The Official THIRD CLASS Blog Series

"April 25, 2010" (poem by Lee boyle)

2011-12-04T00:38:00.000-08:00

*This poem was published in the poetry journal, PKA's Advocate, in 2011.

April 25, 2010

Never
have I seen a day more beautiful. The wind
slugs the American flags
at the car dealerships; the hills and trees
glow dark green.

I cannot press myself
to put the windows up as I drive.

The rain is fresh.
The sky rolls out
just for me
in Columbiana, Ohio.

Help Third Class Make A New Record

2011-03-24T01:46:00.000-07:00

We, Third Class, are an indie rock band from Youngstown, Ohio. We are self-made in all that we do and we need your support. Independently, we produce our own music videos, our own tours, and our own albums. In 2006 and 2009, we released professional albums recorded and mastered in great studios, complete with detailed artwork. It took the band two years to make the money back from the first release (touring extensively and giving away merchandise here and there is drain, not to mention broken instruments, filling the gas tank, and changing tires) and we are still in the hole from the 2009 effort. Now, we have six new songs written and the feedback at our shows is better than ever. There is an actual demand for these songs to be recorded. With your help, we can make it happen! The goal is to make the album available for free to all. If you are a Third Class fan, please donate and help the cause. Thank you!

(Note: If you donate $20 or more, your name will appear in a “thank you” section inside of each copy of the album.)

Go to www.thirdclass.net/newthirdclassrecord to donate!

Third Class Official Website.

2010-10-01T09:53:00.000-07:00

Our lyrics, press and music videos, as well as discography, are all available at www.thirdclass.net. Check it out!

"Sweet Amorous Music" (music review by Lee Boyle)

2010-10-01T09:49:00.001-07:00

Sweet Amorous Music

The Sweet AM is a southern-rock style band with an album which has recently turned up in Indie Wax Records in Youngstown, Ohio. The album is entitled West. The band has a very themed sound and well-executed harmonies present in most of their works. Also frequent in most songs are love lyrics which, in listening formally to the album, seem to address the same love interest in each track. We’ve all heard albums which seem to be dedicated to one relationship, one passion or one idea. With this mindset, West speaks to a certain mood. It is the kind of album which plays while a listener sits on a porch during sunset. It is played in the car while driving over rolling hills. It is played in the background while two people rekindle in a coffee shop, in a banquet hall when one sits in the corner with no partner for a dance. The album is romantic and sad.
Sporting the ethics of modern country music from the last couple decades, The Sweet AM comes off a bit quirky because of an abundant application of background vocals and rhythmically-oriented placement of lyrics. The traditional implementation of highlights expresses an unexpected edge. Many of the pretty guitar licks and background melodies do not smooth over the tracks like might have been intended. Instead, there is a sound in the singer’s voice which reminds of Dog’s Eye View, Barenaked Ladies or Crash Test Dummies. The album doesn’t necessarily pigeonhole this band into a dated, 1990s sound as much as it takes a sincere, open-ended recording style from the era and does something modern with it. This modernization of this sound is most present in the track, “Moon And Chicken.” The darkly love-ridden croons of Soul Asylum or Hootie And The Blowfish are saddled down and applied to a more dance-friendly sound. A trace of roughness is preserved, but is not overdone; no dramatic tangents or contrived moments of soulfulness.

Musicianship sharp, lyrics straightforward, atmosphere well-themed, The Sweet AM teaches the listener the value of the twanged, sad love song. West is instantly canonized in the collection of southern rock which beckons the heart. Check it out if you are a craving a mindset which is temporarily lost in today’s music. The album is available on iTunes and at Indie Wax.

-Lee Boyle

Check out this sweet sketch that Pepe of Third Class made!

2010-09-15T08:55:00.000-07:00

New, Revised Band Bio

2010-09-15T08:44:00.000-07:00

Third Class began as a product of three feral “children” who were adopted by kind parents and given instruments but no musical instruction. Over one hundred and twelve years of what might be called practice – but which also could be called the reinvention of music – the three wild children, locked in a padded room, broke guitar strings and keyboards and drumheads, rebuilding and innovating the tools of their craft until the instruments they used had no hope of being readily recognizable to modern musicians but rather seemed like weapons and torture devices from the future. At first, the music they made with their sci-fi nuitars and kianos was partially recognizable as noise, though would never be categorized as music, at least not by humans. However, over a period of thirty-seven decades, the children, who had since grown into young “men” and had left their padded room, developed a musical styling which was not wholly unbearable to others. In fact, with time and repeated exposure, some even began to enjoy the music which those who later became known as Third Class produced.

But, seriously, the band formed in 1999 in East Palestine, Ohio where brothers, Lee and Jack Boyle, with friend, Pepe Parish, played their first show in a living room. In the years to come, they performed at Cedars Lounge and other venues in Youngstown, Ohio’s general area, as well as many basement, living room and barn shows, and self-recorded four demo albums (now out of print) at the Boyle Residence. They were featured on the local NBC News while playing their first “battle of the bands” competition and received airplay on a program called Backyard Bands on Youngstown’s 98.9 FM. They also received a small review in The Morning Journal in East Palestine for their performance at a high school talent show. In 2004, the band played the first Nouveau Rock Festival, an indie-music showcase hosted by locals, The Zou, in Youngstown. In 2005, Third Class embarked on a modest tour to pass out demos and perform in New York City and in Long Island, New York. They received interviews published in Youngstown’s The Jambar which revered the band for a “fierce independent streak.” Then, in 2006, the band played shows in Akron, Wooster, Bowling Green and Kent, Ohio, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Louisville, Kentucky. A couple months after an interview on Kent State University’s Black Squirrel Radio online, Third Class recorded their first studio album, Chloe’s Epitaph Is Chloe, at Ampreon Recorder with renowned Youngstown engineer and musician, Pete Drivere. Youngstown’s The Walruss called the album “an attempt to classify [an] idiosyncratic sound” and Youngstown’s The Vindicator deemed Third Class “a band to be reckoned with in Northeast Ohio.” To promote the album, the band played numerous Ohio shows, such as in Cleveland, Youngstown and Alliance, Ohio as well as in Philadelphia, Sharon and Cambridge Springs, Pennsylvania, Cleveland, Tennessee and Louisville, Kentucky. The band received airplay from 93.3’s The Homegrown Show in Youngstown and Ruckus Radio online, as well as write-ups in The Salem News in Salem, Ohio and Youngstown’s Valley24.com. In 2009, Third Class released their second studio album, The Red Wheelbarrow, recorded at Ampreon, which The Voice of Wooster, Ohio called “an intellectual pursuit.” Write-ups followed from Youngstown’s Valley24.com, The Vindicator, MRNspace.com, Tribtoday.com, The Salem News and Jambrain.com. Third Class received airplay from unsigned-artist radio stations online, Westsidewill Radio and JFL: The Mixx, and an online pod cast interview by Saw Kick Media of Cleveland, Ohio. During the same period of time, Jack’s poetry was published in The Salt River Review online and he was accepted into graduate school with a teaching assistantship. Lee’s poetry was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in Off The Coast in Robbinston, Maine, Abbey in Columbia, Maryland, Leveler online and Advocate in Prattsville, New York. Third Class proceeded to play shows in their regular routes and included shows in Geneva-On-The-Lake, Columbus and Athens, Ohio and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. By 2010, Third Class’ albums were available in a variety of places including online stores such as iTunes, Napster, and CDBaby. Local stores, Indie Wax in Youngstown, Dave’s Music Mine in Pittsburgh, Square Records in Akron, Turn-Up Records and Spin-More Records in Kent, Ohio, started carrying the albums. Dyno Records in Newburyport, Massachusetts and Madgirl World in Portland, Maine gave away free copies of the albums and the band had played their seventh consecutive Nouveau Rock Festival in Youngstown. In 2010, Third Class began premiering newer songs at local venues such as The Lemon Grove and Cedars Lounge in Youngstown, as well as The Black Cherry in Toledo, Ohio and Boney’s Nite Club in Eastpointe, Michigan. They also received airplay on online radio station Rukus Radio and had their music featured in a play, entitled Love Song, performed in Youngstown State University’s theatre.

