reviews
"He’s Done It All" Jaimie Kastner, Toronto Sun
Sebastian Agnello, mild-mannered C&W sideman-about-town, is poised to transfigure into his reaction-spewing, Fender-thrashing, real-life Bob Roberts-on-grunge alter -ego Sebastian.
“All the music we do is politically motivated,” he says, long hair tucked behind his ears, skeptical eyes aglow, in the basement-cum-studio of his East End home. He’s wearing knee-high Doc Martens and a Ministry “Jesus Built My Hotrod T-shirt. “This is my country look.”
“Seb” has spent 30 years plying club goers with everything from punk to country, bubblegum to politics, “Cornflakes and Ice Cream” to ” Pasta and Vendettas”, his upcoming seventh indie album.
The maverick musician’s rap sheet includes:
* A No. 1 hit on CHUM-AM at the age of 14- The Lords Of London’s “Cornflakes and Ice Cream”: “It was pure bubblegum, still, not bad for a bunch of fourteen year olds.”
* Opening for Jimi Hendrix at Maple Leaf Gardens: “It wasn’t bad; I always preferred Jeff Beck myself.”
* Opening for Frank Zappa and The Mothers Of Invention at the Rockpile: “I spent the whole night filling the drummer’s milkshake container with beer and staring at his bass drum – and even that might’ve been an hallucination.”
* Helping nurture Blue Rodeo’s original rhythm section in the early “80s band “SCAB”.
Through it all–including solo musical rants like White Liberals On Reggae, Stop Picking On America, and the country album Full Moon And Welfare Cheques–Seb’s maintained his working–musician’s cool.
“My band Spuff opened up for Hendrix at the Gardens in ’69, the night he got busted at the Toronto airport. He was late for the show. We just did drugs and played a longer set–we were big acid freaks.”
Although life since hasn’t all been a bowl of Hendrixes and Zappas, Seb is among the few who can claim he’s “only ever worked as a musician–never had a day job.”
In the ’70s, he shifted into the playing pattern that has financed six independent albums and created his Turtle Shell Music label.
He plays country to finance his more original forays, which, musically, absorb everything from Phil Ochs to the Dead Kennedys plus any grunge fallout since.
“Anybody who knows how to play two chords in this town can make a living.”
“And when I’m not working, I’m out jamming in the bars for free. I love to play.”
"The Sebastian" By Gary 17, TO-Nite Magazine
He gave a CD release party and nobody came. “Not even me,” Sebastian Agnello quipped about the release of his latest album, a 12-tune sampling of the incisive mind and flawless music of this veteran Protest Rock/Country songwriter who hasn’t mellowed at all with age.
“I was busy gigging at some watering hole or something,” he joked as he explained how he’s not bothering at all with traditional record retail outlets or press campaigns to get the self-produced disc into the hands of his many fans and many more potential new ones. It’s orderable on the internet and buyable, for just $10, at his gigs and that’s it. “I’ve had it with playing the media/industry game,” he says.
While he’s far from been ignored by the local press — Daryl Jung of NOW and other admirers at the Sun and Star have written him up over the years — he’s nevertheless not only not a household name, he’s also vastly under-appreciated by the local and Canadian — the provincially minded — professional musical establishment.
“Seb” as he’s known to his buddies (though he’s listed as “The Sebastian” in the online Canadian Music Encyclopedia site that’s part of the canoe.com network) is one of a kind, a songwriter in the mould of Phil Ochs and commentator of the same sensibilities of Lenny Bruce who’s what Iggy Pop could’ve been if he’d stayed musical, David Bowie if he’d stayed angry, or Bob Dylan if he’d not lost his identity to the spiritual sinkhole of celebrity icon hood.
Relentlessly poking his lyrical fingers in the eyes of lay bouts, leftists, money-grubbing Capitalists, music biz poseurs, bad lovers, hypocrites and hierophants of all creeds and scenes, Agnello also manages to make his rants fun by putting them over a musical mix that’s derived from the same sources as those of Blue Rodeo, Bruce Springsteen — people who know how to rock it out while still letting you hear the words. It is not Pop music — but it’s what Pop should worship.
