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Dead Superstar (one of Long Island's top Hard Rock bands), has a very important message for all of you:
"We would like to thank everyone who tried out for the new lead guitarist slot in Dead Superstar. It was a tough decision for us, but we are happy to announce that Todd Bowes from Westchester, NY will be joining Dead Superstar as lead guitarist. Todd has been in the New York area for over five years, having played with Ex Machina, and Dared the Knot. We are all very excited to begin this new chapter of Dead Superstar, and look forward to seeing you as we begin our next tour promoting the album, Tribulations. Todd's debut will be on November 10th when Dead Superstar shares the stage with POWERMAN 5000 at the Crazy Donkey. Stay tuned for more details." - Dead Superstar
On Friday March 26th 2010, I joined my good friends from Dead Superstar on their first tour ever! Personally, I had never been on tour and was thrilled to go on the road with them. There were 6 of us: Terence (Vocals), Evan (Guitars), Troi (Bass), Jared (Drums), Jaimie (Merchandise) and myself. After arriving at the train station in Mineola (Long Island) from New York City, Evan picked me up and he tells me: "Troi is still waiting to pick up the RV and we are stressing!"
After a few hours, Troi arrived with a house on wheels. Literally. When I heard that we where going to be traveling and sleeping in a van, I was picturing the typical tour van with everyone crammed together. But I was very surprised when I saw this huge RV, especially since I had never been in an RV! Once we packed up all the equipment we made our way to Allentown Pennsylvania, where Dead Superstar were scheduled to play a show that night. We sat in traffic for a long time as we crossed through New York City into New Jersey, to get to Pennsylvania.
Once we finally made it to the Crocodile Rock in Allentown, it was crunch time. We had 10 minutes to take the gear out of the trailer and get it setup so that Dead Superstar could get their groove on. They then rocked a set to a fairly empty room, thanks to another Rock show that was happening upstairs. Who the hell books 2 different shows of the same type of music in one night simultaneously? The geniuses at the Crocodile Rock. Regardless of how many people where there, Dead Superstar played a great set and had a good time doing it.
After they finished their set, we headed upstairs to check the scene out. The average age in that room must have been 18. We hung out for a bit, and then headed back to our house on wheels. By that time, we were all starving and could have found something to eat, however, parking our house wasn't the easiest thing to do. While we were all hanging with the members of Black Water Rising from Brooklyn, a light bulb lit up on my head. "Hey guys, why don't we call Domino's and have them deliver the pizza to us?" Off course the answer was a loud "yes"!
Before the pizza arrived, the guys from Black Water Rising hit the road. Once the pizza delivery guy showed up we where all in heaven. We literally swallowed that pizza and those wings, in 1 bite! We were the human trashcans! Jaimie, the only girl there, says to all of us: "You guys are pigs!" Once we finished eating, we got on the road and headed to a rest area between Allentown and Philadelphia, where we all fell asleep pretty fast.
The next morning, the first thing we all said was how bad we all wanted to shower! After a few failed attempts at getting some water running inside our house on wheels, we ended up renting a cheap motel room and showered before heading over to Pennsylvania, where Dead Superstar had a scheduled performance at the Philadelphia Tattoo Arts convention. Once we got to the motel, which was the type of place you see crack whores and dealers hanging out on every episode of Cops, we all showered, got changed and were ready to take over the convention!
Once we got to the Sheraton hotel in Philly, we parked the RV and started unloading the equipment. After setting up we went to check the scene out. I had never seen so many people with tattoos in one place. It was an amazing site! The term "colorful characters" is an understatement.
Before Dead Superstar took the stage, Terence, Troi and I went to get some food. As we walked around a quiet downtown Philly, we saw this homeless guy laying down along the curbside. We went to check on him to make sure he was OK, which thankfully he was. After leaving the man behind in his deep uncomfortable sleep, we saw another one! After walking blindly in order to find a place where we could eat an original Philly Steak Sandwich, we finally found this pizza joint and the three of us stuffed our faces.
There were a lot of people hanging out backstage once we got back to the convention. Since I was there not only to help the band out but also to document the event for all of you, I decided to go for a walk and check out the scene. After a few steps, I come across "The Enigma" who was about to perform. I then ran into some Burlesque girls and then into some porn stars! It was surreal to say the least. The show was about to start. So I quickly ran upstairs to check out the ink festival! It was mind blowing to see so many people getting tattooed at the same time!
