 |
| Martin & Jonah |
Drummers (Chronological Order):
 |
| The ever elusive Eric Smith on drums... this was from our first tour through Europe and; it was in Amsterdam, the last show of the tour. (This photo ended up as the cover shot for our first Anthology CD - Photo by Elsbeth Muesen) |
When we started Career Suicide we were mostly in our late-teens/early twenties... Eric was the older/wiser member of the band who may have been in his early-30's at the time. He was originally from Barrie, Ontario and had played in a number of other bands there and in Toronto. He was into a lot of the same punk/hardcore that we were and more. I clearly remember being introduced to 60's psyche/garage and the Nuggets compilations at his house before band practice.
 |
| One of the only known image of Eric Smith (Enlarged extract from above pic) |
For all of the things I could say about Eric's proficiency as a lightning fast drummer, what I think of first when describing him is his amazing wit. That guy is one of the sharpest, funniest and most clever people I've ever met. How he hasn't written a string of books or TV shows is beyond me.
Oh, he drummed when the band was still called Fuck Jonah and he was the one who came up with the name Career Suicide. He also came up with a rough version of the logo design and was the first person to get the logo tattooed to his arm.
 |
| Eric's arm |
 |
| Another rare picture that nearly features Eric: Playing drums with Hong Kong Blonde |
 |
| Flyer courtesy of Eric - according to him this was the only show he played before leaving Toronto and moving to Vancouver. (He rejoined CS to play on their first European Tour). Jonah: Having a drummer that lives thousands of kilometers away, only to rendez-vous off-continent to do a tour without practice is a fairly typical CS thing... |
Mark Jerret played drums for a few shows. Mark was in Teen Crud Combo and played in a lineup of Fuck Jonah as well.
Chris Colohan: (S/T EP)
Jonah and I briefly played in a band with Chris on drums, Jonah and I played guitar and bass respectively and Stephe Perry sang. I don't remember what the band was called. Anyway, it was at this time that we invited Chris to play drums for the first CS single. Our drummer at the time (Eric Smith) had just left for Vancouver after recording the LP with us. The two records were recorded pretty close to each other.
Jesse Parker: (Founding member of Pre-CS bands, later joined CS and played on Jed Whitey Split, Signals EP and some early tours)
Jesse was our drummer for quite a few years. He routinely lent us equipment, drove us and our stuff around, and we practiced in his basement.
He was a really proficient drummer and came on our first West-coast US tour, but after a time became less interested in the hc scene; we parted ways just before the first Japanese tour, and the writing/recording of "Attempted Suicide."
Mark Hurst (Japanese Tour)
Mark played drums for us on our first Japanese tour as Jesse couldn't commit to going. Our bass player (Matt Miller) couldn't come either, so Mike Haliechuk played bass on that tour as well. It was one of the tightest and well-practiced line-ups we had. Mark really blew it out of the water with how prepared he was.
Brandon Farrell (Attempted Suicide LP)
Brandon is by far the best drummer today in punk, well Jonah's right up there too, but the two of them are insanely talented!
Click HERE to see him in action (FB account maybe needed)
More thoughts below on Brandon, from CLRVYNT interview with Martin:
Attempted Suicide had drumming from Brandon Ferrell, who passed away earlier this year. Can you talk about him and his importance to that record’s sound?
We played a benefit down in Richmond following his passing, and it had everything to do with making sure his wife and kids were looked after. We’re really proud to be a part of that, because they were so important to us. That whole family has always been so near and dear to us.
Him and Lauren have been huge supporters of the band, and friends of ours for almost as long as the band has existed. We’ve always admired Brandon and, in terms of this generation, I’d say that he and Jonah and Chris Ulsh are among the most versatile and talented punk musicians in terms of quality musicianship and output across all of their various bands.
As far as the Attempted Suicide record is concerned, initially, Jonah attempted to record his drums as part of the LP. In fact, there are demos with Jonah on them. Anyone who has played music knows that there are two types of musicians: those who can play things exactly how you want them, and those who can do that, but also bring in another element, giving a new quality to what you’ve written. That’s what it was like to be in the studio with Brandon.
