Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Winner of the College of Eastern Utah Battle of the Bands Competition

On Saturday, March 27th, we competed in the College of Eastern Utah's Battle of the Bands competition in Price, Utah.  We were very excited for this show, not only because of the $500 prize for the first place winners, but because of the high number of people that come to the show.  In fact, two years ago when Formerly So competed, there were almost 1200 people present.

This year was a little bit smaller in terms of spectators, but the competition was put together really well.  There were two stages with a PA system provided by the college, so we did not have to supply one in order to compete.  There were nine bands participating, and through a randomization process the playing order was determined.  We were scheduled to be the last band playing that night, going on at about 9:40PM.

The number one reason why this Battle of the Bands competition was so much better than the rest was because of the judging system.  In other Battle of the Bands competitions we have participated in, the judging was mostly based on spectator voting, which not only transformed the competition into a popularity contest, but also catered to the bands that played first.  In one Battle of the Bands competition we competed in, we also were the last band to perform and the polls were actually closed before we even hit the stage.

Our set went very well.  We had 15 minutes to play, and were able to squeeze in four of our songs: For You, For Me; Disappointment is Control; Filter; and Cut Down.  Every member of the band performed to the extreme, putting on great moves and really trying to involve the audience.  This was also our new rhythm guitarist Joe's first show, and he did great, really nailing our songs and putting on a good show.

Halfway through the second song, however, Jeff got an enormous blister on his wrist that burst.  It didn't interfere with the set, besides leaving red streaks of blood across the body of his bass guitar and his arm.

Because we were the final band to play, the results were announced soon after (around 10PM), and we were asked to leave all of our equipment on stage in case we did take first or second place, which would mean we would play a brief, fifteen minute encore. 

When the results were announced, we were all pretty stunned to hear the name Formerly So announced as the 2010 Champion of the College of Eastern Utah's Battle of the Bands competition.  We hit the stage once again, this time performing the following songs: Unattached; It's Simple, It's Over; and finishing up with Shattered Sun.

The competition was really fun, and we competed against some very good bands, which hopefully we'll have the opportunity to play in shows with in the future.  The bands that competed with us were: Sugar Stone, Centrifuge (who took 2nd Place), Hero's Hero, Wittikism, Shift & Shadows, Feed Me to the Forest, Dear Bobbie, and Trustfall.

We had a great time playing this show and the prize money gave us the help we needed to more speedily release our upcoming album "Disappointment is Control," which is now scheduled for release in late April.

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