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| Wednesday, June 11, 2008 at Hawthorne Theatre |
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(click for full-page printable poster)
GENRES
Rock
Jazz
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Nonpoint
The Exies
Deep Field
Under The Flood
Silversafe
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Hawthorne Theatre 503-233-7100
1507 SE 39th Ave, Portland, OR (MapQuest)
8pm (doors open at 7pm). All Ages.
$16.00 advance tix from TicketsWest.
$18.00 at the door.
ABOUT NONPOINT -
Nonpoint was formed in 1998 in Ft. Lauderdale Florida. The band has sold well over 500,000 records in the US and has a huge, dedicated and ever growing fan base. They continue to be embraced by rock fans and press, as well as rock radio. Their unrelenting live shows have earned them the reputation as one of the best live bands in rock today. The band has toured with a who's who of metal including Mudvayne, Staind, Ozzfest, Disturbed, Linkin Park and Sevendust to name a few. Nonpoint's new CD "TO THE PAIN" is the culmination of everything this band is and has worked for. In an era of one record and over-with careers, Nonpoint is steady and true, growing larger with every year and doing what they do best, crushing with their sound and presence. No frills, no bullshit, just brutality...NONPOINT.
The first single from To The Pain, "Bullet With A Name" has been climbing the charts steadily and is already one of the band's most successful singles. The "To The Pain" CD is on pace to also be their most successful yet. Anyone who knows anything about Nonpoint knows that live is where this band comes to life. They take things to a whole new level with their energy and presence. After a stint on last year's Warped tour, Nonpoint has started this touring cycle with a 3 month, sold-out coast-to-coast tour with Sevendust. This tour will keep them on the road through early April, and they are already in demand for many of the huge radio festivals this spring.
The band has expanded its sonic palate without losing its metal underpinnings. "To The Pain" is flavored with equal measures of Latin rhythms and progressive metal guitar work. Soaring melodies intertwine seamlessly with screams originating from some inner wealth of anger. The band took hold of the writing process on this record with both hands and dug deep to the core of what the Nonpoint sound is all about. In true DIY styling, everyone was hands-on in the creation process for the new record. Guitarist Andrew Goldman took the helm to produce and mix the bands 4th outing, and KB created and assembled all the artwork for the packaging including the photography.
Nonpoint is growing, gaining speed and winning more and more fans with every step. "To The Pain" is the next step for a band that truly appears to be here for the long haul.
ABOUT THE EXIES -
I start to believe/The more that I see/I know it's true/This is a modern way of living with the truth," "A Modern Way of Living With the Truth"
"How did I get here?" asks The Exies lead vocalist/guitarist/songwriter Scott Stevens on the band's deliberately raw cover of the Talking Heads' "Once in a Lifetime," from the band's new album, A Modern Way of Living With the Truth, its debut for the Eleven Seven label distributed by ADA.
It's a reasonable question to ask the L.A.-based band whose two previous albums for Virgin, 2003's Inertia and 2004's Head for the Door, produced the #6 Active Rock/Top 10 Modern Rock hit "Ugly," used by World Wrestling Entertainment as the theme to their Survivor Series pay-per-view event, as well as the #12 Modern Rock hit "My Goddess."
After two years of touring with bands like Breaking Benjamin, 30 Seconds to Mars, the Used, Sparta and Evanescence, then appearing on Motley Crue's Carnival of Sins tour last year by special request of Nikki Sixx, a fan of the band, the group was on the verge of losing two of their members.
"I was ready to quit myself," says Scott Stevens, who founded the band in 1998 with bassist Freddy Herrera. Throw in the fact the band left Virgin Records and changed their management, and you've got the ingredients for either the end...or, in The Exies' case, a new beginning.
Enter guitarist Chris Skane, who was a member of the group in one of its earliest incarnations, and remained friends with them. The three began to write together, pouring their frustrations and dreams into a new set of songs that reflected their anguish, guilt, remorse, shame and pain, but also their hope, optimism and strength of spirit, finding the missing link between grunge and emo. The trio forged forward while, at the same time, harking back to the original meaning of their name--the existentialists.
"We just decided to hang out together and write as friends," says Skane. "It didn't even cross our minds that it could be a permanent situation."
The band describes the new album's sound as a yin-yang synthesis of "beauty and destruction," A Modern Way of Living With the Truth, produced by James Michaels (Alanis Morissette, Motley Crue and Meat Loaf), runs the gamut of sound and emotion, from the wistful opening "Leaving Song" and the harsh anti-materialist rant of "Lay Your Money Down" to the simple piano chords of the regretful "Stray" and the wistful ballad "My Ordinary World" to the propulsive melodic hardcore of "These are the Days" to the techno questioning of the title track.
The album reflects the band's inner torment, a way of dealing with the uncertainty of the modern world. Songs like the album's first single, "Different Than You" and "Fear of Being Alone" explore the conundrums of, as Scott puts it, "coming into this world alone and leaving alone, what you gather along the way. And the fact it's all gone at the end." Quieter songs like "Stray," about the regret caused by infidelity, and "My Ordinary World," which talks about the desire for change, co-exist next to cathartic bursts of anger such as "Dose" ("You always leave me behind for someone new/Now it's my turn to hate") and "Better Now" ("I gotta believe/That she's getting better/While my heart bleeds/While I can't forget her").
"The whole impetus for the album came from me standing back and taking stock of my life and the band," recalls Scott. "That desperation and fear, 'Is this it for me? For us?' You just start to wonder what you're doing wrong."
Chris explains he came up with the album title while watching the news. "It's about the way our society is so quick to blame others for the things that go wrong in their lives," he explains. "And that can involve politics, sex, spirituality, relationships, work of any number of ways we use to convince ourselves just to get through."
Of course, more often than not, Scott is pointing the finger at himself. "I seem to badger and beat myself up a lot, but I'm no different than anyone else in that way," he says. "Shame is a big topic on this record, but I'm also trying to make peace with myself." "We made the record we wanted to make," offers Chris.
"We were allowed to be creative and make statements without anyone questioning what we were trying to do. We have a support system really into the record and what we want to do, and the independent nature of how this record was made plays into what's happening right now in the industry."
"This is a change, sure, but it's also a progression," adds Freddy about the band's new effort. "We've gone way past what we've done."
"I'm very proud of the album," concludes Scott. "Even if not one soul hears it, I've accomplished something I've wanted to for awhile. It's the most mature record we've done and, song for song, the most consistent."
"These are the days/That last forever/A time in my life/I won't surrender," he sings. "For better or worse/These are the days I will remember."
With A Modern Way of Living With the Truth, The Exies truly tapped into these feelings, and exposed them for the world to see.
ABOUT SILVERSAFE -
Silversafe has been rocking the Northwest since mid-2006. Tyler Chen and Gabe Kniffin (formerly of the Vancouver rock band Redshift), and Jonny Davidson and Cameron Silsbee (formerly of the Portland rock band The Lemons) have joined to create a fresh modern hard rock sound that is winning over new fans daily.
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