Even the engineer that we had — we used the same engineer for the new LP as we did for Attempted Suicide. He's a great drummer himself, Jon Drew, and he was in this ancient old warehouse building in downtown Toronto. We were in this brick-and-beam loft studio, and so what he did was set up two kick drums facing each other, all of the microphones in there, and they covered them with heavy carpet. Behind the drums, he set up this hollow wooden box with a tall microphone stand, fully extended, with a microphone in it that was purely there to pick up vibrations from the floor. It was recorded in this really cool, innovative way, and then obviously Brandon was playing the drums. It came together — it's the worst word to describe a punk recording, but it came together in the most beautiful way.
Even Jon Drew, when he went back and was poring over the tracks to see whether there might be a mistake — when you're recording drums, you've got 10, 15 microphones set up all over the place, and it's like, if a snare wouldn't hit the same way throughout a song, you might need to correct it a bit. He couldn't believe it — every single kick, every hit of the snare, every hit of the cymbal, of a tom, is precisely perfect when Brandon does it. And Brandon never had any training as a musician in any way, and certainly no training as a drummer. He was this natural idiot savant. The guy was born to play punk music, and whether it was guitar, vocals or drums, he just nailed it every time no matter what he did. His work with Government Warning and Direct Control and Wasted Time — all of it was amazing, and I'm obviously biased, but to me, the two most special recordings he ever did were 1) the Direct Control demo, which to this day I can listen to without getting bored of it, and 2) his drumming on the Career Suicide LP. Somebody at a music school could come back to it in a percussion class and be like, "All right, guys, so we're not going to talk about Tito Puente today; we're going to talk about Brandon Ferrell. You need to pay attention to the drumming on this record, because it's just amazing." Jonah's songwriting was great, but the drums were just something else.
Dave Brown (Cherry Beach EP, 2008 ExD Studio 3 Session, various tours)
Dave was the longest-standing drummer in Career Suicide to date. He toured with us numerous times through Europe and North America, as well as the second tour of Japan.
We recorded the Attempted Suicide LP soon after he joined, but we had already committed to recording it with Brandon Farrell (Municipal Waste/Government Warning) on drums. Dave recorded with us on the Cherry Beach EP, and he released a "bootleg" version of the EP on his Sewercide label, for our UK/Northern Ireland tour .
Dave left the band a couple years ago, he moved to Halifax about 5 years ago and commuted for a few years, before that just became too much of a challenge for the band.
Dave's label has put out some truly great releases over the years. He's also played in a number of other bands, even taking Jonah to task by doing his own solo hardcore project a la Madmen.
Ian Romano: (Current)
Our new drummer is Ian Romano and he's great. Definitely one of the most gifted and tightest drummers we've ever played with.
Bass players (Chronological Order):
Mark Rodenhizer AKA Mark Pesci: (Founding Member)
Mark joined Bored of Education when Jonah left town on a 2 month trip, which was the inspiration for changing the name to Fuck Jonah. Fuck Jonah turned into Career Suicide, so technically Mark Rodenhizer was a founding member of the band, though he only played one show (that Jonah and I were not part of).
Noah Gadke: (Both Demos, S/T LP, ST EP, 2002 ExD Studio 3 session and early tours)
Our first bass player. Noah is a hilarious, gangly, monster tattoo covered sweet-heart, who has some of the most bizarre and niche tastes in music. From what I understand he's actually become quite a decent musician however when he played in CS, his bass playing was appropriately amateur.
Bennet Jones-Phillips: (Played some early Shows)
Bennett never recorded with us... he was supposed to (I think), but quit the band before that could happen. I do have some recollection of him being with us at Audio Lab studios, but maybe not as a musician... He played on the very first CS tour through the mid-west and was a fairly active member of the band in the early period after Noah went on to become a TV producer at the local cable TV provider.
Bennet played in a number of local bands over the years, and is still involved in the scene. He and his ex-girlfriend Zoe helped us make a short movie we all filmed called Hedge Attack, which was like an amateur skate video set to fast 80's hardcore songs, only we were even more amateurishly throwing ourselves into giant hedges. This was pre-Jackass/pre-internet, and I'm sure not aged very well...
