About A Million

 

About A Million hails from the tiny city of Coatesville, PA. To say this band is unique would be putting it lightly, there are so many things going on in this band it's hard to pick a place to start; To start I feel like I should mention that this is a family band. Family bands aren't all too common when thinking about songs of this style. I'd compare them to something like twee, jangle with a mix of Alex G. and garage. 

Going back to the family band point, this band consists of the Leitch siblings, the siblings being.

Scotty Leitch, Anthony Leitch, Kyle Leitch & Jessica Leitch. some of these names might sound familiar, primarily Anthony and Scotty due to their other side projects. Scotty has been featured on my blog before under the band "Pirouette" but is now better known as "Shelf Life". If you haven't yet listened to Pirouette I recommend you do so ASAP.

The "albums" I'm sharing today I forgot I had and can't find anything about them online at all, nothing, 0, zip, nada. The reason why I call these songs "albums" is because I would consider these more of something like home recordings and demos more than full fledged albums, these don't even have album art or lyrics which is why I'm borrowing the photos from the bands facebook which also does not have much info about that band but I digress. 

as well as not knowing much about the recordings or having album art / lyrics, I also don't have any release dates for any of these albums but I'm guessing maybe around 2003/4? sometime before pirouette but I could be wrong entirely. Regardless I hope you enjoy these long lost tracks.

DREAMING IN A DIFFERENT LANGUAGE

1) Gentile Rubber

 2) Hallucination

3) It's called well love 

4) Plastic Black 

5) Since We've Been Apart

6) Something About Hannah

7) Surviving a Plane Crash

8) The Stereo Had it Cumming

9) This Cocoon is Cacomfortable

10) His Girl Fridays

11) In Our Dreams

12) Nah, I Think I'll Just Go Home

13) The Yearbook That Gave Birth To The Dictionary

14) Krystal Boll

15) Matt's Black Haircut

16) Technilogical Composure (bass) 

Man Made of Paper

1) Air

2) Dirty Mafia

3) Drunken Spaceship

4) Last Chances are Hard to Breathe Without Anyone

5) Man Made of Paper

6) Oh

7) You Gotta Know

Don't let our chord break

1) 12 year old with aids

2) Don't Give Me That

3) I CAN'T BE FREE

4) She Won't Say Anything

5) Since We've Been Apart (Acoustic Version)

6) Something Random Something Weird

7) The Truth

8) You were telling the truth

9) All the hours

10) Animals eating animals

11) Cars are retro

12) His girl friday1

13) I Hate Breathing

14) Lullaby

15) Makeout session with the enemy (4 Miles Ago)

16) Makes Sense

17) My Only Friend

18) She won't say anythingg

19) Techincal Difficulties 

20) The Jealous Sound

st. geme

 

I have nothing to say about this band, I have 0 band history, about any previous or music that followed after this EP

with that out of the way

St. Geme  formed around 2008 in Hollister / Monterey, Califronia (information from LastFM)

beyond that the musicians are as follows

Michael Glines

Alaina Musich

Brett Nickel

Zachary McPherson

and 

Andy Snyder

who are now later in other musical projects, Alaina is a piano teacher as well as a solo artist, michael and brett played together in Sugar Sauce around 2014 / 15

as for Zachary and Andy I haven't found anything concrete on them currently

as for their sound for this album I'd say it's a mixture of indie alternative with some emo? undertones, I know I am not describing that properly but it's a blend of all three, something at first I wasn't sure if i was going to add to this blog as it might not have fit the somewhat theme I have of alternative and emo music, but after a couple of listens (only 4 songs) , I could tell that it deserves a place here

 

 st. geme - Coincidence EP (2008)

1) Nothing Here

2) Massacre At Stillbrook

3) Near Death Experience

4) Civilian

Catscratch

 

Punk band from Austin, Texas. Later changed their name to The Quicks.

Danielle Starry, Lia Powers, Tracey Crossett (bass, 1987 - 2004, died from an overdose at 17)       

- Taken from Discogs

unfortunately I don't know much about this band but from the short info taken from their discog page I can see this band was an early rock / punk female band, If I had to compare the band to anything I would compare them to something like CUB or the evaporators; all the band members are in their mid teens so it's kinda jangle punk you'd expect to see at a house show or garage; really digging the sound I hope I can uncover more of their music in the future, below I'm leaving scans of the inserts so you can read the lyrics and liner notes as well as see a very poor photo of the band. I also saw that they later changed their name to the quicks but I can't find anything about that band on the internet so I'm unsure of this is the only thing they released.

