Tom Sandoval knew what was coming. After the 43-year-old reality star appeared on America’s Got Talent in June, many viewers were vocally critical not just of his performance but of his apparent attempts to “rehab” his tainted image.
In 2024, he had been dubbed the “most hated man in America” after it emerged during season 10 of Vanderpump Rules that he cheated on longtime girlfriend Ariana Madix with her then-best friend, Rachel Leviss. Both the cast and fans of the hit Bravo show rallied around Madix amid the infidelity scandal, dubbed “Scandoval,” while Sandoval was pilloried.
When he was first approached about auditioning for AGT, Sandoval suspected he’d be in for more of the same. “It was something that my buddy Jason had brought to my attention,” Sandoval tells The Independent. “I immediately did not want to do it. I felt like it would create a lot of negative backlash, setting myself up to get trolled.”
Speaking while visiting family in St. Louis, Missouri, Sandoval reveals he was also worried about the sheer terror of being on the AGT stage in front of judges like Simon Cowell and Howie Mandel. Ultimately, though, he says he decided to do it for the sake of his band.
“They were with me through one of the hardest times in my life,” he says. “And to go to them and say, ‘Hey, I don’t want to do it ‘cause I’m worried about backlash’ — It would have broken my heart to do that. So I was like, you know what? These guys have been there for me, and I want to do this for them and for us.”
Sandoval and his band, The Most Extras, performed A-ha’s “Take on Me” during the first round of auditions and ended up receiving four “yes” votes from the judges. The audience danced along, many with mouths agape, trying to reconcile that in front of them was the same man they watched for over a decade on Vanderpump Rules.
While Bravo is an undeniable part of his history, Sandoval says he’s keen to move on from it. On August 19, the second round of AGT auditions begins on NBC, and he’s brimming with excitement about taking the stage once more.
The Traitors star traces his musical journey back to his childhood, when he began playing trumpet in the fourth grade. He joined a marching band before quitting sports to appear in a production of the cult favorite musical Little Shop of Horrors.
More recently, he taught himself to play guitar and is now taking voice lessons as he fronts a band for the first time. He’s been in bands before, but they never worked out. “It was always original music,” he says. “I would put so much time, so much passion and money and effort into getting this band to the next level, and then it would fall apart. It was just so heartbreaking that I didn’t play music for quite a while.”
Eventually, he found his way to The Most Extras, a nine-person covers band, but he isn’t ruling out a return to creating original music again. Vanderpump Rules fans might remember “Touch in Public”, the 2015 single from Charles McMansion, a duo Sandoval formed with the late actor Isaac Kappy.
For now, though, he is leaning into the joys of appealing to a broad audience with songs everyone can sing along to. He says he has “learned some hard lessons” during his time touring with his new bandmates, recalling their van getting stuck in the mud during their first tour and needing to be hauled out by a stranger, lugging equipment up multiple flights of stairs to get to a rehearsal room in New York, and the ceiling falling during another small gig.
After their AGT debut, Simon Cowell told them, “Not everyone comes on this show to get a record deal. Sometimes it’s about being true to who you are.” Sandoval echoes that sentiment during our conversation. “I feel like this is something that really is true to me,” he explains. “It’s something I love. Music has always been in my life. My dad was a DJ, and I grew up listening to great music. It just really inspired me.”
When we spoke, Sandoval had not yet decided which song his band would perform during the second round of auditions. He did say that he’d been attending vocal lessons and was eager to come “full circle in another talent show; a much, much bigger one in fact, the biggest stage we’ve ever been on.”
Regardless of the outcome on AGT, Sandoval is looking ahead to the band’s fall tour. “I’m so grateful to be able to do something like this, to be out there, to have my band be able to be on a big stage like that,” he says. “I’m just excited for what’s to come.”
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