1997 – Girlfriend and Rocker Teen

January of 1997 kicked off in a wonderful way. I felt like this could be the best year of my life. I had just turned 16. I was in a heavy metal band that was beginning to sound great (in my estimation). I was achieving notoriety in high school as a guitar player. I had just had my first kiss and it was with the girl I really liked. Now we were officially a couple. Wow, I was really floating on a cloud! 

Around February 1^st, for Ella’s 16^th birthday, her family took me along with them to see a Broadway musical, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. I enjoyed sitting next to Ella holding hands and breathing in her enticing perfume throughout the evening. This was a pleasant new experience. Not only the lovely female companionship, but the show itself opened my eyes to the power of professional musical theater for the first time. I laughed and was impressed by its humor and music. Afterwards we went out to eat at a fancy Chinese restaurant. I had General Tso’s chicken with rice. I could barely eat a meal without meat in it. And I rarely finished eating without feeling full. 

Friday, February 14th was my first Valentine’s Day with a girlfriend. What a big deal! We exchanged gifts and cards and enjoyed some private time together. Her and I wrote love letters to one another regularly. As old-fashioned as it might sound it meant so much. While I was as horny as the next guy (and my hormones were in full gear) I made a very conscious effort to approach our relationship with respect to her feelings as well as her sense of readiness to develop our physical relations. I did not want to rush into things with her and I wanted her to know that I was genuinely interested in getting to know her more and more on every level. I can say that we got to know each other slowly, steadily, and quite satisfactorily.

My friends and I were excited when we heard Metallica would be playing at Madison Square Garden in March. We picked up tickets from Ticketmaster at the local Nobody Beats the Wiz electronics store. Surprisingly, Ella was interested in going despite her not being a fan of the band or genre. Metallica played some songs from Load, but most of the set was from their earlier albums which felt like a good balance for the fans. They also gave us a preview from an as-yet-unreleased track, “Fuel”. Despite Metallica being one of my favorite bands and biggest influences, I did not enjoy the show much. The mixed company of my friends and girlfriend in this setting put a damper on things for me somehow.

Later that month there was a talent show at St. Edmund Preparatory (Catholic) High School. This was the school that Yae, Yie, Jack Longman, Timmy Manhoff, and Lou La Rocco attended. Another local teen band Trademark was performing that night, and “our” drummer Jack was filling in as their drummer. Several of us went to the show that night. My eyes and ears were very competitive, and I compared myself and my band to anyone else in our musical environment. I couldn’t help but enjoy the Trademark performance. They seemed like cool guys that could play well and who knew how to have fun. Somehow, I wasn’t jealous to see “our” drummer performing with them. It was cool to know that our musical world was expanding.

My bandmates and I longed to hear what our music would sound like with a good quality recording. One day we got our first chance to memorialize our sound for posterity at the local Electric Plant Sound Studios run by Vee. As money was always tight amongst our group of teenage rockers, getting everyone on board to commit to getting to the studio and chipping in for this pricey day out, was a big deal. Our parents helped get us and our equipment there as we were a group of 16- and 17-year-olds about to enter unknown territory. I unpacked my Gibson Epiphone Flying V guitar and plugged it into the nearby Marshall amplifier stack. I turned it on and cranked a few riffs out in typical unthinking teenage enthusiasm and blasted my excited notes right into studio owner Vee’s ear as he muttered to himself annoyed, “Fucking kids!”

We continued to rehearse and develop through winter and spring. One day Judd came into rehearsal with this mean-sounding, raw guitar riff in drop D tuning. Very soon I was adding some ideas to it that were both melodic and a bit off center. The music was sounding ferocious yet also had an element of something melodic and beautiful. We settled on the song title “Beauty and Chaos”. By around mid-spring we had renamed the band from Requiem to Beauty and Chaos and were moving forward with gusto.

Playing in the high school marching band was an experience. The gold and black outfit with the funny hat (shako) was a bit corny from my “metalhead” perspective. But hey I wore a uniform in Catholic school so, whatever. The mix of students was exciting. It was enjoyable to see the girls in the flag and twirling squads in their cute uniforms. Some girls were very attractive to look at (especially their legs and hips). Each section kind of kept to themselves to a degree. We were certainly discouraged from socializing freely during rehearsals or in parades, so the best we could do would be to talk to whoever was next to us. Jason and I marched side by side as often as we could. Marching in a parade had an air of doing something special. We may not have sounded amazing, but there was something impressive about a large group of teens walking in step to the beat of our drum corps and coordinating this mass movement over time and distance. We took part in various parades in multiple city boroughs. On April 13^th, we marched in a small local parade which was quite meaningful to me, the St. Columba Little League Baseball Parade. Being as I played baseball with St. Columba for six years and attended St. Columba church as a practicing Catholic during high school days, it was amazing bringing together these different aspects of my life. I marched in the same parade as a ball player not too many years earlier. 

