Chapter 9
Although I tried to bite my tongue, the Amped in Anaheim Fest felt like another money suck, even though it was pretty lean as far as a tour would go.
The guys and I flew out of Colorado Springs in the morning, landing in California long before noon.
The only thing we brought were overnight bags, the guys’ guitars, and a snare, because I didn’t trust that the shared drum kit provided by the festival would capture Once Upon a Riot’s sound properly.
We would be flying back to Colorado the next morning.
One detail that made me feel a little better was being greeted by Mick at the airport. He’d rented a large van and, after a lone new roadie helped us load our stuff in the back, we piled in and headed out of the airport.
Mick had the new roadie at the wheel. From where I sat, he looked much like the guys we’d had on our tour—mostly big and muscular but with a bit of a beer gut, longish brown hair that needed a trim so it didn’t look so scraggly, tattoos on every inch of his arms, and a full beard.
Mick introduced him as Eggs—short for his last name, Eggleston—and then Eggs proceeded to tell us how much he loved our music.
At least we had an ally.
“You’re not on till 1:45 and the gates don’t open till noon.
I already picked up your credentials yesterday, so we just need to get there before noon to do a line check.
Me an’ Eggs looked over the backline, and you’ll be good to go there.
” Although I knew a line check was a modified sound check and the backline was amps and that sort of thing—and I understood that time was tight at the festival—I worried about getting there early enough, almost interrupting Mick until I remembered we were in a different time zone.
My brain hadn’t caught up and probably wouldn’t, but, just like on tour, I had to put my trust in Mick and know that he wouldn’t let us down.
“Any of you hungry?” Mick asked, his voice sounding much like an old friend.
We all confirmed that we were, and Mick took us to Denny’s.
While Mick and Zack talked about merch, my brain started calculating expenses…
just like when we’d been on tour. I knew this was as lean as it would get, our one roadie there to help us get set up.
We only had fifteen minutes to set up and break down, because the festival had a pretty tight schedule, and I didn’t even know how many bands were there, but there had to be close to a hundred.
There was a main stage and two others (we were at one of those) and bands would play from just after noon until close to midnight.
But there was, of course, the flight, the van rental, Mick and Eggs’s pay, this meal, and who knew what other costs.
And, listening to Mick and Zack, I got an idea of how the merch would work.
The festival would get a cut but they’d handle everything—and they were the ones who provided the hotel for the night, so there was that at least.
I knew, though, that we weren’t making a whole lot—again, because we were the new kids. But Mick kept telling us that a festival like this was a great way to get new fans.
My stomach was in knots and Braden kept rubbing my back, trying to help me relax. His attention was meant to be comforting but it was starting to get on my nerves, so on the way to the festival, I grabbed his hand in mine to still it.
Once we got there, though, my entire mood changed. The energy was electric—not at first, not while we took a quick tour, but this was huge. We even saw several artists from bands we’d worshipped over the years as they did their line checks.
Before I could even register it, we were on stage, playing for a rowdy crowd. We didn’t have as many people as we might have had if we’d been on the main stage or if it had been later in the day, but I imagined a lot of the people in our crowd were new to us—and that was perfect.
Unlike we’d first envisioned, we weren’t able to play all the songs we’d wanted.
The headliners at night had an hour and a half to play, but we barely had a little over half an hour—meaning we couldn’t even play our entire first album.
So Zack picked the songs and the order, and we played six songs from our first album and two new ones.
The crowd loved them all.
God, I’d forgotten just how intoxicating it was to play for a live crowd, one that loved your material and gave you all the energy you needed to perform better than ever.
And it wasn’t just me—I could see it in the way the guys moved on stage and on their faces when they turned so I could see them.
Zack, in particular, looked and sounded better than he had for a good chunk of the tour earlier that year.
It was then that I knew we had a chance to be big. Sure, I’d had all the heady dreams before, but this was a sensation that we were on the right track.
Maybe this was what Zack had felt all along.
After we broke down and left the stage, we were ushered by Mick to the media tent.
I was immediately grateful, because even though I wouldn’t consider the temperature outside the tent hot, it was humid—and the tent had plywood “floors” and fans all over the place to make it more comfortable than the stage.
We knew about the interview scheduled with Roxy, but there were three other people we’d be talking to.
Again, I was awestruck. There were some radio stations there, but I recognized the signs at the tables as we passed—Kerrang!
, Loudwire, Billboard, Alt Press, Rolling Stone, Rock Sound, Ferocity, and so many others.
This was real. It was so weird, because we’d been on tour with some big names, like Fully Automatic and Bleak Viper, but this just really hit home with me that we were…we were with our people.
I even had to fight back tears.
Our first interview was with a local rock radio station and his questions were generic. I got the feeling he didn’t know who we were, but then he talked about “You’ll Never Get the Best of Me,” our third single, and said it still got a lot of airplay.
Then we had an interview with a music blogger, someone I’d never heard of. His name was Thomas and, although he started out by shaking our hands and smiling, he wasn’t a friend. “So I’ve been told your next album is going to be quite a bit different than your first one.”
Zack said, “Sure, it’s gonna be different. There’s no getting around it. We’re not the same people we were when we wrote the first album. And we wanted to go in a different direction by incorporating blues into our sound, and it works.”
