I'm IN the Band - Part 1

In the winter of '92 I was gearing up to finish my senior year of high school. I had been playing guitar for three years, and a friend of mine had taken up the instrument as well. It was cool having a friend who was learning the guitar at the same time as me (actually quite a few of my classmates played, and one kid had even gone so far as to rank us - and before you ask, I'll just say that I wasn't even ranked in the top 10). We would trade notes, share what we had learned, and get together to jam every few weeks.

One day before history class my buddy told me that he had been asked to join a band.

"What kind of music do they play?" I asked.

"Hard core," he said.

"Don't do it," I said.

I had no respect for that kind of music, and I couldn't imagine that my friend did either. We both liked metal. He was into Iron Maiden and I was a serious Metallica fan. Both bands, and the metal scene in general, relied heavily on guitar pyrotechnics and long extended solos. Hard core did not. It was angry youth music, an off shoot of punk, and was no where near as musically refined as metal. I further explained that no self-respecting player with a serious interest in the instrument would cheapen himself by playing in a hard core band. He agreed and thanked me for giving him my opinion.

A few weeks later in the same history class my friend told me that inspite of my advice he had in fact joined the band, had already played a gig, and that they were looking for a second player to fill in some of the sonic space.

"I'll do it," I said. Who cared if it was a hard core band? Not me. Sure, I had told my buddy not to join them a few weeks earlier, but that didn't mean that I would have said no if they had offered me the spot. Hypocritical? Sure. But is was an opportunity to play in a band that was already playing gigs. My thinking was that I'd slum it for awhile, get some shows under my belt, and be road ready for the next suitable band that had an open slot for a guitar player.

When I went down to meet the band I discovered that they were all in their mid to late 20s and really had no aspirations of ever becoming huge stars (actually the drummer did; he was another "metal" guy, and later on he would become one of my biggest allies). They just wanted to play music that was loud and fast, perform it in front of angry kids who beat the piss out of each other during the shows, and perhaps one day put out a 7-inch. At the age of 17 with college on the horizon, that seemed like the ideal band situation for me.

All that I had to do now was convince them that I was the right choice...

To Be Continued

To Part 2