Year In Review - Band Wise 2009

Hey I wrote one of these last year so I'm going to write one again this year. This is what we did in a productive 2009.

January - We started off January with 1 practice (Bain got to try out all his new gear haha) and a solid show lined up, Our first one with the wonderful company Kingston Punk Productions. A really good band named Sydney was breaking up and decided to do one last tour and we got on as an opener in Kingston, Lifestory:Monologue was also on that show, we just had to sell some tickets. We were all looking forward to it until a couple days before the show some conflict happened and due to scedualing conflicts with work we had to cancel this show. I felt like a total idiot for having to cancel but I still went up to the show and it was awesome. We didn't do much the rest of January.

February - Things got rolling again in February, Bain and I played Variety Night at TISS for fun and then we played a free show at Off The Wall youth centre with Colfax. I don't know if it's possible to "sell out" a free show but we almost managed to do it with a crowd of 87 people in a Tiny venue. A couple days after we headed up to Ottawa and opened up a show for Chris from Music is Life Ent. at the New Bayou, which was actually a reallllllly cool downstairs venue in Ottawa its too bad it closed, we played well. On February 28th we headed up to Vankleek Hill to record "The Last Song For Hope" with producer Terry Gillespie for the cd Living in The Chorus which we have for $15 and all proceeds go to Cancer research.

March - I will remember this month the rest of my life. This isn't "with the band" but we still all went. What I'm getting at is the Greece trip. This was one of the best and most expensive March Breaks I've ever had. But it was worth it. We all were in the same room and clearly got into some trouble, but not me since I'm a wimp/or smart (depends on who you're talking to) but the other guys definitely acted the band stereotype haha. We got some sweet video footage and made a video blog which you can watch here www.youtube.com/thesundayfire . After we got back from Greece we played with These Silhouettes at the Pheonix in Brockville. Lame-ish crowd - where were ya!

April - We started April off with a BANG. We played another Raize the Truth night at BCI with Colfax, Kardiac Arrest, A Street Light Sunset and some other bands, it was a REALLY great crowd that night. We didnt do anything else in April, I always thought it was a boring month anyways.

May - 0, zip, nothing, we literally did nothing in may, maybe practiced twice.

June - Unlike April and May we did a lot in June. We got a shipment of our brand new shirts in which look sweet! We started off by playing a really lame (sorry guys from Ottawa haha) house party, We played in a room thats about half the size of our small practice space in front of Jared, Hannah, and 4 other kids but we got free pizza so it may have been worth it. The guys in Colfax organized a last minute show at The Roaring Frog with Us, Them, Leigh and Eric Widinski it was a small crowd but good times enjoyed by all. A couple of days after that our friend and guitarist Ian Bain informed me he was leaving the band he was going to stay for the summer at first but then having a full time job in order of saving up for school didn't let him have the time so on June 19th Bain played his last show with us at Brockville Memorial Centre with Crisis Jane, The Love Machine and a couple other bands. Finding a new guitarist wasn't hard, Scott who played bass for us on Bains last show stepped up to the plate as our new guitarist. Jordan and I also played our first acoustic show in a long time, it was the mantras 5th year anniversary we also played running on 4 hours of sleep as it was the day after grad haha.

July - With just weeks of Scott joining the band we got probably the best oppurtunity in this bands history. We were going to open for Silverstein. Ever since we started this band I can remember 3 years ago when we were 14 sitting in our old singers living room listening to their album Discovering the Waterfront talking like "Imagine we got to open for these guys, ya right that wont happen" and now we actually are was pretty amazing. We didn't play so great though haha although it was still a great show and a good name we shared the stage with. A couple days after we played Raize The Truths last event ever at Hardy Park. It was a long day of outdoor events and we played second last Nick couldn't make it so our old friend Bain played bass, it was our worst set ever haha. Noones fault just bad sound enviroment.

August - We took a vacation break then our buddy Leigh hooked us up with Ten Second Epic show here in Brockville at the Roaring Frog. We opened up and played well it was our first "good show" with scott. Also on the show were The Latency, Today I caught the plage and project mantra. Jordan and I did an acoustic show in kemptville for the cd release of living in the chorus which we recorded a song for in february then played another acoustic show in Ottawa. We ended off august by playing the last show ever at the roaring frog (missing that place a lot) with our new pals in Lifestory Monologue. We had an awesome time at our friend Lily's after party.

September - We were booked to play a headline show in Ottawa at Mavericks on September 12th, it was a big show with a lot of locals. It was the best show we've ever played, people got right into it, it also helps that we got good pay for this show thanks to our tour manager Brodies wheeling and dealing hahah. 2 days after we played at off the wall for a free sohw in brockville and 2 people showed up - lame.

October - We played our friends Abbey Sweet 16 which was pretty fun then we played Ottawa and Brockville with Credible Witness (from Windsor) we were supposed to play an oshawa show but stuff didnt work out. Not a lot of people showed up to either show (why we arent playing Brockville for awhile haha) but still fun times with the CW guys)

November - The only thing we did in November was practice and get an interview in The Voice.

December - Busy month. We started off by starting the recording process for our new ep with our main man Cam producing, we laid down tracks for one song which took us a long 14 hours we are currently finishing up vocals and demoing new stuff. We are getting cam back down here this January and February. We played to the biggest crowd we've ever played to - 600 people at the TISS Chirstmas assembly which generated a new fans and more interest. Unfortunately, that show was Nicks last. It was a good 3 years with him as our bassist We are going to miss him but we're definitely looking forward to working with our new bassist STEVE KIEFER.

