The Casualties

The Guys of The Casualties (who me, Dannah, and my sister) saw live!

The Casualties concert: Lose Your hearing, Break Your bones, Have fun!

By Alyssa Super

If you know of the Casualties, I’m sure you know of how well they are in concert. And for those of you who don’t, The Casualties are an underground New-York based “alternative” band. Because of their anti-mainstreamism, the band comes to small, sometimes underground clubs such as the Red Sea or the Triple Rock. Let me tell you one thing, even if you don’t necessarily enjoy all of the Casualties music, or have never heard of them at all, this concert will still be enjoyable. Touring non-stop, you can’t ever really miss them, sometimes they will be in a state two or three times per year. Once the band is on stage, the Casualties make sure that the crowd interacts and is having fun. Allowing audience on stage is one of the awesome aspects of The Casualties.

The concert was really a great show especially since the band is extremely into what they do. They scream, throw their arms and pour emotion into everything they do. They play loud, and clear; so loud that you have ringing in your ears for the next week. And the weakness you are feeling, well- that is just your legs, that are about to give out on you because you’ve been jumping, pushing, or standing too long!

I was introduced to this band, and since than, I have really enjoyed them. The show was great, and the best part of all was the fact that after the show, the guys sit back and talk to us. A lot of musicians see themselves as better than others, but not the Casualties. They will take pictures with us, and even just sit back and well…chill.

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rancid

dreamtheater

LOS ANGELES - After recently celebrating the band’s 20-year anniversary, Dream Theater returns with its first-ever best-of collection. Spanning 1991-2005, the two-disc set contains rare single edits, B-sides and a trio of new remixes that spotlight that band’s nonpareil musicianship, complex arrangements and amazing songwriting. Dream Theater’s GREATEST HIT (...& 21 other pretty cool songs) will be available from Rhino on April 1 at all physical retail outlets and www.rhino.com for a suggested retail price of $19.98 and at all digital retail outlets for a suggested retail price of $12.99.

Referring to Dream Theater’s first and only major radio hit, “Pull Me Under,” the compilation’s tongue-in-cheek title is a testament not only to the band’s sense of humor but also highlights the acclaimed New York-based quintet’s ability to make music and cultivate a legion of fans on its own terms, without help from radio or MTV. The collection features more than two hours of progressive hard rock from James LaBrie (vocals), John Myung (bass), John Petrucci (guitar/vocals), Mike Portnoy (drums/vocals) and Jordan Rudess (keyboards).

The collection contains three newly remixed versions of tracks from Dream Theater’s breakout 1992 album, Images And Words: the aforementioned “Pull Me Under” as well as “Take The Time” and “Another Day.” Portnoy says this album presented the perfect opportunity to give the songs a bit of a facelift. “The original mixes always sounded a bit ’80s’ to me, so we had our good friend and longtime mixer Kevin Shirley give the tracks a bit of an update to sound more like the rest of the Dream Theater catalog. The songs remain the same (no pun intended-Kevin just mixed that album as well), but there are little nuances in the tracks that I forgot were originally there, and it’s very cool to hear them again.”

The collection’s 22 songs are split evenly between two discs, which are divided into “The Dark Side” (the metallic) and “The Light Side” (the melodic). Filled with some of the band’s most sinister sounds, the first disc lives up to the billing of “The Dark Side.” Longtime fans will appreciate the abundance of alternative versions of classic tracks, including single edits of “Lie,” “Home,” and “Misunderstood.” Disc One concludes with two tracks from the band’s 2005 album Octavarium: “The Root Of All Evil” and “Sacrificed Sons.”

The second disc, “The Light Side,” spotlights the band’s melodic side and features an alternate mix of “Through Her Eyes,” a single edit of “Solitary Shell” and “To Live Forever,” a 1994 B-side from the U.K.-only single of “Lie.”

A grassroots phenomenon for 20 years, Dream Theater continues to record studio albums acclaimed for award-winning musicianship as well as artistic vision. To meet the demands of a demanding global fan base, the band also maintains an active touring schedule that regularly includes sold-out performances around the world.