After walking around for a bit, I headed back downstairs to catch the different performances. The first act I saw was the one featuring “The Enigma” and his sidekick “Serena Rose”. This act was very fun to watch, it included chain saws, light bulbs, halogen lights, tubes and all sorts of other bizarre things. The highlight of the act was “The Enigma” inserting a really long tube into his nose, which he had coming out of his mouth and after he drank two bottles of Gatorade, the liquid started coming out from his body into the tubes. This guy is amazing!
Next up were the body suspension performances, hosted by Joanna Angel from "The Burning Angels", and featuring tons of hot girls hanging from chains that where hooked up to huge hooks that pierced their skin. This was insane to say the least and the crowd loved it.
Finally, the time had come for the music acts to begin. First up was Panzie from New York City, who put on a good performance but the crowd was not feeling it. I think it was the wrong crowd for them and by that time most people had gone downstairs to the bar area.
Once Panzie finished their set, it was go time for Dead Superstar! We brought out the gear as quickly as possible so we wouldn't lose the crowd. After a quick sound check, the band played a furious set in which the energy was addicting. Everyone in the room was feeling their vibe, specially “The Enigma” and model Danielle Darkko. After the previous disappointment of the night before at the Crocodile Rock in Allentown, the band was within its element - playing great Rock n' Roll in front of a decent sized crowd.
After they finished their rocking set, we hung out backstage for an hour and then proceeded to bring all the equipment downstairs. Once we packed all the gear we hanged out in our RV, were Erric from Killcode joined us with Tattoo artist Kelly Edwards from San Antonio. Once the night was winding down we all decided to go into the hotel and find a party… at 5 am!
We literally went through every floor of the hotel and listened for noise, because according to Erric from Killcode, that's where the party was! We suddenly found a baby crib and Evan got in while Erric blasted him around the halls. We finally heard some noise inside a room, we knocked and once this girl opened the door Erric tells her: "I believe this crib belongs to you." You should have seen the faces of the girls that where staying in that room. They didn't know whither to laugh or scream!
After we destroyed the crib, we took a table, a chair and put these items in the elevator! Nothing was going to stop us from having a good time. As we where going up and down in the elevator recruiting people to join our elevator party, we ran into this security guy. We asked him where the party was and he said all the parties had been shut down. For a second we thought he was going to escort us out of the hotel, but he was actually pretty amused at our antics.
We ended up at the Hotel Lobby, loud as hell and that's where the party ended with a classic Continental Breakfast. We where literally the first ones there and ate a ton of food! After that we finally went to sleep!
We all woke up the next morning, amazed that we weren't hassled by the Police, since we were still parked by the loading dock and had the RV extended! Once I woke up I was ready to go to the Tattoo convention and get my Pantera "Cowboys From Hell" Tattoo! I will tell you all about that on a different article. Jaimie also joined the ink festival and got a killer dagger from Kelly Edwards, whom we had met the night before.
After getting inked, we hit the road and headed towards New York City with a pit stop at Crackle Barrel where we all stuffed our faces once again! We then got back on the road were I fell asleep and when I woke up, we were in Queens! I got dropped off in Astoria and headed home.
All in all, it was an amazing experience and we all had a fun time without any big problems or unnecessary drama. The band wants me to go on tour with them again, so stay tuned to see when that will happen. I want to thank everyone from Dead Superstar, Erric from Killcode and all the crazy bastards that were at the Philadelphia Tattoo Arts Convention! If you haven't experienced a Tattoo convention, I highly recommend it!
You can listen to Dead Superstar's new record titled "Tribulations" right here:
Not very often do you find a band that stands out from the mess of bands that sound exactly the same. It is pretty sad, but Dead Superstar brings hope back to the Music Industry. Formed in 2005, Dead Superstar is here with a clear mission: they want to bring the masses a fresh mix of musical elements and through their powerful, energetic performances; they hope to cross new boundaries. After seeing them perform 3 different times, at 3 different venues, I have no doubt that this phenomenal band will be a significant force within the next decade. With the release of their brand new album titled "Tribulations" and their radio campaign kicking off on March 9th, Dead Superstar is very excited to bring their music to the masses. I recently had a chance to interview the band at The Delancey and after a few minutes of conversing with them, and I realized that their mindset is definitely on target! Here is what went down after they took over the stage at The Delancey on Friday February 19th:
HU: Alright! I am here in New York City, by the Williamsburg Bridge, by The Delancey, with this band called Dead Superstar.
In Unison: Dead Superstar!
HU: Yeah! Dead Superstar just jammed hard man! And you guys…
Terrence: Take 1!
In Unison: (Laughter).
HU: So Troi, you were going to tell us a story. What happened? Go ahead.