Gabby Resch: (Early tours)
Jonah and I briefly played in a band with Chris on drums, Jonah and I played guitar and bass respectively and Stephe Perry sang. I don't remember what the band was called. Anyway, it was at this time that we invited Chris to play drums for the first CS single. Our drummer at the time (Eric Smith) had just left for Vancouver after recording the LP with us. The two records were recorded pretty close to each other.
Jesse was our drummer for quite a few years. He routinely lent us equipment, drove us and our stuff around, and we practiced in his basement.
He was a really proficient drummer and came on our first West-coast US tour, but after a time became less interested in the hc scene; we parted ways just before the first Japanese tour, and the writing/recording of "Attempted Suicide."
 |
| Mark Hurst on drums in Japan |
Mark played drums for us on our first Japanese tour as Jesse couldn't commit to going. Our bass player (Matt Miller) couldn't come either, so Mike Haliechuk played bass on that tour as well. It was one of the tightest and well-practiced line-ups we had. Mark really blew it out of the water with how prepared he was.
 |
| Brandon Farrell (Right) Gabby (on the left) also played bass - see following section... |
Brandon is by far the best drummer today in punk, well Jonah's right up there too, but the two of them are insanely talented!
Click HERE to see him in action (FB account maybe needed)
More thoughts below on Brandon, from CLRVYNT interview with Martin:
Attempted Suicide had drumming from Brandon Ferrell, who passed away earlier this year. Can you talk about him and his importance to that record’s sound?
We played a benefit down in Richmond following his passing, and it had everything to do with making sure his wife and kids were looked after. We’re really proud to be a part of that, because they were so important to us. That whole family has always been so near and dear to us.
Him and Lauren have been huge supporters of the band, and friends of ours for almost as long as the band has existed. We’ve always admired Brandon and, in terms of this generation, I’d say that he and Jonah and Chris Ulsh are among the most versatile and talented punk musicians in terms of quality musicianship and output across all of their various bands.
As far as the Attempted Suicide record is concerned, initially, Jonah attempted to record his drums as part of the LP. In fact, there are demos with Jonah on them. Anyone who has played music knows that there are two types of musicians: those who can play things exactly how you want them, and those who can do that, but also bring in another element, giving a new quality to what you’ve written. That’s what it was like to be in the studio with Brandon.
Even the engineer that we had — we used the same engineer for the new LP as we did for Attempted Suicide. He's a great drummer himself, Jon Drew, and he was in this ancient old warehouse building in downtown Toronto. We were in this brick-and-beam loft studio, and so what he did was set up two kick drums facing each other, all of the microphones in there, and they covered them with heavy carpet. Behind the drums, he set up this hollow wooden box with a tall microphone stand, fully extended, with a microphone in it that was purely there to pick up vibrations from the floor. It was recorded in this really cool, innovative way, and then obviously Brandon was playing the drums. It came together — it's the worst word to describe a punk recording, but it came together in the most beautiful way.
Even Jon Drew, when he went back and was poring over the tracks to see whether there might be a mistake — when you're recording drums, you've got 10, 15 microphones set up all over the place, and it's like, if a snare wouldn't hit the same way throughout a song, you might need to correct it a bit. He couldn't believe it — every single kick, every hit of the snare, every hit of the cymbal, of a tom, is precisely perfect when Brandon does it. And Brandon never had any training as a musician in any way, and certainly no training as a drummer. He was this natural idiot savant. The guy was born to play punk music, and whether it was guitar, vocals or drums, he just nailed it every time no matter what he did. His work with Government Warning and Direct Control and Wasted Time — all of it was amazing, and I'm obviously biased, but to me, the two most special recordings he ever did were 1) the Direct Control demo, which to this day I can listen to without getting bored of it, and 2) his drumming on the Career Suicide LP. Somebody at a music school could come back to it in a percussion class and be like, "All right, guys, so we're not going to talk about Tito Puente today; we're going to talk about Brandon Ferrell. You need to pay attention to the drumming on this record, because it's just amazing." Jonah's songwriting was great, but the drums were just something else.
 |
| Picture courtesy of Matt White |
Dave was the longest-standing drummer in Career Suicide to date. He toured with us numerous times through Europe and North America, as well as the second tour of Japan.
