Wang Chung's ?Dance Hall Days? plays to introduce the segment.
Aurast: Hello, Rewind Faithful. Aurast Dagger Sasc here from the Rewind Headquarters! Which is a room in Seiri?s Adenna home for those of you that didn?t know.
Aurast: Now, some of you may be wondering who I am, and that's understandable. I have been off the dueling radars for many a blip. But I'm sure many of you will remember me as the winner of last year's prestigious Madness tournament. It's not a card I like playing every day, but if it'll hurry the plot along? Super Mario ?TIME?S UP!? sound effect.
Aurast: Hahah, I could get used to this. I'm so tempted to scramble all their levels and settings on the soundboard as a gag, but having seen how long it takes to ?EQ? everything just right at our own recording studio, that's far too cruel a prank even for my tastes. Anyway, some of you may also be wondering: where's my usual volatile twosome? Where's Seiri? Where's Harris? What am I doing here, and how much chloroform did I use on them? Shock revelation sound effect.
Aurast: Well, to answer the most burning of those questions, I am here today to announce the important release date of my band Shoe Slam's debut studio record! ?Friends For Hire!? PRE-ORDER NOW!!! It just takes a name and address and any one of our acceptable methods of payment.
Aurast: So exciting. And to bring this news to you, I have had to infiltrate the home studio of RhyDin's most vulgar talk show duo under the pretense of breakfast, slip past their toddler and babysitting security, and lastly crack the code on their complex radio-recording equipment. All of this was considerably easier than I?m making it sound by the way, but don't let it go allowing you to think you could do it too. I've got some noteworthy advantages over you in the secret agent biz. For example, I'm ?family,? and you can't go any deeper undercover than that.
Aurast: I never thought I'd be saying it, but it's sure good being back in Adenna. I had almost forgotten how relaxing it was. If you can clear the time to come visit, I suggest that you do so. I'm only back home this week to catch up with friends and family like Seiri and the brother and the kids and such; to pass out and sell as many copies of my record as I can, and to have a few dinners and get my fill of dragon's meat before I have to go back to Penrith, which by the way, if you haven't had dragon before, then what the hell is wrong with you? Get your a** to your nearest bbq dragon grill and order yourself some dragon ribs for crying out loud. Have a dragon steak. Hell, have some peppered dragon strips or a grilled dragon tail! For real, you're being unfair to your mouth.
Aurast: There are so many luxuries here. Well, luxury's not really the right word. Dragon meat is more... decadent. That's the word. There are so many ?decadencies? here. I'm speaking purely about the cuisine, mind you. But in all seriousness, you should book a room at the Slipkey for at least a weekender. You can take my word for it: you won't regret it. Tourist travel has really opened up over the years. Don't come expecting a suntan, but do bring your bathing suit. It's worth spending the night, that's for sure.
Aurast: Feels weird being the only one talking. I love a radio show flown by a single pilot as much as the next person. I listen to plenty of shows like that; podcasts and things. But it just feels like there should be someone sitting across from me at the empty microphone. It just isn't the same RhyDin Rewind, is it? It would have been nice to get someone from my band here with me, but sadly it didn't work out that way this time. Oh well. We'll be fine. My voice is more than equipped to entertain you all on your commutes or whatever has you tuning in this morning. My brother Havelast has this gift as well. It's just that Dagger Sasc depth, you know, always taking full advantage of all your playback devices' bass properties.
Aurast: But this wouldn't be radio if we didn't talk about music, right? You want to know if Shoe Slam's your cup of tea or not, and I want to help you. Right then, so let's talk about this new album of mine and why this amazing piece of work needs to be added to your personal music library.
Aurast: I should break down what's in our DNA before we get in too deeply. We're rooted in rock or alternative rock, and we're more pop than hard or heavy. We have flavors and elements from various styles, but what Jodi, Casey, and Rioz, our guitarist, all bring to the band balances us from tipping in the direction of any one genre.
Aurast: First off, I hate categorizing bands, especially today's bands, in genres. Bands are often such a talented, diverse group of musicians that can cover so many ranges. They should be, anyway. At least that's what I was taught. I know you might argue with me that that's not the case, but understand, I'm talking about real bands. The ones that it up that you're thinking about right now? To argue with me? I'm not counting those. I'm not counting the heartthrob in his late teens who releases a new love song on his acoustic guitar online every month from his balcony. Those aren't real bands. They're good-looking noises, and trust me people, they're fleeting. A band needs to be able to go to shows. A band needs to be something you can be proud of.
Aurast: I'm very proud of this band. I held off doing anything with the Shoe Slam brand because I knew I wanted it to be huge if it was going to be anything, and I didn't want to mess it up whenever I made my move. I was pretty much waiting for the perfect storm of musicians. We've had that for a while now. Two girls, two guys, it turned out, and apart from looking for a rhythm guitarist for touring, we are more or less... whole. But don't let my silver tongue sell you. Decide for yourself with this radio edit sample of one of our singles, ?Let's Face It.?
Aurast: You know... about two years ago, in August I believe, I began writing the first drafts of what would become some of the earliest songs on the album. The first member I officially recruited for Shoe Slam was our vocals, Casey Nicholson.
Aurast: Casey's a friend of mine from school and a long-time member of the church choir, so she's been singing since... youth group, I'd say. Now those days may be a thing of the past given her sacrilegious affinity to taking ?artistic nude? photographs of herself and posting them online, but fortunately, her voice never diminished any from her days in service to the lord.
Aurast: I personally heard it for the first time driving her home from a club because she had one too many drinks and needed a ride, and all of a sudden she started singing along with this song on the radio. I probably took my eyes off the road way longer than I should have when she did that, but luckily there wasn't much traffic out at 1 AM. I remember when I got home and lied in bed that night, I started thinking I might have found a singer, and I think I brought up the idea to her the very next day.