The James Madison High School Spring Concert took place on May 29^th and 30^th. I performed in a few groups including guitar ensemble, jazz band, and marching band. I appreciated the guitar ensemble for expanding my world into that of nylon string and classical guitar. I must admit though that I was a bit frustrated with the limited volume of the acoustic guitars without amplification. During the jazz band performance there was a section for players to take turns at improvised solos in “Kansas City”. While I was no expert in the genre nor at sight reading guitar charts, I was quite at home with improvising solos especially over stable background harmonies. This was my strong point and gave me a chance to shine. The Marching Band performed on the second night. The emcee announced us with flair. On stage waited two young females holding the JMHS Golden Knights banner. Then entered the corps leaders who blew the whistle which initiated the drum corps to enter from either side of the auditorium while playing a cadence. A cheer from the crowd. After another whistle sounded, the female flag bearers streamed in from either side of the raised stage with alternately black and golden flags. Another cheer from the crowd. The drum majors blew yet another whistle to signal in the rest of the band. As the drums played the appropriate parts to cue in the music, the rest of the large marching band started marching in via three entrances at the back of the auditorium! The music filled the space, and the audience must have felt like it was a marching band takeover as wind players streamed down the aisles to the tune of “Louie, Louie”! There was a palpable sense of Madison pride and teamwork in the air. 

Part of the reason that Beauty and Chaos had been willing to go the recording studio and pay for a good quality two-track live recording was that we were gearing up to start playing out live at local rock clubs. After much preparation (practicing, recording, promoting, etc) and one false start gig on May 24^th that didn’t happen at NYC’s East Village club The Pyramid[1], Beauty and Chaos made our debut club performance on Thursday June 5^th at a rock and goth club called The Bank (East Houston at the corner of Essex Street). While the spacious bank-turned-night-club floor did hold substantial empty space that evening, our friends, and supporters who turned up truly helped us to kick off our first “real” live show. The level of energy and noise that we generated in that space was thunderous and being up on a stage and playing to an audience was exciting.

We soon hit the NYC rock club scene again. On Monday June 16^th, Beauty and Chaos played at the legendary CBGB[2] (315 Bowery Street). After seeing several live shows of other bands up until that point, it was so cool to be the ones in the spotlight even if it was a Monday and only a handful of friends and supporters could make it. We returned to play at The Bank on August 7^th and let our live show rip[3]. The previous summer we attended a local musical event in neighboring Gerritsen Beach called Weedstock. It was put together by Jasper Donahue’s dad and featured several local hard rock and metal bands. We went to check it out. This year we were invited to play, and we performed a set including “Dark Winter” and “Armageddon” as dusk was setting in. Mischievous teenage vibes were in the air as we played outdoors facing The Creek and open grass on a baseball field powered by generators.

Beauty and Chaos had a unique opportunity in the fall to perform at Flatbush Park Yeshivah. This was the school that Judd Diamond and a few of our friends attended as kids so it was very trippy for them in that regard. We unleashed our teen-angst and voluminous brand of melodic metal onto a crowd of unsuspecting “nice kids”. They had no idea what to make of us, but at least they allowed us to play our whole set.

Beauty and Chaos also had some other events that seem to have happened in 1997. We were invited to meet with a local promoter and potentially have him represent us in some way. We had no idea about the music business besides that we needed to copyright our music. We mailed a copy of our music to my address, so we at least had a “poor man’s copyright” on our side. The meeting with the local promoter was cool. We regretfully handed him a copy of some of our music with a letter kind of threatening him not to steal our music “or else”. Unsurprisingly, we did not hear back from him. But over the years our paths would cross, and we were friendly enough. There was also another outside interest in us, which involved us visiting a professional music studio on 34^th Street, a few blocks from Madison Square Garden. We met with two middle-aged men and answered some questions about our band. Again, we heard nothing much back from them. Maybe we thought they were going to offer us a record deal? Who knows? But our eager teenage spirits were filled with both possibilities of “success” as well as pessimistic inclinations. We were just being ourselves.

