And then we were DESTINY: How did we go about the name change?? By
the time we were in our new rehearsal location we were back to being the
four member band, played our very first ever prom in Ogallala and were
getting a good following.. I really didn't want to rock the boat with a
name change but we were changing, evolving in our sound and visually as
well.. The heavy rock sound we we had started with was being changed
gradually to a top 40 type of rock.. So at one point they decided a name
change was in order.. It was more than likely already known what the
name was going to be but for a little while they let everyone put in
their two cents worth and I thought about DESTROYER (from the album of
the same name by KISS).. That was poo pooed right off and there might
have been a second idea put in by me but I really wasn't into naming the
band and thought we should stay with Rizzen for the fact that it would
take a while to build up the fan base we had built.. Then I saw the
inspiration for the name they were leaning towards, the album Destiny by
the Jacksons.. I wasn't a fan of the Jacksons then or ever.. They had a
few songs but not many I cared for.. Destiny would be the name so.. If
you don't like it, THERE'S THE DOOR..
Well he never said that and really we were established by this time (early '86 I think) and it was alright, i just hopped we wouldn't have to rename the band again anytime soon.. That being said I soon found other groups named Destiny, an all female group in Omaha had the name.. I told them of this hoping the name would be changed with no chance.. To me the name was a wussie departure from a harder feeling of Rizzen.. But also the Rizzen name had us develop a reputation.. Anytime we played at certain bars our "fan base" would go and tear the shit out of the place. A name change didn't change that, the fan base stayed constant until 85-86 when we would have the greatest surge we would ever have. Popularity is a fickle bitch though.. And that would be none more evident when in that popularity we went into the studio to cut a few songs..
The studio experience: For quite a while at one point Ernie was wanting us to go into the studio to record a few songs and finally we did just that... A guy owned recording equipment and we went to his basement studio.. I had never worked exclusively with a click track and we didn't have a backing tape or demo to work from so Ern and Joe played the song for me to lay down the drum tracks of the song.. It took two tries for one song and one for the other for me to get the drums done.. I think the guy working the tape deck was figuring on several hours just for the drums only.. After we got out of the studio the next morning (around three, time flies when you're having fun).. It really was an interesting time that day and then we would have one more session some time later but that wasn't as good although on my part I nailed it again in one take.. The rest of the time was truly wasted because they were in a party in the studio mood.. I left before the session was done knowing nothing good was going to come of it.. That second session started the souring of the band to me.. There were other issues.. We practiced in the garage on the hill under the then main water tower for the city.. Ernie would call this the cave and we recorded a rough demo there, putting the songs from the first studio visit on there and then selling it to "fans" at our shows and for a while that was a great tape and it seems like everyone had a copy.. To me it was good but it was never used to get us booked, or if it was it was very rarely used that way.. The second studio effort was completely a waste of time as the results were never put on a demo tape.. I was right about that one..
The manager at the time was whoever Ernie could manipulate the easiest.. His sister would "manage" for some time, then a guy named Jeff.. Actually I think Jeff was off and on through the entirety of the band as a manager.. Actually being the manager is almost low man on the totem pole with roadie being bottom.. We had roadies but not the tech type, they were mostly the type that did the grunt work, unloading the truck and stuff.. They got the payment of getting in free when it was a gate purse thing.. That was fine with them I guess.. After the first few gigs we stopped arriving in multiple cars with our gear and used u-haul trailers and trucks to get our gear there.. By the end of that first year we played R.D.'s in Sedgwick Colorado.. That was the mecca of gigs, the ultimate bar for bands.. Back then they had the 18 drinking age bars and 21.. 18 got three two beer (koolaid by comparison) and the 21 bars got six four.. The hard stuff, and so conversely the 32 bars had more of a younger crowd.. That was R.D.'s bar and they stretched that rule a little bit with a feeling that if you could lift the mug off the counter, you were old enough to drink there.. I didn't drink beer so I didn't drink there, and after a certain gig would never drink again.. That gig was the once and only time we played in my hometown.. There were only a handful of gigs that really stood out. The first gig mentioned earlier with that dastardly cramp.. The first crowd no show at the tech school. Then there was the time we played the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.. That was at R.D.'s and there was a little feeling by me that we would have a very small crowd.. The opposite happened, we had the place packed to the rafters as they say, and sold out of beer by ten.. We just started an hour before that, what gives?? That's how big and apparently thirsty they were.. The gig at Oshkosh (b'gosh) where we played in a quanset and had to move a pile of grain before we set up.. A graduation gig it was on a cloudy and then very wet rainy evening.. The gigs at the st. pats community center, a good number of gigs there.. The show at Padroni Colorado on a Monday night in early December where the roads were covered in ice and the drive home was interesting because we got slowed by what is called Peetz hill covered in ice and me noticing that we weren't doing the 60 miles an hour the speedometer was saying.. Did something that freaked them out that night.. I jumped out, asked them if they needed a push.. Being in a band you do weird shit like that.. The final gig was my brothers graduation party.. In between were a great number of faceless gigs that didn't register as very big to me, but were important none the less because they were gigs.. I loved being in the band when we played. It meant something.. There was a little fame..
