My god

I CLAIM IT ALL

Upcoming gigs section updated!

Saturday, November 3rd @ Genesis in Royal Oak, MI... We are playing with TRIAL. I could not be more excited about this. Trial has been a huge influence on me over the years, especially lyrically. I finally got the chance to see them at Burning Fight in Chicago 2009, and their set floored me.
Plus, this show is with a lot of other cool bands, good friends of mine. A lot of these people haven't gotten to see a proper Cloud Rat show, and know me mainly from my time singing for Under Anchor (now on unofficial hiatus I suppose haha). I think this gig will be one of the best Michigan shows of the year.

Before that though, we get to see and play with our lovely buds in Protestant! October 6th at the Gulag in Detroit. Gonna be a fucking rager, as well as Madison's new crust band Marrow's first show.

US/Canada tour with thedowngoing is shaping up very nicely still. Had a couple of changes, but still only need a few more dates and will be set. Fuck yeah!

Recording more for the split with Orgullo Primitivo and the MOKSHA lp this week. Super excited to get more work done on that stuff.

More updates soon! In other news, I am now unemployed. I've been working the same construction/crane/steel fab gig for almost 10 years, and am now done. It's a long story and I'm not going to get into it. Major life change, but I am feeling pretty fucking optimistic about it.

Take care friends.

-R

Tell your loved ones you love them.

Ah, friends of the Rat blog. Whiskey Dad here. I hope you have been well.
Things at the Rat camp have maybe seemed relatively quiet for the past few weeks. And I suppose they have been, other than booking the shit out of that Nov-Dec tour. We only need help with 3-4 more shows and we are basically set on that one. Thank you SO FUCKING MUCH to everyone involved. You are getting the biggest hugs ever.

In other news, yesterday I witnessed a major accident at my jobsite (I am a crane operator / steel fabricator / construction). I was in the crane setting wood trusses on a huge 300 ft long by 80 ft wide building. At the end of the day, the entire building collapsed with 5 guys up on the walls and trusses. Two were hurt badly, and my cousin and I were the ones to dig through the debris to pull one of them out. I'm not sure why the building collapsed, could have been the ground being too soft, letting the support legs give way, or the framers may have been cutting corners. I don't know, doesn't matter. All I know is, there was a man crying for help, pushed through the floor, buried under thousands of pounds of wood and metal. Scary. Tell your friends and family you love them, everyday. Alright?
There are more stories to be told from the past week, but later. It's been a wild time lately.

This weekend, we head to New Orleans to play with Lightning Bolt and Thou, then to Denton, Texas to play with Forbes/Young/Gonzalez Trio, Terminator 2, and Bludded Head. Super pumped. Next weekend, 2 shows with False (Ft Wayne & Detroit). Super pumped again.
Tomorrow, slumber party with my daughter and her best friend and Madison. Oh, and I have a new roomate. Life is crazy.

Europe is shaping up a bit. Sounds like we are going to fly into Ireland, do some shows, ferry to Scotland/UK, do more shows, then do the whole rest of Europe. Ending sometime shortly after a fest that I can't remember the name of right now because I'm delusional. Alright, good night.

Love,
R

Check this shit!

We are very excited to be a part of this series of 7"s from Greece via Blastbeat Mailmurder / Productions, entitled Monomaniac. Volume One coming within a month or so!!

http://blastbeatprod.wordpress.com/2012/07/29/impending-kickoff-of-the-monomaniac-series-bbm-on-leave-latest-distro-arrivals/

7 INCHES TO DESTRUCTION

HOLY FUCK! Do you see the post below this one, that just says "Hello"?!
That is a rare sighting of the mysterious-type Pokemon, the Drinch. Usually seen smoking tons of cigarettes and beating their drumset furiously, and being generally mysterious. HE POSTED ON THE BLOG. Mind = Blown.

Anyways, you may have noticed the links under the cover photo of our blog. We are getting fancy now huh? So yeah, this page will be news and what not, then there is the upcoming shows page, the discography/lyrics/download page, and videos for now. We will probably add more (photos, links, etc) in the future.

All of the gigs lately have been fucking amazing. Republic of Dreams are so good, and sweethearts to boot. Got to hang with our Curmudgeon friends again, awesome times. Moezes, Phil, Jess, Corey, Britt and all of our other Buffalo area friends: We love you. Jamestown NY was a hell of a show, punker than life (in a good way). Fucking skateboards and punk, coolest shit humyns have created thus far. Thanks to everyone involved with and at all of these shows!!!!

Life has been an emotional rollercoaster again lately. What to do about it? Keep your head, that's what my ma says, so that's what I'm doing. Love ya mom.

Will update again soon. Gonna get to booking that Nov/Dec tour heavily real soon.


Also, Europe in the spring... !

-R

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hello.

-a

Pics from the Medusa show 6/23/12

Thanks to Adam Degross for the awesome pictures!!

                                       

BIG SHOWS BEST FRIENDS BIG TOUR BEST FRIENDS

Alright. So the weekend of June 22nd-24th was amazing. Marquette, Minneapolis and Milwaukee were all great, hanging with some of our best friends ever ruled. New friendships were also made, while older ones were ever strengthened. Thank you sincerely to all of the lovely folks who were a part of those shows and hangouts. Also, COKSKAR from Minneapolis fucking ruled my life. One of the best bands I've seen lately. And COURTESY SPIT from Muskegon as well. Can't wait to see both of these bands again.

I posted a lot of upcoming shows and our Nov - Dec tour with thedowngoing from Australia. Will put the actual dates/locations up asap. Much love.

R

New Tracks from the Rat

http://www.mediafire.com/?in9o8964s1nu5v7
Our side of the split LP with Republic of Dreams.

Split w/ Republic of Dreams, upcoming shows, PARTY.

Hello all of our lovely friends, hope all has been well. We have been enjoying the grand weather up here in Michigan, our 4 months of nice weather almost makes up for the 8 months of misery.

Our material is finished for the split LP with Republic of Dreams, and that record will be out in about a month, just in time for their US tour! Soon, we will post a mediafire link of our side of that record. We're pretty excited about it, pretty gnarly junk.
Originally, we were going to get the material finished for the Orgullo Primitivo split first, but the ROD split had a deadline set so the record could be out before their US tour. So up next we will get to working on the vocals for the OP split and our 2nd full LP, Moksha.

So we have some shows coming up finally!
June 22nd-24th in Marquette MI, Minneapolis MN, and Milwaukee WI are all set. Can't fucking wait!
Then we have July 13th - 15th in Toledo OH, Jamestowne NY, and Buffalo NY. Jamestowne and Buffalo are set, awaiting final details. Toledo / BG is getting worked on.
Then we have July 18th and 19th with Republic Of Dreams in Grand Rapids MI and Muskegon MI, then possibly July 20th in Mt Pleasant MI, but that is still iffy.
August is up in the air for us, as Adrian's band Old Soul will be touring. September there is possible talk of us playing a fest all the way out near Vancouver.
Our next big tour is going to be going to the West Coast of the USA in November / December. After that, our sights are getting set on heading overseas. YES PLEASE.

So, lots going on for us right now even though we have seemed a bit quiet lately. Our van is halfway fixed now, and our instruments / gear are next on the list of getting fixed up. Now we just need to fix our fucked up brains.

Much love to everyone. We miss all of you. Come to Michigan and we'll take you river tubing.

-R