Virtual Soapbox

RASH: "Behind The Music." 

The Unabridged History 

9/8/96 - 11/15/99

What would become Rash was originally just an idea. I used to be subscribed to a list server that was made up of alumni of Psi Phi Delta Fraternity. Around July of 1996, I sent out a message inquiring about who might be interested in putting together a large jam session. A lot of the guys who are alumni of the House play a variety of instruments, so my bright idea was to try & get anyone who was into it all together in one place, & just basically see what would come of it. As usual, I got the typical responses about people being interested, let them know when & where it would be happening, some people who didn't play anything wanted to just come & just generally, a pretty positive reaction. Over the course of the next two months, there were a variety of emails sent out, with a variety of responses. Eventually, we got five people to agree to participate, including myself. We all confirmed we would assemble ourselves at my house in Syracuse, NY on the weekend of September 8, 1996. What would come of that weekend surprised no one else more, than the four people who went on to become a band called Rash.  

The idea of the initial get together, would be just to have some fun, bash out a few tunes, & at the very least, get a chance to see each other. This being our first time getting together, I rented a drum kit from a local music store, since I had yet to purchase my own. We moved the majority of the furniture out of the front room of my house, & set up. The people who came & played that day were Bob Rozwod, Bryan O' Malley, Steve Jakubowski, Scott Coldren, & Darin Shears. We played for an hour or two, & then Darin came. He stuck around for a few songs, & then split. As things turned out, that was the first & last time he played with us. We were destined to became a four piece band.  

The very first song we played was "Rockin' In the Free World" by Neil Young. We just counted off the beginning, & went right into it. Granted, it was rough, but when we finished, we all kind of looked at each other. And the strangest thing was, it sucked, but it had potential; & it wasn't completely awful. If you've ever read the book about Led Zeppelin, "Hammer of the Gods," it talks about how the very first song they played together, which was an old tune by The Yardbirds (Jimmy Page's previous band) called "Train Kept a Rollin'." The book states that when they finished playing it, they all looked at each other & were surprised & pleased at not only how it had sounded, but how it felt. Now granted, we are NOT Led Zeppelin, but there was some of that feeling in the room that day at my house. It felt like there was a chance that we could really have something here if we worked at it, & that it might actually be worth continuing to do it. It felt right, so we kept playing. 

By the end of the day, we agreed that we'd all had a good time, & would like to get together again. Around this time, I began to seriously look for a drum set of my own. What I ended up getting was a used seven piece Tama set, complete with all hardware & cymbals. It was a good deal, & the set was in great shape.  My wife Kathryn played a very large role in making this all happen, & I'm still thankful to her for it to this day. So now I had an instrument; I was ready to play. For me, the whole reason I started bugging people about getting together in the first place was just born out of the frustration of always having to just watch when these guys would jam on their acoustics at parties & such. I knew that trying to learn guitar or bass would take too much time & I'd never be on their level anyway, so I went with drums. Funny thing was, that first time we played together, I hadn't even sat behind a drum kit for over five years, & my playing time before that was very minimal. For whatever reason, it was something I could teach myself, & also pick up fairly quickly.  

The name Rash came from something stupid that one of us said. To this day, none of us even remember who came up with the moniker that would stick with us. We were making jokes about how we'd sound to people, & someone said that we would grow on them "...like a rash." And that's where it came from. We've discussed several times coming up with something more accessible, & maybe not quite as stupid, but, Rash has stuck. We are Rash, forever & ever, amen.  

So now we had four guys (with instruments) willing to play & a stupid name: we were a band!. For the remainder of that fall, we got together several more times. Due to the holiday season, we didn't end up getting together to play again until February of 1997. We practiced another one or two more times, & then our first chance at a live gig had presented itself to us. Our friend & fellow Psi Phi Delta alumni Chris Brown, hosted an annual party called Toaphstock at his house in Mclean, NY every year around the time of the Summer Solstice. He asked us to play, & we were excited to get the chance to do so. It'd be the perfect opportunity for us for our first live gig- it'd be in front of friends at a friend's party. We figured this way, if people hated us, at least it'd be people we knew who'd tell us we sucked, instead of total strangers. The date would be June 20th, 1997.  

We put together enough songs to have two full sets to play. We ended up renting a PA for the day from the same place that I'd rented the drum set from when we first got started. As it turned out, they gave us a great deal. We not only had a huge PA, but we also had our own sound guy, Seth, to run the board for us. I was pretty psyched because he had enough stuff with him that I got to mic every single drum in my set. From what we were told, we were pretty loud. I never got to hear it from in front of the PA, so all I have to go on is what we were told. We set up in the early afternoon, & hung around until it was time to play around 6:00pm. We figured if we played later, people would have had more to drink, & be more susceptible to how we would sound.  

