Vegas Archive: Tomorrows Gone 1995 demo and compilation tracks (1995)

For more information about the songs, read the commentary from Tomorrows Gone frontman Lance Wells.

1995 was a rather productive year for Tomorrows Gone. Our demo from 1994 had earned us a small but loyal following, and we were playing a lot of shows at places like The Henderson Elk’s Lodge, The Henderson Jaycees, The Huntridge, The Caves, and The Tubes. We were also writing new songs which would culminate in another recording later in the year.

Unfortunately, we would also face a revolving door of bassists in ’95. Rosati was kicked out of the band in 1994 because he was playing in multiple bands and didn’t really seem all that committed to TG. It wasn’t an easy decision by any means, and I actually came to regret the move years later when I became close friends with Mike during our time in the band Faded Grey. Turns out he is/was an awesome friend and bass player after all.

Mike’s replacement in TG was Billy Schmutz. Billy was a really cool and laid back guy that Jeff and Shay knew, and at one time he also played in a band called Last Laugh with Kenny Anderson’s older brother, Kyle. Billy’s all-time favorite band was Agent Orange, which was also one of my favorites, and he was basically the type of person everyone wants in their band: he was competent at his instrument, he was stoked to play, and he had a great personality. I don’t remember exactly why he left the band, but I’m pretty sure it was on his own accord. I lost track of Billy for a good 15+ years after he left TG, but I recently ran into him at a Bad Brains show at the House of Blues and he is still the same cool dude.

After Billy’s departure from the band, we faced a little down time, but I do recall playing at least one show at the Tubes as a four-piece with Jeff on bass and Shay on guitar. Jeff was a guitar player at heart and was much happier playing six strings instead of four, so the search was definitely on for a new bassist. It was around this time that I met Kelly Garni.

I was working as runner for a law firm downtown, and Kelly was employed as a server for the same company. He was very friendly and he just so happened to be a fellow musician who at one time played bass in the band Quiet Riot with the legendary Randy Rhodes on guitar. Kelly was very humble about his past and he would always field all of my numerous questions with a smile (QR’s Metal Health was one of the first LP’s I owned way back in 3rd grade). He came to a TG show once, made it clear that he enjoyed our music, and later offered to play in the band when he found out we were in need of a bassist. Jeff was all about the “ex-members of Quiet Riot” tag, but as cool as Kelly was, I just couldn’t envision an older rocker from the Sunset Strip in the band (so much for being an open-minded punker).

We were still looking for a replacement for Billy when we went back to Digital Insight to record our second demo. With Shay on guitar, our song writing had taken a more technical direction, and we were eager to record some new material with or without an official bassist. I actually kind of missed playing an instrument, and I offered to handle bass duties once again as I was already filling the spot at band practice.

Our sound was also under the influence of some different bands, which made for an interesting mix of fast hardcore with some darker, emo(tional) lyrics. Lifetime was probably the biggest musical influence at the time for Jeff and Shay, and while we all still loved the classic hardcore bands like 7 Seconds, Dag Nasty, and Gorilla Biscuits, we were also listening to a lot of the current underground music of the mid-90‘s. For me personally, some rather depressing stuff like Hello Bastards era Lifetime, Jawbreaker, Still Life, and Unbroken played heavily into my lyrical approach, and vocally I tried to create a hybrid sound influenced by Curtis from Chain of Strength, Matt Weeks from Current, and later era Turning Point. The fact that I was also having some serious issues with growing up, family, and a certain relationship also made for a pretty bleak message on my part.

As for the actual recording session, I remember it being very relaxed. We had a good rapport with the guys at Digital Insight from our previous demo sessions, and all of us in the band were a little more confident about the songs we were bringing to the studio this time. In fact, I would go so far as to say that this 1995 session was one of the few recording experiences I actually enjoyed. The recording studio is such a sterile environment where all of your flaws are completely exposed loud and clear, and even though I realized documenting our music was a necessary evil, I always preferred playing live.

We ended up recording seven songs total, five of which would end up on the second Tomorrows Gone demo. The details of when the second demo was actually released are somewhat hazy, but it seems we may have sat on the recording until 1996 as Mike (Pinaud) is listed as a member of the band on the demo insert. For some reason, we also re-recorded the songs “December” and “Watch Me Fall” from our 1994 demo, but the new version of “Watch Me Fall” was never released until the TG discography CD came to fruition. The songs “Three Thirty-Three” and “In Silence” from the second demo both ended up on compilation records, as did an exclusive track from the session called “Without  a Face.” The line-up for this recording was Fred – drums, Jeff – guitar, Lance – bass and vocals, and Shay – guitar.