TO-Nite Magazine, Issue 158, Nov. 1999
SOCIALIST YUPPIES BEWARE! "No one escapes Sebastian’s wit"
Funny how some folks will line up for hours, pay huge amount of hard-earned cash and sit in a football stadium to see a rock show. Dammit, there are some fine practitioners of the art right in our own backyard.
Case in point? Well, a couple of weeks ago, a few of us brave New Edition staffers ventured into the upper reaches of the Hotel Isabella. What we discovered was a guy who’s been cranking out his own brand of social commentary, liberally laced with both black humour and really fine guitar work.
Sebastian, our musical find in question, is really no new discovery at all. Having played around Toronto for years, however, he is now making a foray into the world of indie records with the release of a single called “No Compromise”.
That song title pretty much sums up Sebastian’s musical approach. His songs, more than slightly satirical in nature, take shots at just about every type of hypocrisy that he can discern in today’s society. Proponents of nuclear weapons come under the same scathing scrutiny as middle-class yuppies who drive BMW’s but vote NDP and attend peace rallies because they have “liberal” attitudes. Strong words, many of them, but ones that should probably be heard more often; infused with Sebastian’s dry humour, the songs turn his ideological opponents into the subjects of scorn quite effectively, and often hilariously.
On a serious note, the man is a guitarist to be reckoned with. Displaying a fluid style that is deftly complemented by the backing drums and bass, Sebastian weaves a musical trail through the weirdness of North America in the 1980’s. Is he part of that eccentricity himself? You be the judge- the B side of “No Compromise” is called “Stop Picking On America”.
Roger Elliot, The New Edition
S.C.A.B @ The Headspace
…..then S.C.A.B. came out. I must admit that this band was the most bizarre thing I have seen in awhile. A powerful trio with the guitarist, Sebastian, handling vocals. S.C.A.B. proved to be more than just another band. The guitarist went on at great length with juicy political diatribes before and during each tune. Some of the audience was impressed while others heckled “…get on with it”. The music was something else altogether. I could assemble several analogies: such as Kim Mitchell meets Crass or Toronto’s only Jazz Anarchist ensemble (maybe polkaholics too? …ed). At times the lyrics are so poignant and witty that I thought Tom Lerher had gone punk. At other times the politicization was overdone and tedious. However if I had to choose between mindless generic “I hate Reagan” thrash or intelligent, and provocative material like Sebastian’s then I’m afraid I’d take the latter,…S.C.A.B. has an idea of what they’re doing when they circle the “A” in their name…catch ’em.
Vacuum, Black Triangle
"Sebastian Stops Picking"
Singer/songwriter/guitarist and basic scamp Sebastian will be celebrating the release of his latest single at a bash at the Hotel Isabella this Saturday (Oct. 16). The single, “No Compromise”, is backed up by a tune called “Stop Picking On America”- a song that will likely generate its full share of controversy, especially here and now, what with free trade, the contra-gate affair and Robert Bork. The record will be released on the U.S. indie label Coral Records, thanks to Coral producer Andrew Camp, who heard a rendition of the tunes while working with Sebastian on a recording session for another artist. Camp felt the songs had commercial potential and helped fund the recording and production of the disc.
Calling Sebastian a “good all round songwriter”, Camp says he likes the songs for their overall quality and natural appeal. “I’ve since heard a lot of Sebastian’s earlier material and “No Compromise” struck me as a good rock tune that wasn’t as absolutely politically defined as most of his other work”.
Camp says that this fact helped determine that “No Compromise” would be the A side of the single and that “Stop Picking On America” would wind up on the flip. “I hope that “No Compromise” doesn’t get overshadowed by the more obvious controversy of “Stop Picking,” he says, “because it’s a very strong song and deserves to be heard.”
