Story behind "Path of Rage" & "Innovation"
Posted: May 12th, 2014, 8:08 pm
Found this on The Slashtones page using Way Back Machine. It gives a behind the music look at the themes that Taz & Tommy Dreamer used back in ECW....
“The MASKED TONES”
(Giving this "band" a name was meant as a joke. It was only going to be a one time studio situation.)
Path Of Rage (1) Used once in 1997 on WWF RAW for Taz.
RITCHIE SCARLET: lead & rhythm guitar
HARRY SLASH: rhythm guitar
ANDY ABBENE: bass
STEVE BUDGIE: drums
Innovation (1) Used once in 1997 on WWF RAW for Tommy Dreamer.
ANDY ABBENE: lead & rhythm guitar
HARRY SLASH: rhythm guitar
RITCHIE SCARLET: bass
STEVE BUDGIE: drums
Recorded Feb.1997.
Produced by Harry Slash. Recorded & Mixed at The Palace Studio NY by Eddie Whol.
The Story Behind The Song:
I had 'broken up' The Slashtones (for the 15th time) and quit the music business (for the 16th time) on Jan. 1, 1997. In early February of 1997, Paul Heyman called me and asked for a "small" favor, (the first of many...) he needed music for an ECW/WWF cross over. Just two instrumental songs was all he needed. I figured why not? It was only two songs, it won't hurt me to go back into the studio one last time so I said yes. Then Paul told me he needed them in 4 days, yes, this was a Thursday and he needed them by Monday for a live RAW broadcast. I spent the next several minutes trying to explain to Paul how hard that would be to do in so little time and then had to scrambled to find an available studio and musicians.
For a number of reasons, I chose not to use any of the former Slashtones or the studios that we had used. I lucked out and found Eddie Whal's "Palace Studio" available, but only on Saturday. The first & only call to find musicians was to drummer Steve Budgie. He was in the middle of a jam session with fellow Ace Freehly band member Ritchie Scarlet and 'Soul Crush' guitarist Andy Abbene. All three were available Saturday, and were willing to do a "marathon" recording session.
At 9 am Saturday morning I entered "The Palace" with a two pounds of coffee and three packs of cigarettes. Budgie and I had worked out most of the musical arraignments on the back of a napkin the night before at an ECW Elks Lodge show. The five of us then worked out the bugs and started recording. 23 hours later I staggered out of The Palace with four newly written, recorded, mixed and mastered songs. Yes, four (4), Paul had called me before I went into the studio on Saturday and asked me to try and do more songs because they (the WWF) might be doing certain things differently. The other two were very cheesy, generic rock, that in retrospect, I'm glad the WWF changed the angle around and only used the two above songs. It was an insane rush job to get the four tunes done in so short a time that when an occasional bad note was played I let it go. Parts of the guitar solo on "Path Of Rage" were recorded with a slightly out of tune guitar. Both Ritchie and Andy were willing to redo the part, but I said "Don't worry about it, the fans will be screaming, the announcers will be talking and no one will notice. Besides, they'll only be played once." Little did I know how wrong I was.
I got home at 9:30 am on Sunday morning. I then left little samples of each song on Paul Heyman's voice mail and tried to go to sleep, "Tried" being the optimum word as my phone rang 10 minutes later with Paul on the other end wanting to hear all four complete songs. I put the phone next to the speaker, hit play and let the tape run. 12 minutes and 58 seconds later Paul said "I can't believe you actually got it done," "Neither can I." I said, "But I need to sleep," I hung up the phone and went to bed only to have the phone ring again in 15 minutes, This time Paul had his assistant Debbie Boumont on a conference call and asked me to play the four tunes for her to hear over the phone. I obliged and 12 minutes and 58 seconds later told Paul again that I really needed to sleep. Eight minutes later Paul called again, promising that this would be the last time, He had Taz(z) on the line and only wanted to hear the tune I did for him. I played Path of Rage over the phone for Taz and then begged Paul to not call again and let me get a few hours sleep. "No Problem, he said, and "Thank you." I unplugged my phone and went to bed. Ten minutes later my beeper went off. It was Paul...
