Cows

Growing up during grade school and middle school, it was almost as if time stood still, or moved slower than molasses in January. The days felt like they took forever to pass by, and the 6+ hours in school each day felt more like 12 hours minimum. 

When I first got to high school I was a bit concerned because the length of classes were going to be longer, but much to my amazement they seemed to go by quickly. I finally came to the conclusion that being in a different classroom for each class as opposed to spending an entire day in one classroom must of had something to do with it. When I stepped back to take a look at my life, it seemed as if high school was passing by in a flash, and grade 12 was no exception. The snow was on the ground, exams were underway, and the first semester was coming to a close....OH! AND the Epileptic Brain Surgeons video was finally complete! 

For the life of me I can't even remember where I was when I saw it for my first time, which is fairly shocking given my track record with memories. I honestly can't remember if there was a viewing party, or if I saw it on much music, or perhaps one of the guys simply showed it to me on a VHS tape. Never the less, it was amazing in my eyes.

Although the Surgeons had now released 3 different demos, a lot of the same songs were on each of those demos. For the video however, they decided to go with one of their new songs "Cows" which to even the un trained ear, was clearly one of the stand out tracks on the tape.

The video kicks off with some footage of a creepy abandoned house/barn which I believe was in Streetsville, or Caledon if I remember correctly, followed by footage of goats hopping around in a pen. I always found it hilarious that they threw goats in there, one just assumed they couldn't find any cows to film. Or perhaps it was just older stock footage that Owen had kicking around.

The rest of the video is a potpourri of imagery that still brings a smile to my face over 20 years later. Some of the high points being: Pooh playing guitar in oversize shades resembling a muppet version of Ray Charles or Stevie Wonder, Waller singing with drumsticks coming out of his ears, footage of the boys dancing from the infamous "Club 2000" (now known as Nashville North and coincidentally in the town I happen to live in currently), Steve shredding the 12 foot half pipe at the legendary Grassroots, the only indoor skatepark Brampton ever had (R.I.P.), cameos from Ronnie Rowbottom and Al Nolan, our favourite pool hall we used to hang out at, the scenes in front of the old K-Mart in Brampton, which were my old stomping grounds as a kid....shall I go on? 

I've pretty much just described the entire video with the exception of the ever classic hot rocks footage, which could be a blog post in itself. Since I'm on a roll here though I'll give you the gist of it. There was a battle of the bands held in Brampton once upon a time at a bar known as "Hot Rocks" which any true metal historian can tell you about if you've never heard of it. 

Old sketch I did slandering Hot Rocks

E.B.S. signed up, showed up, and battled it out against an array of "hair bands" essentially. Waller was dressed like he was straight out of Motley Crüe or Poison, and there was a lot of tension in the air between the hardcore kids and the "glam fags" as we used to call them. 

An all out brawl almost ensued in which Mike Myre was the ring leader of, and a certain....ummmm.....humble narrator was at his side. The crowd was predominantly people who came to see the Surgeons, so naturally the glam rock guys backed down. Every time I watch the video I can remember that night like it was yesterday. It was really incredible seeing my friends in a video on television, I felt as if they were somewhat famous now, or at least a step closer to fame.

Here is the video, it will also be added to the videos page for easy access should you feel the need to watch it again in the future. Mad props still after all these years, go out to Owen S.Roberts. Film maker extraordinaire.

Current Updates 10/17/2013

Serious apologies everyone, I seemed to have really dropped the ball last week with my blog postings. I ended up missing Wednesdays post as I was knee deep in a new Street Trash song that literally demanded a weeks worth of attention from me. We had our friend Greg Dawson from BWC studios do some guitar work on the track. I literally poured 40 hours of heart and soul into this new song, we hope you enjoy.

I never got to post on Friday as it was a holiday and I got my son a day early for the weekend, plus I had him the holiday Monday as well. Needless to say all my time was devoted to him. I hope all my fellow Canadians had a nice thanksgiving with their families and loved ones. 

This week feels like its almost over before it even started. Tuesday I ended up going down to Toronto to see Mach Spitz perform with Friendly Rich & the lollipop people, which was definitely a treat for me. It was nice seeing some old faces and meeting some new ones too. 

Yesterday I went up to the boonies to work with my good pal Steve at thedevilslatex.com in my latest venture. I have been trying my hands at sculpting mask designs for Steve, and so far it's going quite well. I absolutely love sculpting and I am excited to see where this new venture brings me. 

I haven't had a chance to shoot anymore Heavy Ghetto segments yet either for YouTube, so hopefully I will get around to that next week. It's kind of strange, I quit my job yet I seem to be busier than ever now. Between working on music, hanging with my son, sculpting, tattooing, catching up with friends, the new podcast, and GTA V, it's been a bit tough to focus on writing let alone even finding time to sleep! I know I said a few posts back that I was trying to break away from current events and move forward in the story, and I apologize for falling short on my word, but I guarantee you this sorry will continue...