Troi: I have a story that happened with our old band Perseverance a few years back. We were playing up in Toronto. And these two guys smashed a window, fucking grabbed the TV set, walked to the curve and where like: “Yo, Taxi!!!”
Terrence: (Laughter).
Troi: Taxi pulled up. The guys got in the fucking cab with the TV and took the fuck off! (Laughter).
HU: Did you guys get any video of that?
Terrence: No.
Troi: No, no, no… I wish we did bro!
HU: So first of all. Introduce yourselves; say what you play, where you are from, and your influences. We’ll start with you man.
Troi: Hmmm… Troi Mosby. Long Island New York, via Queens. Influences: Anything grooving, anything hard.
HU: For example?
Troi: Hmmm… From Pantera to The Village People bro! I am all across the spectrum.
Terrence: The Village People? Yeah kid!
Jared: Wow!
HU: (Laughter). How about you?
Terrence: (Laughter). Hmmm… Terrence Keith. My influences go back into the deep roots man. We are talking like 70, 60’s… James Brown into Zeppelin and The Doors, into 90’s Grunge. Like Rock from Rage Against the Machine, Soundgarden, a little Black Sabbath and Pantera. It goes all over the floorboard baby, all over the floorboard.
HU: Speaking of Black Sabbath, did you know that it recently was the 40th anniversary of Black Sabbath?
Terrence: Yes, I did hear that.
Evan: Yeah…
HU: And I think most musicians today if it wasn’t for Black Sabbath... Black Sabbath shaped up what was going to happen in the music industry with Hard Rock music. I think they were The Beatles of heavier Rock.
Terrence: I agree. And also a band a lot of people are sleeping on is AC/DC…
Evan: AC/DC, I was about to say that.
Terrence: AC/DC…
Evan: AC/DC all the way!
Terrence: A lot of people think they had…
Evan: They are Rock N Roll.
Terrence: Yeah, they think that AC/DC had those mundane like grooves because people used to say: “Oh, they had no groove!”
Jared: Done, dirt, cheap…
In Unison: (Laughter).
HU: And since you mentioned AC/DC, it is Bon Scott’s death anniversary today.
Jared: Today is the day?
HU: Today is the day.
Jared: Ahhh man… that is a really sad day.
Troi: Really?
Jared: I am Jared. I am the drummer for Dead Superstar. I am most deeply influenced by Bon Scott’s pants in the “Let It Be Rock” 1982 wide-release movie.
Terrence and Evan: (Laughter).
Jared: When Bon Scott opened the show wearing a pair of ripped jeans and by the end of the show the jeans where so scared of Bon Scott, they had fallen off of his body miraculously…
Terrence: (Laughter).
Jared: I thought that fucking was the most amazing Rock N Roll moment that I have ever seen on film. So here is to fucking Bon Scott!
Terrence: Hip, hip.
HU: Like an imaginary shot?
Jared: Exactly.
HU: Yeah, I mean…
Jared: What’s funny is that Bon Scott was 33 years old when he died and a lot of people in music, and the musicians and artists know about this thing, is that 27, 33 curse. That artists die at 27 or they die at 33. And that is something that is really close to us. We had people that we know die at that age. We got family that where musicians that have died at that age. And most of us have escaped both of curses at this point. We are just worried about Evan; he is a little under the wire.
Terrence, Troi and Evan: (Laughter).
Jared: Bringing up Bon Scott, that curse and that whole thing, is really important to us because our record “Tribulations” is coming out. And a lot of the songs are about loss and things that have happened to us in our lives as people. Whether we have been injured or hurt, or somebody died, or somebody close to us is no longer with us... So that is important.
HU: Yeah right on! You always have to keep the memory of everybody who has passed, because they influence us in one way or another. Whether it is through art, through music, through family. They influence who we are and the future of what we are going to be. Like for example, Black Sabbath, AC/DC, any other influences that you can think of?
Evan: Man, I listen to everything! I don’t even know where to start. But if it sounds good, if it has a good riff to it; it can be any type of Rock, Hard Rock, Metal, Extreme Metal… I listen to everything. I love the riffs of Lamb of God and August Burns Red, and then I’ll get down with 311 and the Dave Matthews Band. Whatever it is man, if I hear a good riff, if I hear a good solo... I might be influenced by it. I also like a lot of progressive music like anything that John Petrucci and Dream Theater, or Opeth does. I let all the different kinds of influences just come together and I try to write whatever sounds good.
Troi: The Who is still rocking it out in the Super Bowl.
HU: Yeah!
