BRIMSTONE

Brimstone was a Heavy Metal band that Mark was in between 1994 and 1998. here is the story from Mark's view...

In 1993 two high school friends Jeff Dion and Chad Elliott started a band called Brimstone. Initially it was only the two of them. Both Jeff and Chad were guitarists.

In the Summer of 1994 Jeff and Chad both parted ways as Brimstone. Jeff kept the name Brimstone and put together a new lineup. The new Brimstone was born! The 2nd incarnation consisted of: Jeff Dion - rhythm and lead guitar, Chad Ashworth - rhythm guitar, Rob Linblad - bass guitar and Greg Simmons - drums. This new lineup began writing and rehearsing original music. Greg was limited on his drumming ability , and when He bought a set of drums He called on close friend and fellow drummer Mark Rich to give him some pointers on drumming and to show him how to properly set His drum set up. Mark agreed and went to Greg's house. Mark was introduced to the rest of the band. They all hit it off immediately. That night there was chemistry as Mark played drums in Greg's place. They went over some songs that Jeff had been writing as well as some cover tunes. After playing for 2 hours the sound was tight. It sounded as if they had played together before. The music that was played that night was captured on a talk boy recorder. The next morning, anxious, they woke up early and began to play once again. This time a cassette recorder was used to record some of the music that they played. That cassette was later transferred by Mark to compact disc and is simply known as Brimstone 1.

Mark, wanting to be a part of Brimstone kept trying to convince the band to let him join. This was hard considering that they already had a drummer. After 2 months the band had decided to make some changes. At that time Brimstone lacked a vocalist and they needed one soon as they had written some songs that needed lyrics. Chad had sung a few times but He wanted to play guitar full time. Rob decided to give up bass to sing, Greg gave up drums to play bass to make room for Mark to come in on drums. The 3rd incarnation of Brimstone was born in October of 1994. The new lineup consisted of: Jeff Dion - rhythm and lead guitar, Chad Ashworth - rhythm guitar, Rob Linblad - vocals, Greg Simmons - bass guitar and Mark Rich - drums.

The journey began. The band rehearsed and partied at Greg's house, having a blast in the process. The songs that were written during the next 9 months were 3-5-7, 5-7-3, Green Horizons, Pamela, Becky and Brutis. All of these songs existed for a while musically they just didn't have lyrics or titles. Brutis was a song that was played as early as the first meeting with Mark. That night when they first met after jamming they watched the horror movie "Ticks". In that movie a dog named Brutis had been killed by an oversized tick. The next morning with Chad on vocals they wrote a song called "Brutis". This song was based on what they saw in the movie. The song "Becky" was about Greg's younger sister. It was a joke song. Some of the early cover songs the band played were (Welcome Home) Sanitarium, Seek & Destroy, When I Come Around, Basket Case, Crazy Train plus crazy versions of You've Lost That Loving Feeling and Lean on Me. The times were fun!

One night while the band rehearsed, Eric Martin and Bill Dyes who lived across the street had come over and introduced themselves. The house across the street had 3 floors and was a party house on the weekends. They came in and said "we heard you playing from across the street and you sound good. Would you like to come over to our house and play?" We were all excited and nervous as we had not played in front of an audience before. We carried our equipment across the street to the first floor which was Eric's apartment (Bill lived on the 2nd floor). We set up in the living room and began to play. There were about 40 people in the apartment rocking to our own music. It was a great feeling. A couple weeks later we played on the second floor at Bill Dyes' apartment. That night we were rocking and the police showed up and asked us to quiet down. We closed all the windows and continued to play. After a while the police came again only this time there were three police cruisers outside. They ordered us to stop playing because of the volume so we just hung out after that.

This was kind of a sad situation but, Chad had been lacking in his guitar playing. This was by no fault of his, he just couldn't learn guitar as he wanted to. Chad tried to be a good guitarist by practicing. Jeff was helping out by showing Chad different things on the guitar as well. The Guitar just wasn't for Chad. He sold His equipment and quit the band. Chad remained friends with the band and was always at our practices giving his opinion of new songs. When Rob could not make it to practices, Chad would fill in on vocals. Above all, the friendship between us all remained strong. This was the 4th incarnation of Brimstone. The lineup consisted of: Jeff Dion - rhythm and lead guitar, Rob Linblad - vocals, Greg Simmons - bass guitar and Mark Rich - drums.

