Tale of the Hawk by Doug Marks

I started Metal Method in 1982 to finance my Rock N' Roll habit. I was frustrated trying to form a band in Hollywood and needed financial backing to make my dreams a reality. When you're completely broke most effort is spent on survival- not chasing rockstar dreams. So, the plan was to make enough money through Metal Method guitar lessons to finance my band.

My ex-wife Londa and I shared this dream. She's a graphic artist and her responsibility was to create the band's image. She had the same role in my previous bands. Problem is, there was always more emphasis on survival and keeping the party going than artistic creativity. Trust me, when the truck's clutch goes out at the Florida state line and you still have several hours to go to the gig, artistic expression is the last thing on your mind.

Metal Method guitar lessons was a success from the beginning. By 1985 we had accumulated $80,000 to invest in the band. Over a six month period of time we found each member one by one. Our expenses included room and board for the band members, paying for rehearsal space, salaries, advertising, and promoting gigs. With these expenses it doesn't take long to plow through $80,000.

By the time Hawk had performed at the Roxy in November of 1985, we had been rehearsing daily for months and had already played several area shows. On the strength of the Roxy performance I was actually put in touch with Ahmet Ertegun, the founder of Atlantic Records. In the middle of a rehearsal I was told "Mr. Ertegun is on the line." I had no doubt that success was around the corner.

On the other hand, there was a lot of stuff going on that made the situation unmanageable. I won't explain the details because there's no need to rehash these events. Anyway, within a couple of months of the Roxy show I threw in the towel. That's right, I quit my own band.

I have the entire video of the Roxy show and plan to release most, if not all of the performance. The reason that I'm only releasing one song at a time is that there were problems with the audio track. The audio was recorded directly from the mixing console. That's why it's so clean sounding. The only problem is that you're hearing the "house mix." What I mean by this is that if an instrument was mic'd through the public address system you hear it clearly. If an instrument didn't need to be mic'd it's not in the mix. The first song of the performance has no guitar because the soundman wasn't up to speed yet. The guitar appeared after the intro of the second song. There is very little bass on the entire recording because the bass was loud on stage and didn't need to be mic'd. Many years ago I asked the bass player to overdub the bass but wasn't able to convince him of the value. So, I played bass on the "No One to Love" YouTube video. On "Fades So Fast" we feature a stunt double - Rich Smith. Rich has augmented Lonnie's bass parts, copying them as close as possible. The rest of the recording is from the live performance.

I always thought that what happened during this period of time was too important to allow it to vanish. When you listen to Charlie you'll hear shades of Axl Rose. When you look at the black Ovation you may think that it's reminiscent of Cinderella featuring Tom Keifer. This video was recorded before we ever heard of Guns N' Roses or Cinderella. So, perhaps we had an influence on the Hollywood music scene in the mid 80's.

I've been very pleased by the YouTube comments on these videos. It's great after almost twenty-five years to be able to share this with you. Watch Video