My newborn great niece "layla"

Welcome To Grade 12

Another summer of debauchery had passed, most of which is a blank to me surprisingly, and it was September once again. I was truly excited for my final year of high school. Everything had come full circle and I was at the top of the ladder and the top of the food chain once again...the king shit of the school if you will, and I was looking boss in my new army green combat pants and Misfits t-shirt my mom had bought me for the first day of school. I was still growing my hair in the undercut style, and it had gotten quite long over the summer, it now touched my shirt collar.

It was strange coming back to this place and not seeing my gang of friends, most of whom were older than me. Majority of them had graduated, but thankfully a few of the more scholastically challenged ones still remained, so I wasn't completely alone. Not too mention Mike Myres was still present, which I couldn't figure out since he was already in grade 11 when I started high school ! Turns out he wasn't sure where he wanted to go career wise after gaduation, so Mike decided to accumulate practically every possible credit on the agenda. Smart guy I thought, at least he will have choices.

It seemed like Mike and I were really getting closer as friends now, since most of the boys were gone and we had the same lunch period. Plus our common love for the Beastie Boys just continued to bring us closer as Mike became a bigger fan of them with every passing minute. The same went for Mike Chapman, who was now attending Humber College for radio broadcasting. Chapman had also gotten himself a motorcycle which he used for his college commute. The three of us hung out quite often, and we were continuing to jam in Mike C's basement on occasion. 

Mike ended up meeting some pretty cool dudes in his college course, mainly two guys named Stewart & Owen. They were both very cool, laid back, friendly guys with a bit of flare and a zest for life. If I remember correctly, Stew was in the radio broadcasting course with Mike, and his friend Owen was majoring in film. Owen & Stew were trying to start their own audio/video production team, and now that they had met Mike, they knew someone in a band. A band that could use a music video. When I heard the news I just about shit 10 bricks! Epileptic Brain Surgeons were going to have a music video...

The Coin-Op Podcast

Just as I told everyone I'm trying to shy away from too many "general update" blog posts, here I am yet again with my foot in my mouth, as its time once again for some new current updates.

This time however, I'm stepping aside from music for a change, to inform you of my latest non musical venture. My friend and former co-worker Jon and I were always having hilarious discussions about old arcade video game machines, and our conversational chemistry was so natural, we would be red faced from laughing, eyes tearing up, and highly excitable...all from a simple video game convo. After a few hangouts where the same pattern re-occurred, Jon suggested we should start a podcast radio show. Being the type of guy that I am, constantly relying on my creative outlets to maintain my sanity, I instantly agreed on his brilliant idea. 

We shot some ideas around, mentioned it a few times, but nothing ever really came of it. Jon lived right across the street from me too so why were we slacking so much? Ironically he moved to Guelph at the end of the summer, and NOW we finally decided to actually do this damn thing! So last Tuesday, Jon showed up at my place with some energy drinks & party favours, and it was time to roll tape.  

I had previously planned to set my living room table up as a make shift radio station, with various microphones and a mixer, unfortunately I realized at the zero hour that I was missing a few key elements to pull off my planned setup I had in mind. So we ended up simply sitting a microphone in the middle of the table to do our thing. An hour later we were finished an we both felt pretty good about it, it felt natural, nothing felt forced, and surprisingly we spent 45 minutes talking about the classic 1983 arcade game "Dragon's Lair"

Later that day I did a bit of editing and processing of the recordings, which I wasn't super thrilled about. There was a substantial amount of noticeable air and hiss in the background, caused from the two of us sharing one mic that we were both sitting a fairly far distance from. I'm so picky when it comes to production but there wasn't much I could do by that point, but live and learn, move on, and retain that new knowledge for the next recording. I also made us a theme song that day, finalized all the editing, and launched a website for our new podcast, which we decided to call "The Coin-Op Podcast" since we are strictly talking about coin operated machines. 

We're both pretty stoked about the whole endeavour, and we've already received some decent feedback from people. The show is going to be bi-weekly for now, so you can expect episode two sometime next week if things go as planned, however it might end up being a monthly show, we haven't quite decided yet. Never the less if you've got 45 minutes to kill listening to two bad dudes talk about Dragon's Lair, click the link below, and be sure to like & share on Facebook! Peace out!

http://coinop.podomatic.com/entry/2013-10-01T16_57_09-07_00

www.facebook.com/coinoppodcast

 

The Epiphany

It felt like the rest of my grade 11 school year was spent in a lysergic stupor, when I wasn't too busy squeaking through classes with below mediocre grades... or reciting off the entire "Paul's Boutique" album with Mike & Mike. Apparently that wasn't enough for us anymore either, and we decided to take it to the next level after Mike Myre informed us his home camcorder had the ability to retain music in it that you could later record video over without compromising the pre recorded audio. So naturally we decided to take our "rapping" to the next level and make music videos.

It wasn't long before we were at Mike's place, recording some choice cuts from "Paul's" onto the camcorder. If I remember correctly it was material from the later part of side two. It was time for the next step, and now here we were having to lip synch essentially while trying to keep in time with the audio. It was actually a bit difficult just trying to jump right into action, since we could punch in the video recording at any given point of the song. So now here we were like a bunch of fools, dressing in various outfits and filming footage in Mike's garage as well as other places around Brampton. We knew it was pretty ridiculous, but it was just fun as hell to do, and we actually felt like we were doing something noteworthy and creative. 