“The MASKED TONES”
(Giving this "band" a name was meant as a joke. It was only going to be a one time studio situation.)
Path Of Rage (1) Used once in 1997 on WWF RAW for Taz.
RITCHIE SCARLET: lead & rhythm guitar
HARRY SLASH: rhythm guitar
ANDY ABBENE: bass
STEVE BUDGIE: drums
Innovation (1) Used once in 1997 on WWF RAW for Tommy Dreamer.
ANDY ABBENE: lead & rhythm guitar
HARRY SLASH: rhythm guitar
RITCHIE SCARLET: bass
STEVE BUDGIE: drums
Recorded Feb.1997.
Produced by Harry Slash. Recorded & Mixed at The Palace Studio NY by Eddie Whol.
The Story Behind The Song:
I had 'broken up' The Slashtones (for the 15th time) and quit the music business (for the 16th time) on Jan. 1, 1997. In early February of 1997, Paul Heyman called me and asked for a "small" favor, (the first of many...) he needed music for an ECW/WWF cross over. Just two instrumental songs was all he needed. I figured why not? It was only two songs, it won't hurt me to go back into the studio one last time so I said yes. Then Paul told me he needed them in 4 days, yes, this was a Thursday and he needed them by Monday for a live RAW broadcast. I spent the next several minutes trying to explain to Paul how hard that would be to do in so little time and then had to scrambled to find an available studio and musicians.
For a number of reasons, I chose not to use any of the former Slashtones or the studios that we had used. I lucked out and found Eddie Whal's "Palace Studio" available, but only on Saturday. The first & only call to find musicians was to drummer Steve Budgie. He was in the middle of a jam session with fellow Ace Freehly band member Ritchie Scarlet and 'Soul Crush' guitarist Andy Abbene. All three were available Saturday, and were willing to do a "marathon" recording session.
At 9 am Saturday morning I entered "The Palace" with a two pounds of coffee and three packs of cigarettes. Budgie and I had worked out most of the musical arraignments on the back of a napkin the night before at an ECW Elks Lodge show. The five of us then worked out the bugs and started recording. 23 hours later I staggered out of The Palace with four newly written, recorded, mixed and mastered songs. Yes, four (4), Paul had called me before I went into the studio on Saturday and asked me to try and do more songs because they (the WWF) might be doing certain things differently. The other two were very cheesy, generic rock, that in retrospect, I'm glad the WWF changed the angle around and only used the two above songs. It was an insane rush job to get the four tunes done in so short a time that when an occasional bad note was played I let it go. Parts of the guitar solo on "Path Of Rage" were recorded with a slightly out of tune guitar. Both Ritchie and Andy were willing to redo the part, but I said "Don't worry about it, the fans will be screaming, the announcers will be talking and no one will notice. Besides, they'll only be played once." Little did I know how wrong I was.
I got home at 9:30 am on Sunday morning. I then left little samples of each song on Paul Heyman's voice mail and tried to go to sleep, "Tried" being the optimum word as my phone rang 10 minutes later with Paul on the other end wanting to hear all four complete songs. I put the phone next to the speaker, hit play and let the tape run. 12 minutes and 58 seconds later Paul said "I can't believe you actually got it done," "Neither can I." I said, "But I need to sleep," I hung up the phone and went to bed only to have the phone ring again in 15 minutes, This time Paul had his assistant Debbie Boumont on a conference call and asked me to play the four tunes for her to hear over the phone. I obliged and 12 minutes and 58 seconds later told Paul again that I really needed to sleep. Eight minutes later Paul called again, promising that this would be the last time, He had Taz(z) on the line and only wanted to hear the tune I did for him. I played Path of Rage over the phone for Taz and then begged Paul to not call again and let me get a few hours sleep. "No Problem, he said, and "Thank you." I unplugged my phone and went to bed. Ten minutes later my beeper went off. It was Paul...
