BYZON + VOR

History of the band from Bill:

 

 "I  met Keith and Ben in the Fall of 1985.  We created Byzon (your Dad was not in band at this point) and played for a little while with another guitarist.   He was not working out. We needed to find another guitar player and Keith knew your Dad and recommended him. He met us to practice a few times and that was it. He was perfect.   Once your Dad joined things started to move quickly and we got a lot better.Most of the music we were playing were originals by the keyboard player Ben. .

 

The following Fall (fall of 86) we played in a Fredonia Battle of the Bands and won that.  It was sponsored by Energizer batteries and called the Energizer Rock n Roll challenge.   So we kept winning contests and made it to the national finals at Villanova University.  We came in third and won I believe $2,000.   We used that money to pay for a house rental in Rochester that following summer (summer of 87).   We practiced every day and just played clubs in upstate NY.  By the end of that summer we decided that it was time for Ben to move on. Your dad and I had one year of school left. Keith had graduated but came back and lived in Fredonia to keep band going. We needed to find a singer and a keyboard player as Ben did both. We eventually found two women to join.  Keyboard player and a singer. It was basically a disaster.   It was not the same. After graduation the plan was to move to Rochester for one year and paint houses for money. (Your dad and I.) Keith went home and got a job at a studio in NYC.  Your dad and I had a house rented in Rochester, kept writing songs and one year later, moved to NJ/NYC to join up with Keith and find a singer and keyboard player.   A long search finally found us Bill Barnes.  He ended up the singer in VOR.  We spent about 6 months in Keith’s studio after work  hours working on a four song demo. We finally finished it and started to shop it around.   Nirvana was getting big at this point.  Labels were not signing bands like us and wanted alt bands like Nirvana instead.   After a few months, it became clear that Keith was no longer interested in continuing so we kicked him out. Bill, your dad and I continued to do acoustic shows at the Bitter End on Bleecker Street. "We played local clubs in town at that time with Ben. One night we had a show downtown and when we got there, the line was down around the block of people waiting to get in to see us. Very cool.  Touring clubs in upstate NY was awesome.   The Bitter End shows were great."

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Bill asked to specially include that whenever the four of them would go out on weekends, one bar would always play Peter Gabriels "Solsbury Hill" the moment they walked in because of their love for the song!