As fun as it was, it was also quite embarrassing being half in the bag one night at a party when Myre decided to put the video on. Normally at a party in those days the tv didn't garnish much attention, but at this particular party the home wonder happened to have a HUGE t.v. that was the focal point of the entire room! I'm not sure if I was red faced with embarrassment or not, but I specifically remember having a really hard time even making eye contact with the tv. It felt so awkward to have a party full of people watching us pretend to be the Beastie Boys. 

It was at that very moment that I felt like we were a bit of a joke, despite a lot of positive feedback around the room. I realized right then and there that if we wanted to be taken seriously, we had to REALLY bring this rap thing to the next level...

OMG! DOUBLE POST!!!

Yes you read that correctly, double post! In honour of Friday and Mondays posts being non existent I've decided to be twice as nice today and make up for the two lost days. The first posting "M.E.A.T." is the continuation of the story, as where this post will be a short and sweet one, mainly to bring you up to speed on current events. I feel like I've been doing this a lot lately, perhaps because I have a lot going on in my life right now.  I was also having some continuity issues with the Heavy Ghetto storyline as far as dates and timelines went, but those issues have been resolved. Hopefully there will be more story and less current updates from here forward. 

STREET TRASH: My current new side project with my pal Mach Spitz has come with another one! That's right, we've released yet another new bomb track to smack your senses around. This ones entitled "Skrew-ta-knee" some clever word play on "Scrutiny" The vocals are a back n forth frenzy between us that almost feels like a barrage of samples, mind you there are a barrage of samples here. Mach created the music, I mixed and arranged, and we collaborated on the vocals together. We hope you dig it as much as we do.

http://streettrash.bandcamp.com/track/screw-ta-knee-scrutiny

HEAVY GHETTO-THE VLOG: It's back! Episode two is now complete as of this morning and I've just finished uploading it to YouTube as I write this, literally! I hope you enjoy it and as always feel free to contact me or leave comments  with your constructive criticisms, and don't forget to like, share, subscribe, and all that good social media Tom fuckery! Cheers! 

K to the Bizzallz

M.E.A.T.

Another musical matter of importance I overlooked was a new fanzine type magazine that came out in 1989, serving the greater Toronto area and its surrounding suburbs. The name of the magazine was M.E.A.T. which was an acronym that stood for "Metal Events Around Toronto"

I'll never forget the first time I encountered the rag. I was partaking in my usual record shopping at HMV, and on my way out the door I noticed a small magazine rack with a sign that said "FREE" so I grabbed the first ever issue of m.e.a.t. It was all printed on black and white news print, like a small newspaper. Although it was somewhat ghetto, it was steps beyond your typical homemade fanzine. 

When I got home I flipped through the pages quickly, then I dismissed the mag so I could listen to my new records. Eventually I became bored and made my way back to the magazine, this time however I ended up reading the entire thing from cover to cover. It was actually well written, and the fact it supported local talent was almost a godsend. M.E.A.T. also catered to the typical metal fans in regards to what was happening on the more commercial side of things with bigger bands that weren't local. 

M.E.A.T. gained steam and momentum very quickly, and the magazines publisher Drew Masters, was releasing an issue every month. In the beginning I was questioning if we'd ever even see a second issue, now here I was scouring record stores on the 1st of each month looking for the latest copy. The mag had also graduated to a slick, glossy coloured cover by now, signs it was doing well. I had no idea who this Drew character was until I finally saw a pic of him one day. Drew looked like your typical hair bag, head banging rock on, the type of guy I once was, the type of guy I loathed now, and although he did come across as a bit of a dick in some of his writings, I couldn't give the guy anything but respect. Respect for investing his own time, energy, passion, and money into something he truly believed in... Us! 

Us as fans of heavy music and us as the local musicians making the music. How could you hate on a guy who had that much ambition which ultimately meant exposure for us. You couldn't hate...even if the guy did look like a Mötley Crüe reject. 

For something that was free, the rag had over 35,000 copies in circulation a mere 2 years later , quite impressive for the little zine that could. I think one of the driving forces behind that was the scene itself. Toronto has always had a very prolific music scene, and the fact we now had our own magazine to document and support that scene, how could the rag not do well? 

It was always exciting getting the next issue and seeing what bands were being interviewed, what new local talent had been discovered, plus you could find out all of the metal happening around the city as far as live performances went. After awhile it wasn't uncommon for me to see my own friends such as the E.B.S. boys or the dudes from Mal Havoc gracing the pages. 

By 1995 m.e.a.t. was no more, but some of its contributors went on to start "Brave Words Bloody Knuckles" which has since became the leading authority in local heavy music, and it would be an understatement to say they've taken the ball and ran with it. Kudos to all involved with BWBK for keeping the spirit alive, and of course Kudos to Drew Masters for being one man who made a difference for all of us. I think he should change his name to Drew Mattered...