As to whether “Picking” is merely a tongue-in-cheek satire or a dead ahead pro-American anthem, Camp seems sincerely unsure. “I know that Seb believes in being outrageously radical and that in some places this song is gonna stick out a mile. He’s a shit-disturber and he likes to kick it up anyplace he can so I really can’t say exactly what he means by it.”
“I’m American born myself and I certainly don’t agree with many of the policies put forward by the American government. But there are some things about America that make it a great country. Mostly, I’m not that politically-minded- but I’m commercially minded as hell and I think his record will do well for us.”
Sebastian, who referred inquiries about the new record to Camp, will be whooping it up at the Izzy on Saturaday and will presumably be available for direct comment at that time. Show starts at 10 pm.
James Marck, Now Magazine
Diane Wells’ CD Reviews
SEBASTIAN AGNELLO – A MUSIC LEGEND AT 50 COLLECTIVE CD REVIEW
As avant-garde Toronto singer-songwriter-musician Sebastian Agnello will be celebrating his 50th birthday on Saturday, October 26/02, I felt it appropriate to offer a toast to a man who “loves to play”.
With his latest release as a solo artist (Modern Day Cowboy), released in 2001, Sebastian Agnello (or Seb as he’s more informally known) resurrects his music project known as “Sebastian Country”. His long and illustrious career was launched in 1966 by a #1 pop song on Toronto’s CHUM-AM (“Cornflakes & Ice Cream”), recorded with The Lords of London when he was a mere 14 years old.
Several years later (summer of ’69?), at Toronto’s Maple Leaf Gardens, Seb’s band Spuff would be put in the unenviable (but far from unmanageable) position of stalling a crowd that was anxiously awaiting the arrival of Jimi Hendrix, who had been detained at the airport due to a drug bust. Seb also opened for Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Inventions at the Rockpile, although in which band formation is unknown.
Sebastian Country appears to have been conceived circa 1985, following a stint with a band known as SCAB, which would eventually branch off into an early version of Blue Rodeo. Seb, along with doing lead vocals, plays guitar and piano on the début album, Full Moon & Welfare Cheques. The rather amusing “Canadian-content” title track was composed by guitar prodigy Tony Quarrington. Surprisingly, Tony did not perform on this CD but has since become a highly accomplished and respected guitar player in his own right in addition to recording and playing live with psychedelic pholk guitarist Brian Gladstone.
Happily, Full Moon & Welfare Cheques also contains six memorable tracks written by Seb, including the Nashville country-swinger, “I’m Country” (on which he admits “I might look like a city punk, but I’m country”) and “Play Your Cheating Heart”. There are a couple of upbeat hoedowners, including “I Love Robbing Banks” (Clark/Coe) and “Going Down to Texas” (Silverstein).
Along with a couple of endearingly political CDs issued in 1998 under his first name, Sebastian (White Liberals on Reggae – no doubt inspired by Ian Dury’s White Punks on Dope – and Queen St. Left – This is a Protest Album), he re-released Full Moon & Welfare Cheques on CD as well.
Sandwiched in between those releases and 2001’s Modern Day Cowboy was 1999’s While Baby Sleeps, my favourite,
after White Liberals on Reggae, which contains numerous rock’n’rebel rotations. This collection of rock/funk-oriented originals is exciting and thought-provoking and speaks to deception, independence, illiteracy, barroom blues, political buffoonery, vicarious glamour, and illusory (suicidal) flights to freedom (“Lonesome Road”, which is oddly phrased but tremendously compelling at the same time). Seb also makes a connection between poverty/starvation and juvenile delinquency very poignantly in “Boys in the Alley” and provides some excellent lead guitar here as well as on the marvelous ensuing track, “A.O.T.A. (All of the Above)”. As a matter of fact, Seb provides ALL the instrumentation and vocals. The sound was mixed by Wayne Berge and mastered by Albert MacDonald.
