Furnace Fest was over a week ago but we’re still coming down from the FF high. Brandon stops by my basement to talk about his top three Furnace Fest moments. Learn more about the upcoming Beloved hometown show that Knuckle Breakers Productions will be capturing and how you can be a part of it.
Read MoreIn 1995, The Get Up Kids began exploring their surroundings and expanding their horizons in much the way that early Tooth & Nail and Solid State artists did. In the midwest emo scene, they were sharing the stages with bands of seemingly all genres, while making friends in many other states. They didn’t ask permission for what they did, and no one stopped them from blazing new pathways that would connect the regional underground scenes together and really open up the all-ages movement.
Mark Salomon is a legend and forefather of the Tooth & Nail scene. He was pioneering new artistic and cultural territory while being iconic, professional and a showman all at the same time.
Read MoreToday’s episode features the not-only legendary but iconic drummer Steve Kleisath from Strangarm, Shai Hulud, Further Seems Forever, and The Darling Fire.
Read MoreTerminal can be described in many ways. One and Done, One Hit Wonder, Casualty of the industry, a career that seemed over before it began.
Read MoreHopesfall is a very influential post hardcore/spirit filled hardcore band. They emerged in the North Carolina scene and the greater Southeast with bands like Beloved, Stretch Armstrong, he is legend, Underoath and Luti-Kriss around 2000. they were a Furnacefest band and a Cornerstone band.
Read MoreChad Johnson is a significant figure in this movement who was identifying next level talent that was yet to reach its potential and creating opportunities for them. He was quite successful in aggregating and attracting further talent primarily in the southeast region. Further Seems Forever, Underoath, twothirtyeight, hopesfall, and more.
One the first releases ever on Solid State, Stretch Arm Strong were pioneers of the scene that was emerging in the southeast in the late 90’s. Known for being straight edge and positive, Chris McLane was one of the most engaging front men of the era. His message was always to include and to encourage and to make a positive impact. From the beginning Chris truly understood the what a scene was and that its life-force was found at the community level.
Read MoreScott Mellinger joined the legendary band Zao to replace Brett Detar as a musician between the albums, When Blood and Fire Bring Rest and Liberate Te Ex Inferis. He immediately brought a new sonic element helping them arrive at their signature sound, but his influence didn't stop there. Despite being in a band with big personalities, Scott emerged as a leader and became the band's stabilizing point guard. Zao's streak of longevity was truly unexpected given their early years and the amount of environmental change that has occurred since the late ’90s, making them about as legendary as it gets in our world. Scott's a great thinker and I always feel it's a privilege to speak with him.
Read MoreThe Showdown is a very special band who was able to break a lot of new ground and turn a lot of heads by taking what was going on in heavy music and amplifying it to extreme levels by adding new layers of performance that mixed art and crowd interaction with humor to create a symphony of chaos that played the audience like an instrument. Their front man David Bunton is a legend in the scene when it comes to stage persona. The Showdown blended metal with classic rock, and were a big part of the dirty southern heavy scene along with He Is Legend and Maylene and the Sons of Disaster.
Read MoreRandy Torres has done it all in the Tooth & Nail world, and he has done it well. Guitarist for Project 86, engineer for Aaron Sprinkle, A&R for the label, touring musician for Anberlin, composer, sound designer and more. Coming from a supportive environment in SoCal at just the right time in the late 90's, Randy has been able to make a great career for himself and that career is marked mainly by how personable and likable and easy to work with he is.
Read MoreHangnail is an old school classic Tooth & Nail punk band and is back with new holiday music! It's their first new music in 17 years. This seemed like a good occasion to hang out with the whole band and look all the way back to the mid 90's as this group of best friends in high school, who never had a lineup change and were first generation Tooth & Nail kids just trying to play cover songs until they got their first big opportunity at Cornerstone '98.
Read MoreAcceptance is a Tooth & Nail artist a couple of decades in the making. They just made and released their first album on Tooth & Nail called Wild, Free this year. But it was right here in the Seattle/Tacoma area where Acceptance was founded in 2003, right at the time that Tooth & Nail was transitioning to the new sound with the explosion of the 2nd generation. Acceptance, who were first generation Tooth & Nail kids, teamed up with Aaron Sprinkle, and instead of taking the indie path, they were one of the first bands to be scooped up by a major label right off the bat and in a lot of ways were the major’s guinea pigs. they created a landmark album called Phantoms that became a legend of the scene, but the band never truly found a groove before disbanding in 2006. Their music, however, would continue to rise in popularity thereafter, and is still known as a flagship Seattle band.
Read MoreSlick Shoes is back and full of new life. It's not uncommon for bands to reunite these days, but it's often just to play through an old album or do a reunion tour. Occasionally, reuniting bands put out new music. Some times that music is good, but rarely does it capture the full original spirit or energy of the band's former youthful self, but in this case, Slick Shoes has in fact done that. It has been 17 years since their last album, and the new music is killer. 2003 was pretty much the year that the Tooth & Nail scene had fully completed its generational change from punk and pop punk to the rising emo and screamo. This conversation with the full band really helps to paint the picture of that transition. We also cover the band's formation, personalities, and musical approach.
Read MoreThe Juliana Theory’s biggest album, Emotion Is Dead, one of the most legendary in the Tooth & Nail catalog, just reached its 20 year anniversary. This episode explores the conditions in which the band and particularly the frontman Brett Detar emerged.
Read MoreNinety Pound Wuss formed in 1994 just down the road from MxPx, and became one of the first bands on the label. The Seattle indie scene at the time was quite artistic and developed compared to the rest of the country, it could easily be described as snobby. Bands like Ninety Pound Wuss and Roadside Monument had a very difficult fight to prove their legitimacy in the eyes of their peers and to get the opportunities they deserved, so being associated with and dropped into the Christian pop punk subculture gave them great exposure but came at a cost.
Read MoreTooth & Nail goes global in the mid 90’s by acquiring and licensing Christian metal bands from Norway: Extol, Lengsel, and Selfmindead. This episode explores how kids growing up on the other side of the world were having parallel experiences to kids here with regards to discovering heavy music and finding identity amidst struggles with authority and religion, and in just the same way, great and influential music was created to express those feelings that resonated with others. Along with the rise of the mail-order scene and the internet, global connections were able to be made musically with other like-minded people who would then have the opportunity to influence one another.
Read MoreSome say that Bruce Fitzhugh is the Godfather of Christian Metal and while he would resist that designation, he is certainly at minimum the driving force behind one of Solid State Records' first big successes as the lead vocalist and guitarist from Living Sacrifice. He also is credited as being central in the development of the heavy music scene that gave rise to a very positive culture that emerged in central Arkansas in the 90's, the national scene, and eventually the mainstream.
Read MoreFrodus was a pioneer post hardcore band whose influence is larger than their footprint ever was. This important group was recognized early by Brandon and Tooth & Nail, who acquired Frodus, a non-Christian from the 90’s DC punk scenethat transitioned into the Tooth & Nail world as part of the recipe for the success of the scene we all know and love being built. These origins and early attractions to the danger of music and new movements is something we all feel or felt at some point to varying degrees, but Nate particularly embodies that mindset and is able to articulate the experience quite well.
Read MoreIf there is are legends in this scene, Josh Scogin is one of them: frontman of Luti-Kriss, Norma Jean, The Chariot, and ‘68. Josh has played thousands of show, and from what we can all gather from our shared experiences of seeing them, and from scouring the internet, there appears to be not even a single moment in any of those thousands of shows where Josh is ever giving anything less than his whole self.
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