If anyone knows of a way to get in contact with the surviving members, please let me know I'd love to interview them or get more info to share.

      

Mwaha (2001)

1) 0:00 - Catscratch Theme

2) 1:59 - Benny

3) 6:05 - Thank You, Mom

4) 7:54 - Bananas

5) ?:?Mwaha

6) 9:51 - Good Times

7)13:04 - Mohawk Boyfriends

8)14:13 - I Won't Go

9) 15:46 - Packington's Pound

Hour of The Star / Her Grey Earth

 "Hour of the Star formed out of the ashes of the vegan, straight edge band Her Grey Earth. But unlike Her Grey Earth, Hour of the Star was built on the emo icons that came before them. Influenced by bands such as Indian Summer, Moss Icon, Current, Navio Forge, Native Nod and many others, the boys of Hour of the Star took that sound and feel and added their own spin to it. The screamo feel with a pop edge put Hour of the Star on the maps, a small dot only, but on the maps none the less. The band was short lived as Steve and Jaime opted to head off for greener pastures. Bryan, Jeff and Josh decided to call it quits with Bryan and Jeff going off to form a band with members of You and I/Instill and Unaswered. The Sebastian Coe never recaptured the same emotion and friendship that Hour of the Star did…

RIP

Love,
Bryan, Jeff, Josh, Jaime and Steve " 

- LastFM

I couldn't have said it better myself. I found this band while searching through discogs looking for new music, I ended up finding "The Clocks" which I haven't been able to listen to as of yet but the album art had me sold so I bought the vinyl anyway so I'm looking forward to that. Hour of The Star is a melodic emo blend which I just love every minute of, I am really tempted to say they remind me of a mellow version of IHateMyself but anyone who even remotely knows music will say that is absolutely not the case, but I don't know, it made sense in my head.

This band had two releases which was a self titled 7" and a split with the band "Her Grey Earth" which they themselves only released a split and a demo that featured songs they were on the split so basically only a handful of songs which is why I'm labeling this post as a combo discography of both Hour of The Star and Her Grey Earth. 

Hour of The Star - Hour of The Star (1997)

1. Intro

2. Root beer & Running Shoes

3. St. Anthony

4. Steeplchase

Hour of The Star / Her Grey Earth  (1997)

1. Hour of The Star - Postmark

2. Hour of The Star - Rickard

3. Hour of The Star - Star With a Thousand Pointed Ray

4. Hour of The Star - Last Dance

5. Her Grey Earth - As Darkness Fall

6. Her Grey Earth - Consume

7. Her Grey Earth - Deathcamp

Phallucy

 "Phallucy was a rock/alternative metal band from Sacramento, California. The band's drummer, Abe Cunningham, later became the drummer with the band Deftones, which is now a worldwide success. Phallucy has reunited three times, in 1999, 2001 and 2008 for the Chi Cheng Benefit Show in San Francisco along with Death Angel and other special guests."

- LastFM

Here's an interesting one, adding Phallucy of Sacramento, they themselves (Phallucy) only put out a single album "Valium" which in itself is a pretty great sounding album somewhere I'd rate between a 6 and a 7 which isn't too bad! The interesting parts is when looking at the members a little more closely, more specifically Abe Cunningham ; drummer for Phallucy and later drummer for the band "Deftones" as well as Sonny Mayugba (Guitarist) marrying Lynn Mayugba (lead singer) of the skirts and later giving birth to Violet Mayugba founder and lead guitar / vocalist for the Sacramento band "Destroy Boys" which I have actually had the opportunity to see multiple times throughout their career, the earliest being 2015 / 2016 if I remember correctly, somewhere in that time frame at least. Easy to say that music runs in the family, I also believe Abe C. filled in on drums for Destroy Boys some years ago, so that's nice. Below I'm adding the only release by Phallucy, enjoy

Phallucy - Valium (initial release is dated as 9/11/2001) unsure if that's true

1) Kristy

2) Naked Movie Star

3) Head

4) Cancer

5) Peaks

6) Box Song

7) Fingers

8) Ironsides

9) Needles

10) Coffee

11) Two Years

Fevered Pitch (2020 Updated)

"Fevered Pitch

Jacob Hanes - Electric Bass
Kenneth Kirk Daniels - Electric Guitar / Backing Voice
Anthony Salvini - Electric Guitar / Lead Voice
Nathan Rippey - Drums

Fevered Pitch came into being in the fall of 1996, and was the result of two sets of long time friends joining their musical forces together.