In July of 1995, Greg had moved out of his house, wanting to be on his own. He moved in with the brother of one of our friends (Jason Jennings), Rob and his girlfriend Tina. This didn't stop the band as we were able to practice in the cellar of this apartment. This new apartment gave the band more opportunities to practice whenever we needed to. We continued to write songs as well as play our old songs. It was at this time the songs "Dark Nightmare" and "Pit of Rage" were written. Some of the cover songs the band was playing at this time were Self Esteem, Enter Sandman and Seasons in the Abyss. One summer night Rob and Tina had invited a bunch of friends over and we brought our equipment into the (large) driveway and played for their guests. It was a great time until the police arrived and ordered us to take it inside because it was too loud. We brought the equipment into the cellar and resumed playing well into the night, never seeing the police again that night. For the next year the band practiced 3 or 4 times a week. A lot of partying ensued and fun times were had. It was during this time that the band met Branden Wright who became long time friends with the rest of the band especially Mark. Branden's father was dating Greg's Mother which is how they met. Unfortunately Rob and Tina split up which left the band with no place to jam and Greg with no place to live. For the moment things didn't look good for Brimstone as a band, but things were about to change...

In the Summer of 1996 Greg moved back in with His mom and sisters and the band was back in business after about a one month break. Instead of the old jam room, the band jammed in a corner of the cellar opposite of where the old jam room was. The old jam room was now Greg's bedroom. The band would play once in a while across the street where they had played a few times before. Eric Martin had moved out so the 1st floor apartment now belonged to Kevin "Gill" Rogers and His roommate Tommy. One night when we were playing there we took a break after playing a while, a guy approached us and He asked if it would be OK to jam with us. That guy's name was Nathan (Nate) Perkins. We didn't know what to expect but we agreed to let him play. WOW!!! What a guitarist he was. He could play almost every Metallica song which amazed all of us. We played for an hour with Nate on guitar. Jamming with Nate felt right. We had met our future second guitarist for Brimstone we just didn't know it yet. Nate started to hang out with the band and came to our practices jamming once in a while. After about 2 months we asked Nate to join the band as a second guitarist to make Brimstone a 5 piece band again. Nate agreed and the 5th incarnation of the band was born. The lineup consisted of: Jeff Dion - rhythm and lead guitar, Nathan "Nate" Perkins - rhythm guitar, Rob Linblad - vocals, Greg Simmons - bass guitar and Mark Rich - drums. The band started rehearsing the old tunes as well as writing new ones again. One of the songs that the band wrote was called "Always" which had a hardcore feel to it. Nate came up with the main riff and the rest of us came up with the other parts. Always was the first song that had been written and completed in about 3 months. The song was amazing and heavy. Nate learned all the original Brimstone songs during practices as we would go over them every time we played. The band was getting tight and sounding great.

In the Fall of 1996, the band had to move out of Greg's house because of the volume and partying that went along with our practices. The band moved into a rehearsal studio in Lawrence Massachusetts called "Grumpy Grampy" studios. This was a very fun time for the band because we had full reign to do what we wanted, when we wanted. We spray painted the room with all different designs. Our welcome mat said "WEL-CUM". We had 24 hour access to the place. What was cool was there were other bands to interact with and get pointers from. The manager of the studio was named Dave. He was in 2 bands at the time called the Sqwags which was a cover band and also a band called The Boner Donors which was an all original punk band which had just recorded a CD entitled "Groovy Cats, Heavy Hats". A then unknown band Godsmack was 2 doors down from us.

We rehearsed 4 times a week and practiced our original material and played covers. It was really laid back and we had a blast. There were 2 songs that the band worked on, but never completed. The band mainly concentrated on getting all of the originals tight. It was during this time that Greg and his girlfriend Yvonne found out that they were going to be parents. We were all happy for them, but there was going to be changes that would have to be made when their baby was born. That was ok we were willing to work with Greg. Unfortunately our stay at Grumpy Grampy's was not long, lasting only 4 months. The details were never figured out, but the band was kicked out of the place. All that I remember is getting a call from Jeff telling me that the next time we were practicing it was going to be at His house. He had moved all of our equipment to His house in the cellar.

Around March of 1997, the band began rehearsing in Jeff's cellar. The band to this point had overcome some obstacles, but sadly Brimstone was beginning to fall apart...

The sound in Jeff's cellar was great. The acoustics were incredible. During this time only originals and older covers were played. The band didn't really write anything new. Unfortunately after 2 months Nate was not happy with the lack of new material being written and was getting bored so he decided to leave the band. Brimstone continued on as a 4 piece in the 4th incarnation again. Within 2 months Greg's girlfriend gave birth to their Son, Greg JR.. Greg decided He needed to be with His family and had to leave the band. The band understood that Greg had to leave and were very sad to lose a founding member.