We recorded the Attempted Suicide LP soon after he joined, but we had already committed to recording it with Brandon Farrell (Municipal Waste/Government Warning) on drums. Dave recorded with us on the Cherry Beach EP, and he released a "bootleg" version of the EP on his Sewercide label, for our UK/Northern Ireland tour .
Dave left the band a couple years ago, he moved to Halifax about 5 years ago and commuted for a few years, before that just became too much of a challenge for the band.
Dave's label has put out some truly great releases over the years. He's also played in a number of other bands, even taking Jonah to task by doing his own solo hardcore project a la Madmen.
Our new drummer is Ian Romano and he's great. Definitely one of the most gifted and tightest drummers we've ever played with.
Bass players (Chronological Order):
Mark Rodenhizer AKA Mark Pesci: (Founding Member)
 |
Mark Rodenhizer (on left) playing bass in Fuck Jonah:
(This is also another rare picture of Eric Smith on drums. Jesse Parker has a 2nd mic on the right and Martin Farkas is in the helmet).
|
Noah Gadke: (Both Demos, S/T LP, ST EP, 2002 ExD Studio 3 session and early tours)
Our first bass player. Noah is a hilarious, gangly, monster tattoo covered sweet-heart, who has some of the most bizarre and niche tastes in music. From what I understand he's actually become quite a decent musician however when he played in CS, his bass playing was appropriately amateur.
Bennett never recorded with us... he was supposed to (I think), but quit the band before that could happen. I do have some recollection of him being with us at Audio Lab studios, but maybe not as a musician... He played on the very first CS tour through the mid-west and was a fairly active member of the band in the early period after Noah went on to become a TV producer at the local cable TV provider.
Bennet played in a number of local bands over the years, and is still involved in the scene. He and his ex-girlfriend Zoe helped us make a short movie we all filmed called Hedge Attack, which was like an amateur skate video set to fast 80's hardcore songs, only we were even more amateurishly throwing ourselves into giant hedges. This was pre-Jackass/pre-internet, and I'm sure not aged very well...
 |
Gabby on bass:
Picture from Anthology Vol 1 CD,
taken in Amsterdam during final show of first
European tour
|
Gabby Resch: (Early tours)
Gabby played bass for us on the first European tour, he was also the driver of the very first Career Suicide tour through the mid-west US. Gabby went on to play guitar in a great Toronto band called the Reprobates and was involved with a few other bands. He also convinced Direct Control to go on tour through Europe and I believe played bass for them on that tour. Gabby was childhood best friends with Matt Miller and it was through him that we were first introduced.
Mike Haliechuk: (Toronto shows and First Japanese Tour)
Martin: Neal of Poland played bass for us at a show or two in the states... he was a good friend of the band.
Jonah: Neal played for us at Chicago Fest, which was directly after our first Japanese tour. Mike (Haliechuk) decided to stay in Toronto, and Mark, Martin, and I drove to Chicago straight off the plane to meet with Neal to rehearse that evening for our show either that night or the next day. Neal may have also joined us for another show in the midwest as well. Musos in different area codes...
Matt Miller: (Signals EP, Attempted Suicide LP, Cherry Beach EP, 2008 ExD Studio 3 Session, various tours and shows)
Matt was possibly our longest serving bass player. He joined the band in the mid-2000's and was involved until about 2011-ish, I think. Matt and I had previously played in a couple bands that went nowhere in Vancouver... Actually, there's a barely relevant connection to Anne Marie from White Lung... Matt (bass), Anne Marie (drums) and I (guitar/vocals) played in some terrible band in Vancouver right before Career Suicide was formed. It was good fun, but I'm glad recordings didn't survive as I wasn't much of a song writer.