Third Class’ style is best-described as indie pop or alternative rock. The trio wields a 5-piece drum set with a boxy sound, a four-string bass guitar tuned to the notes F, A, C and high F, a cheap keyboard and a 2-string guitar tuned to a mid-range C and G. The band rotates instruments, oftentimes with Lee on the keyboard, or guitar, and lead vocals and with Jack and Pepe taking turns on drums, bass and back-up vocals. The lyrics are often written in a stream-of-consciousness style with crooning vocals which go frequently out of Lee’s comfortable range. The keyboard licks are reminiscent of piano in up-tempo musicals. The drums are an undulation of tempo and complex patterns. The bass is slippery and usually distorted. The guitar plays mostly a twang of power chords.

New Music Video by Third Class

2010-09-15T08:41:00.001-07:00

Lee Boyle of Third Class is featured in their new music video for the song, "Laugh And Cry." The song is from their 2009 album, The Red Wheelbarrow and is available online on iTunes and CDbaby.com. Details on thirdclass.net. Enjoy:

"Diversity In Tiger Style" (music review by Lee Boyle)

2010-08-02T00:48:00.000-07:00

Diversity In Tiger Style

The Youngstown, Ohio-based band, Tigerstyle, comes at the listener from collective angles. So many styles are packed into one collection of songs that there is no other way to listen to the band but from start to finish.
Their new release, Face EP, also known as TigerBath EP, is a blank-labeled compact disc which the band has been giving away for no charge, a signification that the music is what matters most. Over time, the formats of one’s favorite albums may change, but their favorite songs live on forever, regardless of any visual style of the musician. Face EP gives the local listener a clean slate. It is a disc to put in their car stereo, to give their full attention to. There are no strings attached. The listener knows the band is called Tigerstyle and nothing of what’s to come to their ears.
When beginning the EP, one might think of the atmospheric beginnings of some tracks of famed artists such as Bright Eyes or The Mars Volta. As one fiddles with the volume knob, a noise oriented track, slowly fades into consciousness. The track sets a laid-back mood, a mood soon to be broken.
Once in the midst of the EP, ramping up from ambient noise to a subtle integration of rhythm and melody, the listener realizes they are in the presence of a rock and roll band. It is as if Tigerstyle soothed us at the beginning only to rock us that much harder when the guitar comes in over the churning bass and drums. The lyrics are brief, the solos are long, the rhythm and bass notes go on their own tangents. Anyone who is a fan of classic rock or hard rock will get their kicks with this band, although Tigerstyle is neither. They cannot be categorized with a genre. Fusion, which they refer to themselves as, is the best anyone can conclude. They have a mix of funk, rock, atmosphere, blues, jazz and much more. One moment, they are Pink Floyd-esque, the next moment is an echo of Red Hot Chili Peppers and Santana, and the next there is some Andrew Bird-like whistling.
Overall, Face EP, is a true adventure. Even if you are not enthralled at the end, you’ve received an education on how to draw attention in music. The band takes you on a journey with them, sneaking up and capturing you with the first moment of the EP in order to make sure you will be committed to the rest of the ranging spectrum of material. If you want variety, Tiger Style is for you. The album is available at their shows and at Indie Wax Records in Youngstown, Ohio.

-Lee Boyle

"Ceiling God" (poem by Lee Boyle)

2010-08-02T00:45:00.000-07:00

*This poem was published in the poetry journal, Abbey, in 2010.

Ceiling God

If god lived in the ceiling, like I thought
when I was young, he was probably
spying on me that time when I laid on the neon green floor
in my apartment in a small town,
when I was 21.
He must have silently chuckled
as my brother and I, mesmerized,
gazed up at the ceiling fan,
watching it spin
until it looked like
it was reversed, like a wheel,
or until we felt like
we were spinning,
like
we were
watching the fan from
above as it sat below, connected
to the floor, deeming us
the new ceiling gods, the new spies, spying
on a motionless, propeller-like creature from
our mysterious, green perch in a carpeted heaven.

I wonder if god played along
on another day farther in the past, when I was
even younger, when my brother and I
did semi headstands at 3 and 5 years old,
straining our legs toward the ceiling tiles
as our bent necks angled our heads
at a view of the ceiling which looked
like a floor, a new world of tiled ground.
And we were the place’s odd inhabitants
who never got to touch the dusty planet’s land,
cursed to remain a hovering species
in our sky, our carpeted ceiling that magnetized
our backs to it, our bodies like
burrs in faded foliage of a red-carpeted sky.

Two Documentaries You Should Watch

2010-02-18T10:49:00.000-08:00

Based on their two studio albums, we, the band, home-made two documentaries. The first, "Chloe's Epitaph Is Chloe: The Roc Doc," is a series of self-interviews where we explain the meanings behind the songs of the 2006 studio album for the two people that would ever care to watch and learn about the lyrics. The second film, "The Making Of The Red Wheelbarrow," is the band documenting the making of the second studio album. The members travel with their Youngstown, Ohio friends, The Zou, to Chicago, Illinois to master the album after recording in Youngstown with Ampreon Recorder; the notorious Pete Drivere (Dead Beat Poets, Pete Drivere And The Pretty Demons, The Infidels) at the helm of the album's sound. The second documentary is a bit more interesting.:

Chloe's Epitaph Is Chloe (The Rock Doc)

Third Class | MySpace Music Videos

The Making Of The Red Wheelbarrow

Third Class | MySpace Music Videos

Low Budget Music Videos

2010-02-18T10:40:00.000-08:00

During the releases of our first two studio albums, Chloe's Epitaph Is Chloe (2006) and The Red Wheelbarrow (2009), we followed up the albums with some home-made music videos. They were all directed and shot by us, the band with exceptions of current and former members of Youngstown colleagues, The Zou, and our youngest brother, Steve Boyle who is also a Youngstown musician. Watch them and see which ones catch your fancy.