Whats in store for 2010? Recording!!! We have a some brand new songs and are still writing new stuff. New myspace layout done by Steve from Hidden City Design - so far it looks SICK. NEW shows/tours. Hopefully gonna play with some big acts.

Thanks for wasting you time reading this hahahaha
Brendan

Band of The Week: Lifestory:Monologue

There is a specific reason I'm putting these guys as my band of the week which I will mention in my next blog.

Lifestory Monologue These guys are from Guelph and are simply ; Amazing. Really nice guys, have played with them once and many more to come.

Their singer Richard also looks and is almost as funny as Zach Galifinakis.

Sorry for being late. again.

Band Of The Week - Kingdoms

I chose Kingdoms as my band of the week this week. I saw Kingdoms open for Protest The Hero on Friday night and have been listening to their cd ever since. They are a really energetic metal band from Guelph. The singer, Hutton is a really nice guy and puts a lot of energy into his show. You should definitely check them out if you're down for a good metal riff.

My band of the WEAK is Abandon All Ships. They also opened for protest and were pretty lame.

BRENDAN

Stoked,

For the first time in a long time I'm actually really stoked about what our band is doing right now, we played a huge show to about 500 people yesterday and really rocked it. Unfortunately it was the end of our Nick Era, I'm going to miss him but everyone got a calling in life and this was just not it. We got our new bassist Steve showing a lot of initiative and learning the songs pretty well. We got a tour van and are looking at trailers, we are recording our cd and it sounds really legit and i'm stoked for everyone to hear it. After 3 years of doing this people see what we are trying to do and are enjoying it and we are too. I can't wait to see with what the future holds for our band. Everyones taking it seriously but still having a good and that is what matters most.

BRENDAN

Band Of The Week - The Maine

Holy Batman, long time and no post!

Anyways I bet all of you were waiting for me to choose THE MAINE as my band of the week. These guys have been one of my favourite bands for about a year an a half now, my good friend Jordan showed me them when they were just starting off and I forgot about them until they put out Can't Stop Won't Stop. They are one of my favourite bands because the way they write is just so awesome. They make it so simple yet it sounds so good and catchy and that's what make basically all their songs good songs. They are a REALLY GREAT live band as well after seeing them at warped and this fall on the OP tour. Another thing that gets me stoked on them is that they are actually really nice guys and care about everyone who came to a show or bought a cd.

Anyways if you've never heard them go listen now. Other than that this Friday I'm incredibusy so ill update you on that.

BRENDAN

Today. Change. Meh.

So today we had band practice as we do every tuesday. Today was different, our bassist Nick came. He usually didn't attend practice as he is busy or we forget to tell him before we started this once a week deal. We were all talking before practice and have been about we should find someone new in his position. He really seemed like he did not care to be at practice or in the band at all. I texted him after practice asking him if he did care he replied with "To be honest not anymore man, sorry" Which was kind of what I wanted/didn't want to hear. It has been frustrating having him not care recently and now it is sort of a relief and excitement we get to work with someone new. At the same time, he has been one of my best friends for the past 3 years and if member changes have taught me anything you don't stay the same friends after you are not playing together all the time. I am still grateful for our friendship and have done a lot together, even traveled the world! Not many friends can say they've done that at the age of 17. When there was a rough part in the band he stuck with me and I don't think he'll ever know how much I appreciated the support.

We have a new bassist, someone who we are all stoked to work with and hes stoked to work with us. For awhile, it won't be the same but i'll get used to it. I'll miss having him around to fend off our peanut allergies, to watch him play smashed drunk, listen to his terrible jokes and many more memories.

BRENDAN

Band of The Week - Mayday Parade

Last Christmas I got an iTunes giftcard and didn't know what to buy and I had heard of Mayday Parade from a few friends so I downloaded one of their tracks "Miserable at Best" It was pretty good although it didn't stay playing on my Itunes for awhile like some songs. I saw that they were touring with some of my favourite bands but didn't think anything of it until I was just searching music the other day and came across them again. I downloaded some songs and got really into them.

Anyway we have band practice again tomorrow, getting ready for a 3 song set in front of a large crowd before the Christmas times which we are taking a bit of a break during then playing some pretty solid shows during the months of January - March and in between there finishing up the record! Woo!

BRENDAN

ps. ITS SNOWINGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG

Christmas

STOKED

BRENDAN

LIGHTS SHOW REVIEW

So last night I went to see LIGHTS in Kingston, thanks to my friend Marc at Kingston Punk Productions. I went up with a couple of friends I rarely see so that was good. When we got there it was pouring rain. So we walked over to a game store. My friend Blake and I knew LIGHTS likes world of warcraft and we saw some WOW cards for 4 bucks so we split on them to give to her for fun, our other friend Pat bought beef jerky because apparently she likes that too! haha! So we got inside realizing at the door, i could have brought someone else because I had a +1 and the rest of the guys bought their tickets already. So we got in around 845 and Jets Overhead went on at 10. It was a long wait. They were OK, I didn't enjoy them but I didn't dislike them, they were REALLY good with harmonies. Their lead singer rocked out a bit too hard for the style they were playing but all in all a decent set.

Then we waited about 20 minutes for LIGHTS to come on. She was a bit late hitting the stage at 11. She played basically all her songs. In between songs she even had videos of her Captain Lights comics play on the screen. She played amazing thats all I can really say haha.

Our band is finally starting to do bigger things which is sweet.

BRENDAN