Garrett Montgomery joined the NYSMusic staff in 2014, covering The Mad Tea Party Jam. During the summer of 2014, he tag-teamed many shows with long-time friend Chris Cleary, covering MTPJ, Umphrey’s McGee, Luna Light Festival, Catskill Chill, and other festivals together. Contributing to NYSMusic gives Montgomery the opportunity to combine his love for music and writing; he has enjoyed interviewing bands such as Consider the Source and TAUK and writing features on venues such as The Bardavon 1869 Opera House.
Highlights in Montgomery’s career since joining NYSMusic include covering and photographing Umphrey’s McGee on New Year’s Eve in Atlanta, getting to know folks in the scene, and exploring many beautiful venues in New York. Sharing his musical experiences through the NYSMusic medium has been a great privilege and Montgomery only hopes to improve in 2015 and beyond.
Montgomery grew up heavily influenced by his parents’ love of classic rock and is a huge Led Zeppelin, Allman Brothers, and Queen fan. He attended Mountain Jam as a high school senior in 2007 and was awestruck by the entire experience and one act in particular– Umphrey’s McGee. He has been to 39 subsequent UM shows and identifies as an Umphreak.
When not attending concerts, Montgomery is an avid Mets and Rangers fan. He also enjoys hiking, kayaking, and hanging out with his yellow lab, Ajax. He has lived in Montana and New Zealand but his heart is in the Hudson Valley.
His musical bucket list includes attending an Eminem show and partying together after, going on a date with Taylor Swift, and raging at an Umphrey’s concert with at least three generations of Montgomerys one day. When asked about his taste in music, Montgomery says, “I used to be all about the blues but now, I usually say ‘funk it.’”
Looking for a new and different place to spend a quiet evening away from the kids? Looking for a unique place just brimming with a romance, beautiful music, and specialty drinks on hand to round out the perfect setting to take your special someone? Whether it’s making a first impression or showing that someone how special they are to you, I have the perfect setting; The Turquoise Tiger at the Turning Stone Exit 33.
Turquoise Tiger – Turning Stone Casino
This venue has been fashioned after 1940’s Film Noir. It features the sexiest specialty drinks around, classic 1940’s period art deco design, photos of the jazz and standards greats, and featuring some of today’s most sought after musicians to entertain you. Seated by a dapper young man decked out in a zoot suit, it’s as though you are transformed into a different era the moment you step inside the doors.
Turquoise Tiger – Turning Stone Casino
I recently had the opportunity to visit the venue and meet one of the regular musicians, Devin Bing. Devin hails from New York City and his blend of sultry crooning, and jazzy beats of the great standards bring a toe tapping mix t0 some of my all time favorite tunes.
Devin Bing – Turning Stone
In between sets of his show, Devin so generously sat down to talk with us recently about his music, his inspirations, and his future plans.
Kathy Stockbridge (KS): Hi There. I am so super impressed with you. With your talent. You are so young to love this genre of music. Tell me how did you come to play this type of music.
Devin Bing (DB): I know right. I am a product of my environment. My mother is a cabaret singer and actress, and my father started a live theater off-Broadway, very off-Broadway in Long Island. So I grew up with Gershwin, and all that music. So the music again, was a product of my environment as I heard it all the time. It was just so beautiful to me. I also am into instrumental jazz. Once I heard Miles Davis “Kinda Blue”, I was like “WOW”, love the art of improvisation. That’s why I do the trumpet sound.
KS: That was amazing, I was blown away by your vocal talents beyond just the singing.
DB: When I was growing up and studying music, and I was evolving as a musician and singer, fascinating to me was George Benson and Ella Fitzgerald’s scatting and their vocal improvisation. I been lucky enough to learn an instrument to improvise on, but to the take the vocal instrument and emulate and turn it into a horn player or something more has always been a passion of mine.
KS: When making note of it I titled it “vocal trumpet”.
DB: You know what I call it? A “Trumouth”. You know a Trumpet + Mouth? It actually has brought me attention for gigs as people see it online and want to book me because of it. But seriously, Miles Davis was a big influence and bridging that vocalist/instrumental thing has always been a passion of mine.
KS: You mentioned you studied music. Did you study through high school, or did you go to a musical college?