When Matt moved to Ottawa, we invited him to join CS and he "commuted" in for practices and shows. Matt's signature is that he refuses to play with a pick, so it definitely added something unique to the sound of CS. He's quite a proficient bassist, but mix that with playing too fast and drinking too much, and magic can happen. With Matt part of the routine before any show was to go to a local hardware store to score liquid glue that he would use to coat his fingers ...otherwise his fingers would be totally shredded after our set.
Matt went on a number of tours with us over the years: Europe, Japan, several times across the US and Canada. Matt ended up leaving the province, which was his reason for leaving the band. He's another one of those amazingly hilarious characters that is sorely missed. I don't think there's been another member of CS that could crack up the whole band the way he does. Matt was such a blast to go on tour with. One day we'll release the Matt Miller Band demos from the California tour.
Jon Sharron: (Current)
Jon is our current bass player. He joined the band around 2012 and his first tour with us was to Europe. Jon's a local legend having played in countless bands from Toronto (Brutal Knights, Rammer, Chokehold, etc).
Guitar
Dallas Good: (Current)
Dallas is now in Career Suicide "full time" on second guitar. He has to miss gigs here and there because of his full time band, The Sadies, who are a long running and well loved Country/Psych/Roots band.
 |
| Mike Haliechuk (left) & Mark Hurst: Pictured on Japanese tour, Mark played drums - see previous section. |
Mike played a handful of shows with us around Toronto in the early years
and also the first tour of Japan. He never recorded with us or
played in the band regularly, but was a great help to fill in here and there. I
think he even played drums for us at a show once at Planet Kensington (which
used to be the Greek's and is now Thirsty and Miserable). If I remember
correctly, Mike actually duct-taped the drum sticks to his hands, because they
would fly out otherwise.
Neal "of Poland" AKA Neal Dyrkacz (Played a few shows)
Jonah: Neal played for us at Chicago Fest, which was directly after our first Japanese tour. Mike (Haliechuk) decided to stay in Toronto, and Mark, Martin, and I drove to Chicago straight off the plane to meet with Neal to rehearse that evening for our show either that night or the next day. Neal may have also joined us for another show in the midwest as well. Musos in different area codes...
 |
| Picture courtesy of Matt White |
Matt was possibly our longest serving bass player. He joined the band in the mid-2000's and was involved until about 2011-ish, I think. Matt and I had previously played in a couple bands that went nowhere in Vancouver... Actually, there's a barely relevant connection to Anne Marie from White Lung... Matt (bass), Anne Marie (drums) and I (guitar/vocals) played in some terrible band in Vancouver right before Career Suicide was formed. It was good fun, but I'm glad recordings didn't survive as I wasn't much of a song writer.
When Matt moved to Ottawa, we invited him to join CS and he "commuted" in for practices and shows. Matt's signature is that he refuses to play with a pick, so it definitely added something unique to the sound of CS. He's quite a proficient bassist, but mix that with playing too fast and drinking too much, and magic can happen. With Matt part of the routine before any show was to go to a local hardware store to score liquid glue that he would use to coat his fingers ...otherwise his fingers would be totally shredded after our set.
Matt went on a number of tours with us over the years: Europe, Japan, several times across the US and Canada. Matt ended up leaving the province, which was his reason for leaving the band. He's another one of those amazingly hilarious characters that is sorely missed. I don't think there's been another member of CS that could crack up the whole band the way he does. Matt was such a blast to go on tour with. One day we'll release the Matt Miller Band demos from the California tour.
Jon is our current bass player. He joined the band around 2012 and his first tour with us was to Europe. Jon's a local legend having played in countless bands from Toronto (Brutal Knights, Rammer, Chokehold, etc).
Guitar
 |
CS lineup for Dallas Good's first show (Aug 25 2013):
L-R: Martin Farkas, Jon Sharron, Dave Brown, Jonah Falco,
Dallas Good
|
Dallas is now in Career Suicide "full time" on second guitar. He has to miss gigs here and there because of his full time band, The Sadies, who are a long running and well loved Country/Psych/Roots band.