Troi: Fucking 62 years old man! Don’t get fooled again!
Terrence: No one mentioned the Rolling Stones. But hey, that’s all good.
HU: But they already had it. Since we were talking about different bands that have influenced so many other bands, for example, Metallica, Do you guys think they will ever have a spot at the Super Bowl?
Terrence: I don’t think they ever will.
Troi: I don’t know…
Evan: They should! They absolutely should, but they probably won’t. You know whom I would love to see: a Led Zeppelin reunion at the Super Bowl.
Jared: Oh wow! That would be amazing! I think that the NFL has the balls to put Metallica on stage at the Super Bowl. They are just going to have to get through other bands first, you know? They did Bruce Springsteen, and they did the Rolling Stones, and they did The Who.
Terrence: Did U2 do it yet?
Jared: Yeah, U2 did it.
HU: U2? I think so right?
Troi: Yeah.
Jared: Definitely.
Troi: Janet Jackson with the titty!
Terrence: Oh!!!
Troi: (Laughter).
Terrence: The titty!
In Unison: (Laughter).
Jared: That was the best!
HU: No, no… you had to bring that up!
Evan: I went to grab a beer and I saw everyone’s face! I missed it!
Troi: That was a nice titty you know?
Evan: I looked away to pick up my beer and I see everyone’s face… The Missed Boob!!!
Troi: I wanted to see that titty since she appeared in “Good Times”!
In Unison: (Laughter).
Jared: Yo! I have to agree with that!
Troi: (Laughter).
Jared: That is pretty much when I was interested.
Evan: I think that was before my time.
Terrence: You got it over with at the Super Bowl.
Troi: (Laughter).
HU: That was classic.
Jared: I don’t want to let everybody else look at my girl. You know what I am saying? HU: Since you where talking about the new record, what else can you tell us? In my opinion it is obviously fresh, I heard the music just now, and it is real good!
Evan: It's raw! It's dynamic! And there is a lot of variety. We don’t stick with any particular types of given labels, whatever you want to label the type of music that you hear. And that is one of the things that are going wrong with all music these days; everyone feels that a certain type of music has to be labeled a subgenre of a genre. Whatever it is, Hard Rock, fucking Groove Metal … Death Core now is the hot thing in Extreme Metal. You know if it is good music, if it sounds good… just play it, listen to it, like it and call it whatever you want to.
Troi: Yeah! We went into the studio with Joey Z from Hard Rock/ Metal band Life of Agony … and we just did our thing man. Just laid down our tracks and what came out, came out man. There was no set plan! We did our thing and we just tried to make it happen. I hope everyone likes it.
HU: How was working with Joey?
Troi: Great!
Evan: Fucking awesome!
Troi: (Laughter).
HU: Obviously you spent a lot of time together with him and with yourselves in the studio. Was there something that happened ridiculously funny or something that just inspired the record during the process? Whether it was pre-production, production, mixing…
Troi: All I can say about this album… it was made of on Jack Daniels and late night sushi bro!
Terrence: (Laughter).
Troi: A lot of hours up in the docks in Brooklyn just doing our thing man. It was an interesting experience. Joey Z is a good man. He grew and we grew with him.
Terrence: (Laughter).
Troi: It was an experience bro! It was a great experience that I would do again in a minute. It was good times. We got what we wanted to get across.
Terrence: Let me tell you that he did one hell of a job on the album. But you got to pick it up and see for yourself because it is dope. The production is off the hook, everything is tight and you got to check it out because it has a message and it is a good vibe, and a grooving CD.
HU: And where can people find the CD? Give them a couple of links, plug yourselves.
Evan: Yeah, we are on Twitter. You can follow us on there.
Terrence: Do we Twit?
Troi: We are on Twitter, we Twit, we Facebook, we iTunes, we CD Baby, we La La, we Lu Lu…
Terrence: We take your sister to a ball, we do all those things and we do it right.
Troi: That’s right!
Terrence: (Laughter).
Troi: We take your sister to the fucking concert; drop her off with her panties in her back pocket.
Terrence: (Laughter).
Troi: We do all that shit! (Laughter).
Terrence: When we drop her at her house in a freaking carriage, you know it’s us.
Troi: That’s right! We lean her up against the door, push the doorbell and bounce!
In Unison: (Laughter).
HU: Any closing remarks? What do you want people to know about Dead Superstar?
