Part Five: Battle Of the Bands!

A short seven days after our first show, we were asked to play in a battle of the bands at a little place known as the Modesto Virtual. A bar located in the downtown Modesto area thats main attraction is its Battletech computer games, and a decent sized stage. To start off, we knew this battle would be impossible to win, but our hopes were high, we had a large crowd, and our last practice had gone a lot better than our first show had. no Mackie PA blowouts or anything of the sort.

As you know in a battle of the bands, the bands playing are usually unknown and fairly inexperienced when it comes to live performances. we were all battling for a chance to play with the metal gods known as Cattle Decapitation. if you have never heard of these guys, well then eat your heart out, and go buy one of their CD's. Unfortunately, the show was rigged from the start, but thats something ill get into in a later post.

So our turn comes up, and as you would guess, as were getting ready, we have a bunch of onlookers with dubious looks on their faces. we had spent the majority of our time conversing with the soon to be fans, and drinking at the bar. for 5 dollars there you can get a mini pitcher, thats basically the equivalent of 4 beers in an easy to carry pouring container. screw cups, we drank right out of the pitchers! we were excited, because we had gotten a good time slot, where the crowd was hungry for the music, and everyone was feeling the vibe.

Anyways, sound check is complete, and Brian starts his usual crowd gathering  introduction, (this works really well. almost none of the other bands get people psyched up for the performance) which right away had a lot of giddy kids ready to mosh their hearts out. And we're off! we start off with our usual set-list order, which we painstakingly put together in practice over a mass montage of cigarettes and Pabst Blue Ribbon, and from the first four count, things went out of control. Right off the bat we had people trying to do stage dives in a venue that due to its lack of a dance permit didn't allow moshing.

(see the guy on stage right? he shouldn't have been there. *grin*)

so while we are doing our damnedest to keep straight faces while we totally destroy the other bands that played before us, there was mass confusion in the crowd. People having a blasty moshing, and head banging while security tries to break up the pit, and other people jumping out of the way to avoid getting dragged into the debacle. I have to give the security there props, they succeeded in breaking up the pit a few times, but after a certain point, it became a useless endeavor.

In my opinion the response from the crowd was more than enough to put us on the winning list of bands, but as i said before it was rigged. and the added effort security had to make in order to maintain some semblance of order apparently hurt us more than helped.  Heres a few pics so you can see for yourself a bit of what it was like.

 

Moving right along, the performance went very well, and we got a lot of new die hard fans from it, but of course, we didn't win the battle. instead, we won the peoples admiration for letting them go all out on the floor, and taking a hit of sorts in the contest so they could have a good time! I suppose that is a better thing, especially since it set us up for our next show, which i will be bringing to you guys soon!

Part Four: The First Show

Shortly after i demolished the band with the unlearnable song Enter the Colosseum, we got our first show... Well it wasn't exactly a show, it was a house party for Brian's wifes sisters birthday. Despite the fact that it wasn't in front of a lot of people, i was as nervous as Brian's dog jack which is a deer leg chihuahua  that shakes uncontrollably for no apparent reason other than to look like it had just almost been run over by a semi.

 I had never met any of Nikki's family, or their friends for that matter so i was justified in my nervousness. My hands were clammy, the beer was cold, and everyone was having a good time while i just observed the situation. I finally decided to crack open my beer after we got all of our gear loaded in, and tho it helped calm the nerves, it didn't really do anything to help my racing mind. I gotta tell you, the last show i had played was almost 4 years previous, and at the time i didn't care if we got booed off the stage, or got a standing ovation. Fortunately we got the latter.

So here i am, standing around looking like a dumb ass, when all of a sudden a bunch of my other friends show up. Now im really nervous. No one has heard me play in any sort of live situation, and tho im glad to see them, i realise that i was coming down with a case of the stage frights. That wouldn't last long, as the guys decide its time to do the dew, we plug in, set our volume to face-blasting insanity, and who would have guessed? the powered PA that we rented from guitar center decides to blow out in a shower of white smoke and blue light!

How could this be happening? i thought. of all the things that could go wrong, now we cant be heard as we should be. thankfully it was still functional... well partially. it would shut off and on frequently, and you could hear Brian sing about 30% of the time, but that little event got my mind off of the playing of the music, and had me more worried about the effect of a lack of vox would have. take in mind, that this was all while we were sound checking.

After a few laughs and a few more swigs of my beer, it was time to start. a few inebriated yet apprehensive onlookers waiting to have their ears mutilated by the metal we worked so hard to provide for them. We started off with Bitter Demise, an original composition by Brian, that in practice sounded amazing, but as i realized that most of the band had the same jitters i had, everything was going to be a lot harder than we expected.

We didnt kill the song entirely, but i must admit i was a bit suprised at how bad it sounded. Maybe it was the faulty PA, it could also have been the 12 or so beers we had all just shotgunned, but i was mortified when i heard the actual product. No one seemed to notice, as they started to get into the music, and at that moment a wave of relief washed over me. Maybe it didn't sound that bad. Or quite possibly, the garbage i was hearing was what they wanted to hear. either way, things went pretty smoothly from there except for the occasional added effect of the smoking PA, and the loss mid song of vocals. All in all the performance went well, and the small crowd was excited, and wanted more. the bandmates on the other hand were in a rush to get it over with, and drink themselves into oblivion. And that we Did

A couple of birthday shots later, and i'm feeling quite talkative. I hadn't given myself a chance to really meet any of the people i didn't know, and in my current state, i was ready to break into party mode. So i jumbled around the house talking to the pretty ladies i saw lounging in corners cupping their drinks like they were the last cup of booze on the planet. why people do this i'm not sure, but i always thought that if you're with friends and you're drinking, the last thing you should be doing is standing in a corner twiddling your thumbs around your cup.  the mixed tunes of rock, metal and hip hop as they always do made a few people start to dance, and i myself indulged in a few diddys of sort. i'm no dancer, so i probably looked like one of the Charlie Brown dancers.

