Back in 2008 I spent a lot of time on Last.fm, looking for ‘related artists’ to Forever The Sickest Kids, Fight Fair, ADTR, and p much any other band who looked like they might have some combination of neon, poppy choruses, breakdowns and keyboards. One of the better bands I found this way was FAREWELL, specifically their 2008 album “Isn’t This Supposed To Be Fun?”
It seemed like there was a pretty sweet ‘neon pop’ scene in North Carolina back then, with Farewell, Mercy Mercedes, Dear Noel, and a few other bands I can’t think of right now, but they all p much disappeared in 2009 from what I can tell. I could do some googling, but instead I will turn to you, the readers: what’s up with FAREWELL? Did they break up, turn into a garage rock band, or just quietly fizzle because the dude who wrote all the songs went to college??
And in case you slept on this band, here are some choice tracks:
Not really sure what “First One On The Blog” is about, but I assume it is about how da haters on teh internet should stfu because they don’t understand how hard it is 2 be in a band and they should get a lief because they are loosers!!
This song is called “Darling Darlene,” which is a whiteknightcore anthem about how he is a sailor and wood defend her from waves and krakens or whatever. P gay but I liek it anyway :(
“Cut You A New Smile” is probably the best song on the album. No clue what it’s about, but seems likely that it also has something to do with haterz?? Very heartfelt lyrics in any case *single_tear.gif*
Given that it’s called “Hey Heather,” I assume this song is an embarrassing ode to some girl who friendzoned whoever wrote this song. Sad 4 his dignity, but song is p awesome if you ignore the lyrics!
They put out an album in 2009 that wasn’t as good, this being the only track I really like despite the embarrassing lyrics which are basically the same thing as “Sk8r Boi.” It’s about how u thought all the nerds and outcasts in high school were losers but the jake’s on u because now they are rly happy and famous and they have amazing lives and *U* are the real looser!!!
Great album, got it in a box somewhere. Eighty-Eight’s is still a major jam.
And Dear Noel isn’t from North Carolina, those dude live like a town over from me in Indiana. Seen ‘em like fifty times, friends with em on facebook and shit.
Do you have any of their later songs?? All i have is some random myspace rips from 2009, which i loved. Singer had a great voice.
I have their 2007 EP and their 2010 one, both are pretty great, the second one is more fun, first is probably better. I think there was a third one I never got, but the singer is a beast, in a ‘rock’ band now I never listened to:
https://www.facebook.com/theprowlrock
Oh man, these guys! They are from the same city where I went to college, and while I never saw them, I’d always hear about them playing gigs around town. Essentially, they were pretty much the pet band for my at-the-time tr00 faggot/neo skramz friends to make fun of, although I think some sour grapes may have secretly been involved, as they, amongst all the ‘real’ local bands in Greensboro, were the one signed to a major independent (Epitath).
Although I never followed them too closely, it’s safe to say that most of those bands just frittered away into nothing after they realized that getting rich off of this music anymore would be like trying to draw blood from a stone. One day, they seemed to be playing every other week, and then a year later, and you don’t see their names anywhere (except maybe in the discount rack at the local music store).
Neon/Scene was fairly strong in Greensboro for a while, and most of those kinds of bands (as well as all related metalcore) acts played regularly at the Greene Street Club (a venue predictably reviled by the Greensboro “DIY Hardcore” scene…except when Earth Crisis played there). The venue still gets a lot of metalcore coming through (you may recall the “Cowboy Hemphill/Chelsea Grin Incident”, which took place at the Greene Street a few months back), and I was delighted/aghast to find that apparently, Greensboro is a hotbed for little scene holdovers as well, as evidenced by the surprisingly decent turnout for the BOTDF/BC13/Deuce show I was at last month.
Why am i not surprised that you have encyclopedic knowledge of thos band and their contemporaries
I saw them once, singer sounded totally different, not bad tho, so it was just kind of weird and I had to look up whether or not they replaced him. Powerspace/Asteria/Bayside/Monty Are I show, was totally dope. Guy from Dear Noel was in the crowd and made fun of me for breaking those merch rules I posted about.
Ah Farewell, def used to listen to that first album a lot when it came out. I agree with Save Parker, 88′s was my jam as well. But that band was shady.
They apparently sucked at writing any good songs for their follow up album. So their producer Mark McClusky sold them a bunch of songs from his old band “In Stereo” who were from Atlanta.
I met one of the orig. guitarists who told me how they kicked him out because they were all oldfags and Epitaph wanted at least one young dude in the band. So they replaced him with that kid in the Braves hat.
For the longest time, me and one of my bros were convinced that the singer’s hair was a wig because you could not find any kind of photo/video of him without that black hat on. The same guy who was kicked out showed my bro and I this photo of him without the hat. Real hair, he just had a massive as fuck bald spot and he was too embarrassed to be seen without that hat. Lolz.
damn dude! lol @ the bald spot thing!! do you know how they went about writing the first album? like, if it was cheated?
this band meant soooo much to me dude. i first heard them 4 years ago when i was 16, when i was stealing my dads car to go chase the “girl of my dreams”. lulz. NOSTALGIC AS FUCK BRO!
after i heard the new record i was like, straight up shot down. i thought it was gonna be awesome as fuck but it turned out totally lame. not a single song was good, not one. i read an interview they had about the new album and they were talking about how they took a more ‘green day’ direction to it, and i thought ‘man, i hope it isn’t lame as fuck’. it’s too bad they talked out of their ass on that one, since they bought the effing songs. i could’ve sworn anything that these guys had full potential :/
dude same I was 16 four years ago and I listened to it on repeat its pretty rare when I like every song on an album
I was even following a blog they had about the recording progress of that secound album, I realy tried to like it but it just sucks
I can’t wait for fun to be popular again so that this kind of band make money and hire a good producer that makes up for their inabality to compose/play music
idk I haven’t speak english in a while I hope this sentence makes sense
I had to copy/paste “the jake’s on u” because I thought maybe the italics were playing tricks on my seeing balls but they weren’t and holy shit is that ever an advanced phrase. Need to start jocking that.
They are still together actually. They have a new album coming out this winter supposedly that they are working on in between playing sporadic shows throughout NC. I miss that whole scene. It was fun and had a bunch of really chill dudes in it. Unlike our (I live in NC) current scene which is full of a bunch of kids who try to one up each other constantly and shit talk each other to promoters to try to get shows. Its so bad my band started playing shows in VA instead just to avoid the fucking drama. We just wanna show up drink some beers and play shitty metalcore/hardcore.
Which current scene are you referring to? 80s hardcore revival/neo power violence? Scum Rock? Metalcore/metal bands with singers that make “epic” hand gestures? DIY Anarcho-Communist Post Rock? Moshcore? It is important to specify, as our state is a hotbed for alternative youth subcultures and underground rock music.
Any of them cause the bands in them aren’t any good really. They just ape their favorite bands ad nauseum.
They are friends of mine. They no longer all live in the same town and are probably done all together.
One of the members got cancer, but he’s all better and they’re writing a new record.
duuuuude
yess
that first album WAS in fact sick