Oh lord, it's the high school band demo tape. It was cheese metal of the highest order--somewhere between Iron Maiden and something worse--but was legitimized by the presence of local drumming legend Dan Fadel. There was literally no music scene at all in my hometown of Westfield, NJ, but twenty miles away in the Morris Plains/Parsippany area, a happening circle of players was developing, and the center of their universe was the Fadel's studio-equipped home. I met Fadel during a Berklee 5-week program for high-schoolers in the summer of '88, and the band soon followed. We did maybe six shows, one of which was opening for Man'o'war. A different era, to be sure.

Some of the name players to originate from this area: Dave LaRue, Brian Tichy (drummer for Slash's Snakepit, Foreigner, Zakk Wylde's Pride And Glory), and 100 Proof guitarist Jon Skibic (Juliana Hatfield, The Gigolo Aunts), and more whose names I can't remember. Dan Fadel went on to form a very popular NYC-based band called Scooby Groove, which came this close to getting signed in a big way, but didn't.

I think I'll have to post an mp3 file of one of these tunes, because they're just hilarious in retrospect. (No disrespect intended, of course.)