About Me
At the tail end of the halcyon days of hair-metal but before grunge rose to prominence, a young drummer by the name of Dave McCabe noticed the burgeoning Seattle music scene and decided to put together a high-caliber hard rock/metal band and enter the fray. For reinforcements, he called up his good friends John Tippens (guitars) and Tom Moore (guitars), the three of them forming a rock ‘n’ roll trinity, the nucleus of the band. With the additions of bassist Dan Dally and lead vocalist Rick Allen, the metal beast known as Dr. Grind was alive at last and ready to rock hard.
They settled in Seattle, cited TNT, Queensryche, and Dokken as influences, and swayed toward the heavier, more progressive edge of the commercial metal spectrum. After months of intense songwriting and relentless practicing, they landed their first show at the Ballard Firehouse in Ballard, WA. It would not be their last. Dr. Grind’s popularity exploded and they whipped through clubs like a whirlwind over the next couple of years, including Maddogs, The Roxy Theatre, and Pier 70, blowing the roofs off wherever they went. They achieved outstanding success on local airways while opening for bands like Foghat, Robin Trower, and Ugly Kid Joe (UKJ).
Speaking of Ugly Kid Joe, the band fondly remembers what they refer to as “The Great Ugly Kid Joe Pumpkin Fight of Halloween ‘93.†The skirmish began with Dr. Grind roadies and UKJ roadies lobbing small pumpkins at each other. Things didn’t erupt into full-scale war until UKJ’s lead singer decided to punt a pumpkin right off the stage while belting out “Won’t You Be My Neighbor.†If the roadies’ tomfoolery was a room full of flammable vapors, then this pumpkin-punt was the spark, and immediately a no-holds-barred pumpkin fight ensued with orange spherical vegetables hurtling through the air like fragmentation grenades in a Vietnam War movie. When the conflict ended, no clear winner had emerged, but there were several inches of slimy pumpkin pulp splattered on the floor, walls, and ceiling. The members of Dr. Grind still find pumpkin seeds in their old gear to this day.
But before ‘93 was ‘91, when Dr. Grind played a gig at Parkers, a Seattle-based club. The band initially slated to play bowed out, so Dr. Grind borrowed another’s band’s equipment, strutted onto the stage with the confidence true rock stars possess, and unleashed several of their songs like sonic bullets. Those bullets impacted on the ears of a man in the audience named Darryl Nichols, who signed on to be Dr. Grind’s official manager, eventually forming Jett City Records, an independent record label.
The band recorded their first demo EP with Maverick Gibson at Full Voice Audio in Seattle. Like all of Dr. Grind’s endeavors, the demo proved to be successful, pushing their popularity to even further heights. The decision was made to go for broke and record their first full-length, self-titled debut album, again produced by Maverick Gibson and eventually polished off with Lou “Hat Trick†Michaels at Paramount Studios in Hollywood, CA, in the infamous upper level number three room, which has a history of strange phenomena. Rick experienced the eeriness for himself while tracking the vocals for the song “Gone†at 3:00 A.M. when a strange voice kept seeping into his earphones, a voice that nobody else could hear, even when they donned the same earphones. Haunted by what was happening, Rick couldn’t finish the track.
With a debut album now under their belts, the band engaged in a grueling touring schedule that took them all over the west coast at a frantic pace, at which time personality conflicts, exhaustion, financial distress, and management issues reared their ugly heads. With the band on the edge of breakdown, the grunge-metal onslaught proved to be the final straw. The wheels of the Dr. Grind train, which had been rolling steadily along for so many years, suddenly came to a screeching halt. In 1996, the already-splintered band officially called it quits.
Dave McCabe and Tom Moore continue to collaborate and all members of Dr. Grind remain friends, with talk of a reunion occasionally popping up in their conversations. Will it ever happen? Only time will tell. But no matter what, for those with an addiction to hard rockin’ metal music, Dr. Grind is just what the doctor ordered.
.. Myspace Layout Generator-Layoutgen.com
..
