The 3 amigos are together again.

Around '83 I was running lights for a local band(35th reunion in the works). That summer one of our buddies, Tim, was maintenance man at Stowe Vt High School, about 40 miles from here. We saw Tim a few times that summer and everytime he'd tell us Deep Purple was getting back together, were rehersing/recording in Stowe and he'd let them in to the HS everyday at 2(?) to play soccer. To top it off he always tried to get us to get a team together to play DP, because they were looking for anyone to play. None of us were soccer players, but he said they didn't care, they just wanted more people. Of course we told Tim he was full of it and laughed anytime he mentioned DP. The liner notes in Perfect Strangers thanks Stowe HS for letting them play soccer everyday, the video was filmed all around Stowe....

Around the same time as the DP thing was going on, one of the bands on the same northern Vermont bar circuit as ours was a band called MegaForce. They used to be known as Bad Habit, but then changed their name when they added a lead singer by the name of Joey Belladonna. He used to lose his voice a couple of times a night singing Journey & Boston songs. We hung with those guys for about a couple of years, often times going to see each others band or playing in adjacent towns. Finally, one night I showed up to a local club, didn't see Joey and asked Tommy the lightman where he was. "He joined Anthrax about 6 months ago". I already had Spreading the Diesase, I just didn't pay attention and no doubt would have thought it was a different Joey Belladonna. Fast forward 20+ years and my son's band is loading in to play the Webster Theather in Hartford, CT for the first time, who's poster is on the wall as the band who played the previous night, Joey Belladonna.