When I was a little boy, I fell in love with music while I was trucking all over New Jersey with my mother. I became an expert on the workings of Kris Kristofferson, Helen Reddy, and Simon and Garfunkle.
By 1977, I was playing the drums and listening to Rush, Kiss, and ACDC, and by age 1982, I was playing the bass and listening to Metallica, Judas Priest, and Iron Maiden. From that moment on, my life became about music.
When disco came, I rebelled (although I also enjoyed from the closet)… Then came rap, and I rebelled some more… but then came Anthrax, and the game was changed forever.
While they never earned the credit that they deserved, in my opinion, when they broke the genre boundaries, they gave us modern music as we know it, and they opened the gates for bands like Nirvana, RHCP, Pearl Jam, and Linkin Park.
In 1992, I worked around the clock at learning all this music on my bass, and although I loved to listen to heavy bands like Godsmack and White Zombie, when it came to the bass, I was drawn to the energy of bands like the Ramones, Blondie, Billy Idol, and the Sex Pistols.
In 2008, I started going to underground shows, following the Misfits and the rag-tag remnants of the 1970’s NYC punk bands. Along that journey, I became friends with Rob Vannice of Juicehead, a Chicago based punk band on the Misfits Record Label, and Vic, Eric, and Tommy of the Koffin Kats, a Detroit based Psychobilly band.
These guys work feverishly to bring us their music, and they ask for and receive very little in return, so I never miss an opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to them. They’ve shaped my life… guided me through the dark times… and celebrated with me during the great times.
No matter how far away my friends have ever been, music has always kept us close, and it provides me with a satisfying feeling of comfort and contentment. It inspired me to start my own band, so that I could pay tribute to the artists that rode along with my mother and I in 1973, as well as the bands that start the mosh pits on Saturday night in NYC.
During my 30-year stretch as a musician, nothing has limited me more than the lack of dedication from other musicians, so I eventually, I turned to the web for help. What I found was a lazy world, filled with hollow souls and empty hearts, completely devoid of the zest that making music brings.
I never did find other musicians to make music with, but I did find musicians just like me… Great people from all over the world, drawn together by the power of a great song, and wanting to share it with others.
Those who put being a decent human ahead of being politically correct. We eat, drink, make fun of each other, live for music and family, by the Golden Rule, teaching, preserving, and protecting decency in humanity. This is not our world, this is thee world… One world… Welcome to it.
We are the Sarcastic, Coffee, Technology, Music, and Movie Club…