Aurast: Sure enough, she liked what she heard and started pouring her time into the project with me. Before Casey came along, I was just filling up a notebook with more and more music that I was probably never going to do anything with. It took her to get me actively trying to make the band happen, so I'm pretty indebted to her for that.
Aurast: When we were in mixing, one of the music guys who ended up signing us was able to tell her vocal range and he said she's a... c-something... mezzo-soprano. I remember him saying mezzo-soprano. Anyway, turns out her range was tailor-made for our band's needs. I knew I couldn't leave that just sitting on the table, because if some other band didn't snatch her up, then life was sure going to.
Aurast: Over much of last year, me and Casey worked on a lot of the material that made it onto the album, and in that time we managed to find our remaining two bandmates through a painfully long audition process that would fluctuate from long and dry weeks of not much of anything to suddenly ?that's him,? or ?her? in our drummer Jodi's case.
Aurast: You can't jam without a drummer. At least that's my opinion. So that was the role we sought to fill next. There's a dive bar I like to go to in Penrith to hear live bands play at called the Upper Room, and there's a hiring board next to the chalk one that has all the drink menus on it. That's where we found musicians for hire, and that's where we found Jodi Alaskey.
Aurast: Jodi's our Flea. For those of you that don't know, Flea is the bassist for the Earth band, Red Hot Chili Peppers, a really good band, and he has a tendency for playing naked or largely unclothed on stage a lot. Jodi's not the bassist, but everything else is the same. She is not often found in the occupancy of clothing. I'm not calling her a nudist or anything. She does wear clothes, just not as much of them as you or I might. So the more you get to know her, the more you start seeing her walking around in a half shirt or bathing suit top, which is understandable for Penrith weather as well. And of course if you ask anyone in the band or who has been to one of our shows, she wears little more than shorts when she's behind the drums. I won't say it's not eye-catching.
Aurast: I really like that about our live experience. I'm sure a lot of people come just to see some skin, but that's okay cause we're getting a percentage from their attendance. Snickering... We don't have the kind of budget for sets or puppetry or props to make them come, so I'm okay with selling some sex appeal.
Aurast: It'd be fun to experiment with stuff like that on down the road like mascots in big costumes, shooting the crowd with waterguns or something, or maybe doing crazier things. Like for example, I saw this famous band from Earth on the internet one night that was playing live in-front of thousands and thousands of people, and they had these drying machines running off to the side, and whenever they finished their cycle, they opened them up and threw out the t-shirts that had been drying inside while they were playing, so they weren't JUST shirts like the ones you buy outside or at the door... They had been a part of the show, you know? I just thought that was really cool.
Aurast: We don't have anything like that planned at the moment, but like to do something like that one day, but until then, it's good to know we're still unique enough to see perform live if for no other reason than because our drummer plays almost naked. There's even a lot of entertaining theories out there that are building some steam online that I've read and really gotten a kick out of; like people thinking 'oh, she must tape her hair to her breasts so no one sees them' or something because they can't see them clearly when she's drumming. Yes, I'm sure that's the reason and not because they're legitimately hard to see clearly when she's drumming. I could find a video in ten seconds of one of our shows with her boobs in them... because it's that easy, and not because I've searched before... Moving on.
Aurast: Our guitarist was the hardest to find, because it was the most important role to fill, at least to me. Some would argue it's the singer, but there's one sound I think is crucial when it comes to a rock band, and that's the guitar. I brought a lot of... desire to the sound of Shoe Slam on the bass already, and I was going to need a really good guitarist to complement both me and the gravitas to a lot of our songs, and especially live, cause you're not a band at all if you can't perform live. Period.
Aurast: A guy named Rioz had left a resume up on the board at the bar with just a phone number on it and something like 'can play guitar.' No last name, and Rioz isn't likely his real name, but I didn't care so long as he was good. Well, after setting up a meet to talk about the band, we chatted a little while, he liked what I had to say, he plugged up, and we liked what we heard. The rest was history.
Aurast: He's played guitar in a lot of other bands, so we were a little intimidated to get someone experienced whereas we were all new to the whole band thing. I don't know how we got him, but I think... I THINK... he liked what we wanted to sound like. Chuckling... We didn't have much for him to sample when we first met him, but he must have liked something! There's that, and I think he maybe hopes we get heavier later on so he can realize some of his technical potential with glorified and extended solos and whatnot.
Aurast: We don't have plans to change direction like that anytime soon. We don't have plans to next album anyway, but we'll keep that door open. We're still trying to cement an iconic sound to the band that makes you go 'yeah, that's Shoe Slam.' It's inevitable we'll do some exploring at some point, but for what I think he wants to do, we'd need to get a hell of a lot more technical, mainly me and Jodi, because his method and theory and what have you is there already. He's an extremely overqualified guitarist and we're lucky that we got him.
Aurast: That about does it for my runthrough of this musical venture I've been on these last few years. I probably should stop broadcasting before I'm found out or cause any lasting damage. I will say if you've been listening though to please consider buying the album and supporting us.
Aurast: If you liked what you've heard, either the sample or my story that led a couple of hungry musicians to this crucial do-or-die point, then please think about picking up a copy of the record for yourself. We all worked really hard on it for like two years, and it comes with a RhyDin Tour T-shirt and a 20+ page autographed booklet signed by all the band members! How cool is that?!
Aurast: Gasp! I hear a patrol approaching. Security alarm sound effect.
Aurast: That's it from me, guys! Time to channel my inner Solid Snake and make my great escape. I don't have my tranquilizer gun on me at the moment, but there's more than one pile of clothes lying around here to stuff a body into. Thanks for tuning in to RhyDin Rewind!
The segment ends with a commercial for Time Travel Marriage Counseling.