September & November 2009 Update

2010-02-05T07:57:00.001-08:00

- (September 2009) Lee Boyle of Third Class was interviewed by MRNspace.com. Read the interview here. Third Class released a new music video for the song "Great Days" off their album The Red Wheelbarrow. Watch it here. Band member, Jack Boyle, has a poem published in The Salt River Review. See the poetry magazine website here.

- (November 2009) The band is working on new material. With one new song written in the summer of 2009, entitled "Heaven And Ice Cream," the band has recently come up with two more new tunes which they recently premiered at a show in Kent, Ohio at a venue called The Outpost on November 6th. These two new songs are "12 And 9" and "Kitty-Cat Eyes." This first public performance of "Kitty-Cat Eyes" can be seen here. Third Class released a new music video for the song "Office Supplies" off their album The Red Wheelbarrow. Watch it here.

Third Class Wrote A New Song

2009-06-29T21:29:00.000-07:00

We wrote a new song called "Heaven And Ice Cream." We've been performing it at shows. It will probably be years until it is, if at all, ever recorded in a studio. It has only been a few months since the release of our last album, "The Red Wheelbarrow." The new song is a nice rock and roll number. Come to our shows to hear it.

The Official Biography: Third Class

2009-03-06T13:10:00.000-08:00

Biography:

Third Class is a band of modern artistic value, a trio of progressive-minded musicians. Their music’s intention is to bring art and life closer together through the display of “Nouveau Réalisme,” a term defined by Pierre Restany in 1960 as “new ways of perceiving the real.” This term has been redefined into a more musical setting by Youngstown-based artists who have been cohesively classified into the “Nouveau Rock” genre, a term coined by a Youngstown band called The Zou. With this in mind, here is the story of Third Class:

Third Class officially formed in 1999 with the brothers Lee and Jack Boyle and their friend Pepe Parish. These three teenage boys lived together in a small town called East Palestine, Ohio. In the winter of this same year, Third Class played their first show in a living room.

In the years 2000 and 2001, after the a number of shows in basements, living rooms and barns, Third Class made a successful attempt to break into the music scene of Youngstown, Ohio. They played their first battle of the bands competition and were featured on NBC News. They also played their first few shows at a venue that encouraged the original style that Third Class was developing. This venue was a bar called Cedars Lounge, the main place for innovative music in the city.

By the year 2004, Third Class had come to represent the offbeat style of indie rock music that had started an underground movement in many areas in Ohio. The band received a handful of interviews from local newspapers and airplay on 98.9 FM. They also co-headlined a big festival called The Nouveau Rock Festival with their friends in a prominent Youngstown band known as The Zou.

After becoming more established, Third Class decided it was time to expand its promotional methods. Being that Third Class was of such an experimental style to many skeptical ears, they decided they needed to travel and find more fans who wanted new and innovative music. Therefore, in 2005 Third Class ventured to Long Island and New York City. In their travels, the band spent a week and a half passing out demos, selling home-made albums, and playing small venues.

Then, in the summer of 2006, Third Class began to think seriously about a well-recorded project. A couple months after an interview on Kent State University’s Black Squirrel Radio, the band went into a professional recording studio in Youngstown called Ampreon Recorder. With the legendary sound engineer, Pete Drivere (The Deadbeat Poets, The Infidels, The Pretty Demons), Third Class recorded a full-length album in four days. November saw the album’s official release under the title Chloe’s epitaph is Chloe. In the following months, the album made its way to being available on a number of music sale websites including itunes, napster, and cdbaby. The album was referred to as an “attempt to classify [an] idiosyncratic sound” by Leonard Crist of The Walruss. In the Youngstown Vindicator, writer John Benson described Third Class as “a progressive pop band falling in the same mindset as Ben Folds Five and Radiohead,” and “a band to be reckoned with in Northeast Ohio.”

After the album’s release and a year of local promotion and numerous shows, Third Class set out on another tour in the summer of 2007. Throughout the process of growing and playing more shows as a band, Third Class had ventured to a variety of cities and venues. But, this was their first real, organized tour. Throughout their travels, Third Class played shows in Philadelphia, PA, Cambridge Springs, PA, Louisville, KY, and Youngstown, OH, with promotional stops along the way in Cincinnati and Columbus, OH. Then, in 2008, they received airplay on a show called The HomeGrown Show on 93.3 FM and an internet station called ruckus.com. They also got a short review of a performance in Salem, Ohio by The Salem News.

All three members of Third Class have a profound love for the literary arts, regarding anything from Harry Potter to As I Lay Dying in their range of tastes. The two brothers in the band, Jack and Lee, graduated in 2008 with Bachelor’s Degrees in English and went on to submit poetry and short stories to different publications internationally. Lee was published in a book called Off The Coast in Robbinston, Maine and nominated for a Pushcart Prize later in the year. This series of events inspired Third Class to title their next album, The Red Wheelbarrow, as such to recognize poetry as a strong intervening influence on their music and to embrace the ideals of William Carlos Williams, the author who wrote the poem which the album is named after. Williams’ philosophy was that there are “no ideas but in things,” a notion Third Class has strongly latched onto when explaining their lyrics to listeners. The lyrics can mean whatever one wishes them to mean. Third Class recorded and mastered this second studio album with the same studios they had used in 2006 and proceeded with an album release show on February 14th of 2009, a show proceeded by interviews from Valley24.com and The Youngstown Vindicator and recognition from The Salem News for their new songs performed at Friends Roastery in Salem, Ohio.

Today, you can find Third Class on myspace.com/thirdclass and thirdclass.net where show updates and album availability are shown, as well as a variety of band photographs and song samples. Third Class continues, at present, to define themselves as an influential part of the up-and-coming indie/progressive musicians of these times.