DB: Yes, yes I did. I went to University of Miami. Not sure if you are familiar with it, but it’s one of the top 5 jazz schools in the nation. What happened was all the studio musicians from the 60’s and 70’s had a big studio explosion at that time down in Miami. So in the 70’s when all these studio cats, who were jazz players doing studio sessions for the Bee Gee’s and artists like that, got together they decided to stay down there and start a program. And then from the late 70’s on it just grew. So I went down there as a vocalist, but I ended up double majoring in both vocals and piano. It actually was the first time they had someone do that.
KS: After graduation you returned to NY?
DB: Yes. I was living in Miami hustling the scene. But there really wasn’t a scene for me there. It was very club heavy. Very Latin Band. There really wasn’t the cultural scene for what I did. So being from Long Island, I decided to come back home because it was better for what I had decided to do.
KS: So who are your musical influences? I can guess just by listening to your first set list, but I want to hear from you.
DB: No…no I want to hear who you think.
KS: Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie…maybe Ella….who am I missing?
DB: No you did great…in fact the list goes on and on. When I was younger, when I was 13 or 14 and all my friends were listening to Back Street Boys, I was listening to Miles Davis and Mel Torme. I was an anomaly. I wanted to be the next Harry Connick Jr. Harry Connick Jr. was someone I listened to an it’s funny how when you grow up you emulate artists and you are trying to figure out your sounds, I emulated Harry Connick Jr. Then I got into Stevie Wonder. I was like oh my God, that was like great. I wanted to sing like that. But do it in jazz. I kinda had this soul and Motown meets jazz. In fact my second set of my act features Stevie Wonder. It’s a part one and part two kind of show.
KS: Well I have to say, you blew me away with part one of the show. You sang one of my all time favorites songs, “Nature Boy”. And I loved your jazzy soulful rendition of it. Normally it’s a really slow song, but you breathed a new life into it.
DB: Oh good, and that’s really what’s happening to me in New York where I’m carving a new niche of jazz singing even the standards. Where I’m taking all these traditional songs and turning them on their heads giving them a younger hipper sound.
KS: Do you see a younger crowd coming to your shows? Tonight you have a mix of 30’s, 40’s, 50’s all here appreciating your music. Do you find you audiences getting younger?
DB: Absolutely, I have been headlining a club down in NYC called the Metropolitan. It’s off-Broadway, so being off Broadway there are a lot of cabaret singers and I’m very different. I’m not a cabaret singer, I’m straight jazz and pianist. But I sing a lot of the same songs they sing. We all sing “My Funny Valentine”, we all sing “Nature Boy”, and the Gershwin tunes, but no one sings them the way I do. I did a show at Lincoln Center and it was a show with a lot of cabaret singers. I came out and sang “Fly Me To The Moon”. And all 1,200 people were like…. It’s been really exciting to be able to do music that I love and to be able to keep it alive and give it this fresh facelift.
KS: Do you have any projects going on? Don’t you have a new album you’re working on?
DB: Yes, yes I do and I’m glad you want to hear about it, because I love talking about it. It’s an album called Shaken Not Stirred. Now I wanted to develop a concept that brought back the art of the LP which is a full album. So many people are making mixed tapes of just single songs and whatnot. I wanted to create something that was not just a collaboration of single songs. So I wrote this album to tell a story from beginning to end. I wrote and produced every composition, and I wrote it cinematically so that you are almost listening to a movie. It takes you through this epic love story about a crooner/night club singer, that meets this mysterious woman and goes on this search to find her. After searching for her he finally finds her and asks her to surrender to loving him. They get together only to discover there’s the opposite side of the love where he finds out she’s not exactly everything he had imagined. Then the torment begins. It goes through this element of I want it all or nothing at all. I actually throw the song All of Nothing At All in there where it goes through that part; the addiction of love and how you need it. Then you go through the ultimatum where it’s me or nothing, and then ultimately the last song is about coming to the realization of his destiny. A lot of it is based on Paulo Coelho’s book The Alchemist in the sense of how it focuses on finding your destiny. The moral of it is, whatever love it is you are pursuing, never give up and follow your destiny. There is a lot of layers to it, but ultimately when you listen to it from beginning to end, it’s this love story with beautiful arrangements, and again it’s got this cinematic style.
KS: When can we expect the release of this album? I can’t wait to hear it.
DB: We’re finishing it up and expect a release in early part of 2015.
KS: Are you planning on going out to tour with it?
DB: Absolutely. We’re doing some things in Brooklyn and some throughout NYC, and then after that we’re hoping to be out touring with it.
