One of the best things that can be experienced, in my opinion, is being young and in a new band.  There is an excitement and a belief that you can be the biggest band in the world.  I tend to be very cynical in nature, but as the new Fall semester at TFC started I was excited.  School was still a drag, but rock and roll was not.  I think that as the Luxury mythology has grown, the idea that we were just a loud rock band has been lost.  Too bad.

  Anyway, we started the new semester rehearsing in what was then the Recital Hall.  Increasingly, roadblocks were put up to prevent that from happening.  The building would be locked as it had not been before, then there was a sign up list posted to use the building, then you could only do so if you were a part of the School of Music.  We moved into the old science building. A flat steel building.  It was old because the school had unceremoniously dropped a new building in the middle of student parking.  At this point we were still a five piece.  Dave and Jamey on guitar.  Chris and myself, and Lee desparately trying to be heard over the top of the white noise we created.  It wasn't until many years later that I realized why we played so loudly.  It was because the drummer had absolutley no restraint and everyone had to turn up just to be heard.  I loved it then.  I miss it now.  The ringing in my ears is a little annoying on occasion.

  There was one problem.  We were not really "gelling" (for lack of a better term) as a band.  Jamey and Dave's styles did not jive in the manner that I had envisioned.  It was sort of a strange time as we worked through this.  Working on new songs became difficult, we had a handful that were developing.  I hate to admit it but we did play Bullet The Blue Sky.  I loved the drum riff.  We were never a great cover band though.

  Jamey was becoming disenfranchised with the whole thing.  It was not immediately apparent to me.  It probably should have been.  I have this picture of Jamey during a rehearsal in that steel building - leaning against the wall with his guitar, just sort of hanging his head.  It is a sad thing for me to think that I did not pick up on this.  However . . .

 We were asked to play at the school's talent show.  I don't think that any of us were certain about doing it, but we were sort of coaxed into doing it. Dave was unable to make it. So, we found ourselves in the gym (gymnatorium? what a great hybrid of words) performing for those brave or generally bored souls sitting in the bleachers.  We were introduced as the Shroud - no big story; we couldn't come up w/ anything better at the time and it stuck - we had this sort of quiet opening before going into the same song that I watched Flag Day perform.  The response was very positive and an encore was called for.  We had few songs to choose from that were really tight and we had already pretty much rocked - so we launched in to a song called "sleeper".  This was our big rock song.  Loud, noisy, raucous - all the good ingredients.  I loved playing it.  Apparently, not everyone enjoyed hearing it.  I looked up and noticed the campus pastor rapidly heading for the door w/ a look of disgust on his face.  The person who had asked us to play had suddenly become very nervous and was concerned about getting into trouble.

  Shortly after this debacle, I was calling around for rehearsal.  Jamey said that he was thinking about starting something else.  He wanted to have more of a role in the band.  He wanted to be the main guitar player, I think.  Not an ego thing, just a preference (?).  I talked w/ him a while and managed to get him to hang around a bit longer.  When I called Dave, the first thing he said was, "I want out".  Problem solved.