Lee of Third Class reviews a pheromones website

2008-10-10T13:24:00.000-07:00

The concept of pheromones is a relatively new concept in human society. Furthermore, it is only the more “advanced” societies that have come to know concepts like these through scientific experimentation. Although it is true that other cultures, in a matter of speaking, recognize this same concept through other methods of interpreting it, the more democratized cultures are the ones who seem to know this “substance of attraction” concept as pheromones.
Therefore, what is my opinion on a product that takes advantage of this discovery? What do I think of a substance that is made to harness the power of pheromones? What effect does it have on society that there is now a product that has a made a much stronger effort to attract a certain sex than other products have made?
Well, I am left with no choice but to ponder these kinds of questions because Best-Pheromones.com has made its presence known to me. Sure, there are probably other products that have resulted from experiments of the same persuasion, but Best-Pheromones claims to be the best. human pheromones are harnessed in this product. This is a new experimentation with products that contain pheromones for men and pheromones for women.
The ingredients that are used are “naturally found in minute amounts in the perspiration” of men and women. Therefore, the naturalness of their extracting of this stuff from human sweat is the key to their successful attraction methods.
I think that this product is, overall, an interesting idea. I don’t consider it harmful in any way, but I do think that the product should be used tastefully by the consumer. I think the strength of the product is a factor that might, by no fault of its advertisers, give the user the wrong idea. That is to say that the wrong idea would be given to the user if he or she were desperate to attract a certain party. I think some people would consider Best-Pheromones some sort of a super power, in a way, instead of advancement in the field of scented products. These products are in demand because our society is increasingly becoming a crowd of socially analytical people that are more creatively free than they were a few years ago. It seems that everyone, nowadays, is some sort of artful master of some craft or trade that they feel they have put their own spin on in one way or another. Obviously, this holds true with Best-Pheromones because of their way of coming at the subject of human attraction in a scientific manner. This product is definitely something that fits in with the general human mindset in American or American-styled societies today. And, although I am very regretful of the colonialism that seems to be taking place in the world with Wal-mart, McDonalds, etc, etc, I am in support of the growing awareness of the importance of subjects such as sociology and psychology. I think Best-Pheromones.com is a result of exactly that. Now, on behalf of the band, Third Class, I am not telling you to buy this product. I am, however, letting you know, reader, that if you are someone interested in people and society that you might want to go to this website, Best-Pheromones.com, and take a look.

Zazoo's in August 2008

2008-09-14T09:07:00.000-07:00

In August 2008, my girlfriend and I took a small vacation in which we went to Columbus, Ohio, Louisville, Kentucky and Nashville, Tennessee. The show I played during our vacation time was, by far, the worst part of the vacation. The band who had invited us were very kind and it was no fault of their own. Spacehooker was the band. But, I played some Third Class stuff solo and got heckled. It sucked.

The B & O Station in July 2008

2008-09-14T09:02:00.000-07:00

Dog Ok invited us to this show. It looked, for a while, like not many people were going to show up. However, half-way through Dog OK's set The Zou (generally) and a few of their friends graced us and, essentially, saved the night as far as I am concerned. The friends that showed up, whether of the Zou Crew or of some other persuasion, were all really cool. We got to see Sam, Cathy, Corey, Mindy, Suz and many more who really made the night fun.
The venue was amazing. Originally a trainstation, this place actually had trains rumbling over some tracks by the rooftop windows as we were performing. It was a very fun, atmospheric experience. B & O had some sort of old-style quality.

Aldo Coffee Company in June 2008

2008-09-14T08:59:00.000-07:00

There were about 10 people tops at this show. And, that's the combined effort of people who just stopped in for coffee and left as well as any people who were at tables. Our friends came up and supported us and we were grateful for it. We felt a bit disappointed because, apparently, there was an art festival of some sort happening in downtown Pittsburgh during our performance.
Aldo Coffee is just outside of downtown in Mt. Lebanon.
Afterwards, we walked around the sidewalks briefly and Pepe took a look at the Aladdin's Eatery in the neighborhood.

The Upper Room Fellowship in May 2008

2008-09-14T08:14:00.000-07:00

This was a show that we played because some of the kids in the youth group at The Upper Room Fellowship Church requested us. We were flattered; happy to play any show, let alone a show for a younger crowd. Our strong points, as far as a local fan base goes, are and always have been children and old people. People our own age do not get us in most cases. Furthermore, the ones who do get us always turn out to be gigantic odd balls, such as ourselves. So, it is few and far between that we meet them anyway.
I got a bit nervous around the time that we performed the song "Rainy And Stormy" because there are lyrics that criticize the American conceptualization of God in the verses. Jack later pointed out that I had crooned that particular part of the song quite loudly over the microphone. I don't think anyone noticed and those lyrics certainly, whether considered in the context of the performance that night or the conception of the song in general, did not apply to all churches or organized religion for that matter. More so, they apply to the ignorance of assumption by some people that everyone is of one belief system. People that assume this are close minded.
After the show, we ate some pizza and snacks. Then, we took a tour of the new wing that was being added to the church.

The Nouveau Rock Festival in May 2008

2008-08-18T11:32:00.000-07:00

This was one of the best Nouveau Fests because The Zou arranged for a really cool stage to be put in the back room of Cedars Lounge, unlike just playing on an non-elevated floor like we had done at the previous Nouveau. It had really great sound and the show featured a lot of fresh new acts such as, one of our favorites that we got to meet, The Sewing Machine War. We played a couple of the new songs and the high-lights of the night were "A Drug Inside Your Wrist" and "Painting A Picture Over And Over."

Susan's Gourmet Coffee in April 2008

2008-08-18T11:19:00.000-07:00

On April 25, we drove to Kent, Ohio to play Susan's Gourmet Coffee, a coffee shop just off campus. We had a surprising turnout, not a big one, but a good group of people. We had some of our closest friends/significant others, such as Ellen Frost, Cory Foster and Mindy Strawn, drive up from the Youngstown, Ohio area and I had a couple people I knew from the Kent State branch in Salem, Ohio come up to see us as well as a couple students that Brandon Hull, our friend, knew and had spoken too at our previous on-campus show with The Zou.
This mention of friends that came to see us makes me pause and want to sincerely acknowledge the people that support/put up with Third Class' antics and have for so many years. People such as the above-named and others such as Chrissy Bailey, a good friend and frequent show attender, and others who have been there especially when we were starting out as a band such as Craig Beight, Derek Baker, Steve Boyle and Karen Boyle. There were also so many that joined along the way and recognized our sound for what it is, people such as Cathy Miller, Megan Whinnery, The Zou, Posture Coach, Brandon Hull who went on tour with us and has become a really good friend in the past few years, Erin and Jessica Kane, Abby Kondas, Samantha Hoover, Kristin and Elizabeth Reeves, Pete Drivere, Dog OK, Emily Elser, and many many more.

The Highlands Taproom in April 2008

2008-08-18T11:15:00.000-07:00

We drove to Columbus, Ohio and visited our friends Amy Erdmann and Billy James, staying the night at Billy's place on April 4th and then heading towards Louisville, Kentucky on April 5th to play, once again, at The Highlands Taproom with a band called Dying Indiana. When we went on, the crowd started to leave so I told them, over the microphone, that they just needed to give us a chance and stay until the music started to make sense to them. Some listened and seemed to enjoy themselves by the end of the set. Before the show, Pepe and Jack and I went and ate a cool place called Just Fresh that serves really really fresh, good food. The drive home was pretty fun but tiring because of having to stop to drop Jack off in Wooster, Ohio where he was going to school. Jack and Pepe remarked to me that this one, semi-empty show wasn't really worth the trouble we went to and I agreed and promised to book more sensibly in the future. Overall, it was a fun time though.