KS: Well I can’t wait for its release and hearing your new music!
As the interview concluded and he returned to get ready for the second set of the evening this extremely talented young man-made a lasting impression on me. I love to see the music of some of the greatest performers and entertainers of all time continue today with a flair from this new generation. Often compared to Michael Buble’ and Harry Connick Jr., Devin Bing is definitely making a name for himself, while continuing to honor traditional standards in a new soulful way.
I highly recommend a night out at The Turquoise Tiger for a relaxing evening of fine drinks, a timelessly classic atmosphere, and some of the best music around. To catch Devin this month at The Turquoise Tiger, don’t forget to mark your calendars for April 10th and 11th at 9pm when he once again returns.
Kim Neaton has been lucky enough to find a career in the music world, where her obsession and over analyzing of it has a purpose, instead of just making her friends and family wish she’d just shut up about it once in awhile. Born and raised in Cohoes, NY, about ten miles north of Albany, being the only child in the house led to a lot of time being alone with music. Between sitting in front of a radio and scanning through stations and genres, and obsessively watching ‘Behind The Music’ type programs on VH1, she not only gained an interest in the music itself, but also the industry behind it.
The pressure to go into a more “normal” field lead her to attending SUNY Albany where she received a BA in psychology and sociology. However, while working in group homes for at-risk youth for several years, and spending the majority of her paychecks on concerts and festivals she thought “There’s people out there that make a living being involved with concerts and festivals, why not me?” After a couple years of internships, and part time work at several small local festivals and radio stations she is now Music Director and midday host at WEQX 102.7fm based in Manchester, VT. When she’s not at the station or attending shows throughout NY’s capital region, she’s likely sitting on the couch at home in the hills of Valley Falls, NY listening to records with her cat and boyfriend Chris, who also, thankfully, can’t shut up about music. Whether it’s good music, terrible music or bizarre music, the research, debate and conversation is never-ending.
While radio is one way to share music with people, Kim wanted to branch out in new ways that may allow her to help others discover and fall in love with new music, this is what led her to becoming involved as a contributing writer with NYS Music. She is very supportive of Albany’s local music scene and appreciates the community aspect it has along with the wide range of genres and truly amazing talent. You’ll find her at shows ranging from metal to jam and from punk to bluegrass, and she feels fortunate that Albany is home to excellent examples of each.
Her longtime addiction of seeing live music has led her to being able to cross off many acts from her live music bucketlist, including: Beck, Beastie Boys, and Rage Against the Machine. Bands she wishes she could see if time travel were an option: The Band, R.E.M, and Talking Heads.
At some point over the last few decades, the foundation of death metal began to crack, and through these cracks came a flood of sub-genres, such as, ‘deathcore‘, ‘melodic death’, ‘progressive/tech death’, etc. This made a lot of traditional death metal fans feel as though their beloved genre was turning into a faraway thing. With a slew of bands manifesting themselves under these new and now prevalent classifications, it’s no wonder that a solid band of talented guys, dedicated to going back to death metal’s roots would gain some serious attention. The band is called Seplophile and they’ve spent the last few years making waves in the name of death metal.
Their debut album Mesonoxian is a true testament to what the band stands for and any death metal veteran would have to agree. It was released in February of 2013 on Butchered Records and is still regarded by most scene supporters as one of the best heavy metal albums to come from a Buffalo local in years. The band is comprised of Shawn Gomez (From This Day) on bass, Matt Backlas on guitar, Greg DiPasquale (Sons of Azrael, Herod) on guitar, Allen Malkiewicz (From This Day) on drums, and Colin Winkelman on vocals.
While still playing the occasional show, they are currently in the process of writing their greatly anticipated second album. They’ll also be playing with New York death metal legends Incantation at Broadway Joe’s on Sunday, April 26. Also gracing the stage that night will be Rochester’s Order of the Dead and Buffalo thrash legends Hellcannon.
So, if you haven’t checked out Seplophile yet, and you’ve been yearning for a heavy dose of death, the likes of which would appease Chuck Schuldiner (Death, Control Denied), take a listen to the track below and watch them perform with Incantation in just a few weeks!
The hard working heavy blues rock band The End Men are ready to release their newest album – entitled Terms and Conditions – onto the world soon. The touring three piece consisting of Matthew Hendershot on vocals and guitars, Livia Ranalli on drums and percussion, and Matt Elia on Tenor Sax. The band calls Brooklyn their homebase – but they have strong ties to the Upstate New York region. They are part of the local musician collective Built4BBQ, which is comprised of acts like The Slaughterhouse Chorus and Henry’s Rifle, to name a few.