“Modern Day Cowboy” (In Memory of Lyle Vallentyne) sees the return of Mickey Andrews on steel guitar (if only on “The Jogger”); he contributed more thoroughly on pedal steel guitar on Full Moon and Welfare Cheques, but that duty has been given over to the equally talented Dennis Conn here. Mike Elliott also guests on fiddle and Steve Petrie on steel guitar.
The title track, starting off similarly, and maybe deliberately, to Fleetwood Mac’s “Break the Chain”, is obviously a tribute to a man who respects and keeps the tradition of the wild and free “cowboy”, but who just coincidentally prefers to ride a motorbike rather than a horse.
“If I Had a Boat” is a weird, corny little ditty written by Lyle Lovett, but it’s kind of catchy, just the same. I didn’t care for “The Heart” (written by Kris Kristofferson), but the original version probably sounds totally different, as Mr. Kristofferson’s vocal approach has a much smoother flow to it.
I understand why Seb chooses to record cover versions of other well-known musicians, but he really does sound more natural and pleasant when he’s singing his own compositions. “Walkaway” is a perfect example, because rather than imitating another song/singer, he blends elements of both “Girl with the Faraway Eyes” and “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before” to create a brand-new classic song of his own.
“Heavy Metal” (Guy Clark, Jim McBride), “The Jogger” (Shel Silverstein) and even Bobby Darin’s
“Distractions Pt. 1” are just too Dukes of Hazzard for me, but I’m sure most of the male population of the world would relate to and immensely enjoy these tracks. The steel guitars are the only saving graces in them, where I’m concerned.
There was no way I could not like “Overtime”, a Seb original (with Mike Elliott on fiddle), and a welcome change of pace to a kind of swingy rhythm and blues. It actually sounds like it came from the same rhythmic mold as Black’n’Blues’ “Ugly As She Can Be”. It would have made for a better closing track, to sustain an overall positive impression of the CD.
“The Take It Easy Trailer Park” (Kinky Friedman, Van Dyke Parks) is another interesting tune, but it seems to lose something in the interpretation, with the instrumentation being kind of choppy.
“Northern Boy” (Randy Newman), another macho manifesto with a marching rhythm is Seb’s always-welcome patriotic nod to Canada, making specific reference to Ottawa and Saskatchewan. However, just as in the next tune “Alright Guy” (Todd Snider), Seb’s vocals tend to suffer when they are forced into the lower range, taking on an unpleasant “gruntiness” which isn’t really necessary, even with those male-oriented lyrics.
There’s no doubt in my mind that Sebastian Agnello is one the best lyrical composers in Canada. I find it very difficult to skip over the rare tracks where the instrumentation doesn’t appeal to me, because the lyrics are too powerful to miss!
"Still Sebastian"
Toronto singer/songwriter Sebastian Agnello, despite his enigmatic yet prolific career as everything from pop star to shit-disturber, remains a fairly well-kept secret. His most recent notoriety came from successful gigs as music director/back-up band for Kinky Friedman last fall at the Bamboo, but the last 15 years have seen other popular and commercial pinnacles.
Currently Sebastian’s main projects are Sebastian Country (which released an album on Cabbagetown Records called Full Moon & Welfare Cheques), a country fusion swing outfit; and SCAB, a hard rock political trio. As well, he works in the studio “seven days a week” with various country-western acts, does a lot of commercials, stays active as a protest/folk singer and is working on an acoustic solo album. He’s in at The Black Swan on Friday and Saturday for what seems an amalgam of it all.
“The Swan gigs will basically be a combination of everything I do,” he says. “We’re going to concentrate about three quarters of the show on SCAB material (Bazil Donovan handles bass, Jim Dumanski is on drums). I guess it’s punk, or something like that, but it’s very political and super-controversial. Musically speaking we’re all over the map – we do everything from sambas to funk. The rest of the show will be Sebastian Country material, for which we’ll bring on our harmonica player, Lance Bennett. So that part of the show will be country music, only played by SCAB plus Lance.”