As things turned out, it went pretty well. Most people had a lot of really positive things to say to us about how we sounded & what we played. Everyone seemed to have a really good time, & we really liked playing. We'd decided to wear stupid outfits, in the event of people thinking we were taking ourselves too seriously. The attitude was, if we looked like we were having fun, they'd have fun watching us. It seemed to work. Check out the pictures from Toaphstock on the RASH: Photo Gallery page. The gig had been in June, & we didn't end up getting together again until that fall.  

After a few more practices off & on over the next few months, we found ourselves in the Spring of 1998. We'd started getting together on a monthly basis to practice, & were actually getting into a pretty good groove. We'd begun to add new material, & we were all pleased with how things were sounding. Unfortunately, something always seems to happen to screw things up. Kathryn & I had to move out of the house we were renting that we'd been practicing in regularly. We ended up moving into a much smaller place that just wasn't capable of housing a Rash practice space. This ended up putting all things Rash related into an indefinite holding pattern. The four of us sent many, many emails back & forth, trying to come up with ideas on how to get together. We'd been invited back to play at Toaphstock again that year, but we had to cancel because I had to work (I'd recently begun bartending at The Brokedown Palace on weekends). So Rash got put on the shelf for a while.  

Around September of 1998, Joe Hammond, my father-in-law, offered to let Rash play at the season closing party of the Palace. I contacted the other guys, & we decided we'd do it. We were to play on Saturday September 26th, 1998. We were going to share the bill with an acoustic version of a band out of Oswego, NY called the Jugglin' Monkeys. Roz, Jake, & I got together & played for a little while on the night before, & then Chewie arrived the next morning. We played for a few hours on Saturday afternoon, & attempted to scrape some of the rust of our set list. We not only hadn't played together in over six months, we hadn't even all been together in the same room during that time.  

That night, the Jugglin' Monkeys played a set first, & they sounded great. There was a huge thunderstorm, & there was a chance that we could lose power, so we rushed up & started playing. Our first few songs were riddled with technical problems with the PA, due to our hasty set up. But, once we got past that, it started to feel good. By time we played the last song of our first set (a kick ass rockin' version of "Do you feel like we do" by Peter Frampton), we sounded good enough that people seemed to really like us. We had a really good turn out of family & friends who came to hear us. We felt good when we left the stage.  

Jugglin' Monkeys played another set, & then we got to finish up the night with our second set. We took the stage feeling confident, & it came across in our music. People not only liked the covers that we played, but also seemed receptive to our original music as well! I never thought I'd see people dancing to "Godzilla."  One of the best parts of this story, was that after played our last tune, "Dirty Joan," Kathryn was tending bar that night, & some guy who'd never heard us before came up to order a drink & HE WAS SINGING THE CHORUS TO "DIRTY JOAN!!"  I never thought I would have lived to hear that...  We concluded our set, & invited both of the guitar players from Jugglin' Monkeys to sit in with us. Only one of them came up, & we had a blast. We jammed out impromptu previously unrehearsed versions of "Hey Joe" & "Little Wing" by Jimi Hendrix, as well as a medley of "Feelin' Alright" by Joe Cocker into "You can't always get what you want" by the Rolling Stones. By the time we were finished, it was very late, we were exhausted, but we were very happy. We'd pulled it off, & it had sounded pretty good, all things considered. Check out the pictures from the gig on the RASH: Photo Gallery page.  

Since that night, we've gotten together to practice only once so far, during Memorial Day Weekend of 1999. Where will we go from here? Who knows... What Rash is, is four friends getting together to do what they all love to do - play music. Until the day when we win the lottery & record our first album to tour behind, we'll just keep getting together when we can, & just doing what we love to do.  

And so the story comes to an end...    I  received an email from Jake (Steve Jakubowski) today, 11/15/99, saying that he's got a great job offer & he's moving to Milwaukee, WI. Even though we've made RASH work with each of us living in four different locations in New York State, trying to keep it together with him halfway across the country probably won't happen.  I wish him well & hope that he finds another band in the mid-west to play with.  With his guitar & bass playing, as well as his excellent keyboard skills, & vocals,  someone will be happy to have him sit in & jam, I'm sure.

So that's that, I guess. I can honestly say, in my own "humble" opinion, that we were a real band in our own right. The chemistry that we had just came naturally. We were a raw product that never got the opportunity to polish off its rough edges & hone its art. Playing in RASH was a real kick for me & I will always have good memories of all the practices & our two live gigs. 

RASH: Chapter Two - A New Hope

In June 2002, we met again in Roz & Sandra's new house located in Brewerton, NY. Things went a little better this time, & we even worked on learning some new covers. We'll all be attending Jake & Dianne's wedding on June 29th, & then after Chewie & Suzie move into their new house, we're going to start getting together again fairly regularly again starting in the fall. Chewie, Roz & I have been keeping in pretty good touch via email, & have started bouncing ideas off each other for new original songs. I'm excited to see what the future holds for RASH.

Stay tune...

[HOME] [WORK] [KATHRYN] [RASH] [RANTS-N-RAVES] [PETS] [LINKS] [SOS] [CHEMYSTRY SET]