The End Men’s newest record will be released on April 21 – as a digital download – with a vinyl pressing to follow shortly afterwards. Terms and Conditions was recorded at John Epperly’s 100 Metropolitan Brooklyn studio and engineered by Epperly and Bobbie Lurie. The album was mixed at Mavericks in Manhattan. The nine tracks (eight with a bonus track) were then mastered by Alex DeTurk, who is known for his work with Willie Nelson, Chris Cornell and David Bowie.
NYS Music is proud to share the release of two tracks from the record – “Morning Birds” and “East of West” via The End Men’s Bandcamp page. The tracks are a free download with accompanying artwork by Nick Dragotta – famed comic book artist of the Image Comics series East of West – which one of the tracks is inspired by. You can read more about how that song came to be over at Neon Gods. The culmination of all their hard work will be celebrated at Beast of Bourbon on April 25. Take a listen to the two tracks, and follow The End Men on their website for updates as the release date draws near.
Zack Luckin has been writing for NYS Music since his freshman year of college. He has covered shows in the Ithaca area and music festivals such as Grassroots, Sterling Stage, and Summer Camp. Starting at the age of five, Zack began taking piano lessons and later took up percussion in the fourth grade. He continued drumming, taking lessons at The Hochstein School of Music in Rochester and was the principal percussionist and jazz drummer of his band and jazz band in high school for three years. He participated in solo festival and all county band every year since the sixth grade and was selected for the Area All-State ensemble as a senior in high school.
Now Zack is a sophomore Environmental Studies major at Ithaca College and minors in German. He is 92 WICB Ithaca College Radio’s Local Music Director and DJ’s their local music show Homebrew. When not interviewing bands or having them in for live performance in the studio, Zack partakes jazz and funk jam sessions and constantly searches for new funk influences as inspiration for his drumming. Though spending most of the year in Ithaca, at his home in Wolcott, NY, he works at Rose Valley Organic Farm and cooks at a local restaurant, Skipper’s Landing.
Zack’s first real exposure to to the live music scene was at the age of 16, when he attended Sterling Stage, a hidden gem in the upstate festival circuit. This life changing experience consisted of live acts such as Sophistafunk, Audioinflux, and Subsoil, leaving a lasting impression and becoming some of his favorite musical acts. Since then his taste for music has constantly evolved, building a love for jazz and funk such at Lettuce, Soulive, Medeski Scofield Martin & Wood, Orgone, and Spare Parts. Zack also has a fondness for many other types of music, including bands like Dave Grisman, Jatoba, The Roots, A Tribe Called Quest, Crosby Stills Nash & Young, and Gramatik. He strives to expand his music library and knowledge, but always comes back to unbeatable sounds of the upstate New York music scene.
Zack’s music bucketlist consists of John Scofield, The Roots, The Motet, Santana, and Swoop Unit.
For the last few years I have had the unique opportunity to cover music of many genres, at many venues, with both up and coming artists, and those national acts that are hitting the billboards. The one thing I notice about all the artists I cover? They love what they do and they love the audiences they play to. It doesn’t matter if it’s a small pub or a large stadium, the music is still the same and the passion behind it as well. What I have noticed is that some however tend to stand out more than others. Some just have a special quality to them that catch my attention and pique my curiosity. There’s something that sets them apart from the rest. A uniqueness that makes them shine a tiny bit more than the next star. Billy Lord fits this description.
Billy Lord – National Anthem Tour
Beginning his career in the music business mid-life, Billy Lord has become an inspiration to those who have always wanted to follow their dream, but let life and responsibility hold them back. What makes Billy unique is that he is not your typical musician. Working in New York City as a media executive for more than 15 years, Billy found himself without a job when his company eliminated his position. Down on his luck with nothing to lose, Billy took that leap of faith to pursue his dream. How many of us have a dream we would pursue…if only we won the lottery!!!! For Billy, he just went for it. The courage it took, and the passion he puts in to his music and song writing, is what makes Billy Lord my Artist To Check Out this month.