Sadly our gig area was contained to a fifty mile radious of Sidney, with the furthest we would play is Sterling, Hollyoke, Ogallala and Dalton... Kimball to the extreme west at the B.Z. tavern..
To get from the Rizzen era to the Destiny era was pretty much this way.. When Blue Earth moved to Lincoln they changed their name several times because of management wanting to sell them to halls and trying to get record deals. They played around the area mostly for the gate, so they played in bigger halls than just bars.. Their stage was bigger and so they staged things differently.. They then ended up moving to Dallas Texas.. So after Ernie talked to their lead vocalist one night he got the idea of a name change from that conversation.. The time frame of this I'm not sure of but I am pretty sure the members were still the original core of Darren, Joe, Ernie and myself.. Darren would last only a short time more, as I said I didn't pal around with the guys very often not for any other reason than I didn't feel like I fit in completely.. I was like the off brand tire on the car..
I did drink during one show.. Of all the times to drink anything it was the one gig we played in my hometown.. I didn't mean to get that drunk, and I was drinking those wine coolers.. Alcohol deadens the senses and in that case it really did.. After that night I swore to never drink during a gig ever again.. The same couldn't be said for the other guys but I felt like I had to be sober or the entire of the band would go in the shitter rhythm wise..
The time we met another band that wanted to gig with us.. We set up to play a gig in town, our home turf and then maybe set to play at their home turf Ogallala some time later.. Their name was Desire and they were a four member band that played about the same music we did a pop rock style.. They set up in one corner of the armory and us in the other.. It was a Saturday and we were ready to play, but not a battle of the bands thing but rather a couple bands getting together to see what they were like and them us.. After that gig they folded and sold some of their equipment to us.. There would be no second gig with them..
When I think of the amount of practice time we did for gigs it was just staggering, although I bought into the idea that he wanted us to be near perfect.. Perfection is unattainable especially when anyone in the band is doing any mind altering chemicals of any kind.. We practiced.. When I got to the practice sites I would check my drums and play as Ernie tuned the guitar and Joe's bass.. We would jam and through these jam sessions a great number of song ideas would get hatched out and some of our better songs would be written.. When the demo was put together my name was omitted from the "written by" credits but their cousin who can't write a lick to save his life was included.. Some of the songs were written with Darren there but he wasn't included either.. I don't know if they thought I would want a royalty at all, but I didn't.. I would have liked to just had the acknowledgement is all ..
We played at a bar in Kimball and got stiffed on the payment owed to us.. This was a real downer and was the last time we would play without a contract being presigned before a gig.. We get to the bar and Ernie had the contract in hand and got the person in charge to sign just before we went on.. After that debacle he would get the contract signed before we arrived.. That meant a month before gigs.. We did get paid for this gig but it took nearly a year to do so.. We never played there again although he was contacted to play there sometime later..
The day I went to practice and Ernie was learning Maniac by Micheal Sembelo was a turning point in the way I viewed the band.. I walked by him and kind of shook my head and he said what and I said we aren't learning that crappy song are we. He let me know right there in no uncertain terms that we were learning this song and the reason was we had to be more diversified with our music.. Ok, I guess sure why not.. We were changing and evolving musically and it was better (?) top 40 ish, while holding on to some of the old heavy rock for requests ...
