Tom Sandoval famously pondered on The Traitors season 3 “I think I’m the only person that is musically inclined in this whole castle” during the creepy doll challenge. While that’s certainly not true of his competition as he and his cover band aim for the win on America’s Got Talent, Tom Sandoval and The Most Extras certainly had enough musical inclination to get them past the audition phase and into the quarterfinals.
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“I am so excited!” the reality star and singer tells Billboard of advancing to the next stage of NBC’s talent competition show, before sharing he previously had some hesitations about competing. “I was very, very nervous. I wasn’t sure I really wanted to do it. I thought, you know, I might be facing a lot of backlash online, and I just decided this is such a great opportunity for me … and for the band to be out there.”
That backlash, of course, is from his May 2023 headline-making “Scandoval” — his affair with fellow Vanderpump Rules cast member Raquel “Rachel” Leviss, who also happened to be a close friend of Sandoval’s girlfriend of nearly 10 years Ariana Madix — which had him go from a fan favorite to Public Enemy No. 1 (or, as The New York Times called him, “The Most Hated Man in America“). Since then, the reality personality has been on a redemption tour of sorts to rehab his image, which included participating in season 2 of Fox’s Special Forces: World’s Toughest Tes, and the aforementioned Emmy-winning Peacock show The Traitors.
But he’s putting the past behind him and moving forward with his musical aspirations, which he also showcased at times on VPR, from the filming of his Charles McMansion video for original song “T.I.P” to playing the wooden penis flute and recording his trumpet playing for pals Lala Kent and James Kennedy’s song.
“I’m glad I did it,” he says of auditioning for AGT and getting a standing ovation from the judges for the band’s cover of A-ha’s 1985 Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 “Take on Me.” As for the band’s upcoming live performance, which viewers will be voting on? “Being able to perform again, when we come back, this is going to be [a] bigger performance, better and just overall, more — a lot,” he teases of the upcoming set, which will be a cover of The Weeknd’s “Blinding Lights,” which topped the Hot 100 for four weeks in 2020. “It’s going to be more extra than the first one!”
“We’re going to step it up as far as, like, just the overall production of our performance,” he explains. “Just really give it our all. We’re gonna be going a little bit different direction, music-wise. So I’m really excited for people to see the variety and the versatility that our band has.”
“You’ll have never seen us perform this song the way it’s going to be performed,” he adds. “It will definitely be our own. Trust me!”
Sandoval does have a goal in mind for the live performance beyond just moving forward in the competition. “I wanted to really showcase the fact that we’re a band that pretty much plays everything and anything,” he says of his group, which often covers classic pop hits. “So I wanted to have a nice little juxtaposition to what we did before, so in the sense of like, genre and era and things like that.”
One thing the reality star did say he’s working on making better this time is his vocals, which judge Simon Cowell critiqued as “weren’t great” after the cover band’s AGT audition. “I’ve been vocally training every day and just doing the best I can to keep improving myself,” shares Sandoval, who also says he “did not take offense” at all to the famously acerbic judge’s comments about his singing. “[I’m] always trying to get better.”
But for now, the performer says he’s just taking AGT one step at a time. “As of right now, to me, [the] ultimate reward is just getting out there and being able to play again,” he says. “And if we’re able to come back and play again and we go further, I will be that much more happier just going back out there and performing.”
As for what’s next for Tom Sandoval and The Most Extras? “We have a tour coming up. We’re going to be hitting about 20 or so different cities,” the former VPR star says. “We’re gonna work on recording some songs as well. Might do some originals too, but we’re definitely going to be recording and putting some music out.”
America’s Got Talent airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. on NBC, and streams the next day on Peacock. The quarterfinals kick off on Aug. 19, with the first voting results revealed Aug. 20.