When I was introduced to Billy at his opening show at Toby Keith’s in Syracuse, I was extremely impressed by how passionate he was about his music and achieving this dream. Sharing a little of his back story with me, I could tell that this gentleman truly loved what he was doing and how fortunate he was to do it. I find of those in the business that have been able to pursue it as their career, when asked, they all would still do it, even if they weren’t getting paid. They do it for the love of it, not for the pay. For those lucky enough to begin their musical journey right out of the gate? Well, they never had a Plan B in place. It was only music. For Billy though, he started his journey after an original career didn’t work out. How lucky for us life threw him a curveball. Billy writes all his own music and lyrics. Making his performances standout that much more.
He has assembled some of the most talented musicians to surround him bringing out the best of all his music, and their chemistry is spot on. With Amos Sanfilippo on guitar, Colin Boughton on drums, Patrick Dowd on keyboards, and Roger Monteiro on bass, Billy’s band brings to his music a distinctive country rock sound that is unique even in the ever-changing country music scene today. Another thing I like about Billy is how he gives those locals a chance to sit in and join him on stage to showcase his music alongside.
I had a moment to speak with Billy to find out a little about him in his own words.
Kathy Stockbridge: How long have you been performing?
Billy Lord: Only about three years. To me, becoming a true top-tier stage performer is the next step on my evolutions an artist. Songwriting and guitar came first, then I worked on becoming a vocalist. Now in really learning the ropes of getting a crowd on their feet.
KS: How would you categorize your music…country…rock…?
BL: I always consider my music “American music,” though recently its leaning heavily toward modern country. Fans will hear that with the next album. Very country radio friendly stuff.
KS: What musicians have inspired you to this style you have created?
BL: Kid Rock, Bob Seger, Tom Petty and most recently Brantley Gilbert and Jason Aldean. But, I try not to listen to other people’s music too much because I never want to be derivative. I always want to be mine. Rock a Billy, if you will.
KS: Was this just a hobby ever or did you do it as a second job before?
BL: This was passion born out of losing everything… My career, my home, and my money. Music saved me during a very difficult time in 2009, when I was working homeless in NYC. It started as a way to keep me sane during a dark time. I didn’t look at it as a career until 2012. When I knew it was going to be my life, I quit my part-time jobs and gave myself to music fully. Jump and the net will open.
KS: What was your day job prior to this?
BL: I was a marketing manager in newspaper publishing for 15 successful years.
KS: How did that job end?
BL: I was laid off with several other managers when the economy hit the wall and the Great Recession took hold.
KS: How did you know that this is the direction you needed to go?
BL: When I was working homeless, I was unloading trucks at night and I’d get out at 3am and nowhere to go. I had an old guitar that I’d never learned to play. It was my last material possession. So when I got off work, I started teaching myself to play. Almost immediately I started hearing songs… Pure fits of inspiration, it was cathartic for me. But I really knew it was the right direction, when I got radio play on Z100 two days after recording my first demo. To me, it was a sign to keep going. And I have no plans to stop. There is no Plan B.
KS: Have you written all your life or is it something you just picked up as life went on?
BL: The funny thing is… My whole life I never knew I had this talent. And if I hadn’t been fired, I would have never known.
KS: Where do you get your inspiration for writing songs?
BL: I get asked this often because I’m such a prolific songwriter… And I tell people it’s like I have a radio station in my head. I hear full songs. Most recently, I’ve fallen in love, so that station is tuned in to the sound of endless summers and new love. I think listeners will live the new songs.
KS: What has been your support system throughout this venture?
BL: I’ve been very fortunate to have extremely supportive fans. The first two albums were crowd funded and our upcoming tour will be as well. I also have a few angels on my shoulder looking out for me.
KS: How did you assemble your band…what were you looking for? How long have you played together?
BL: Only a few months. My drummer Colin Boughton and keyboardist Patrick Dow and I have known each other since we were kids. We played little league baseball together. They both chose music and have been playing their whole lives while I pursued a business career. They were there ready to go when I needed a band. My guitarist, Amos Sanfillipo was a family friend and has had a long, successful career touring with major bands, and Roger Montiero, and amazing bass player with a similar touring career was suggested by Amos. We’re a motley, funny bunch. But we’re hard workers too.
KS: What is your advice to those that may be afraid of taking that step towards achieving their dreams?
BL: If you want to be something, give your self to it one hundred percent. Become it. Believe in yourself when others don’t, which will be always.
KS: Where can our readers see you in your tour?
