The South Side Sports Bar Rocks!... do I really need to say more? Okay, I'll say more. We had a kick ass show last night. The crowd was loud, our friends Chris, Derek & Shayne from LEVEL'D showed up and played a few songs during one of our breaks & Gill (the owner) booked us for another show on December 10th. I haven't looked through the photos yet, but as soon as I do I'll get some posted. I just need to find a less labor-intensive way to build the pictures page... my carpal tunnels hurt just thinking about that page.

We're not planning to book any shows for the rest of November because Jose & Blanca's baby is due any day now and we want to give them time to get used to their new baby. But watch out for us in December. We'll be back to kick some serious ass in Nashville and we're looking to book shows for the other two weekends in December and into 2005. See ya in about a month!

I know, it's been a long time since my last update, but it's been a busy month for all of us. As you can see from the front page Otis is now a married man (or at least it's official now), and I'm not going to bother with any show commentary because I have tons of pictures to sift through and decide which ones to include on the site. So I gotta get to work on that.

We just booked a show on November 5th in Nashville, at the South Side Sports Bar, and possibly another show at Sidepipes (also in November)

Now, the regular update that's about a week and a half late. Our show at Sidepipes in Nashville was a HUGE success. They loved us, we loved them... it was a big freakin' love-fest. Okay, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but we are going to book some more shows at Sidepipes and possibly a few other bars around Nashville. I'll get the pictures (shot by our friend Doug Kelley) up as soon as I work my way through the 100+ pictures he took and choose the best of the best

October is going to be a slow month for the band because it's going to be a busy month for the band members. My sister is getting married so I'll be gone that weekend. Otis is getting married (then going on his honeymoon) so he'll be gone for two weekends. Jose is expecting a new baby so he might be out of service the next weekend, or the week after that or the next, who knows. For now we're looking at either the last weekend of October or sometime around Thanksgiving for the first show after the break.

We had one of our best shows ever last night at The Hangar. Those of you who weren't there really missed out, and you know who you are. But anyway, thanks to everybody who did come to what might be the last show in St. Clair county with Jose on guitar. We have a couple more shows booked and Jose is sticking with us till the end of September.

Pictures from the last couple shows will be up soon; I've been resizing and cropping for the last several hours, now I have to decide which ones to put up. Unfortunately I promised not to put my favorite one on the web site, but here's a hint of what's in the picture (.)(.)

Well, I know it's been too long since the last update, but things have been happening that have kept me away from the computer. So I'll just lay it all out now... First, There will be new pictures from the last two shows soon. Once again, we had a blast at Sally T's - of course we knew that we would. Candy's was fun, and we got some good recordings for a cover song demo disc, but as you'll read in the next paragraph, it's of no use now.

Now for the bad news... Jose is leaving us. He says he wants to concentrate on instrumental music. We're not exactly sure what that means, except that his creative impulses are leading him off in a different direction than the rest of us. So now we are looking for a new guitar player, or maybe two. For now, Jose is going to stick around for the two shows we have scheduled at The Hangar (8/14) and Sidepipes (9/3).

If you're interested in trying out for the position, we're looking for a talented guitar player comfortable with playing covers and creative enough to take our music to a new level (or one of each type of player). We don't intend to let this be a setback, but we're not looking for a Jose clone. You don't have to play like him, but you gotta be good at what you do.

Call me (T-Bone) at 618-779-4581 to set up an audition

Keep it in the family... Well, the bad news is that Jose hurt his hand at work on Thursday. Those damn factory jobs just aren't safe for guitar players. He'll be fine soon, but we had to call off the show last night at Candy's. Luckily, we went up there anyway because Otis' uncle, Todd Schifferdecker, was there.

Why? Well, when Otis and I were kids (before we started calling him Otis), Todd played guitar and bass in several bands and was a big influence on the two of us wanting to be in a band ourselves. Not only that, but Todd taught Otis to play guitar.

You may still be wondering why this matters... in case you haven't figured it out, Candy asked Todd if he would play the show with us. He thought it was a great idea, and so did we, so he went home to get his guitars, and we started setting up the rest of our stuff. I'm not gonna list all the songs we played (I couldn't do it if I tried), but we played some of our usual covers, plus some that we had never tried before. It was a lot of fun... too bad Jose couldn't be there for it. Check out the PICTURES page for a couple shots of Keith and Todd playing an acoustic tune together.