The details regarding each of the three compilations that featured TG songs are also a bit murky, but  the first was probably the Bucky Records 7” called My Parents Went to Las Vegas and All They Bought Me Was This Fucking 7″. Bucky Records was the brainchild of Boyde Wenger, also from the LV band Boba Fett Youth, and I was pretty stoked when he asked us to be a part of the record (we gave him the song “Three Thirty-Three”). Boyde and I became fast friends as not only was TG and BFY playing a lot of shows together, but we also worked together for a while throwing boxes around on the graveyard shift at a company called RPS.  As a band, we were also down with the other folks featured on the compilation from various encounters, and while there were other local bands playing a style of punk/HC very similar to what we were doing in TG, our ideals left us aligned more with the crust punks, pop-punks, and random weirdos that were involved with the Bucky comp. Too bad the record was mastered at the wrong speed, because sonically and visually (artwork by Greg Higgins) it was a really cool and diverse representation of the Vegas scene circa 1995/1996.

Another compilation we were on was called Making Human Junk, which was a 14-song LP put together by a guy from Spokane, Washington named Micah Prim. From what I recall, Boyde from BFY/Bucky passed along our second demo recording to Micah, and in turn, Micah wrote us a letter asking us to contribute a song for a compilation on his label, Hybrid Records (this was pre-email and all of our communication was done via snail mail). Of course we were flattered by the request and quickly sent Micah the song “In Silence”. The album turned out great, complete with silk-screened covers and a nice newsprint booklet with a full page for each band featured on the LP. Some of the other bands featured on Making Human Junk were Acrid, Apeface, and Whorehouse of Representatives.

While the Hybrid Records compilation leaned more toward the crustier side of punk, the last compilation we were asked to be a part of was certainly more “emo” influenced, and included bands like Milhouse, Palatka, New Day Rising, and Braid. In Words of One Syllable was a 13-song album compiled by two people from the Phoenix area named Eric and Shelley (I never did get last names through our snail mail correspondence) for a label called Catchpraze Records. Our contribution to this compilation was the exclusive song “Without a Face”, which was recorded during the same session as our second demo.  For reasons unknown, we didn’t use “WaF” on our second demo, and strangely enough, it was a perfect fit for this compilation as it was easily the most emo(tional) TG song. Much like Making Human Junk, Eric and Shelley did an outstanding job with the record, and we were more than happy with the finished product.

The remainder of 1995 was spent playing shows with two different bassists, the first being Jason Navarro. We met Jay when TG played a show with his band Jack Kevorkian and The Suicide Machines (later just The Suicide Machines) at The Huntridge in 1994. Although Jay lived in Detroit, Jeff kept in close contact with him, and he actually played at least one show with TG during a short visit to Vegas. The show was at the Henderson Jaycees, and it was one of the best shows we ever played. Highlights from the show included an impromptu cover of Minor Threat’s “I Don’t Wanna Hear It” (Jay and Jeff told me we were playing a surprise cover right before the set) as well as a real “shocker” when Jay killed power to the whole building after his nose ring made contact with a microphone that was obviously not grounded. Thankfully he wasn’t hurt, and the show resumed after the tripped breakers were reset.

After Jay returned home to Detroit, another old friend by the name of Joe Kozlowski stepped in as the next of several TG bass players. I actually grew up with Joe in Boulder City, and we were friends from countless days spent skateboarding around that small town. Joe moved to Redondo Beach, California while we were still in high school, but he eventually moved back to Vegas for a few months in 1995 and joined the band for a short period of time. Much like Jay, I only remember playing a couple shows with Koz on bass: one show at The Caves and another pretty cool show at The Henderson Jaycees. Eventually Joe moved back to California, leaving us in search of yet another bassist as 1995 came to a close.

-Lance Wells

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Tomorrows Gone
1995 demo and compilation tracks
1995

Fred Abercrombie – drums
Jeff Dean – guitar
Lance Wells – bass and vocals
Shay Mehrdad – guitar
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