First Full Rehearsal!

April 29, 2010
For the first time in about 15 years Distorted Pony got together as a full band. David arrived on Friday and we set up at Total Annihilation for four nights of rehearsals. Some songs we really kicked ass on. I have to say most of the stuff we did off of Punishment Room was played with such intensity I was worn out by the third song. David’s presence was a real shot in the arm. We’d been rehearsing this stuff before but at a much more tame level, mainly because we’d been really focusing on arrangements, playing the right parts and notes, attention to dynamics and tempo etc…all the stuff that makes a rehearsal not a live performance. I think once David stepped in we knew it was time to play as free and energetic as possible, we’d get to any changes and tweaks later.
We tore thru most stuff, only having to run thru things once and then at the end of the set we discussed what songs we had to work on some more.
So here’s the list:
HOD
Death in the Turnstile
God’s List
Krank
Gutbug
Forensic Interest
Dept. of Existence
Smitten
Slow Leak
Go Kart
A Fine View from the Temple
Angel on a Haug

Most of them we were pretty well prepared for but there were some parts that had to be ironed out. Slow Leak for example we really had to work on the intro arrangement. A Fine View, I had to get down a simple rhythm guitar part that was just a matter of moving a few note around. My biggest obstacle was singing Forensic and Angel. Angel especially is weird to sing because there is only one guitar part and some of David’s lines flow from chorus to verse so even though we are in the verse section what he is playing during the choruses doesn’t get resolved until we are already in the verse, so instinctively I was waiting for the end of those lines before coming in etc…anyway by the end of the last rehearsal most of that stuff was hammered out and I started to feel much more comfortable singing on those songs.
The first night of rehearsal went well, the 2nd night we were adapting to corrections that we’d made and I think by the end of the last night we were feeling really confidant about the set. We know there are other songs that people would like to hear and I expect that as the we continue rehearsing and playing together we’ll dust them off and start working them out, it’d be great to have all of the released material available for us to glean from.