Saturday, April 11, 2009

The Scheme Demos

The Scheme 2002-3
In 2002 I moved to San Francisco to play with some of the original members of Drowningman, Denny Donovan and Todd Tomlinson.

Todd had been playing with Peter Martin(Lifetime/jets to brazil) in a band called San Geronimo. They had been playing with Ian Miller (Redemption 87) in a new band which Denny and I moved cross country to join.

These songs were all recorded in our practice space in Oakland by Denny. The sound quality is really good for a 16 track recording done in a little concrete box. No overdubs, no auto-tuned vocals a last vestige of the days when the "e" word meant bands like Promise Ring or Texas is the Reason. We had a shared love of Oasis which unfortunately manifested itself in rowdy drunken behavior more than it did in the music.

We turned down a few labels and pissed off more. We were close to recording when it all fell apart. I dug these songs up for a friend the other night and listened to them for the first-time in a year. 

Lyrically and vocally part heart-broken bitterness (Your year is almost up, Cardboard casket showroom) or various misadventures of waking up in strange girls beds in strange apartments in neighborhoods you aren't sure how to get home from (Western Addition) or the night the fellas from Vermont invited some fine ladies home from the bar and all passed out while they robbed the apartment (Capt. Steubing finds a mate).