ooOOoo

The Edge Of Madness

Tour starts in 4 days! We are leaving at 7am on Thursday. I'm so excited for this tour! I will have copies of the very first issue of my very first zine available, and we get to see so many wonderful friends and bands and places. YES!
Thanks so much to everyone who have helped us so much with this tour: Chris Yeung, Bryan Funck, Landon/Dallas, Matt Preston, Nevin IFB, Pizza Hi Five, Rat Storm, Jim and Andy in Knoxville, Seth and Blake in Atlanta, Gripe and Dan Vinyl Rites in Athens, Tony and Greg in Tallahassee, Rick and Alden in Ft Worth, Jenny Ray @ Phoenix Project, Ford and Vinyl Junkie in Houston, and the Austin folks who helped us out, even though we didn't end up making it there. Next time for sure! Thanks again to you all!
And to everyone who may be reading this, hope to see you on the road!!!

Also, we have been confirmed for the 5th annual DIY vs. DOMESTIC ABUSE show, a benefit for the Milwaukee Women's Center. We are really excited to be a part of it this year! We will also be doing a show in Madison the day before, and maybe Fort Wayne the day after, not sure yet.

ANNNNNNDDDDD we are going to be doing a short tour around SMASH IT DEAD FEST. March 22nd - April 1st. We will post the details for that ASAP!


All right. Much love from the Rats. Take care!

-R

DEC 9

fuck yes

NÖ PÖWER @ Sewercide Mansion from Prison of Mirrors on Vimeo.



M/cloud rat

Operation grindcore & Music for vultures

Some nice folks asked to interview us.
check it yo
Operation Grindcore interview
Music for vultures

i've been drawing.

M/cloud rat

tricks

The Lurking Fear

Hey all! We added a little links section. Check them out! Will add more as we remember them.

Tour is almost all set, just need Birmingham AL or Jackson MS area still! If you know anyone who can help us in those towns or surrounding areas (Basically any city that will split up our trip from Dallas TX to Melbourne, FL. WHEW), please let us know or let them know. Thanks! We are getting pretty stoked for tour, and got some new shirties and patchies. We will have some of the last remaining copies of our LP, as well as copies of the Oily Menace / Wolbachia split LP and (fingers crossed) the new Autarkeia split 7"!

LAIR / Brian Uhl and Robert Inhuman just made this for us. So fucking cool.

Modern Life Is...

...definitely not War, according to an ex-marine Vietnam war veteran whom I thoroughly pissed off yesterday on my lunch break at work. More on that in a bit.

First, just thought I would throw it out there that we are writing for a full-length LP to be out next spring/summer. We have the music for 9 songs written, 2 more being worked on currently, and a neat little cover tune. Madison has I think 5 or 6 songs worth of lyrics done. We already have a name and concept (no, its not a concept album though), but we will wait to unveil that until a later time, probably when we record it, most likely February-ish.

So now for the story (sorry, I know this is the Cloud Rat blog and not Rorik's personal bullshit blog):

My good friend and bandmate Jimmy and I were having lunch at this tiny chinese joint in Lakeview, MI. I'm wearing my work clothes, which, this day, included my cherished Modern Life Is War hoodie. This bigger, older guy sitting at an adjacent table asks me about my shirt, I tell him its a band. He then unbuttons his shirt, opens it like a bat opens its wings, and his shirt underneath says MARINES. He stairs at me real hard for about 10 seconds, then tells me that my shirt is a "fucking crock of shit" and that war is hell and american life bears no resemblance to it. I, with infinite wisdom, maturity and tact, tell him to "fuck off" politely. God I am an idiot sometimes. I could have just remained silent, or nodded and smiled, or said I'm sorry, or that suffering is relevant, or that the band name is not implying that modern american life is literally war, or that he doesn't know about me and what I've been through, or countless other things. But, in the heat of the moment and caught off guard, I of course said the worst, most immature thing possible. Fuck off. Real nice. So he got up from his table, walked to mine, put his finger in my face, and gave me a lecture of how shitty, disrespectful, ignorant, and spoiled that I am, and then said "any time, any place if you want to tell me to fuck off again. In Vietnam, they taught us how to kill and maim, and that's it." Very uncomfortable. I told him "I'm glad that you are proud of that." I have learned that I'm not good with confrontation. There are any number of things that I could have said to make the situation end quickly and generally comfortably for both parties, but when I'm caught off guard and in the moment, all my logic and knowledge gets thrown out the window and my adrenaline pumps and nothing good comes of it. Need to work on that.

So I'm gonna leave you off with some good shit that I just heard yesterday. Check it out, super good. 

GRIPE - PIG SERVANT

-R