Before these priorities, though (SCAB, a spin off project of The Sharks, was formed in 1981), Sebastian released three singles under his other country name, Patches, which saw country chart action Canada-wide, leading to tours with Grand Ole Opry legends Charlie Pride and Hank Snow, among others. Through it all he’s opted for politics over pop.
“I’ve been doing the protest stuff – so called Queen Street music – since the mid 60s when I was in a band called The Lords Of London, which was the biggest Canadian pop band at that time. We had a number one record on the CHUM AM charts in 1967, if you can believe it, but I quit that band at the height of its career just before we were to sign to do the Ed Sullivan show. We had a hit called “Cornflakes and Ice-Cream”, and did Upbeat in Cleveland, which was like Dick Clark, and Swing Time in Detroit, if you remember back that far. But I quit because it was too commercial – and to get more involved in politics and philosophy. Which I did by starting a new act called Spuff.”
Spuff ended up recording one album for Mainstream Records, at the same time that Janis Joplin and the Amboy Dukes were signed there. They did tour dates in Canada with the Mothers Of Invention and with Jimi Hendrix on his last tour – at the Gardens in Toronto.
Upcoming Sebastian gigs include 3 nights of Sebastian Country at The Horseshoe and a solo folk show, “all protest material” at the Free Times Café.
"Protest Songs Still Satisfy"
One phrase – “I ain’t a-marchin’ any more” – could sum up most of what a young local singer named Sebastian is surveying this week at The Hotel Isabella. He is presenting a history of protest songs from 1930 to 1980, a collection of heretical works whose common theme is the refusal to march to whatever beat was prevalent at the time. Ant-war, anti-authority, anti-business and anti anti-Communist, Sebastian’s tunes, culled from the works of Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs and others, are his reply to the ’70s, “the sell-out decade.”
At every other period in Sebastian’s research he found a minimum amount of commitment to some alternate philosophy. But when it came to the seventies he evidently had problems; only a slim diatribe by John Prine represents those years. It was not a hot decade for protest.
The 1930s, on the other hand, were a lot hotter than Sebastian let on in the early part of his show. It was a decade spitefully rich in dissent; Sebastian hinted at it with one of Guthrie’s wry tunes but missed the mark with two songs from Jimmie Rodgers. The only protest in the first. One of Rodger’s blue yodels, was a familiar one: “women make a fool out of me.” My condolences to Jimmie, but I was expecting a hard nip at the oil trust. The second, about a man named Bill Campbell, was simply realistic rather than polemical.
Through all of this Sebastian’s plain voice was adequate for a brand of material that requires only adequacy from a singer. Even with the extreme cold in the place slowing his fingers, his guitar-picking was clean and effective. Hardly charismatic, he was at least friendly, and he had a few words to say about each of the songs and their place in the tradition.
Later the tireless Pete Seeger was given his due in his pro-disarmament rewrite of Oh, What a Friend We Have In Jesus, which was not at all subtle but certainly contained the clearest message of the show. More of that would’ve been in order, but Sebastian confessed to skipping a few more Seeger songs – “because they’re too depressing” (2 days before Christmas)- in order to move to the pre-Vietnam era in Bob Dylan’s John Birch Society Blues, a biting little piece that required intuitive timing for the punch-lines. He socked them all in the right spots and received his best response from the crowd, which was by that time dressed for the outdoors to ward off the preposterous chill in the place.
The Vietnam War brought the upstarts out of the woodwork; Sebastian had the best of the war songs: Phil Och’s Draft Dodger Rag, Joe McDonald’s Fixin’ To Die Rag and Tom Paxton’s Talking Niet Nam Pot Luck Blues. Again, none of these required vocal calisthenics, so Sebastian’s plain delivery was satisfying; in his talking style there was an effortless, humourous inflection, and the sort of commonalty that made memorable the people whose songs he sang.
