So, a long time ago I was in a band. Well, actually it was 2002 (I think). I thought it was a good idea, like most entries on this blog, to write it down before I forgot all about it. Having said that, I won't ever completely forget about the band, because;
a. It was a fun experience, and
b. We have some songs to show from it

The band was born from the meeting of 2 guitarists (me being one of them), a bass player, drummer and singer. To take it back a step, originally Dave (the other guitarist) and I had been jamming on acoustic guitars, just casually, for probably 6 months or so. Dave had been in a band ("Game Over") and we were jamming a lot at the tail end of that while they wound down. He was keen to do something, but I was busy at work (yes, even back then... seems like I've always been busy at work) and figured it wouldn't happen. Then one day Dave says to me "we're going to meet these guys on Saturday arvo to have an audition". I was a bit startled, but excited as well. Knowing nothing about what might transpire (I didn't even see their ad, know what kind of music they wanted to play, etc. - Dave had spoken to them on the phone I think), I packed the gear into the car and headed into South Melbourne. It was a bit of a weird, awkward meeting at first - the bass player and drummer were YOUNG. I think maybe 19 or 20 years old? At the time we were late 20's, so there was a considerable age gap. The singer was our age as well... but looked young. Me and Dave... well, we looked old already :)

We jammed on a couple of things to begin with, but things just didn't seem to be working well. I think we could all tell that we could play our instruments well, and we were all similar in tastes and styles, but it just wasn't coming together. I distinctly remember our new found bandmates going to get some lunch and me and Dave hanging back at the rehearsal studio. Dave looked at me, and said something along the lines of "We've got to come up with a song, and we've got to do it now". So, in the space of about 10 minutes, we wrote the basics of a brand new song (not even using ideas we had jammed on before). The guys came back, we showed them the song, they were pretty impressed I think. Truth be told, I thought it was a pretty shit song actually... until they added to it, and then it became our first real song :)

So, we rehearsed pretty regularly (I think weekly?) and things went smoothly for a long time. We wrote prolifically, and we wrote well. Generally, I'd write riffs and the basics of most songs, Dave would fine-tune (and in some cases completely turn them on their head - kinda like a producer), Adrian (the drummer) would write the lyrics or pull from a book of his lyrics, Mark (the singer) would write the vocal melodies and Paul (the bassist) would just add magic (that's the only way I can describe it - he had a knack for it). We all worked well together. And for the most part we had fun. We wrote 12 songs (from memory) and recorded 4 (which will no doubt appear here in the blog soon)

But then cracks started to appear. People would be late to rehearsal. A rift started (I can't even remember why) between Adrian and Dave. I got narky that Dave was continually re-writing my songs, and I thought he was being too much of a perfectionist, fine-tuning songs in the moment rather than moving forwards. Dave no doubt thought I was being a bit too militant in my songwriting approach (which I can be). We started to move in different musical directions - some wanted rock, some wanted screamo, some wanted emo, some wanted straight-up punk, some wanted pop. Personalities were stretched and rubbed the wrong way to create friction. Someone had another band. Someone wanted to play a different instrument. One of the final straws was just even coming up with a name for the band. I think that took probably 3 or 4 months. Everything that was suggested was immediately shot down by someone or analysed to death. Eventually we settled on the name "About The Rockets". Even then I don't think anyone was really that happy with it. It all got a little Spinal Tap really :)

Thus, we broke up. We wrote 12 songs, recorded 4 and played 1 gig. Without sounding too wanky, we had so much potential (I genuinely believe so). We were definitely on a path to becoming a decent Australian band. It was a shame to see it fall apart. I'll post some songs over the coming months as part of my "songs" thread, and you can be the judge :)

Labels: Music