The Dutch Village Inn in March 2008

2008-08-18T11:09:00.000-07:00

On March 20, 2008, we played a show at Dutch Village Inn with The Zou, Devonshire, and No Clue. No Clue was a band of kids who were around 12 years old. They were very talented young musicians from North Lima, who attended South Range High School. They brought the majority of the crowd. The Zou, Devonshire, and us all brought about 10-20 people each and this band brought like 80 people, friends, parents etc. They played mostly original songs with the exception of "Twist And Shout" and "8 Days A Week" by The Beatles. A few friends and co-workers of mine from the Columbiana, Pizza Hut came by and I was happy to see them there. Everyone seemed to have a good time. The show was especially triumphant for us because it was one of the rare times where an all-ages show got a very good attendance aside from our Lazy Bean shows in Columbiana, Ohio.

Quiet Bob's in March 2008

2008-08-18T11:02:00.002-07:00

This was a show on the west side of Cleveland, Ohio. We played in a small bar with a bunch of old-school style punk bands. We usually fit in well with punk bands because we feel that we share the same attitude as they do except for our difference in musical style, but this time it seemed like we were the preppy kids who were overachieving and making everyone else scowl at us. We played one of the best shows, ascetically, that ever have (go figure) and were met with bewilderment from a group different clicks that came to see only their friends' bands. But, we made friends with some people and sold a t-shirt. It was a good crowd overall; interesting to say the least.

The Rathskellar at Kent State University in February 2008

2008-08-18T10:55:00.000-07:00

The Zou invited us to open for them at their pre-Halloween Rocky Horror Picture Show performance for the college students on the campus of Kent State University. We played with them and some cruddy punk band who had a stand-up bass and didn't know how to use it for more than a novelty item. But, the sound was very good and the stage was a fun one to play on and there was an excellent crowd. We tried to stick to our pop-rock sounding songs to keep the place in an upbeat mood and it seemed to work well. We sold a couple albums which is always exciting to us when we are out of Youngstown. Kent, Ohio is a cool place as it is, let alone the university campus. One of the funnest moments for me was loading our instruments in. We had to put our amps and stuff on platforms with wheels and push them to an elevator and then take it down a few floors into a kitchen that we had to go through to get to the stage. I wish we had had a video camera on us. We could have patronized ourselves as a famous rock band going through the back stage area. Brandon Hull, our friend who had ridden up with us, goofed off for a while with us as we pushed each other around on the carts with wheels until we almost wrecked. The Zou premiered a couple newer songs to us that night that we really liked.

Barley's in February 2008

2008-08-18T10:54:00.000-07:00

This was the strongest set we've ever done at Barley's. We were on it the whole night and we had a lot of fun too. We opened with "Blue" and closed with "A Drug Inside Your Wrist." The Bedspins headlined the show.

Cedars Lounge Christmas Show in December 2007

2008-08-18T10:51:00.000-07:00

This was our second time playing with The Zou on Christmas Day. It was a good show and we played the covers "Feliz Navidad" and "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" by John Lennon And Yoko Ono. We also, were called by The Zou front man, Khaled T., the night before the show and were requested to learn the song "When The River Meets The Sea" by Emmet Otter. So, we performed that song with Khaled as a guest singer on the night of the show. It was a very energetic show.

Barley's in November 2007

2008-08-18T10:47:00.000-07:00

This show exhibited one of our better receptions from the Youngstown, Ohio crowd at Barley's. I think it was because we played with jam bands and people associate some of our songs with experimental music qualities. So, it was a good mix. Jones For Revival did an impressive set, especially when they featured a double saxophone solo by one saxophonist. Papadosio did a nice atmosperic set, setting the mood with ambient keyboard riffs. We got the crowd dancing with "Rainy And Stormy" and fired them up more with the newer song "Tell Me You Love Me," as well as the classic, "Blue."

Friends Roastery in October 2007

2008-08-18T10:43:00.000-07:00

We played a set with the electronic rock group called Devonshire and we semi-premiered a few of our newer songs to the audience. Drew Wade of Devonshire came up and sang vocals with me on the loud rock song "Victory Of The Severed" and Katlin Potochnik wrote us up a very down-to-earth and complimentary review in The Springfield High School Newspaper for her school. We have always loved playing at The Roastery. It was always a good time.

The Cove Niteclub in September 2007

2008-08-18T10:42:00.000-07:00

Five Elements, a reggae band from Youngstown, invited us to open for them in this show. Modern Life and Captain Braskey, also Youngstown acts, made their way to this venue as well. The Cove is located in Geneva On The Lake, Ohio. When I got there, Pepe and Ellen and I spent a good amount of time walking around and looking at the lake. The place had a charm to it and the bar did too. It was a fun show to play and the crowd was completely cool, especially for an out-of-town band reaction. Modern Life played an especially impressive set.

