Sacrifice
three years ago, in 2005, a band played their first show at redhouse in walnut creek. they were horrible, the singer was off-key and couldn't find his voice, the bassist played like a frustrated four-string guitarist, and i believe that the drummer dropped his sticks once or twice. still, something about them was intriguing. they had a sound that was familiar and, for the exact same reasons, like nothing that had ever been heard before. despite their own disappointments in the performance, the group kept playing. after a few more shows and many hours of hard work and rehearsal, the band had found its sound. their name was downfall society. the horrible singer was peter hulin, the frustrated bassist was austin welborn, and the clumsy drummer was chris haman. within six months of their first show, they were blowing people away, selling cd's, making t-shirts, and consistently booking shows at least once a month. after finding their sound, they found that the name was too dark, too specific to one genre to represent a group like them. they had a sound that was out of this world, like something from another planet. these men were not of this earth, these men were sons of saturn. and thus from then on they were known as just that. sos...sons of saturn. throughout the next two years, the band continued to play shows throughout the bay, hitting venues such as the concord pavilion, bourbon street, redhouse, lucky pizza etc. as with most bands working towards success, there were conflicts. the three musicians appeared torn, wanting different things both musically and out of life. there was fighting...there were drugs. there was anger and resentment, problems of the past being brought into the future. in december of 2007 the band broke up. austin welborn went on to form echophobia, also known as stereodivine, with austin stoddard, kevin blachley, and joe caron. peter hulin and chris haman formed saturn rain with sinjin davis. saturn rain played one show before breaking up due to conflict and trust issues on and off stage. echophobia continued playing, but austin was not happy. it was not the music he loved. peter and chris felt the same way with saturn rain, and with their next group jcp, formed with joe megley on bass and joe caron on guitar after his departure from echophobia. both bands, jcp and stereodivine, played the concord pavilion battle of the bands and failed to make the finals. this was strange for austin, chris, and peter, because as downfall society and sons of saturn, they had made the finals two years in a row. there was a feeling of depression among all three. austin felt abandoned, peter felt ashamed of how he had treated his best friend, and chris felt hopeless, as if nothing would ever get better. then one day in june of 2008, austin welborn called peter hulin. the two agreed to meet and play some music, for old times sake. it was the happiest the two had been in a long time. later that day, chris haman joined the two and the three jammed for the first time in six months. there was happiness and good times all around. the three played music every day they could for the next week, jamming, showing off their new skills, working through new material that would be fun to play, and talking through the problems that had broken up the group six months prior. the three agreed, a reunion show was neccessary, not only for the three of them, but for the fans that had been left disappointed at echophobia, saturn rain, jcp, and stereodivine performances, which were sad replacements for a group as original and meaningful as sons of saturn. the three realized something they knew all along, they had been playing with musicians from another world, an uninspiring planet known as earth. there was only one combination that was ever meant to exist, a collaboration of three brothers bringing color to a world of black and white...the three true and only...sons of saturn.