“It might seem that way, but a lot of bands fail spectacularly with their second album.”
“Yeah, a lot of bands do, but we just tested two of those songs with our audience—and they ate it up.”
He was right, of course—I’d seen it with my own eyes—but I wondered if it was because those were all new fans who didn’t know the difference between our first album and the new songs because they were being exposed to it all at once. And would that matter? If they liked the music, they liked it.
“But not all your fans are here, Zack. If they listen to one single and don’t like it because they feel like you’ve lost your way, your album will fail.”
“You know what? If they don’t like what we’re doing, they can suck it.”
Thomas raised his almost bushy gray eyebrows. “I think your fans will be disappointed to hear that,” he said, jotting some notes on the paper.
Jesus—should the rest of us intervene? I exchanged glances with Braden, but Cy was looking across the tent at a thin woman with wispy blue hair, maybe trying to make a love connection.
Zack spoke before we could even stop him.
“That’s not necessarily directed at our fans.
Look…we as a band are gonna do what we want and I can promise you it’ll be damn good.
Our real fans will love it. Wannabe fans, the ones who only listen to us because they think we sound like Avenged Sevenfold or Slipknot or some shit like that, they’re probably going to be disappointed because we sound like our band.
We sound like Once Upon a Riot and nobody else.
That means our records are going to sound a little bit different every single time and people just need to get used to that. ”
Thomas unpursed his lips. “I think you’re still insulting some of your fans.”
“I don’t give a shit what you think.”
I couldn’t help myself. Cy was in another world and Braden was playing the good bassist, letting our frontman do all the talking.
“I think what Zack is saying is that our hardcore fans will eat this album up because they’ll hear us in it.
People who are on the fence might need to listen to it a time or two before they fall in love with it.
” Zack started to speak but I cut him off.
“And they will fall in love with it if they just give it a chance. Like Zack said, we sound like us, so fans will only hate it if they dismiss it right off the bat without really listening.”
Again, Zack acted like he was going to argue, but then his face softened. “Yeah, what Dani said.” It wasn’t until that moment when he was looking directly at me that I caught a whiff of alcohol.
My shoulders dropped—but there wasn’t anything I could do about it. And I wouldn’t do anything about it right here and now. Maybe the truth was that I needed to get used to Zack like this and pray that someday he decided to dry out on his own.
The remainder of the interview continued feeling contentious. Why had this guy even wanted to talk to us? He didn’t seem to like us at all—and Zack didn’t help. We were going to look like a bunch of pretentious assholes and I seemed to be the only one who cared.
We had a couple of other quick interviews and then we arrived at Ferocity’s table.
Mick kept appearing whenever we had to shift from one table to another, but this was our last stop, and then we could enjoy the festival as fans rather than musicians.
“Hey, guys!” she said as we approached. Standing, she grabbed a mic and said, “Let’s go outside.
If it’s okay, I wanna do a video interview. ”
We all agreed. She nodded at a guy across the way, waving him over.
It wasn’t until he met us outside the tent that I saw his video camera.
Roxy spent a couple of minutes positioning us so that, even though she’d be in the shot, the camera would get all four of us band members.
Roxy looked almost like a model with her slim features and hair that flowed like she was in a shampoo commercial—except that it was a vibrant, beautiful purple, a notable feature that would become her trademark.
Her tattoo sleeves also made her stand out, and I wondered if I should do that too.
I liked the tattoo I’d gotten on my shoulder, but I couldn’t really enjoy it because I couldn’t see it.
“Are we good?” she asked her camera guy.
“Ready when you are.”
Although the interview went well, I constantly worried about how I looked—in that humid environment, how badly had my eyeliner bled?
Did my hair look flat? But as I looked at my bandmates, they appeared to be fine.
Later when I viewed myself in a mirror, I realized my appearance wasn’t nearly as bad as I feared.
Yes, my eye makeup ran a little bit, but it didn’t look horrible.
And, even though Zack dominated the interview like he always understandably did, Roxy made sure to ask Braden, Cy, and me pointed questions so we got a little air time.
At the end, after she sent the camera guy off to go capture more footage of bands onstage, she said, “Dani, if you don’t mind, I’d love to do a solo interview with you.”
“Yeah. You said that before.”
“No, this is different. I have a ‘Bad Ass Women in Rock’ series that you’d be perfect for. I’m a little overdue for a new installment.”
Holy shit. I’d have to check it out. I wondered if she had older rockers like Lita Ford and Joan Jett or if her series focused on contemporary women, like Maria Brink, Valerie Quinn, Taylor Momsen, Kyle Summers, and the like.
Because I loved being part of this small group, I knew I’d have to dive into the whole series.
“I’d love that.”
“How about later today?”
I glanced at the guys and Zack said, “I don’t see why not. We’re here till tomorrow morning.”
“Perfect!” Roxy gave me her cell number, so I gave her mine, and she said she’d text me later when she had some free time. “I’m pretty much married to this festival till the gates close tomorrow night, but I think I could sneak out for a quick bite.”
And thus began my friendship with Roxanne French, AKA Roxy of Ferocity fame.