It was a struggle for me as I entered my teen years to somehow reconcile my natural desire to be a peaceful, loving, and harmonious being with what I perceived as the somewhat threatening world around me in which I had to live and engage. The external “real world” seemed to be encouraging me to be, if not particularly negative, at least less of a “dreamer” and more of a “realist”. So, I found ways to compromise and embraced the grimmer aspects of what I perceived as “real life”. The lyrics I was writing and singing at the time often reflected this begrudgingly pessimistic view. 

Ella must have had some difficulty relating to my melodic metal band and its attendant group of members and our mini entourage. We were a group of guys with a lot of testosterone and masculine energy. While we were not tough guys nor troublemakers, we were sarcastic, goofy and crude with one another. When a female came into our presence, as a gang we had no idea how to act in a mature and inclusive way. This was naturally a challenge for me as it had me wanting to spend more time with my girlfriend away from my group of friends. Slowly but surely the strong bond I felt towards my bandmates was evolving into something different. Being alone with an intelligent, friendly, and attractive female was easily becoming more appealing to me than being with the guys all the time.

Making home videos was a fun pastime that my friends and I regularly engaged in throughout high school years. The name of our “movie company” was Flice Productions. Flice created home-made movies which we would make on the fly. Generally, we would hang out in the basement, come up with an idea, write out a super basic sketch and then commence filming. It would sometimes take a whole afternoon, but probably would not become more than a one-day project. Our skits and movies often involved a loose and semi-understandable plot colored by costumes (made from odds and ends), “voice overs”, choreographed fighting, and even sing-alongs! It’s amazing that Hollywood never came looking for us.

September began with big news. The famous and beloved Princess Diana of Wales had died in a car crash while being pursued by paparazzi. It seemed so senseless. I didn’t know much about her, but a few weeks later when I heard Elton John’s revised version of “Candle in the Wind” reworked and dedicated to Princess Diana, I could sense what a special person she must have been.

By Thanksgiving, Metallica’s new album Reload was in stores. I did pick up the cassette and enjoyed listening through several times, but my excitement was muted. I was maturing as a person, and I was not very inspired by their new music. I appreciated that they were willing to try something different and follow their own path. I felt I was too.

School in December was cool as everyone was looking forward to the holiday break so there was both a winding down and a preparation for performances. The James Madison High School Holiday Concert took place on December 19^th. The symphonic band opened with a satisfying rendition of the light orchestra standard “Sleigh Ride”. The rich sound of the musically advanced symphonic band inspired me and created a pleasant holiday atmosphere. In previous years I had been in the lower skill level concert band playing trumpet, but this time, as a senior, I was playing guitar in the symphonic band. The guitar ensemble played Pieter van der Staak’s sophisticated yet simple “Snow Flake” which planted a seed in me regarding the potential of composing for guitar ensemble. We finished with “Joy to the World” which surprisingly featured me playing the melody on soprano recorder.

Shortly before my 17^th birthday, we heard the very sad news that one of my very favorite comedians, Chris Farley had passed away at the young age of thirty-three. That Christmas Eve as I played through various holiday songs from my Christmas Fake Book, I found and played one that seemed a fitting tribute to Chris Farley - Dolly Parton’s “Hard Candy Christmas”. Mom allowed me to have a little apple schnapps after dinner and it was a poignant moment reflecting on this fresh loss during the holidays. That same night I dressed up as Santa Claus for the benefit of my cousins and some young neighbors across the street contributing a little holiday cheer.

The groundbreaking and epic blockbuster film Titanic was now in theaters. It combined beautiful and haunting music and a heartbreaking love story against the backdrop of a legendary historical ship and subsequent shipwreck. Shortly after its release in late December, I went to the UA Sheepshead Bay movie theater with Ella and her mother to see it. Her mother loved movies and was supportive of our relationship so sometimes she hung out with us. It was cool. What was not so cool for me at that raw age, and especially as the stoic front man of a heavy metal band, was how I emotionally cracked open slowly but surely as the movie developed. I ended up erupting in a stream of tears and muted sobs towards the end of the epic and dramatic tragedy with my girlfriend and her mother sitting right next to me! “It is … (sob) … so … (sob) … heartbreaking! Waah! … (sniff sniff) … Waah!”