Coram singer days away from finding out if she'll play on the big stage By Peggy Spellman Hoey Gina Cutillo refuses to play the blame game. When it comes to the up-and-coming songwriter and musician's success, she feels there's no one to blame but herself and her hardworking band mates. She never knew the hit song "The Blame," a deeply personal song about betrayal and infidelity, would garner such attention with the powers-that-be in the music industry when she put pen to paper more than a year ago. Like many other writers who have made the big time, she found herself inspired and for all of about 20 minutes she cranked out her innermost feelings about an "intimate relationship," Ms. Cutillo said. Although she didn't feel as though fate was at work that moment, the universe felt otherwise. Now the 33-year-old chanteuse and her band have a chance at stardom through Doritos' Crash the Super Bowl, a nationwide battle of the bands contest in which fans cast votes electronically -- similar to "American Idol" -- to decide who will perform at the Super Bowl in Phoenix next month. And the countdown has begun. "Believe me, the anticipatory waiting is killing me," Ms. Cutillo said during a phone interview. "I definitely believe we are an energetic, fun, great band," said Ms. Cutillo. "I always wanted to write songs for the masses -- I love a great hook." While "The Blame" has a great hook, Ms. Cutillo leaves it at just that -- like the song itself -- she won't say where the fault lay in her former relationship. "I think it speaks loudly, so passionately," Ms. Cutillo said. "Something about the song grabs you. The musical energy and lyrics speak." Once the song was out there, she and her band mates decided to take a crack at super-stardom and submitted the song for consideration, Ms. Cutillo said. Doritos' contest was spawned two years ago with top executives' decision to do away with the celebrity-driven advertorials that appear during the latter half of football season as prelude to the sport's biggest night. As part of the contest, executives asked fans to download videos of themselves performing their own songs -- not advertising jingles -- which were narrowed down from about 350 to 10 semifinalists by Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas fame and executives from his label, Interscope Geffen A & amp;M Records, and the Doritos company itself. Fans nationwide, who cast their ballots electronically through MySpace until Dec. 31, will decide the top three finalists to be announced on Jan.7. The final three bands will win $10,000 and the chance to film professional music videos and will be flown to Phoenix for the week preceding Super Bowl XLII. But that's not all, the final three will also win tickets to the Super Bowl so they can watch a clip of the final winner's music video, which will be aired during a commercial break as part of the program lineup. The last band standing after the Feb. 3 battle will win national exposure and a recording deal with Interscope Geffen A & amp;M Records. "We are proud to provide one of the biggest and best stages possible for our fans to celebrate their passions, fulfill their dreams and potentially launch a career," said Ann Mukherjee, group vice president of marketing for Frito-Lay, in a press release. "But ultimately it will be the music and performance of these talented acts that will truly shine under the spotlight." Ms. Cutillo, who is a manager at Borders Books and Music in Stony Brook, said the contest has provided the band with a unique opportunity to perform at a national level and receive notoriety after slugging it out in local clubs in the area. "The Doritos people rock," she said. That said, Ms. Cutillo and her band mates, who include lead guitarist Ron Labriola, bassist Paul Siegel and drummer Jay Castronova, are anxiously awaiting their 60 seconds of Super Bowl fame. "We're like a big family," said Ms. Cutillo, who also plays rhythm guitar, noting that the band has a natural synergy that is hard to find. "It was kismet that we were all meant to play." But the band mates aren't the only ones who seem to feel that way. During the band's show at Mulcahy's in Centereach on Dec. 29, patrons showed up bearing gifts of Cool Ranch Doritos -- Ms. Cutillo's favorite flavor -- chanting "Cool Ranch Rocker," a new moniker for the songstress coined recently by a Newsday columnist, who wrote a feature on her, Ms. Cutillo said. She added that many fans an well-wishers will be right along with her in the final days in hopes that she will bring it all the way home for Long Island and, more importantly, Centereach, her hometown, and, Coram, her newfound home. "Everyone from Long Island has been so supportive," Ms. Cutillo said. "You don't understand how many people would like to see someone from their island make it." For updates on Gina Cutillo and Crash the Super Bowl, log onto www.ginacutillo.com and www.myspace.com/doritoscrashthesuperbowl, respectively.
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