Scar Chasm

  It's ironic that I just recently made the old song "Scar Chasm" by my old band, Shadow Puppets available on our MySpace page and on YouTube.  The song is about spiritual, mental and relationship struggles.  For months now I've been planning to make a video for it and today just seemed like the appropriate time to do that since I'm going through all that all over again.  Of course, without Kayla here, I had to shoot the footage myself.  Also, of course, since the Shadow Puppets are no longer together, I had to find a way to portray a band without any members but myself.
  My solution was an old standby: masks.  In the video for "Equilibrium" by Chief Loh, I had worn a mask simply because I wasn't very good at editing video.  It cut down on having to sync the lips up to the audible words.  Now, the guitarist and bassist are each played by me wearing different masks.  In the band, there were two guitarists, but there's only so much I can do.  If Jamie, Matt and Justin want to have words with me, I'm here.  Anyway, hope you all enjoy it.  Oh, and the lyrics are available at Zombie Genesis.

Same Old Song

  I just uploaded the song Scar Chasm by my old band, Shadow Puppets on our MySpace page.  You can find the lyrics to it on the Zombie Killer Genesis blog.  I still plan on making a video for it, but haven't gotten around to it yet.  Been busy.  I just put out chapter 10 of the Nocent.  Hope you enjoy it.  So far, readers have voted unanimously for me to start putting out a chapter on Mondays too.  So let it be written, so let it be done.  Your wand is my commish.  Oh, I am now down to fewer than 100 days left in the Navy!  Double digits, baby!  I just got some new friends on Facebook.  Most of them are old high school friends.  If you're reading this, hello!

Costumes and Masks

  When I was in the 2nd grade, I was in a school Christmas production of the Night Before Christmas.  I played one of the reindeer.  I remember that deer costume.  It itched like a mofo.  One of the little numbers we did was to sing Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer so we had to learn the entire song.  I thought it was the funniest thing in the world that the song starts with the words, "You know Dasher and Dancer. . ." as if they take for granted that we know all the reindeer names.  Most people mumble their way through that part and make up names like Jazzer and Nixon.  Then it goes on to question, "But do you recall the most famous reindeer of all?"  Ironically, it's only at that part that everyone confidently jumps in with "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer!"  I used to laugh my head off at that.  I was a weird kid.  A lot has changed about me since then: my height, shoe size and nose hair count.
  I've been fascinated by masks throughout my childhood.  It started with Star Wars.  The stormtroopers, Boba Fett and Darth Vader were the coolest thing!  My aunt brought me to see Episode 4 in the theatres in 1977 when I was a 1 year old.  My parents brought me to see the Empire Strikes Back when I was 4.  The same year of that Christmas play, I went by myself to the theatre on the US Army base in Taegu, Korea to watch Return of the Jedi.  For each of the new Star Wars movies (Episodes 1, 2 and 3), I went to see them in the theatre wherever I happened to be living at the time.  I've watched every single one when it first came out in theatres.
  But I was talking about masks.  When I was in the 4th grade, living in Fort Benning (Columbus), Georgia, there was a cartoon I watched religiously, called Mask.  There were these armed agents who rode around in armored attack vehicles which were disguised as regular cars and trucks.  They also, true to the name of the show, wore masks with visual enhancing eye gear and whatever.  I still have a lot of my Star Wars and Mask toys.  Somehow, the concept of masks always fascinated me (don't tell my shrink).
  Skip ahead to high school and bands like Green Jello and GWAR were big.  Sykotik Sinfoney were not so big, but I liked them.  Anyway, they're all masked bands.  Then in college, Slipknot, Mushroomhead and the Berserker came out.  I began to get the idea that I could make my own masks.  I don't even remember how many I've made so far, but I'm getting better and better at it.  You can see one that I made in Chief Loh's music video for our song, "Equilibrium".
  I will be showcasing my newest creation in the video I'm making for Shadow Puppet's song, "Scar Chasm". A little background on the mew mask: part of it is a respirator.  When I was a member of the crew of the USS Wyoming, SSBN 742, I was part of the paint crew.  Whenever we would come into port, we would chip off rusty areas of the submarine and repaint it.  We had to use a respirator for safety.  I incorporated mine into the mask cuz I think it looks cool.  I'll tell you when I've completed the video so you can watch it and judge for yourself whether or not you like it.

Musical Journey

  When I was in high school, my best friend, Raymond Wallace introduced me to Nirvana.  They are another of my favorite bands.  Anyway, Ray played the guitar and we sang together mostly Nirvana covers as a duo.  We called ourselves the Death Poets.  In 1994 I graduated and moved to Tucson.  That is where I started making my own music for the first time.
  My parents had gotten me an electric guitar as a graduation gift.  I sat in my little studio apartment and used a dual deck cassette recorder to make little songs under the name Rachel's Morbidity.  I made three tapes with six songs each.  I went to a local recording studio to have bulk copies of my tapes produced and had them on consignment at a record store.  The first album, called Deathbed Alarmclock, sold six copies.  The second album, called Mordant Nocturne, only sold one.  I never had enough money to pay for studio time to produce the third album, called Soma Tack.
  For a little while, when I was in the church, I played rhythm guitar for a country band, called Saddle Creek.  The singer was named Karl and the bassist was my best friend at the time, Randy.  The only thing we ever worked on was a cover of the Wolves by Garth Brooks.  I think we were only together for a month before we disbanded.  I wish we had recorded our practice sessions of that song.  We did it quite well.
  Years went by and I became an avid karaoke singer.  One night, a guy named Jamie approached me.  He told me that he admired my singing.  He had put together a band for the purpose of having me sing for it.  He played lead guitar, a guy named Justin played bass and a guy named Matt played rhythm guitar.  We used a drum machine to make our beats.  I named the band, Shadow Puppets after a book title from one of my favorite authors, Orson Scott Card.  We made maybe four songs, but Jamie accidentally erased most of them from his computer.  The only surviving song is called Scar Chasm.  I'm going to put together a music video for it and put it on YouTube and our MySpace page.
  When I met Kayla, I found out she's a drummer.  I wanted her to play drums for Shadow Puppets, but Jamie didn't want her to.  I told him that I was leaving the band to form a new band with Kayla.  Thus was born Chief Loh.  The name comes from my pizza delivery days.  At the pizza shop, the drivers would drop off their money in a cash box to be counted later at the end of shift.  We each had a slot to insert our bills and checks.  Kayla has always told me that when I sing, she can see my chi flow.  I labeled my money slot with the name Chief Loh as a play on words.  When Kayla and I started making music together, it only seemed natural to use that as our name.  It's kinda cool that on my MP3 player I have music from Rachel's Morbidity, Shadow Puppets and Chief Loh.