WEEK 135 – REPAID IN BLOOD – REVISITED

My HeadBangers, revisited from Week 28, some of the best guys I have met, please welcome back:

REPAID IN BLOOD

Before we get started, I have to give you all some information on the Viper Room:

The Viper Room opened in 1993 and was once owned by Johnny Depp, the world-famous Viper Room  has hosted the likes of Johnny Cash, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Stone Temple Pilots, Bruce Springsteen, Oasis, Queens of The Stone Age, Courtney Love, Natalie Cole, Elvis Costello, Pete Yorn, Lenny Kravitz, Pearl ..

“Rebel Scum”

Those who know me know I love a band with a message and if this isn’t a message you will never get it.

“Wake Up, Time To Die”

Just a little background on my Geeks:

Repaid In Blood is a metal band that started in 2006 in San Jose, CA. The name was taken from a lyric off The Black Dahlia Murder’s first full-length album, Unhallowed. The name is an expression of violence in its purest form, vengeance. Victor Hernandez and Jake Burrman formed the band in high school. Jake Burrmann and Juan Galvez are the last founding members of the band, and yet, with the powerful vocals and live performances of Darrell Durham, along with the blistering leads of Patrick Small, Repaid In Blood is a strong and cohesive family.

Repaid In Blood mixes the best of Death Metal and Metalcore genres creating their own unique genre: Geek Metal. Which blends crushing riffs, searing solos, and ball-shattering breakdowns with a variety of pop culture, movies, games, and geekdom samples into their performances that always gets the crowd going and shouting the lines and samples during the show!

For more background pull up Week 28, that’s right 107 weeks ago, 749 days ago, Repaid in Blood was the feature on the blog.   As I said then “these guys are the real deal”.  I hadn’t run into a band that was so fan driven.  By that I mean they actually sent out lil care packages to their fans with hand written notes.  How many bands do that??  Not many my HeadBangers.  This is mine:

I have kept these items with other things sent to me from some other bands, but this is my special one.  You get CD’s that are autographed by the bands, and that’s great, but a hand written note, come on who does that, my geeks that’s who.    I’m working on putting everything in a big frame instead of locked up.  Seriously these items have been to Finland twice and back to the USA with me.  I want these guys to know how special it is to me.  Some days I may need that extra lil something to make me smile and here it is.  Thank you guys, it means a lot.

I wanted to catch up with the guys and see how everything is going and what they did while we were all in the Covid lock up, let’s take a look…..

Darrell Durham – Vox

When the pandemic hit and we went into lock down I was able to work from home as an IT engineer. From home I worked with Jake to record footage for videos for the new album. Was able to conduct interviews about the release from home via Skype. In the meantime I have really taken up vinyl collecting again. I have my dad’s old collection and started building on that. I am a huge fan of the Melvins and now own all their albums on vinyl. I am looking forward to writing new material with the guys and hopefully soon we can play some of the Reflective Duality material live. I think it will sound massive live! Lot’s of energy and emotion. I’m very animated on stage. I miss being on the stage a lot.

Juan Galvez – Drums

When the pandemic hit I knew the music industry was going to take a big hit. So I knew it was going to put things on pause. Luckily I had already recorded my drum parts for the latest album early. In October 2020 I teamed up with my buddy Mark at Weapon Rex media and shot a drum play through for the new album. I’m also in another band, Infinite Sleep, and now learning drum parts for a upcoming release. Other than that I played a lot of video games and picked up the guitar again. Been learning a lot of Deftones, easy stuff but fun to play.

Jake Burrmann – Guitars

With the pandemic shutting everything down, the band was stuck in a bit of limbo whilst almost being done with the latest record, Reflective Duality. Several things were pushed back which ultimately led to the album coming out in January 2021. Our manager and I handled all the behind the scenes shenanigans for getting the album ready, and dealing with all the usual things that happen before a release lol. I also put together 3 music videos for the album. Personally I’ve taken up a few new hobbies. I started playing the drums, yoga, meditating as well as reading a lot more. Specifically the Dresden Files and Star Wars novels. I’ve spent a good portion of this past year or so reflecting inward and spending time with my wife at home, being safe.

Patrick  “White Light’nin” – Lead Guitarist

Patrick has been super busy at this time doing what all Metal Geeks do.  Let your imagination run with it lmao.

My Thoughts:

Well my HeadBangers what can I say.  LMAO you all know that I am never at a loss for words.  I’m a Metal Blogger FFS, oh and I cuss but I’m a Navy Brat in my defense, you know how Sailors are…   Doing this blog has made me unexpectly emotional.  Oh shit…  See what those little personal notes do…  and after all this time they haven’t changed they are still my Geek Metal Brothers and Metal Family.  It doesn’t matter how long it’s been, and it has been 749 days, over 2 years, and I listen to the music, look at those smiling faces and know that through all the madness of the last 2 years they are still here.  If I text them they answer and vice versa, that is what family is, metal family always.  Like the sign says and Jim Morrison  NO ONE GETS OUT ALIVE….  Love you guys always.

That’s it for this week my HeadBangers.  Join me next week for another band and another song, in the meantime don’t stand to close to the fire if you can’t handle the burn…..