Paul McGrath The Globe And Mail
White Liberals On Reggae
A top notch songwriter and guitar virtuoso, Sebastian has long maintained a reputation for his no-bullshit, sometimes off-side, “politically incorrect” songs and his uncompromising satirical, often harsh and cynical world view. Never one to mingle with the glitzy, superficial, PR-generated side of the music business, he has always made his presence known through hard-hitting and intelligent political rock. Sebastian may offend some, disturb others, and delight the rest, but, he’s unfailing in his ability to make the listener think.”
As the title of this album might indicate, this album contains a fair amount of what might best be described as biting social comment. In fact, Sebastian Agnello lays about him with such vigour that few targets are left unscathed, from radio programmers and ego-bloated rock stars (No Names Please) to publicity-seeking peace demonstrators, “old men” in the White House and the Kremlin, violence in Zimbabwe and oppression in South Africa. Occasionally the songs are a little self-indulgent and the fact remains that outlining the problems (and the surrounding hypocrisy) doesn’t go a long way towards solving them. Except of course, to raise our consciousness.
Canadian Composer, (Socan)
"Protest Singer Attacks Hypocrisy"
Rock ‘n’ rollers who want to display their conscience are having an easy time of it in these late ’80s days: play a few benefits, look as if you mean it, and pay lip service to the broadest based and least controversial causes available. (After all, everybody in their right mind is against environmental destruction and starving Ethiopians.)
But veteran T.O. singer/songwriter/rocker and self-confessed “protest singer” Sebastian Agnello is obnoxious and pissed-off enough to rage against hypocrisy wherever he sees it. For his last few albums, he’s taken a “politically incorrect” stance by attacking the armchair-conscience folks who support easy causes with less-than-total commitment.
Sebastian protests against protesters. “Lorraine, Give Us A Break”, from his “This Is A Protest Album”, charged the renowned Queen Streeter with a “no-wars-if-women-ran-the-world” feminism that conveniently ignores the right wing antics of Maggie Thatcher and Indira Gandhi. He released a song called “Stop picking On America” at the height of the free trade controversy. His “White Liberals On Reggae” album skewers left-leaning sorts who ptotest peacefully while driving BMWs, or demonstrate in front of Litton Systems and then go home to the ol’ microwave.
“They’re hypocrites,” says Sebastian, “and that’s what bugs my ass. Not to say that I’m not hypocritical in my own way. But I’m not gonna be like Bruce Cockburn, who accepted Canadian aid money to fly to poor Nicaragua, a country that wont give their people a free vote.
“I wrote ‘Stop Picking On America’ in 1981. I was traveling through Europe and wherever I went, all these socialist groups were demonstrating. Hundreds of thousands of people all yelling, ‘down with America!’. These two American hitch hikers came over to me because they noticed I was wearing a Canadian pin and said, ‘they want to kill us!’ and tried to hide their US pins. The protestors were burning effigies and U.S. flags, and I got totally indignant.
“So I started yelling, ‘Stop picking on America!’, and we switched pins. I asked one guy why he was wearing it, and he said ‘because my best friend died in Vietnam, and this is what he sent back.’ To this day I wear that American pin on my denim jacket.
” ‘White Liberals’ is an extension of that. A friend dragged me down to Queen Street for a Lillian Allen record release party, and I think she’s brilliant. The Horseshoe was packed, and 80 per cent of the audience was white middle-class kids. I thought ‘this is great, more power to her.’
“But then she sang something about ‘Why is Reagan exporting revolution to South America?’ and I said, ‘She means Central America, right?’ Then she sang, ‘He should have exported revolution to Canada!’ and I said, ‘Huh?! If it’s so bad for her, why doesn’t she go back to Jamaica?’ I said, ‘Well, what do you expect? It’s a bunch of white liberals on reggae. White people trying to raise money for black people to attack white people? Is that hip or what?'”
Sebastian is a hardass – a loud-mouthed, ranting, maniacal iconoclast. But because he scabrously questions those who question authority, he might also be the most true and effective conscience of the left-leaning musical community in Toronto.