We got a new lead vocalist at one point after the name change.. I'm not sure what the deal was that he agreed to a new vocalist but.. His name was Ricky J. on stage and i'm not sure what his real name was.. He joined and sang maybe three to five songs and would be in the band through the final (paying) gig in Kimball.. When I think now of that time I think the reason he went with a new vocalist was to practice more, and more often..
Well he never said that and really we were established by this time (early '86 I think) and it was alright, i just hopped we wouldn't have to rename the band again anytime soon.. That being said I soon found other groups named Destiny, an all female group in Omaha had the name.. I told them of this hoping the name would be changed with no chance.. To me the name was a wussie departure from a harder feeling of Rizzen.. But also the Rizzen name had us develop a reputation.. Anytime we played at certain bars our "fan base" would go and tear the shit out of the place. A name change didn't change that, the fan base stayed constant until 85-86 when we would have the greatest surge we would ever have. Popularity is a fickle bitch though.. And that would be none more evident when in that popularity we went into the studio to cut a few songs..
The studio experience: For quite a while at one point Ernie was wanting us to go into the studio to record a few songs and finally we did just that... A guy owned recording equipment and we went to his basement studio.. I had never worked exclusively with a click track and we didn't have a backing tape or demo to work from so Ern and Joe played the song for me to lay down the drum tracks of the song.. It took two tries for one song and one for the other for me to get the drums done.. I think the guy working the tape deck was figuring on several hours just for the drums only.. After we got out of the studio the next morning (around three, time flies when you're having fun).. It really was an interesting time that day and then we would have one more session some time later but that wasn't as good although on my part I nailed it again in one take.. The rest of the time was truly wasted because they were in a party in the studio mood.. I left before the session was done knowing nothing good was going to come of it.. That second session started the souring of the band to me.. There were other issues.. We practiced in the garage on the hill under the then main water tower for the city.. Ernie would call this the cave and we recorded a rough demo there, putting the songs from the first studio visit on there and then selling it to "fans" at our shows and for a while that was a great tape and it seems like everyone had a copy.. To me it was good but it was never used to get us booked, or if it was it was very rarely used that way.. The second studio effort was completely a waste of time as the results were never put on a demo tape.. I was right about that one..
The manager at the time was whoever Ernie could manipulate the easiest.. His sister would "manage" for some time, then a guy named Jeff.. Actually I think Jeff was off and on through the entirety of the band as a manager.. Actually being the manager is almost low man on the totem pole with roadie being bottom.. We had roadies but not the tech type, they were mostly the type that did the grunt work, unloading the truck and stuff.. They got the payment of getting in free when it was a gate purse thing.. That was fine with them I guess.. After the first few gigs we stopped arriving in multiple cars with our gear and used u-haul trailers and trucks to get our gear there.. By the end of that first year we played R.D.'s in Sedgwick Colorado.. That was the mecca of gigs, the ultimate bar for bands.. Back then they had the 18 drinking age bars and 21.. 18 got three two beer (koolaid by comparison) and the 21 bars got six four.. The hard stuff, and so conversely the 32 bars had more of a younger crowd.. That was R.D.'s bar and they stretched that rule a little bit with a feeling that if you could lift the mug off the counter, you were old enough to drink there.. I didn't drink beer so I didn't drink there, and after a certain gig would never drink again.. That gig was the once and only time we played in my hometown.. There were only a handful of gigs that really stood out. The first gig mentioned earlier with that dastardly cramp.. The first crowd no show at the tech school. Then there was the time we played the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.. That was at R.D.'s and there was a little feeling by me that we would have a very small crowd.. The opposite happened, we had the place packed to the rafters as they say, and sold out of beer by ten.. We just started an hour before that, what gives?? That's how big and apparently thirsty they were.. The gig at Oshkosh (b'gosh) where we played in a quanset and had to move a pile of grain before we set up.. A graduation gig it was on a cloudy and then very wet rainy evening.. The gigs at the st. pats community center, a good number of gigs there.. The show at Padroni Colorado on a Monday night in early December where the roads were covered in ice and the drive home was interesting because we got slowed by what is called Peetz hill covered in ice and me noticing that we weren't doing the 60 miles an hour the speedometer was saying.. Did something that freaked them out that night.. I jumped out, asked them if they needed a push.. Being in a band you do weird shit like that.. The final gig was my brothers graduation party.. In between were a great number of faceless gigs that didn't register as very big to me, but were important none the less because they were gigs.. I loved being in the band when we played. It meant something.. There was a little fame..
