aka: Blackout, Eclipse, Midnight, and Meltdown. This is the first band I was ever in. Started out with Mike Underhill and me watching the show Parker Louis Can't Lose. On one episode there was a group of people in the school all wearing black that were called The Darkside. Me and Mike looked at each other and decided that this was a really cool name for a band and that we would do it for real. Not just sitting around talking about starting a band. We were going to do it. He said that he had a cousin that played guitar and that he would play the drums. I won't say what I was going to play at first, but I soon decided that I would be our bass guitar player. It turns out that Mike's cousin was Daron Mitchell and there was a building outside his parents house that we could practice in. So....we met there. We didn't have anyone to sing for us though. Daron sung a little.....his own stuff here and there. But we needed someone to sing for our new band. I remembered that my friend Chris Hanger had told me that he had sang backup in a band before. So after talking it over with Mike and Daron, we got Chris to come join our little group. And after a short time, we switched to the instruments that we were born to play in this band. We had no drummer, so I stepped up and decided to take on the roll and we.......talked Daron into playing the bass..
The four of us became great friends through the years that we were in this band. It was an escape from whatever else was going on in our lives. At least I can say it was for me. We created many diverse and uncomplicated songs as Darkside and had a blast doing it.....even though I only had padded chairs to hit on with the drum sticks that Chris had given me. Then we saw that the name was taken. We had never expected that to happen. So after all the name changes, Chris leaving the band and then coming back, we became Meltdown. That was the final name of this particular band. We still get together to play the old tunes every once in a GREAT while. But, as with most childhood bands, most of us got married and settled down. I am actually the only one of us that isn't married as of now. |