I got the bad news this morning that Candy's Bar & Grill will be closing at the end of the month, June 30th. The kitchen will only be open until the end of breakfast hours on Sunday the 13th of June. While I can't say enough about how much I'll miss hanging out there, and eating their food (if you've seen me, you know I like to eat), the other half of the story is that we'll have to find a new practice space (we used to practice in the apartment above the bar). So if you know of a place we can rent cheap (or FREE) to practice in the Belleville, Fairview Heights or O'Fallon area, let us know. You can use the contact info on the SHOWS page to give us the info.

Once again, we want to thank Mark & Candy for allowing us to make noise in their attic while it lasted, and we will miss hanging out at Candy's as much as we will miss playing shows there.

I almost forgot to comment on our "Best of the STL" TV appearance. I'm on Keith's shit-list for not telling him he would be interviewed after we played, but other than that, it was a lot of fun. We played "The Way You Run" with Jose for the first time in front of people, and the crowd went wild. We only had 3 to 4 minutes to play, so we couldn't play "My So Called Life". We had planned to play "Angry", but we didn't want bleeding ears all over the TV studio. We figured we would try "The Way You Run"... even though last time we played it live was at The Way Out Club with Chris Rader on guitar and nobody was there to see it except the bartenders and the cat.

Being the house band for the night was interesting... to say the least. But it was surprisingly easy to end a song on cue, at least after doing it a few times. And being a guest on the show was much better than working on it, like I usually do. (In case you didn't know, I work at City TV 10 as an editor, but I didn't ask to be on the show, they asked me if we would do it).

And of course, we would like to thank everybody at City TV 10 for inviting us on the show.

You can download "The Way You Run" from either the pictures or music pages. The video includes an introduction by the show hosts, an interview with Keith and a closing comment by the hosts. You may need to download the RealPlayer from www.real.com. The player is free, but you have to be careful to choose BASIC during the set-up. I'm sorry if you have to do extra work to watch the video, but Real video gives the best quality at smaller file sizes.

Okay, Now that I'm almost finished posting about 3 and a half tons of pictures (well, 50 actually) from the show at Candy's, I'll talk about that show... Like it says below, the show was a blast. We played some covers, we played some originals, we hung out with friends; and the night was over before we knew it. If you didn't make it to Candy's on the 28th, make sure to come out on June 6th, the show will alternate between dysphasic, Level'd and DJ Tom the Kong. The show goes from noon till 10pm; it's an all ages show and there is no cover charge. We'll see you there.

We've just been booked for an appearance on "The Best of the STL", a live show on City TV 10 in St. Louis. For those of you who live in the city of St. Louis, you can watch the show live on Wednesday the 26th at 7:30 PM. on cable TV channel 10. If you don't live in the city you can request a copy of the show from City TV 10's web site or we can sell you a copy. I'll be making DVD's from a master tape.

I know, some of you might want to come to the live taping, but we're not in control of that. Call 314-552-2900 to request tickets to be in the studio audience.

You ask ... how come you haven't updated the site since your last show? ... well. I answer ... I was too damn busy last month. Things have calmed down a tiny bit, so here it is, the update you've all been waiting for...

I'll do this in chronological order... starting with Candy's. This is our home, so of course we have to play there, but since it's in Belleville ( a town that's not known as a mecca for original music) we had been working on some cover songs. The problem is, even though learning other people's songs is quicker than writing your own, we still didn't have enough time to learn enough music to cover the night. Luckily, we know this other band that just happened to be available to play that night ... that's right, our friends Chris, Derek and Shayne a.k.a. Level'd.

We set up in the tight space between the pool table and the wall, and began to run off the old folks. We played a couple originals and a cover or two to start the show, then brought up Level'd to do the same thing, just a little bit more of it. We traded off like that for a while (until we ran out of covers to play) then Jose jumped in with Level'd to whip out some serious bad ass shit. I don't even remember what songs they played, but if you weren't there, you missed out. Too bad for you... show up next time.

We've postponed the Moose Lodge Show until we have enough songs to cover the whole show ourselves.

DEANSTOCK!!!! Hell Yeah! - It was a rainy, dreadful day, but the show must go on. So Dean rented a big ass tent, hung tarps for the walls and covered the ground so we could stay dry and not get electrocuted (Thanks Dean).

For those of you not fortunate enough to know Dean; Deanstock is the annual Cinco de Mayo (Uno de Mayo?) party out in the boonies, somewhere near Nashville, Illinois. Dean and Monica are good hosts and great friends, plus Dean could barbecue a turd and make it taste good; but luckily he prefers to barbecue meat. Anyway, back to comments about the show...