The Third Class/Bull Skit World Tour in July/August 2007

2008-08-18T09:57:00.000-07:00

We set out to go on a small tour in the end of the summer of the year 2007. I went to Leonard Truck And Trailer in North Jackson, Ohio and bought a trailer and got a hitch put on my 1992 Honda Accord Station Wagon by Willow Knoll in Deerfield, Ohio. This happened the day we left for the tour because of a complication with the order for the hitch that came from Arizona. We decided not to use the trailer for our first show because of lack of driving experience with it and because we were coming back through our area before the second show. For the first show, we loaded up my station wagon with instruments and headed for The Fire in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This was on July 25th. The venue was a good one and the sound on the stage was good. The bar was having some sort of party where they dressed up in fashionable outfits made up of trash bags. The people at the bar seemed to be distracted by setting the mood for this party, but there was a DJ and a lot of people that were friends of the bands that we gave demos and fliers to. The drive to Philadelphia was fine, but the drive home was tedious. Pepe kept falling asleep at the wheel and I kept getting hungry and stopping to eat more and Jack was the designated talker, the keeper-awaker for Pepe and I. Jack talked philosophically to us for most of the trip home to try to keep our minds working and keep us from dozing off. The worst part of the drive was the home stretch between the Ohio-Pennsylvania border. We got home at like 5 am and I only slept 4 hours when I did get to bed.
The next day, I woke up early (early for getting to sleep at 5) and drove the trailer around as much as I could to prepare for the next show.
We headed for our next destination on July 27th. This time we were going to a closer location called Cambridge Springs, Pennsylvania for a festival called The Firefly Music Festival. Joining us this time was our friend, Brandon Hull, a member of our comedy skit troupe called Bull Skit Productions, a troupe which we had made it our mission to promote (specifically for Bullskit.com) on this tour in order to get more people to watch the skits we made. It was scary to drive there because there were a lot of hills on the route we took. When we arrived, we were directed into a dirt road in the woods that our trailer could barely make it across. Then we were parked behind a stage. The festival was a textbook hippie fest. There were tents everywhere and vendors with hemp necklaces and peace-sign t-shirts; the works. There weren't an astounding amount of people there, but it was definitely a good thing to be playing for a decent sized crowd for us since we were from out of town. Then, one of the organizers of the event informed us that one of the sound guys backed out and our stage wasn't available.
We were all really upset, but then I went behind the main stage and asked a group of guys who were scheduled up on stage next if they could cut there time slot shorter so that we could play a handful of songs. They agreed and were very reasonable and nice about it. So, we played four songs and it rained a little when we played, and only when we played, as if we were not meant to be there, disturbing the natural order of hippie-music fests. But, there were a small group of people that liked the songs a lot. Particularly, a group of girls seemed to be bouncing and tapping their feet to "The Glue Is Starting To Crack" from our album Chloe's Epitaph Is Choe which we had released the year before. Then, we got out of there and someone snapped a picture of us in front of the festival sign. We hit Sheetz and drove home once more before heading out for the last four shows.
Steve Boyle, the youngest brother in my family, joined us for the rest of the tour. He had been at Lakeside Camp in Sandusky, Ohio and we met him when he got home and left early the next day for Louisville, Kentucky. We had to hurry because we had two shows scheduled in one night on the day we left which was July 28th. Jack had booked us a camp site in Sheperdsville, Kentucky and we got there around 6 pm and set up a tent and cooked Spagetti-O's and hotdogs and what-not. Then we got back in the car and pulled the trailer into Louisville where we took to walking around the streets and handing out Third Class and Bull Skit fliers to people we walked by. They were all very friendly and most of them probably threw the fliers away, but who knows. We did get a myspace message from a kid who was camping next to us and went on www.myspace.com/thirdclass to check out the tunes. The first venue we played in Louisville was The Petrus Nightclub with a good rock band called Dying Indiana. There were about 5 people there. Then, we packed up and drove down the street to our familiar venue, The Highlands Taproom on Bardstown Rd., one of the coolest roads I have ever seen, full of coffee shops, used-clothing stores, bookstores, music stores, cool restaurants, health food stores and more. We played at about midnight at the Taproom and there were about 10 people there. Steve also got yelled at for not being 18 and they wouldn't let him into the bar when we played. After that, we all went back to the campsite and slept in the tent.
The next day, we assessed that it wasn't very much more money to stay in one of the really nifty KOA Kabins on the site, so we switched sites and got more comfortable. Then, this being July 29th. It was off to The Hideaway Saloon. This bar had guaranteed us a small spot in there open-mic night and so I went in by myself and played acoustic versions of "A Drug Inside Your Wrist" and "Rainy And Stormy." The people in there were crazy about it. They wanted to hear the full band and I passed out a couple free full-length albums and they were copying them to laptops and handing me cards with different booking phone numbers on it. It was a good promotional moment. We spent the rest of our time that day playing volleyball, hiking and swimming at the KOA.
On July 30th, we played at Stevie Ray's Blue's Bar and played acoustic versions of "A Drug Inside Your Wrist," "Office Supplies," and "Explode The Sky" among other songs. We got no response from the crowd.
We had a break until our homecoming show in Youngstown, Ohio on August 4th. So, we played more volleyball, hiked more and swam more and made sure to get a good portion of the tour videotaped so that we could later edit together our infamous documentary called "The Third Class/Bull Skit World Tour" in which we goof off most of the time. During the time near the end of our trip, we stopped in Cincinnati, Ohio and promoted with chalk on the sidewalk and did the same in Columbus, Ohio. We also visited our friend Amy Erdmann who took us on a stroll around by Ohio State University. Then, we visited our friends Billy James and Jen Townsend who lived just outside the downtown area and we stayed the night at there place and went to Waffle House.
On August 4th, Craig Beight and Derek Baker joined us to ride with us to Cedars Lounge in Youngstown, Ohio for our final show of the tour. We opened for Posture Coach and had a really fun time. This gave us the opportunity to include a lot of our Youngstown and Columbiana, Ohio friends in the documentary.

The Plush Night Club in July 2007

2008-08-02T00:30:00.000-07:00

This show was put together by some middle-man ticket-selling B.S. company that wanted us to pre-sell a bunch of tickets and didn't want to give us any profit. They were a promoting company, yet they weren't doing the promoting. The girl who worked for this company called me out of nowhere and I told her in a straightforward manner that we couldn't guarantee ticket sales. Then, she proceeded to tell me that it didn't matter anyways and talked me into, against my better judgement, booking us, Third Class, at Plush. We opened for a band called Blush. I don't think they sold any tickets either.
Anyways, after the show some promoter guy called me and chewed me out for not selling tickets. I even explained to him that he was in the wrong in the way that he expected to get people to shows and that I had disclaimed myself when initially being called to play the show. But, it didn't make any difference and he told me how he booked shows for Garbage and stuff so as to impress and intimidate me. I just spouted off sarcastic remarks until he hung up on me.

Greenie Beanie's Coffee in June 2007

2008-08-02T00:28:00.000-07:00

This was a coffeehouse in Streetsboro, Ohio. There were like three people there. Our friend Chrissy came with Jack to watch us and a guy sat in on bass in a few songs.

The Mocha Dreams Cafe in January 2007

2008-08-02T00:24:00.000-07:00

This was our first show in this venue. It was in Cleveland, Ohio and we came back at least once more to play the show. There were always interesting bands at this venue. The shows at Mocha Dreams were mostly booked by The Kid With The Hair In His Face. Yes, that's what he likes to be called. We had worked with him years back in 2001 at a show we played at Leetonia Park in Ohio. The crowd here, although small, seemed to really like us. They lounged around on the couches and sipped coffee tapped their feet to our songs. We had a few friends, Anna, James and Craig Beight, make an appreciated effort to come from Kent and other parts of Cleveland to see us play that night.

Album Release Show at Cedars in November 2006

2008-08-02T00:20:00.000-07:00

This show marked the official release of our album, Chloe's epitaph is Chloe. We had sent the cover art to New Jersey, a company called Discmakers. Now, it was done and we put together a fun show with balloon's and a free album giveaway. We also booked two out-of-town acts that we'd played with before, Spacehooker and Hyjinx. Hyjinx is now known as Stealing Jane and have opened for international acts such as Hanson in the recent past.
We were very excited for our release. The next day we played another show in Louisville, Kentucky with the same line-up at The Highlands Taproom. Both shows had strong sets I thought.

Seattle's Coffeehouse in October 2006

2008-08-02T00:16:00.000-07:00

We played at this Wooster coffeehouse in October with The Zou on very short notice. We were the opening band and we were a little off that night. One of Jack's friends who worked there, E.J., said that the people who ran the place didn't really get into the music. I don't know if it is because we played sloppily or because they wouldn't have liked it anyways. Either way, it seemed a bit elitist. But, to each his own, or something.
I also ran into a former high school colleague, Jennifer who seemed a bit frightened by our music.

Home Grown 4 in October 2006

2008-08-02T00:14:00.000-07:00

This was our first show at this bar in Alliance, Ohio called The Ely Street Billiards. When we pulled up to the door of the place we thought it was shut down a long time ago and someone had played a prank on us. But, then we went inside and a whole unknown nightlife unfolded right in front of us. Not only was this a mysterious place full of stashed-way bikers and rockers, but, behold, they liked us. They really enjoyed our music. The people that ran the place were nice and we ended up returning soon after to do it again.