In the Summer of 1997, Brimstone was left with only 3 band members and a long way to go to get back to where they once were. The first task was to find a bass player. Jason Jennings was recruited. The 6th incarnation consisted of: Jeff Dion - rhythm and lead guitar, Rob Linblad - vocals, Jason Jennings - bass guitar and Mark Rich - drums. Jason had been really good friends with the band for a long time and they once rehearsed at His brothers house while Greg was living there. Jay knew all of the songs as He had been to the band practices but He was new to playing bass and there was a period of time for Him to get the songs down. This was taking longer than expected because of Jay's newly learning bass guitar. Because of this and lack of new music being written and lack of seriousness Rob Linblad decided to quit the band. This was hard because Rob was a good friend as well as a band mate. The band just seemed to lose something when Greg and Nate left. Things just weren't the same anymore and Rob didn't want to be involved anymore.

1997 turned out to be a terrible year for the band as they had lost founding members Rob Linblad and Greg Simmons as well as guitarist Nathan Perkins. Jeff, Mark and Jay decided to soldier on and try to revive Brimstone.

The beginning of 1998 hoped to be a great time for Brimstone. Unfortunately that would never be the case.

There were actually 2 vocalists at this point of the band. They alternated as neither could make every practice and when they did they just both sang. Both had been good friends of the band for a while. They were Matt Mansell and Branden Wright. The 7th incarnation consisted of: Jeff Dion - rhythm and lead guitar, Matt Mansell - vocals, Branden Wright - vocals, Jason Jennings - bass guitar and Mark Rich - drums. During this time things seemed to be going ok, A few new songs were being written musically and there was a good vibe going on. Practices were about twice a week. It was a fun time. A couple of times when Jay could not make a practice Matt's friend Phil would come over and play bass. Phil was really good and added a funkier sound to the band which was new and good. Phil soon would be at practice all of the time and would want to play and this was a difficult situation as Jay was our bass player but Phil was actually a more accomplished bass player and Jay was still learning. This didn't sit well with Jay and he let the band know it and we reassured Him that He was out bass player. Things were OK for a while, but as they say "All Good Things Must Come to an End"...

By the summer of 1998, the band had been getting better with their new lineup and Jay was improving on bass and the music was getting tighter. One night though it all completely fell apart. We were hanging out and jamming one night and a few of us were drinking and Jeff had more than the rest of us. Jeff was kind of being difficult with getting serious to play which was a problem. Jay's brother Rob was there that night as He was once in a while. During a break in the jamming Rob was sitting at Mark's drums and just kind of messing around. Jeff jokingly threw a beer can at rob and it happened to hit Him right in the face. Rob took offense and threw a drum stick at Jeff hitting Him so Jeff dove over the drums at Rob and they began to fight. Jay got involved to get Jeff off of His brother. When everyone was finally separated Jay and Rob said that they were never coming back and jay quit the band. Mark decided that he had enough as this wasn't the first outburst he had witnessed by Jeff while He was drinking. Jay and Mark packed up on the spot and quit the band. Matt and Branden left as well. 5 years in the making and that was the end for Brimstone. There were good times, crazy times, fights, drinking, drugs, puke, girlfriends, music and the most important of all... FRIENDSHIPS! The friendships were strong during the course of time that Brimstone existed, but as with most things not everything lasts forever, but for those 5 years, that will be a period of time I will not soon forget. EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In 1999 Mark received a call from a man named Tony saying that He had a band that needed a drummer and was referred to by Jeff Dion whom He knew from another band. Mark decided to join this new band which was called BIG STICK. They rehearsed at a place in Kingston where other bands had rooms, similar to Grumpy Grampy's. After a week one day while making His way into the band room Mark saw Jeff and it was the first time in almost a year that Mark had even seen Jeff. Immediately they were reminiscing about the old Brimstone days. One day Jeff's band cancelled their practice but Jeff was already there so one last time Jeff and Mark along with Ed Leduc on vocals and Tony Gonzalez on bass who were both in Big Stick played all Brimstone songs all afternoon. That would be the last time Jeff and Mark ever jammed together. In 2001 Mark and Greg got together briefly just to relive the old tunes. Mark was playing guitar and Greg was playing bass and for a few weeks they jammed on the old songs but nothing ever materialized. This would be the last time any members of Brimstone would reunite to jam again. Brimstone was officially dead.