My drums, Shayne's cymbals, Otis' bass amp, Chris and Jose's guitar amps - and all we had to mic were the vocals and bass drum; I'm starting to like the small gigs, but I'm getting off topic. Basically, this was a bigger, badder version of the show at Candy's almost a month earlier. We had learned several more covers and played all of them, plus we played most of our own songs since probably 70% of our fans were at the party. I was surprised that there were a few people from Belleville there, including a friend of mine from waaayyy back who I only run into every couple years, but anything can happen at Deanstock.

Level'd brought along a keyboard player and a sax player... the keyboard player pretty damn good... the sax player was a bit of a blow-hard (wink). Level'd always puts on a good show, what else can I say... they rock (but I definitely like them better as a 3-piece). Jose played a few songs with them again, then Derek and I laid down a rousing hillbilly version of "Milkshake" - a joke that about 5 people in the whole crowd caught - now I know how Dennis Miller feels.

Now finally, I come to the last bit of info before I upload this thing. We probably have at least another month of learning covers before we can start looking for cover gigs and we are not actively looking for gigs playing originals until then either, but if something comes up don't hesitate to contact us to see if we're interested/available... weekend gigs are preferred.

The end.

Another weekend and another two shows... This weekend found us in a couple places that were new to us; The Ground Floor in Belleville and Infierno on Washington, Downtown STL.

The Ground Floor is a great room with a large, high stage... this place was obviously set up as a music venue. The only thing they need to do is get a liquor license... but until then, there is a bar right around the corner. We played with three other bands, New Year's Revolution, So Few Words and our good friends (and possibly our biggest fans) Lurking Beneath.

The Infierno... what can I say... beer, mexican food, loud rock-n-roll; I think I've found Heaven. Even better than that, we've found out that dysphasic, Lung Dust & Killjoy4fun is a killer lineup. Look out for more shows featuring two or all three of these bands.

Finally, we just booked a show at Candy's Bar & Grill in Belleville. Check out the SHOWS page for details.

This update is a bit behind schedule ... but the show at The Shamrock in New Athens (1/31) was pretty damn successful, even though nobody that I invited showed up. Enough of my bitching... Our friends, Level'd were on the morning show on channel 2 the day before our show, but the so-called reporters on FOX2 told their viewers that the show was Friday the 30th instead of Saturday the 31st... so who knows how many more people would have come out. Anyway...

We are in a Battle-of-the-Bands on Feb. 25th. The winners will be judged on crowd response and ballots, so come out to Sally T's to help us win some free recording studio time. We also have a gig coming up next month in Nashville... Nashville, Illinois that is. More details later.

And finally... we're finally starting to write some new songs with Jose, and the one we're working on right now is a real ripper. After we play the song live, I'll get it up on the music page, but until then you'll just have to wait.

This is a long one since I've gone 4 shows without an update. I've added booking contacts to the shows page. We have new pictures finally!! These are from the Sparta VFW and Sally T's shows and will be up in the next few days after I redesign the photo page. The Creepy Crawl show on the 30th was a little screwed up ... we got there a little late and had to load in directly to the stage then play right away, but it went well otherwise. Playing at Candy's (our second home) was a good time ... It's about to become a regular gig, so we're going to learn some covers to fill time. Then we can play a good 4 hour set like a proper beer-soaked bar band. The Sparta show was a big success ... Storybook Tragedy opened the night with their own brand of high energy metal, we took the middle spot and Level'd closed the night. The Sally T's show was another new experience for us... we were the lone hard rock band on an alt/country bill opening for The B. Koolman Band and the Ten High Band. Check out their web sites from the links page.

And Finally, we just got the news that Sediment House will not be playing at The Shamrock on the 31st ... but the good news is NO COVER CHARGE and CHEAP DRINKS! Level'd will open for us and we'll finish out the night by getting drunk with you at the bar. I'll have show time information by Friday the 30th at the latest... but show up early and get to drinkin' so we get asked back for another show.

New web site design. By the way, AWM Media Services is Tony Mueller, the drummer in dysphasic. Now I'll return to speaking in first person. I haven't put together a web site for AWM Media yet, but if you need a web site, or want to shoot a video contact me at: --Tony

9.13.03:

We've recorded some demo tracks with a new guitar player, our friend Chris Rader of Level'd. Chris brings a different vibe to the band, and along with that vibe, a different sound. Look out for some big changes to come in the future ... namely a new guitar player to replace Ryan. Check out the three songs from our demo disc on the MUSIC page and two of the older songs recorded live with our original guitar player.