BL: Our 2015 National Anthem US Tour dates are posted at www.reverbnation.com/billylord
While most new artists tend to perform 95% covers, slipping in a few of their own tunes, you find that Billy does the opposite. Billy’s set features the majority of his own music, rocking the crowd with his own sound, only to use the covers as exclamation points on his set list.
I highly recommend you taking the time to check out Billy at one of his live shows. His live show is worth the drive. For those in the Central NY area, Billy will be playing in Vernon this Saturday the 21st at The Stampede Steakhouse.
I see so many wonderful artists….but sometimes there’s just something unique that makes an artists stand out. Can’t pinpoint it to just one thing with Billy, Perhaps it’s the combination of his inspirational story, mixed with his prolific songwriting, and the energetic live show that makes him stand out. Whatever it is though, his unique style is what makes Billy Lord my Artist To Check Out this month. Not coming to a venue near you? Don’t fret you can purchase his recent album at www.reverbnation.com/billylord. From what I understand, the next one is right on the horizon!
Meet Steve. Steve is your ordinary 20-something career-driven civil engineer with degrees from RPI and Cornell, solving problems to better the public good. He attends meetings, drinks coffee out of one of a vast collection of mugs, keeps a pyramid of perfectly sharpened pencils and a pad of graph paper soon to be devoured in a flurry of concrete and steel design. Steve, however, takes a rare form after the sun recedes behind the mountainous wall of the Hudson Highlands. Meet Steve Malinski: NYS Music Staff Writer; gormandizer of music.
Music has always been a part of his life, beginning in the fourth grade at Poestenkill Elementary School when he picked up the sax against a field of other instruments laid out in front of him. However it wasn’t until his college radio years when he got exposed to a wider world of music. Through many on-air shifts at WRPI he basked in the soothing sounds of a vast collection of vinyl and CDs across several genres and decades. This is where he may have picked up the journalistic knack he carries on now at NYS Music, having interviewed the likes of Johnny Winter, Commander Cody, Country Joe McDonald (amongst others), many Albany-area musicians, and interacting with others in the music industry such as Bela Fleck and Eric Burdon.
Steve’s exposure to live music has been a sort of luck-of-chance. He’s tallied at least 140 concerts since 2005 including 19 Dave Matthews Band shows, 11 Phish shows, and 9 Rush shows. At least half of those have been thanks to working as an EMT at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center. His eclectic taste in music has led him to enjoy a range of live performances from the Philadelphia Orchestra and jazz festivals to jam bands and shows like Crüefest and the Warped Tour.
Having moved slightly more than a skip away from Troy dampened an almost daily involvement with radio to a few visits a month. So naturally, Steve’s journey as a writer with NYSMusic began in 2013 after an itch to regain a regularly active involvement in the music scene. He had written a few guest articles and photographed a few concerts and contributed some music reviews and sports articles for The Rensselaer Polytechnic in his undergraduate college years. NYSMusic has opened the door again to writing about music.
Aside from NYSMusic, Steve maintains active roles at WRPI in Troy as their local music director and WVBR in Ithaca as host of “Shakedown Street,” a weekly Grateful Dead program which airs on Saturdays. He also performs regularly with the RPI Pep Band on sax (and sometimes the Cornell Pep Band) and the Hudson Highlands Pipe Band on drums and occasionally finger-picks some tunes on guitar.
Steve’s bucket list dwindled rapidly over the past few years as he has had many great opportunities for shows. He has yet to cross David Gilmour, Dweezil Zappa, Paul McCartney, and The Rolling Stones off that list. His top 5 favorite bands are Rush, Black 47, Phish, The Grateful Dead, and Pink Floyd.
Folk metal has never really had a strong foothold in the WNY music scene, but all that changed when some talented musicians from Buffalo and Rochester decided to get together in April of 2013 and craft their own brand of it. The band is called Throne of Wilderness and they produce a sound reminiscent of the bands that started folk metal in the first place.
Big European acts like Ensiferum and Korpiklaani are widely regarded as being authorities in the genre, but Throne of Wilderness takes an honest approach to early folk and early thrash. This makes for quite a dynamic and with a collaboration of talent like this, it’s pretty hard to leave one of their shows disappointed, regardless of what kind of metal you’re into.