Dream Theater has currently been on the road since June 2007, traveling the globe in support of their latest studio album Systematic Chaos. Their world tour will conclude with a final run throughout North America in May as they premiere their “Progressive Nation” package tour with Opeth, Between The Buried And Me, and 3 supporting.

the ramones

Rocket To Russia - released November 1977; Johnny's favorite Ramones album because "it's got the most classic Ramones hits." Tommy: "When we did Rocket To Russia, we were on a roll, in high gear, touring and everything. At that point, we thought we were gonna make it, that we were on the launching pad." Joey: "'Sheena Is A Punk Rocker' first came out as a single. I played it for [Sire Records president] Seymour Stein. He flipped out and said, 'We gotta record that song now.' It was like back in the '50s; you'd rush into the studio because you thought you had a hit, then put it right out." Tommy: "'Rockaway Beach' was a fantastic song that never got released in the summer, so it was never a hit. That was a Dee Dee thing; he would go down to Rockaway Beach. None of us were real beachgoers except for him." Ed Stasium: "If there is a greatest Ramones song that I recorded, it's 'Teenage Lobotomy.' It's a mini-Ramones symphony. It has every element of what's great about them, in one song: The big drum intro and the 'Lobotomy' chant; the little background harmony oooohs; the subject matter." And, Stasium adds, the dizzying succession of time and key changes in Johnny's acutely chiseled chord progressions, perfectly synchronized to Dee Dee and Tommy's forced-march tempo.

Rocket To Russia was supposed to be the stratosphere shot, the third-time-lucky payoff for four years of rough labor and hot pop. "Each album has its personality," Tommy says, "and with Rocket To Russia, it was the feeling of release. Freedom. The sense of exhilaration." But when the album did not perform to commercial expectations, when the singles ("Sheena," "Rockaway Beach," a cover of Bobby Freeman's "Do You Want To Dance") didn't bust loose on radio, clouds began to gather. "The album that followed," notes Tommy, "has more anger and frustration." Right there in the title: Road To Ruin.

Tommy's decision to stop playing drums and concentrate on production was the first crack in the dream. The songs amplifying that stress-the physical and emotional toll exacted by nonstop gigging; the first, subtle pressures from above to get radio-friendly-were not long in coming: "I Just Want To Have Something To Do," "I Wanna Be Sedated."

"I Wanna Be Sedated" was the result of an especially gruesome road nightmare, when a makeshift humidifier exploded in Joey's face before showtime at the Capitol Theater in Passaic, New Jersey. He was rushed to a New York burn center - only after finishing the show. "That song was about being on the road too long," he said. "Getting burned like that, bits and pieces from different situations, like being on tour in England at Christmas, when everything shuts down: 'There's nothing to do, nowhere to go/I wanna be sedated.' People didn't use terms like sedated then. This was before Prozac."

NOFX

Band History
Here's a great idea, let's get the guy in the band who smokes the most pot to write a band history. That's me. The guy who couldn't remember what was said five minutes ago if his life depended on it. You try and write down the last 16 years of your life and make it seem relevant…

First Practice 1983
Here's what I do remember. I was sitting with a kid named Dillon in our usual spot with the other punkers during lunchtime at Fairfax high school. He was a drummer, and we were dissatisfied with the bands we were in. My band consisted of me and my one and only Punk Rock friend both playing guitar and singing and that was it. Neither one of us had finished any songs. Not quite a recipe for success.

So I sez to my friend, let's start a band. A real band, a band that does stuff. A band that writes songs, practices, puts out records, and goes on tour. We talked about who else we wanted in this band. We knew lots of good people from going to punk gigs around LA. He knew a Bass player named Mike who used to be in a band called False Alarm. We both knew a guy named Steve from Orange County who we agreed would make a great front man. We made some calls and arranged to meet and have a first practice.

That's when I first met Mike. Mike was a huge Misfits fan. He looked like a Misfits fan. His hair was long in front and it was all hairsprayed together to a point down the middle of his face in what was called a "Devilock". Mike had some songs for us to play. I had written a song called "Take Part". It sounded an awful lot like Minor Threat's version of the Monkees' Stepping Stone. Steve didn't go to that first practice, he couldn't get a ride up from Orange county. After that first practice Dillon quit and Mike called up Erik. Mike and Erik had met a couple of years earlier while skateboarding around Hollywood. Erik liked Mike's Black Flag skateboard. It was Punk. Mike had asked Erik to join False Alarm back then, but Erik's mom wouldn't let him do it 'cuz he had no driver's license yet. Later on, when we asked him to play drums with us he was in a band called Caustic Cause. Erik joined us but his other band would have to have priority. We were supposed to be a 4-piece but practiced as a 3-piece, Steve hadn't made it to one practice yet.