South of Shaw was a project that started while I was still in Hard Times. It consisted of Hard Times’ bass player, Rich Villanueva, myself, and two other guys, Bob Amendola and Kyle Palmer.
South of Shaw was Bob’s brainchild and he wanted to put something together that really had a young, pop/punk sound along the lines of Blink 182. They had already formed the band but had a horrible singer and a drummer that they weren’t totally happy with. I had gotten to know Bob through Rich and he would come do songs with us in Hard Times. At some point, they picked up Kyle and then soon after they asked me to come play drums. The band was then complete and we started writing.
We immediately started gigging and writing an album. We ended up recording it in my spare bedroom with Bob and I handling most of the arrangements and recording process. I did all the artwork for the album and eventually we ended up selling several hundred copies at our shows. For our gigs, Bob did the booking and I handled the merch and soon the band was playing some good gigs. We opened for some big name acts such as 30 Seconds to Mars, Angel’s & Airwaves, Plus 44, Sum 41, and others.
The problem with South of Shaw in my opinion was that it was 5 years too late. Pop/Punk was already declining and so we were behind the curve. Blink 182 had broken up and the big pop/punk bands were now back to playing small theaters and clubs. So it just wasn’t going to happen for us. On top of that, I was wanting to get out of secular music altogether and focus strictly on Clovis Hills and other Christian projects. So eventually, we called it quits. Bob moved to L.A. and formed a band called Hart Brake Kid, Rich moved to Las Vegas and and joined another cover band and that was that.
It was a good run though. Lots of good times with this band and the guys were really great guys.