Jared: We want them to know that the album drops March 9th to radio. And that our manager Tom “Smitty” Smith is bringing the album to the people all across the United States. We are going to be on Sirius, we are going to be on College Radio, we are going to go to specialty shows and markets. We are going to be out there getting plays on radio stations across the US, Canada and even some in Europe, so we want people to call up and request our songs! If you hear the shit and you like it, call up your radio stations. Call and request Dead Superstar. Tell them to play it all day long because the only way we can get out there and play for people, is if they want to hear the music. And if they hear the music on the radio, they got to tell them to keep playing it because it is hard to get bands across the country.
Evan: Yeah, we do it all for the fans. That is what it is all about. If people didn’t like our music, if we weren’t having a good time by playing awesome music for awesome people, then we wouldn’t be doing this. So we are getting it out there on the radio. Request Dead Superstar at your local station, at Satellite Radio, or whatever it might be playing. And we are looking forward to kicking ass with everybody out there.
HU: And that is the right attitude. And you know what? Not only pick up the CD, but pick up the merchandise and go to the shows. Everybody, this is for every single band out there! You have to support your local acts. We are in New York where there are a lot of hungry bands, and there are some really, really good bands out there too. Evan: Exactly.
HU: What you are doing is basically evolving to something different. You don’t want to sound like ABCDE, like a formula to try to get that musical perfection, because that fails.
Jared: Yeah.
HU: What you guys are trying to do is get your own flavors out through your own influences. You guys are obviously pretty different dudes.
Troi: Oh yeah man. You got to come to the shows; our shows are an experience man. The more people the better. All I can say is prestige worldwide.
Evan: OH God!!!
Troi: Catalina Wine Mixer baby!
In Unison: (Laughter).
Troi: That just happened! (Laughter). Fucking Evan will eat your dick like fucking Kobiachi!
In Unison: (Laughter).
Jared: I hope this is not going to be at the Satellite station or Cable station, because you are going to have to sensor the shit out of us.
Troi: We want to thank you for coming down man and just seeing the show, interviewing us. And giving us the time to get our shit out there and hopefully everyone will dig it man. HU: The sky is the limit. Thank you guys! Dead Superstar, you guys fucking rock! Any last words?
Evan: Joe…
HU: You never told us who you are?
Evan: You kick ass Joe. My name is Evan. I play guitar for Dead Superstar.
HU: We forgot that part with you right? (Laughter).
Evan: I figured you knew who I was.
In Unison: (Laughter).
HU: But now I know who all of you are.
In Unison: (Laughter).
Terrence: Wait. You don’t know who I am?
Troi: (Laughter).
HU: No, no… who are you?
Terrence (Laughter).
HU: Who are you?
Terrence: My name is Terrence and I am the front man of Dead Superstar. And I just want to say that our music is a revolutionary spiritual message that we want everyone to take a listen to and I want to say that it is not something plastic, that we just made up just to get to number 1, top 10 hits, whatever. This is real! What we write is real. We come from our hearts, we come from our souls and we want to break through. And we want to send a message out. And that is all I got to say. Dead Superstar! It’s almost like a big bang. And that is what we are trying to create, something new, and something different. A new creation of music, bless it.
HU: Amen.
Troi: Troi Mosby, Dead Superstar.
Jared: Jared, Dead Superstar. Terrence that last part was very moving. I want you to hold me right now! I feel very emotional.
Terrence: (Laughter).
HU: (Laughter). Alright, thank you guys!
You can listen to this interview and to their new record titled "Tribulations" right here:
This are Radio Stations that will be playing Dead Superstar's new album titled "Tribulations". If you don't see your local station listed, call them and tell them you want to hear Dead Superstar!
Non-Traditional: Music Choice Full Metal Jackie
Commercial Specialty: KEYJ Abilene, TX KFLY Eugene, OR KFTE Lafayette, LA KJML Joplin, MO KMKF Manhattan, KS KROX Austin, TX KRRX Redding, CA KSHE St. Louis, MO KZZE Medford, OR WAQX Syracuse, NY WCHZ Augusta, GA WDHA Cherry Hill, NJ WKGB Binghamton, NY WKLL WKRL Utica, NY WKTA Rebel Radio Chicago, IL WLFE Burlington, VT WOBX Nags Head, NC WRIF Ferndale, MI WVBR Interlaken, NY WXRX Rockford, IL WYBB Charleston, SC
College/Community: KKFI Kansas City, MO KSJS San Jose, CA WBGU Bowling Green, OH WEOS Waterloo, NY WMPG Portland, ME WORT Waunakee, WI WSOU S. Orange, NJ WSUP Platteville, WI WWSP Custer, WI WXCI Danbury, CT
IMPRINTED by Jo Schüftan (Founder of Horns Up Rocks)
