There's good news, and then there's good news...
Posted June 29, 2007
The winners of this year's Ernie Ball Battle of the Bands Warped Tour contest were announced yesterday and though we weren't selected, we are ecstatic about who was: Lannen Fall, Vallon, Thirteen Yards to Victory, and Astrea. Above anything else, we consider most of these bands to be brothers-in-arms and we couldn't be more excited for them and their opportunity to rock out at this year's Warped Tour (side note: I would say "all" if we knew Astrea better**). But what's even more satisfying is what I think this says about the state of music in our area.
All four winning bands are from generally the same corner of the state map. We all know each other, we all play together, and in many different combinations of bands and friends we all party together: Boston, East Boston, Danvers, and Weymouth. Not mentioned here are Worcester, Springfield, New Bedford, Fitchburg or anywhere else with great, flourishing bands and admirable music scenes, two things this state has a limiteless supply of. This doesn't mean that the music in our area is in any way better or somehow more exciting or "in"--something that would be absolutely ridiculous to think or say--or that our scene is "taking over," or any similar kind of bullshit turfwar statement. But it could mean that the bands in this area might just be working a little bit harder to get the word out, and that the kids from our backyard might just be proving a little more apt to listen. And that, my friends, is a really cool thing.
If anyone from the selected bands are reading this, best of luck at the show and keep doing exactly what you're doing. Obviously, something's working.
The last thing I'm going to talk about is our interim band member. Darren (Anola's Recovery/Full Fit) has been helping us stay afloat while we continue our search for a permanent bass player and we can't thank him enough for it. If he hadn't swooped in and saved the day, we definitely wouldn't have been able to play this Friday at Knapp's Undergound (practical concern), and we would've been completely suicidal if we had to keep practicing without a bass to lock things up (we're unstable). So I just wanted to take a sec to say thank you via blog. If you want to see how well this little experiment turns out, shoot us an email and you can caravan to VT with us for the show (Pat's bringing his hibachi).
Everyone try to keep cool and hang in there with us. The EP is forever forthcoming and so is a new/permanent bass player (fingers crossed) and a new lay-out for our page.
Talk to you all very soon.
Anthony
