(Added Mar. 2002) – We wrote a song about the show. Can anyone figure out which one it is?

(Added Oct. 2001) – This was upstairs on a balcony in a clothing store. They didn’t pay us but instead gave us each $50 store credit! I bought shoes. Dave’s mom came to this show and Dave was careful to mumble the bad words. I also still recall that this store had the worst staircase ever. It was three stories high and straight up from the street. Each section was narrower than the one before it and eventually got so small that you couldn’t stand two people across. Dave permanently dented his shin on his bass amp outside this store while rolling it at high speeds.

(Added Oct. 2001) – This was our first real road trip. We got this cool show booked in Dave’s hometown with some friends of his so we made plans to cruise up there. Bryan ended up having some issue where he couldn’t go so we found a local drummer named Daniel, taught him the songs on a Wednesday and drove up to play on Friday. This was the first show where we were an anonymous out of town band and it was so liberating to play where no one knows you. I still love that about playing out of town. All in all it was a great show … even with the borrowed drummer. A van was rented specifically for this trip. After using a real van once we bought our own van shortly after this trip. I also remember this was the first time I saw the Swank CD and I was so disappointed that I ended up smashing mine before even opening it. The artwork looked like total shit. Wrong font, bad pictures, lame design, it was just … bad. When I finally opened up another one I discovered that the pictures were really washed out and crappy looking. To top it off due to a poor DAT transfer the CD plays slower than the studio original. The whole thing sounds flat and slow because of it. God I was so pissed. I think I still am. Lesson to other bands … get proof copies of your artwork and recordings!

(Added Oct. 2001) – Yep, our big CD release party. Too bad our CD’s weren’t ready on time like they were promised. We invited Railroad Earth from Wilmington to come play the show since they were really cool guys. I remember it being very cold as Paul and I sat in his car making hand written coupons to get a discount on our CD when it came out. The CD ended up being over a month late.

(Added Mar. 2002) – Face First was headed by a friend of ours named Chet. They were this totally heavy thrash/hardcore band from Raleigh. Listening to their old demos it’s amazing how far ahead of the times they were. They were pulling heavy rap breakdowns long before it became popular. They kicked ass live so we played the fastest songs we could. It was all in vain compared to them. Even a GBH cover couldn’t save us. For some reason I remember playing Mortal Kombat for hours after the show with them.