Arrows (2010-2012)
Arrows was put together because i was just coming out of my emotional junk, and wanted to play music again. I got Steve and Justin back, and since Rey had a child, we needed to find a new drummer. I was desperately seeking drummers, we found someone from West-New York/ North Bergen. He played with us for about six months. It was decent. Thing is he wasn’t well-versed in hardcore/ punk, and was really in music to make a career out of it. but everyone knows you can’t make money in hardcore punk, especially the kind of hardcore we were playing. His tenure ended after we recorded our one and only demo. Biggest reason as to why we let him go was because after the demo was recorded, he made no attempt to contact us for practices, even after we tried contacted him ourselves.
We found another drummer from Bayonne. He was pretty damn good, only problem is he was very unreliable. Too many side- things got in the way of him actually playing with us, and there were times where he just didn’t show up. We wasted a ton of time with him. We did however work on one demo with him. It’s got this black metal intensity to it. I worked hard on that song and arranged it, i wanted it to be an organic thing. For it to have a beginning, middle, and end. Sort of like a narrative. But we let him go due to his inability to commit to our band.
We tried a guy out from Boonton, NJ. He was really good, but i wouldn’t work out because the guy works all the time, and he would only be able to make it to practice after 9pm. Which sucked for the rest of us because we either had school or work early in the morning.
After that floundered, i continued to look for drummers with no luck, and without much help from the guys in the band. I finally decided to give up and go on a job hunt. I found a job quicker than a drummer, so i stuck with work.
I hesitantly reached out to Justin in January (2012) to see if he wanted to do this thing. I wanted to start fresh because i feel nothing for those demo songs. Justin, on the other hand, wanted to revisit those songs. So i ended up scrapping the idea to play with them again, and just start fresh with people who want to play the same kinda stuff as i do.
this is our first demo. recorded in Feb. 2011. it sounds like crap, but better than the shit we used to play. i did the vocals while i was sick. most of these songs were sung on the first take because my throat couldn’t handle it. the mix on this thing is super inconsistent, and only like, one song sounds REALLY good.
I wish we worked on these songs a bit more as a group, and not rely on the poor judgment of two people, instead of the whole band.
whatever, enjoy.
http://www.mediafire.com/?u8683x9uud458az
The last demo i ever did with this band:
http://www.bandmix.com/mduran87/
1/22/2012 update - this band is dead. we’ve moved on to greener pastures.
Panthers vs. Wolves! - 11 Songs (2009)
This was a band i had started with Steve and Rey (former drummer) back in 2008. Our last band together broke up because my brother went on to play in a terrible swoopy hair, girl jeans band. Anyway, this is my first band without my brother, whom i would always participate in musical projects with. I was listening to a lot of Orchid, Ampere, Jeromes Dream and Reversal of Man during that period of time, and i think it shows in the music somewhat. The spontaneity of how everything was composed, and how it flowed. it’s really dirty, fast punk rock. recorded on a four-track recorder. This was my favorite band because we actually got out and played shows, released two cds, made shirts, and all that.
This band slowly died by the end of 2009, because i was going through an onslaught of personal and emotional struggle. It’s a shame, because now that i think about it, i could’ve channeled that negative energy into PvW!, and maybe this band would’ve taken off. Alas, we make our mistakes. We can only correct ourselves as we move forward.
http://www.mediafire.com/?qhnfxxqa18pm0e8
Other Bands w/ No music because i lost the songs a loooong time ago, but worth mentioning anyway:
This is Me as You (2007-2008)
In 2007-08, i provided vocals for a metalcore band called “This is Me As You”. It comprised of myself, Steve, Rey, Marco, and my brother. It was the first band in which I attempted screaming vocals. And i was actually pretty damn good at it. I wrote all the lyrics, while everyone else wrote the music. It was pretty interesting. I was immensely interested in the band, because you can do so much with hardcore, and we had an aray of musical influences, from punk, to hardcore, to progressive metal, post-rock. It was neat. I enjoyed my time with them. We played one show and we were pretty good, people were actually pitting. We had pretty gnarly breakdowns. I was 20, so i liked breakdowns a lot back then.
A demo was recorded, but that too faded away, lost forever, never to be heard, but i think the myspace still exists, or…not. We recorded about 4-6 songs together.
Monster (2004-2005)
I was also in a horrorpunk band called “Monster” back in 2004-2005. I was obsessed with all things misfits, danzig, and balzac. So my brother, jorge (RIP), rey, and myself, got together and wrote some fast tunes about murder, zombies, paperbag people, chainsaws, and intestinal abuse. We only did two shows because i didn’t really want to do it anymore, as did Jorge. We released a two/four song demo, that we only made like, 3 copies of, that i lost. i’m pretty sure they were bad anyway.
We recorded a cassette demo. It was done late at night, in the cold, in the ghetto. It actually sounded better than the CD demo we did that was actually mixed.
i don’t have that either. some things are better left the way they are. I had fun though. It was okay for what it was.
i’m currently working on a new musical project. as to what it sounds like, or when actual music will be put out, remains a mystery.
