ORGYMFATWORK said

[orig][quote]

LET%20US%20PRAY said	[orig][quote]
Vital Remains should've disbanded in 2001. Tony is a rock star prick. The last two were weak compared to their old albums. If Tony doesen't own the name. I say Paul Flynn takes back the name and gets Joe Lewis, Rick Corbett, and Jeff Gruslin back in the band and kicks Tony out. Suzuki can stay though.

i grew up hanging out with Rick Corbett's sister, and i remember sitting around with them in their mothers house when i was maybe 17 (a little over a decade ago), and they told me he didn't want anything to do with VR, because he found out that they overdubbed some of his drum parts on "Into Cold Darkness"....

that rumour was confirmed by another member of the band (who i won't name, because i'm pretty sure he didn't want it getting around....i guess he didn't know that Ricky already knew) when i saw him a few years later (we were both working shitty jobs, accross the street from each other in Mansfield) and we shot the shit about his time in VR

anyway, my two cents on this whole situation
i saw VR live, opening for Deicide at Babyhead in Providence back in 1996 (i think....maybe 95), and it was one of the best death metal shows i've ever been to.

fast forward 4 or 5 years
VR at the living room with The Doosh Bags!!! (the first time i saw them with Thorn in the band, and the first time i ever heard The Doosh Bags....man their old drummer ruled!)
in my top five most fun/memorable shows list.

fast forward a few more years, i saw VR play with some shitty bands at some old warehouse in Olneyville....it was awful.

the band was tight, the sound was ok....but the setlist was 100 percent Dechristianize! what the fuck?!?!?!?!?!

i love Deicide, but Vital with Benton is just Generic, and it sells, only because Glen is on it.

i don't know about the price of their shirts, because i am big fat slob, and usually have to custom order t-shirts, so i don't own any vital remains shirts

but i am gonna defend Vital on certain points and disagree with some of you.
I think that Tony is a really nice dude, and about as metal as they come.... i can't remember a single death metal show in the new england area that i have been to, where he wasn't there supporting the local metal scene!! and i find it really odd to see so many of you bashing the guy

Suzuki, another really good dude, and an amazing musician, there are vital albums, where he plays every instrument on certain songs throughout the album and does most of the songwriting.

i will also disagree about Gruslin being their best vocalist. was he awesome, fuck yeah! but i don't see his vocals being any better than Joe or Thorn.

i disagree that Into Cold Darkness was their last good album.....it is my favorite.... but i definately think Forever Underground and Dawn of The Apocolypse (minus "The Night Has a Thousand Eyes"....what the fuck was Thorn thinking?) were excellent!

yes i agree some of their longer songs should be trimmed down because it's just a four minute song played twice....
but i still think every album before Dechristianize ruled.

even then Dechristianize wasn't bad, it just was nothing too original or memorable......

Icons of Evil....oh, Suzuki's drumming sounds faster, past that, i won't bitch if someone puts it on, but i'll never buy it.

anyway, i probably could rant on this subject all day, but it's pointless.....no offense to Dwyer or anyone else here.....but bands change all the time, and it's usually for the worse (especially when they have been around more than a decade), it's best to just accept it and enjoy their older material