Starbucks, Tennessee in October 2006

2008-08-02T00:11:00.000-07:00

My girlfriend, Ellen, and I went to Cleveland, Tennessee to visit our newly married friends, Adam and Kayla. Adam set me up a show at the Starbucks he worked at.
A member of the band Cut The Red Wire happened to be there for the performance and we traded cds and exchanged contact information. Cut The Red Wire is associated with electronic bands such as Joy Electric. The guy was a really nice guy and his music was really cool.

Irish Bob's in September 2006

2008-08-02T00:06:00.000-07:00

We played at Irish Bob's in September with one of New York City's most hard-core touring bands called The Sex Slaves. They were pretty good and they seemed interested in having sex with anyone who might be interested. Also, a Youngstown metal band called Relic played. Nobody, not even the organizer of the show, understood that a P.A. system wasn't provided. So, of course, it was all put on us for the show to go on because everyone else just sat there and looked stupid and bewildered by the news of this misfortune. We called our friend Patrick, from the band Dog OK. He drove from Hermitage, Pennsylvania to this venue in Youngstown, Ohio and provided the sound for the night. We paid him out of our pocket and received nothing from the promoter. We were pretty upset considering that we brought the biggest crowd on top of everything else.

Colossal Mastering in Chicago in August 2006

2008-08-02T00:01:00.000-07:00

We drove to Indiana Dunes beach and campground in Indiana and camped there. Then, we took a train into Chicago, Illinois and messed up our directions on the map. Therefore, we had to run as fast as we could for a couple miles across Chicago in order to arrive at our destination, Colossal Records to get our album, Chloe's epitaph is Chloe, mastered.
When the guy heard the album, he remarked that he'd wished he'd checked us for weapons at the door. This was a direct result of hearing our scary, thriller-type song called "Get Out Of My Head" where Pepe's lyrics threaten to "hit you with a broom/stab you with a knife."
We swam at the beach in Indiana before and after mastering the album. Chicago was pretty.

Ampreon Recorder in July 2006

2008-08-01T23:55:00.000-07:00

From July 10 to July 13. Jack and Pepe and I were in Ampreon Recorder recording our first studio album with sound engineer Pete Drivere. Pete is one of those guys that actually makes his whole living off of music. From hosting radio shows, to being in tons of cool bands like The Deadbeat Poets, The Infidels and Pete Drivere And The Pretty Demons, to running a recording studio business, Pete does it all.
We recorded the album, Chloe's epitaph is Chloe, in its entirety in these four days. We had a good time. We went to get pizza at Papa John's when Pete was mixing down the stuff.
The album was a collection of old and new songs, none of which had been recorded with truly good quality until this point in the band's career.
Ampreon Recorder is in Youngstown, Ohio.

Potter's Camp in June 2006

2008-08-01T23:51:00.000-07:00

This was a private show for our friend Brandon's high school graduation party in June. Potter's Camp is in New Waterford, Ohio.
We felt kind of weird playing for a good amount of old people, but some of them like us. Sometimes, it is only the young children and old people that like our music. Seriously, it works out like that sometimes. The majority of people ages 20 through 40 hate our guts when they hear us play.
Brandon had fun and came up on stage and held a guitar while we played a song. What a goober.

The Boba Bubble Tea Company in June 2006

2008-08-01T23:49:00.000-07:00

This show was a good one with a lot of good bands. We were invited there by The Zou. Posture Coach and Nicholas Megalis were also there. It was a pleasure to open for Nicholas because of his talent on the piano and his acclaim from music critiques in the recent months. He was featured in SPIN magazine a few months after his performance that night and has since been playing fantastic venues such as The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame and The Agora, both in Cleveland, Ohio.
We are jealous.

The Pittsburgh Deli Company in June 2006

2008-08-01T23:45:00.000-07:00

The performance area was upstairs and we had to hook up the P.A. ourselves. No one seemed to want to help us out at this venue. This was our first time in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Luckily, our old high school friend, Liz, was there. She had previously worked there. We talked to her and then went with our friends, Mindy and Cory to Starbucks. This venue was in Oakland so it was cool to walk around before and after the show.
The sound was surprisingly good and our performance had a bit of a papery sound to the vocals, dumbing down the atmospheric qualities, but clarifying the instrumentation.

Abelfest in April 2006

2008-08-01T23:40:00.000-07:00

We have played a crap load of Abelfests in our day. Steve Abel is a man who is rare, a man who cares about booking a good show, but who is not, himself, a part of a band. People like him are far and few and it was an honor playing any of these festivals with him whether they were festivals in the name of his sister's birthday or Halloween celebrations, Steve Abel is a staple in keeping small-town life involved in art, particularly rock music, that is happening in its community.
This particular one I cannot remember because there have been too many. I do know that there was one halloween show where we dressed as a soccer player, me, a pop star, Pepe, and a guy getting out of the shower, Jack.

Black Squirrel Radio Interview in February 2006

2008-08-01T23:36:00.000-07:00

On February 28, 2006. Jack, Pepe and I drove to Kent State University's main campus in Kent, Ohio to do an interview on Black Squirrel Radio. This is Kent's college internet radio station. Surprisingly, the station was set up like a radio station. Because it was college and because it was the internet, we expected the appearance to be more casual. It tickled us that we had to speak into a mike that dangled above us as we sat in a special guests section across from the host, Becky, and the control boards. We made a lot of jokes and played a few tracks of our self-recorded albums. I was attending Kent State at the time and it felt good to be on campus without going to class.

The Nouveau Rock Festival in February 2006

2008-08-01T23:29:00.000-07:00

This was the first Nouveau Rock Festival that we got to co-headline with The Zou. Although, to the this day, The Zou pulls in a much more substantial fan base than our band, we were considered a moderately established act in Youngstown, Ohio at this point. We played an amped-up, loud rock show, complete with me tearing my shirt off and overactive keyboard solos. The drums were pounding, bright lights were flashing. Truly, it was a passionate event for us. Pepe, Jack and I were very happy with the way the show went.
All the other bands, particularly Posture Coach and Lady Fantastic, did wonderful sets. Even Love Circuit, a band that soon ceased a few weeks after this performance, a very new band at that, were at their edgiest. They egged on a couple guys that booed them and a fight broke out near the end of the night. It was a crazy show.

The Highlands Taproom in March 2006

2008-08-01T23:21:00.000-07:00

This was our first show in Kentucky. It was in Louisville. A really nice band called Spacehooker looked us up and traded shows with us. It turns out that they were referred to us by the Long Island bands we played with in Aug 2005. It pays to network sometimes. We got some good shows out of it.
We shared the stage, the very small stage, with Steve Boyle and Spacehooker. Going to Kentucky was fun. We stayed in a cabin in a KOA campground and flew kites. We walked around Bardstown Rd and went to some stores before the show. All the people in Louisville are really nice.