“I picked up the rock, and this is what I found,” he’s fond of saying. I say it’s valuable to have a dissenting extremist around, if only because he forces us to consider all the sides.
Howard Druckman, Metropolis Magazine
Sebastian at The Opera House
Sebastian at The Opera House on Friday, May 17,
I went to the Opera House on Queen St. E. near Broadview Ave. the night of Fri. May 17, 2002 to see the debut of the Sebastian Agnello Trio, featuring Sebastian (Seb) Agnello on guitar and vocals, Kim Doolittle, his long-time musical compatriot, playing bass, and Mike Van Steinberg, helping to rock it up on drums. They came on like blockbusters to the 20-something crowd , who ate it up. Sebastian’s forceful vocals and Hendrix-like scorching guitar expertise on his black Les Paul, was incredible. Kim’s bass playing was relaxed and professional all the way; as was Mike’s heavy duty drumming, throughout the Seb Trio’s entire five-tune set.
All the songs were Seb originals, and had lyrical stories and messages that were as highly intelligent in what they had to say, as they were in being great entertainment. The brains behind the tunes, and their performances, (Seb himself), is probably why Seb has survived decades as a performer of his original compositions, standing the test of time with at least two generations of music lovers.
The first great tune, “I’m A Criminal” (a Punk protest song if I ever heard one), is probably reflective of Seb’s anti-establishment leanings due to socio-economic injustices and anti-artistic freedom which reigns supreme (and legal!). His powerful vocals and hard-drivin’ guitar licks on ” Criminal …”, got the audience’s attention and kept it there for the rest of the band’s time on stage. (Which was all too short!) :Lyrics like “Your jokes are as funny as a kick in the ass!” in the second great tune, “Sharks, Professional Courtesy”, is a simply put lyrical inventiveness in Seb tunes, which captures the listener’s interest and keeps it there. “I Love My TV” initially reminded me of a story I heard about Alice Cooper having 20 TV’s scattered all around his house, so he could watch TV wherever he was. The tempo changes, with accompanying mood swings in this one, was very imaginative.
I just remember “T.O. Girl Of My Youth” being a hard-drivin’ tune, full of rebellious spirit. The fact that it was about reminiscences of a girl with purple hair and a tongue-stud, and the embarrassment of how to dump her, escaped me, until Seb’s info later, illuminated it all for me. The last powerhouse tune that night, called “Tell It To The Big Man”, was an intelligent, and insightful look at teenage prostitution, begging the question, “why does it have to go on?” Another awareness tune from the brilliant mind of Sebastian Agnello, who with Kim and Mike, played up a storm, and left the audience with a good feeling from being highly entertained throughout the entire all-too-short set. (It seemed like it was much longer!)
I can’t leave off without a brief mention of the other fantastic bands at the Opera House that night. The group before Seb, had a singer whose expressive vocals and friendly audience rapport, reminded me of how harp player, Jerome Godboo handles a crowd. Virgin Pornstar who came on after Seb, organized the whole four-band event. I unfortunately missed their set, because I was down in the band room talking to Seb and Kim. From what I gather, they have a big following of die-hard fans, so it’s too bad I missed their set. I just remember the girl who sang for them, being a good-looking blonde. Apparently there was at least one record rep from Sony there that night to see the headliners, Snowblind, which is why Seb said he cut his seven-song set to five, so there’d be more time to feature them.
Snowblind came on like seasoned pros and worked their major fans, assembled there, to the nth degree. The singer was very expressive in his vocals, and rhythm guitar playing. The high-energy pace of their set was creative and inventive too! Their great set ended with the lead guitarist calmly leaving his guitar in front of his amp, while he went to some controls at the front of the stage. He worked these controls in a lead rhythm beat, to get out some amazingly melodic lead guitar riffs electronically, while his guitar (whose feedback was used), was sitting idle behind him at his amp. The big turnout of music lovers that night, included the members of Hellz Kitchen Show. This reflected the quality of music there (where musicians like to hang out on their night off!)
— by Joe Curtis —