Sadly our gig area was contained to a fifty mile radious of Sidney, with the furthest we would play is Sterling, Hollyoke, Ogallala and Dalton... Kimball to the extreme west at the B.Z. tavern..
To get from the Rizzen era to the Destiny era was pretty much this way.. When Blue Earth moved to Lincoln they changed their name several times because of management wanting to sell them to halls and trying to get record deals. They played around the area mostly for the gate, so they played in bigger halls than just bars.. Their stage was bigger and so they staged things differently.. They then ended up moving to Dallas Texas.. So after Ernie talked to their lead vocalist one night he got the idea of a name change from that conversation.. The time frame of this I'm not sure of but I am pretty sure the members were still the original core of Darren, Joe, Ernie and myself.. Darren would last only a short time more, as I said I didn't pal around with the guys very often not for any other reason than I didn't feel like I fit in completely.. I was like the off brand tire on the car..
I did drink during one show.. Of all the times to drink anything it was the one gig we played in my hometown.. I didn't mean to get that drunk, and I was drinking those wine coolers.. Alcohol deadens the senses and in that case it really did.. After that night I swore to never drink during a gig ever again.. The same couldn't be said for the other guys but I felt like I had to be sober or the entire of the band would go in the shitter rhythm wise..
The time we met another band that wanted to gig with us.. We set up to play a gig in town, our home turf and then maybe set to play at their home turf Ogallala some time later.. Their name was Desire and they were a four member band that played about the same music we did a pop rock style.. They set up in one corner of the armory and us in the other.. It was a Saturday and we were ready to play, but not a battle of the bands thing but rather a couple bands getting together to see what they were like and them us.. After that gig they folded and sold some of their equipment to us.. There would be no second gig with them..
When I think of the amount of practice time we did for gigs it was just staggering, although I bought into the idea that he wanted us to be near perfect.. Perfection is unattainable especially when anyone in the band is doing any mind altering chemicals of any kind.. We practiced.. When I got to the practice sites I would check my drums and play as Ernie tuned the guitar and Joe's bass.. We would jam and through these jam sessions a great number of song ideas would get hatched out and some of our better songs would be written.. When the demo was put together my name was omitted from the "written by" credits but their cousin who can't write a lick to save his life was included.. Some of the songs were written with Darren there but he wasn't included either.. I don't know if they thought I would want a royalty at all, but I didn't.. I would have liked to just had the acknowledgement is all ..
We played at a bar in Kimball and got stiffed on the payment owed to us.. This was a real downer and was the last time we would play without a contract being presigned before a gig.. We get to the bar and Ernie had the contract in hand and got the person in charge to sign just before we went on.. After that debacle he would get the contract signed before we arrived.. That meant a month before gigs.. We did get paid for this gig but it took nearly a year to do so.. We never played there again although he was contacted to play there sometime later..
The day I went to practice and Ernie was learning Maniac by Micheal Sembelo was a turning point in the way I viewed the band.. I walked by him and kind of shook my head and he said what and I said we aren't learning that crappy song are we. He let me know right there in no uncertain terms that we were learning this song and the reason was we had to be more diversified with our music.. Ok, I guess sure why not.. We were changing and evolving musically and it was better (?) top 40 ish, while holding on to some of the old heavy rock for requests ...
We got a new lead vocalist at one point after the name change.. I'm not sure what the deal was that he agreed to a new vocalist but.. His name was Ricky J. on stage and i'm not sure what his real name was.. He joined and sang maybe three to five songs and would be in the band through the final (paying) gig in Kimball.. When I think now of that time I think the reason he went with a new vocalist was to practice more, and more often..
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