The Underground in April 2006

2008-08-01T23:17:00.000-07:00

The Underground is an on-campus bar in The College Of Wooster. My brother, Jack Boyle, a member of this band, Third Class, was attending Wooster to attain a bachelor's in English at the time and his friend, Andrew, organized the show for us. We weren't playing at our best that night, but we definitely won over some fans. It was one of those things where the band thinks they sucked and nobody else, miraculously, noticed the screw-ups.
It was cool to talk with Jack's college friends. Our song "Full-Frame Movies" spawned a request for it the next time we played that venue. Good times.

Grumpy Dave's Pub in April 2006

2008-08-01T23:12:00.000-07:00

A friend of ours from Bowling Green named Sean helped us find this venue and book the show. We were all so psyched to go there and play near the Bowling Green campus in Ohio. Our friend Erin was attending at the time and my brother Steve and his friend, Bryan, formerly of The Fading, made a special trip up to Toledo to see a friend and to see our show. But, we all, to our dismay, found out that the bar was 21 + and none of the people we wanted in could get in. It was a fun set but we had a disappointed feeling the whole time we played. The opener, Mitch Migliore was a pretty good talent on the keys and vocals. Dave, Grumpy Dave to be exact, turned out to be a nice guy. So, the night wasn't completely miserable. Afterwards, we went to eat with our friends and looked around in a music store. The drive back home took forever.

The Hi-Fi Club in January 2006

2008-08-01T23:09:00.000-07:00

This was a show we played with Steve Boyle and a funk band called Way Of Love.
The sound guy was good and he liked us and gave us his card, but the other musicians didn't fit in with Steve and us. They just were jamming and doing Sublime type stuff which I am not a fan of. Also, some guy from this company, Third I Entertainment talked our ears off about music and "the scene" and stuff like that. He annoyed us so much that we left early without worrying about collecting a percentage of the door. Later that week we received an e-mail from him offering to allow us to pay him $ 150 to be on some compilation. What an offer.

Elephest in November 2005

2008-08-01T23:04:00.000-07:00

This was a show organized by myself, Lee Boyle, Drew Wade and Kyle Talbott of the former band, The Smileys, formerly known, with slightly different members, as the Columbiana County punk-rock phenomenon called Glen.
The show featured a ton of acts and I was surprised by the amount of people who came and stayed for the whole show. We had acts such as The Ladykillers, The Rydells, Steve Boyle, Sam Goodwill, The Zou, The Smileys and ourselves, Third Class.
The turnout was a bit less than anticipated, but it was still filled with a good group of 60 or more dedicated listeners. And, really, what more can you ask for?

Local Flow 7 in October 2005

2008-08-01T23:02:00.000-07:00

This is a show worth mentioning because it was the 3rd Local Flow show we'd played out of 7 that a band called Ohm had put on. These shows, especially the earlier ones, were very spirited shows. They took place in bingo halls and breezeways and always had an awesome attendance of rock and roll types who brought a lot of energy to the place.

The Battle Of The Bands in Woodworth Park in September 2005

2008-08-01T22:58:00.000-07:00

We won 2nd place in this contest. It was a triumphant moment for us because we have a hard time winning anything in music competitions because we don't play any covers and don't sound very traditional in accordance to other, catchier rock acts. The sound guy, a man who used to be the band director at my high school, East Palestine High School in Ohio, came behind the stage and something to the effect of "I've been in music a long, long time and you guys got something." It was a very wisdom-like, Hollywood moment, accept that it was in Woodworth Park in N. Lima, Ohio.

The Nouveau Rock Festival in September 2005

2008-08-01T22:53:00.000-07:00

The Nouveau Rock Festival is a Youngstown, Ohio festival of the arts which we have been honored in having the good fortune of playing on all of its occasions. The festival is organized by our fellow Youngstown friends and musicians in the band called The Zou.
This particular festival went well. It was the third festival and it was the beginning of some of the bands who are now well-established acts of Youngstown. We played a good set. We always play good sets when we are near an opening time slot. It takes the pressure off.
Festivals like this one and a previously-played Bonfrog Festival we played, organized by Simon Kenneally, formerly of Sijupauna, are good outlets for our music. We are, for some reason, viewed by most as experimental and we need weird, indie events like these to keep us in our element.

Long Island & Manhattan in August 2005

2008-08-01T22:27:00.000-07:00

It is 2008. Obviously, this little tour happened 3 years ago. But, for the purposes of fleshing out the lives of the band members, let us begin the Third Class story here. Third Class existed since 1999, but this particular August series of shows marked the beginning of Third Class as an act that is commercially aware of itself. It marked the movement from playing only local shows, mostly in people's living rooms and barns, to playing out more and establishing a reputation as one of northeastern Ohio's true indie-music acts. Please go to WWW.THIRDCLASS.NET in order to hear about our origins on our biography page.
Anyhow, this series of shows was our first tour, a small tour. It was a journey away from Youngstown, Ohio. On August 18, we played in our home town's city park, East Palestine City Park with a band called The Fading and a band from a leg of The Warped Tour called Brookside. We considered this to be the kick-off show of the tour.
After the show, we went to our favorite truck stop restaurant called 7 & 14 and ate. Then, that same night, we set off for New York.
Our first destination was Long Island, more specifically, Commack, New York. We had reserved a $ 15-per-night camp ground and when we got there we slept in the grass until the night came over us. Then it was off to our first show at McCoy's Bar. The date was Aug 19. We played with a band called A-life, as well as, a now very successful band who has opened for Hanson recently, Hyjinx. And, let us not forget, Steve Boyle, our little brother. He was the one who booked us this particular show. He toured with us the whole time in N.Y. The show was pretty good, but the Long Island crowd, we had the feeling, needed some funkier licks than what we, an indie-progressive act, or Steve Boyle, an indie-pop act, had to offer. All the same, we made some new friends, performed a respectable set and hung out with the other bands.
Then, we had a few days off until the next show. We were dumb enough not to bring a tent, partially because it didn't fit into the van, so we slept on the ground the next couple nights. We also tried sleeping in the front seats of the van.
In our spare time, we played on the playground at the camp site and drove to Fire Island and swam in the salty ocean. That was, looking back on it now, the funnest part. The dunes on the beach and the huge waves made for an awesome vacation while we awaited our next shows.
The next show was at The Coda in New York City on August 22. We basically played to the sound guy and the bartender. It was a monday, but we felt pretty stupid regardless. We even had made an effort to promote a lot outside before the show. Upon arrival in the city, we went straight to McDonald's and ate the first real meal we'd had in days. We were very low on money and had been feasting on peanut butter, granola bars and dried bags of tuna for the last few days. In the city, we stayed in The Riverside Studios hotel and it felt awesome to sleep in real beds with real mattresses.
On August 23rd, we played the Mad River Grille with a small audience of regulars and headed home the same night.
Then, on August 26th, we played somewhat of a home-coming show at the Upper Room Fellowship Church in Columbiana, Ohio. It was a late-night party for a youth group and we ended up playing capture the flag and it was a good time.