It was time for a smoke, and as everyone moved to the somewhat frigid backyard, a young lady caught my eye. tho she had more to drink than pretty much everyone else, she was calm reserved, and well composed. i don't know what it was, but i was enamored by her presence. a long few conversations and a few more shots, and i don't exactly remember what happened. all i do remember was being in the bathroom with her, when i hear mike yelling
 "Is my life real? someone come talk to me! I just smoked some super strong salvia, and i don't think my life is what it is! Is my kid real? is my girlfriend really with me? someone give me a phone so i can make sure i'm really here!"

Mike was tripping out, and as i realized what i was currently doing, and with a giggle from the beautiful lass i was with, my attentions went elsewhere. shortly after that, still lost in a wave of what, i cant even explain, another yell comes about. "Eric time to go! were gonna leave you if you don't come out and help load up! "

after a few shared, and slightly embarrassed looks from my muse, i regained my composure and thus returned home with my first real adventure as a death metal guitarist. I had fun, but in the back of my head i knew that i and the band had a lot we had to work on. it was time to get truly serious about the music. parties and drunken debauchery aside, the Metal was where it was at.

While im not blogging...

I implore any of you that read this to subscribe to the blog! im not looking for any kind of world renown recognition or anything, but its always nice to be able to share things with your readers. As an added incentive im gonna throw in a Exclusive Sneak preview of our upcoming music video for The End Result for anyone that subscribes to this blog! once the editing process is complete that is. ill post about it as i catch up with all of the things ive failed to let you guys know about. Hopefully you'll enjoy the video as much as we enjoyed filming it!

Part three: Enter the Colosseum

WOW! i cant believe its been this long since I've posted on my blog! I'm sure you nonexistent readers have been mortified at my absence! I guess i had better give you guys an update!

Since my last post, a lot has happened. many new songs, shows and amazing opportunities have come up, and while the band isn't famous yet, were busier than ever!

Im not exactly sure where to start seeing as its been ages since i've written anything for you guys, so i suppose ill pick up where i left off.

I think you should know, that everything i write for the band i do at home on my ghetto rigged studio station. I use a line 6 tone port ux2(a decent recording interface for a pretty low price), Sony Acid pro (which is an amazing program for multi-track recording if you cant throw down the 30k for a pro tools hd setup), A great drum synth called Toontrack EZDrummer, as well as its newly updated and much more intricate brother Superior drummer, and from time to time i use the amplitude mastering suite. these programs are awesome if you dont have the money to buy the actual processors and studio equipment that can cost you butt loads of money.

Moving on to.... the Super bowl! While every one including my bandmates were enjoying a day of beer, bbq and other people hurting each other for our televised enjoyment, i was stranded. I had been invited to go to the superbowl party, but due to certain mobile restrictions, i was unable to go, and while i was receiving many "OMG! you should be here, theres more going on than just the football" text messages, I felt the sudden urge to write. and not just to get something off of my chest, but also to punish the guys for rubbing in my absence. that is how Enter the Colosseum came about. talk about punishment, its a 6 minute song of epic proportions, that has yet to be learned by the others.

In the spirit of the super bowl and with the human condition and its many flaws currently on my mind, i decided to add a bit of a fictional back story that combined the days event, with a sort of far out solution to the human problem.

Imagine its February 1st 2009, and millions of people worldwide are sitting down getting ready to watch the highly anticipated Game, when from seemingly nowhere a huge spaceship appears quite visibly around the entire globe, and in the middle of the football field, a single man appears standing on a podium that resembles a coffin. In a voice that can be heard around the world and somehow understood by all the man speaks.

" I, in passage through this life have come to question why the human race so pitiful and weak in hopeless need feed off violence, lust and greed. Is this what were destined for? Parasites of earth destroying all. No change, its just our nature."

the world goes into a fit of forced visual realisation of all of the death and destruction and general debauchery we have participated in our existance and again he speaks...

" So take up arms and follow suit... the Colosseum will open soon... sweet rapture, our blood will stain no more! for those that enter, you have been warned for death awaits you, but fear no more. once dead you shall be whole, restored."

the whole concept of this was a sort of a way to expunge the whole need or urge to kill indiscriminately in a totally fictional way of course. go onto a giant space station and kill, maim, rape and exploit with no consequence other than the possibility of your own temporary death, which with nonexistent space technology could be restored to exactly how you were before you died, but with the memories, and experiences you had in the Colosseum. this of course would be completely viewable by those too weak hearted to actually go and indulge in this opportunity. Ah the re spawn factor. once the song reaches climax, the colosseum closes for the day, but the man again urges people.

"the day is done, the battles fought. it ends for now, but many more will come to die in the interstellar colosseum... come! i bid you curious Fucking Souls... Come!"

pretty crazy huh? lol if only i had gone to that super bowl party. at least thats what the rest of the band says. i hope someday i can put together a music video for this. i think it would be most awesome. don't you think?

for today i am finished. cold fingers and a full stomach don't make for good writing, but i will write again tomorrow. I have to catch you guys up on all of the shows and events that have happened in the last few months! till then!

stay Brutal

Savage Eric