Right from the beginning, there existed a strong urge to do something different not only in the realm of hard music, but also in the bay area, where the band was/is based.

The town of Napa is known for wineries and scenic vistas, not for relentlessly unpredictable and challenging metalcore.

In fact, this was a major inspiration for the bands sound, although it made it hard for the band to fit on a bill with predictable nu-metal bands, which so proliferated the bay area (and still do!).

So it came to be that Fevered Pitch is a name uttered from the mouths of those in search of a refreshing change amongst the blandness that has settled over the land.

Gathering a good following in their hometown and spreading their gospel up through Seattle on multiple tours, the band then realized that the most important element release, their drummer, Rennie, had the good fortune of being accepted to a photography school in Santa Barbara, which he is pursuing at present.

Wanting to keep the focus on the core members, Fevered Pitch in current form is; Anthony on guitar and vocal cords, Ken on guitar, Jake on bass, and Nate on drums (ex-guitar).

As a band that has always strived to stay one step ahead of the pack, you can rely on their new material to uphold their ability to make you question not only what their doing, but subsequently what everyone else isn't doing."

- taken directly from FeveredPitch.com 2004 ~

Random tidbit, I tried digging into the history of this band and found some interesting info not very noteworthy as these people now have careers and don't do anything with this band anymore; the only noticeable thing is their drummer "Rennie" at the time this band was active was on his way to go to college to get a degree in photography, which he got! he works as a photographer now which is interesting because he shot photos for a band that i have yet to feature but is also no longer together. I love coincidences like that.

UPDATED BIO: 2020

Fevered Pitch was a band formed in Napa California in the late 1990s by Anthony Salvini (vox and later also guitar), Nate Rippey (guitar and then later drums), Rennie Solis (drums), Jake Hanes (bass) and eventually Ken Daniels (keyboards and then later guitar).

Their first and only LP was Emergency Test Patterns, which was recorded at Conscious Sound Recordings in San Rafael with Benjamin Grant Dupaw and released in 1999.  Other self released singles and eps would follow which were self produced and recorded, including the final release of the Hidden Words ep recorded by Nate at Laughing Tiger Productions in San Rafael CA in 2003.

The band would play many shows around the Bay Area and embarked on multiple tours of the Pacific Northwest as they developed their sound, which mutated from an early strain of groove metal (Deftones, Sepultura, Machine Head) to more of a metallic hardcore sound in the vein of the releases coming out on Hydrahead records at the time (botch, Cave In, Converge etc).

The members would reconfigure once with a change in instrumentation, before ultimately calling it a day in 2005.  All members have gone on to be involved in other projects (Tony and Nate with Mare Island, and currently with Ken as well in The Old Destroyer [singles out on itunes and other streaming services!], Rennie with Bough Breaks and Jake with Sinister Goldblum.  Other current projects include Ken Daniel’s solo release coming soon on streaming services and Nate’s current involvement in Night Boss.

note: this is the albums cover that I scanned but I also included scans of the back and inner inserts in case you're into that kinda stuff 

Fevered Pitch - Emergency Test Patterns (1999)

1. aux. in

2. rorschach

3. headunder

4. tunnel vision

5. deathstar

6. aux. out

7. sickwater

8. smokescreen

9. descendre

Interesting news! after a short wait I received an email from Nathan with a link to some B - Sides and also another link to a collection of live recorded songs at the legendary Burnt Ramen (R.I.P), I've been given permission to share these for the world to enjoy, so please enjoy!

I'm also including a collection of photos that I previously couldn't find before if you're into that 

A very special thank you once again to Nathan for taking the time to get back to me after several months and making sure I got these to share with you all, You're the man!

B-Sides

1. Dreadnought

2. Landescapes

Live at Burnt Ramen

1. Zoetrope

2. Dissillusionment

3. Metropolis Flickering

4. Dreadnaught

5. Deathstar

6. Pole Position

Hidden Words EP (2003)

1. Within Weeks

2. Get Beautiful

3. Save Your Breath

Fevered Photos (Collection of photos and promo material 1990's - 2003)