
FS: So that sucked. I was thinking about the time Dylan’s guitar was held for ransom.
RK: Yeah, that happened.
FS: I also met a guy that was claiming to be a time traveler. He thought Bill Clinton was still the president and whenever someone would pull out a phone, he’d be like, “Whoa, what is that?”
Talk about your latest single, “Cut the Swarm.”
RK: That was an old one I had written in my early days. It used to be a heavy rock song, more grungy. I had a friend that begged me for a decade for that song. The day or week it came out, he got engaged. He was like, this is the best week of my life.
FS: With the next song we’re going to release, I have a friend that’s been asking me for it.
RK: Maybe he’ll get engaged that week.
Click here for more riffs on Florida-made music.
About the Author
As a born-and-raised Floridian, Emilee loves to write, read and talk about the Sunshine State. She graduated from Florida State University with a degree in editing, writing and media. Now, Emilee uses her skills to edit our print issues and online content, as well as write our weekly e-newsletter, Fresh Squeezed.