The band is made up of Allana Sturm (vocals, whistle), Kevin Murphy (guitar, vocals), Josh Mason (guitar), James Hallenbeck (accordian and keys), Jason Roman (bass) and Eareckson Murray (drums). Allana has a fun way of working the crowd like no other I’ve seen. She commands the audience with stories of mythical creatures and enchanted forests, while leaving no excuse to not be a folk metal fan by the end of the set. Kevin’s vocals compliment her’s perfectly, giving the classic folk metal choir sound to their songs. Josh Mason, already a well established metal musician in Rochester with his other band, Nazgul, brings his own array of crushing guitar skills to the table, while James keeps the folk alive with his accordian skills, and Jason and Eareckson provide the perfect rhythm section to back the entire group.
Furthermore, it’s hard to be a part of Buffalo’s metal scene without having heard of Eareckson Murray. He’s a longtime supporter and promoter of shows, and also lays down sick guitars and vocals for local thrash 3 piece, Cain. All this being said, if you’re a fan of any kind of metal and you haven’t heard this band yet, don’t sleep on your next chance to check them out. Your next opportunities to see them are Saturday March 21 at the Rockin’ Buffalo Saloon and Saturday April 18 at the Tudor Lounge.
Acrassicauda, derived from a Latin word for a species of black scorpion commonly found in the Middle East, originally hails from Baghdad, Iraq. Formed in 2001, they are often hailed as being the first heavy metal band to emerge from Iraq and were made famous in 2007, when they became the basis for the internationally acclaimed documentary, Heavy Metal In Baghdad. Back in those days, the band was persecuted to no end by Islamic militants operating under the Saddam Hussein regime and condemned as Satan worshipers. They had to sneak in and out of their well-concealed basement practice space, while under the constant threat of attack, only to find it destroyed by a missile during an insurgency uprising one day. All of their equipment was destroyed.
Heavily influenced by western bands like, Slipknot, Slayer and Metallica, they were only able to play two or three shows during the entire time they were still based in their homeland and in the midst of being seemingly hunted for playing heavy metal, some of their fans died for having listened to it. One of their first performances included a song called “The Youth of Iraq” which the band was forced to write in support of Saddam Hussein. Headbanging was banned, because it was considered to be too similar to the head movements of Jews during prayer.
But all of that is behind them now. Acrassicauda applied for asylum in the United States shortly after the taping of Heavy Metal in Baghdad and were granted green cards one year after that. In fact, on their second day in the US, the band was able to watch their oldest musical influence, Metallica, perform at the Prudential Center in Newark, NJ. Afterwards, they were allowed to go backstage and meet their idols.
The band currently resides in Brooklyn, New York and has an EP under their belts called Only the Dead See the End of the War, released by Vice Records in 2010. They followed up that release with a performance at the Scion Rock Fest in Columbus, Ohio, where they played with Cannibal Corpse, Voivod and others. A few national tours came later and in 2012, when they opened for Ministry, Ministry’s frontman, Al Jourgensen was quoted saying, “Acrassicauda is my favorite band.”
Furthermore, after 14 long arduous years, the band is finally on the verge of releasing their first full length album, called Gilgamesh, to be released on April 4, 2015.
All this being said, any struggling band with talent who’s thinking about calling it quits because of monetary setbacks, scheduling conflicts, high school drama or a general lack of productivity, perhaps all of the above, needs to take a hard look at Acrassicauda’s career and rethink things. This band is the physical embodiment of perseverance, and after only having seen Heavy Metal in Baghdad just recently, I’m already so proud of these brave guys and their accomplishments.
Check out the links below and support this great metal act, who clawed their way out of hell and lived to tell the tale.
Highlights in Montgomery’s career since joining NYSMusic include covering and photographing Umphrey’s McGee on New Year’s Eve in Atlanta, getting to know folks in the scene, and exploring many beautiful venues in New York. Sharing his musical experiences through the NYSMusic medium has been a great privilege and Montgomery only hopes to improve in 2015 and beyond.
The pressure to go into a more “normal” field lead her to attending 
Now Zack is a sophomore Environmental Studies major at Ithaca College and minors in German. He is 92 
Music has always been a part of his life, beginning in the fourth grade at Poestenkill Elementary School when he picked up the sax against a field of other instruments laid out in front of him. However it wasn’t until his college radio years when he got exposed to a wider world of music. Through many on-air shifts at WRPI he basked in the soothing sounds of a vast collection of vinyl and CDs across several genres and decades. This is where he may have picked up the journalistic knack he carries on now at NYS Music, having interviewed the likes of Johnny Winter, Commander Cody, Country Joe McDonald (amongst others), many Albany-area musicians, and interacting with others in the music industry such as 
