February 26, 2000: Innerside Burning, Gamewinner, Emerge, Looks Like Rain @ Sushi Cafe, Baltimore, MD

Here's a couple flyers for a hot all-locals show at the Sushi Cafe. I believe Alex Dimattesa made the top one and Gus Bowman made the bottom one. I've already covered all the bands on here, so check out their links in the tag list there on the right. Looks like you can still buy the Innerside Burning 7" that was released at this show.

February 13, 2000: Law Biting Citizens, Pale Creation, Eyes Upon Separation, Looks Like Rain @ 123 Pleasant St, Morgantown, WV

Wish I could remember where we played between Pittsburgh and Morgantown. I bet I've got a notebook somewhere with that information. If I remember correctly, Aaron Flanagan was the name of the person that always booked us in Morgantown. Those shows were always fun. We covered "Where Eagles Dare at this show and the place went nuts. The next couple of times we played Morgantown the flyer featured a photo taken during that cover.

Law Biting Citizens were the local hardcore heroes at the time. Pale Creation were a metallic hardcore band from Cleveland along the lines of Starkweather and other tech-ish metal bands of the late 90s. If you've spent any time among Dom Romeo, than you know the "legend" of Nick Fiction. Eyes Upon Separation were an Ohio metal/hc band featuring JT Woodruff who would go on to form Hawthorne Heights. According to Wikipedia, the drummer also went on to join Today Is the Day.

It's always fun to look back at these old flyers and make the connections to bands that featured people that would go on to play in pretty big bands.

February 11, 2000: The El Camino Club of Southwestern Pennsylvania, The Shoddy Puppet Company, Grand Buffet, Looks Like Rain @ The Mr. Roboto Project, Pittsburgh, PA

This was Looks Like Rain's first out of town show, at Pittsburgh's Mr. Roboto Project. As I recall, it was not all that well attended, but I was stoked on Grand Buffet. In the following couple of years, they seemed to have a pretty good run in the indie hip-hop scene, touring with Sage Francis and Sole. I remember them playing at the Ottobar a few years later and picking up their Pittsburgh Hearts EP, which got a lot of play from me for a while. I don't remember anything about The El Camino Club or The Shoddy Puppet Company's performance. The Mr. Roboto Project was a rad little DIY venue that had a huge influence on us a few years later when we started the Charm City Art Space.

February 5, 2000: Looks Like Rain, Red Angel Dragnet, Brace, Seven Ages @ the Solar Haus, Blacksburg, VA

Hey folks. Over six years since the last post. Wow. The last time I posted I was doing so in my spare time at my job at a print shop in Baltimore, MD. Now I'm doing it in my spare time from my job at an ad agency in Boulder, CO. A year and half after moving and we're still pulling stuff from boxes. I recently discovered the box with all my flyers and found some time recently to start scanning them again. Work is a lot busier around here, but I'm hoping to get 2-3 posts up per week. Tell your friends if they're into this sort of thing. Going to be posting them up on my Instagram as well (mikeriley131).

Anyway, in pulling out the flyers, I found some that were in a folder for Looks Like Rain stuff (my old band), so we're gonna get out of chronological order for a bit and fill in some holes for the year 2000. This flyer is from a show that LLR played in Blacksburg, VA with Bryan Flowers's (LLR drummer) old band, Seven Ages, as well as Brace and Red Angel Dragnet. As it's been six years since the last post, my memory is even worse, so forgive me when I don't remember too many details from some of these shows. I do remember that Solar Haus shows were always a lot of fun. Can't remember much about the band Red Angel Dragnet other than Bryan booked them a few times after he moved to Baltimore.

I welcome your comments if you've got any memories of any of the shows I post.

December 28, 2000: Gamewinner, Standfast, The Disaster, The Gacy Project @ the Mosh Mansion, Laurel, MD

This will be the last flyer for the year 2000. Pat Martin booked this show at the Mosh Mansion, where he was living at the time. Not sure who made the flyer. Here's another show that I know I have pictures from that I'll have to dig up and post. I've mentioned all these bands on the blog before, so I won't go into any of that. I'll just say that this show was four bands that were great friends with each other, had a lot of fun playing together, and many of us are still friends to this day. That's what hardcore is all about. Playing some new town you've never been to and meeting people you instantly connect with and being able to call them friends 12 years later. Good stuff.

Here's a little where are they now...

Gamewinner: Pat (bartends at the Ottobar and Metro Gallery), Alex (runs Grave Mistake Records, played bass in Government Warning), Duff (is married and works for BGE), Nik (is a dad, an author and teaches English to college kids), Ryan (is a family man).

Standfast: Rory (sings for Soul Control), Brian VE (is a fancy chef), Licky (no idea), Nate (plays guitar in Polar Bear Club).

The Disaster: John (sings for Not Sorry), Pieces (moved to NYC to pursue acting), Brian VE (see above), Jeff (played in Bad Business, currently co-owns his own graphic design business).

The Gacy Project: John (does IT work for government contractors), Mike B (no idea), Mike R (writes this blog), Nik (see above), Duff (see above).

December 27, 2000: Hatebreed, Bane, One King Down, Stretch Armstrong, E-Town Concrete, Merauder, Voice of Reason, Age of Ruin @ St. Andrew's Church, College Park, MD

This show was, as the kids say, "off the chain". Hatebreed weren't playing Ozzfest yet, but they were headlining huge clubs at this time, so seeing them at a hall with a good sized stage and no barrier was pretty awesome. Speaker dives galore. Some would say the rest of the bill was pretty stacked but Bane was the only other band I cared about. Jamie Arthurs booked the show. Carl Caracia made the flyer.

December 20th, 2000: Strike Anywhere, The Hope Conspiracy, Kill Your Idols, American Nightmare, Rebel Scum @ The Bug Jar, Rochester, NY

Gus Bowman and I were just talking about this show a few days ago. He and I took a roadtrip with Pat Martin and Nik Korpon to this show and the one the next day in Ithaca. For some reason I don't have much of a memory of this particular show but I remember the one in Ithaca being surprisingly poorly attended. As Gus has a much better memory than I do, I'll share his recollections of this trip...

- Raeph, who drummed for KYI at the time, rode with us from Rochester and Ithaca and told some of the sketchiest stories any of us have ever heard. No, I will not repeat them.

- Jesse Standhard was giving out CD-r copies of the not-yet-released Right Bridge LP coming out on Revelation Records. Probably out of spite for all the drama surrounding the record. Read about that here.

- Andy KYI getting back to John 25's house from the spank shack next door, proclaiming "I just spanked it. Gotta freshen up."

- My car got towed and Paul KYI took me to get it. I have no recollection of this.

- Nik Korpon's tics going apeshit on the drive home, late at night, on a snowy ride, and those of us that were awake fearing for our lives.

Great roadtrip! Great bands!

John 25 made the flyer and I'd assume that Josh Lyons booked the show.