Tony Erba - Part IV

Coming off the biggest DCXX entry ever, Erba re-loads and fires again, this time with some Face Value memories.

- Gordo DCXX

What type of chaos did Face Value cause over the years? Most memorable shows and why?

Well we tried to turn every show into a party in the pit, we were a feel-good, let's stagedive and trash the hall type band. My problems were usually with the soundman. I started to bring my own mikes to shows after scumbag club owners would charge us $100 for a 'broken mike' when there was a dent in the spit screen. We'd have a well thought-out set list designed to have the crowd frothing like manic idiots by the time we played the set-closer which was always "Coming Of Age" and then I'd just kind of signal for the crowd to take over and they'd rush the stage and there'd be 100 assholes onstage, knockin over amps, diving off PAs,swinging from the lighting tresses, etc. We broke the stage in half at the Empire, destroyed the drywall countless times at the Babylon, etc.

Most memorable shows? So many. We'd play alot of smaller towns that the 'cool' bands would pass up, and do sellout houses the second time we'd come thru, like Conway, AR; Tri-Cities, WA; Rapid City, SD etc. Syracuse was a great town for us. But the best shows were Clevo after we didn't play for 6 months because we weren't getting over, everyone was kissing Integrity's ass and we weren't drawing so we played on the road exclusively for at least 6 months then we booked the Babylon and oversold the fuck out of it and had a SICK reaction, I have a tape of it, we played close to an hour and the crowd heat was so intense, new kids from the West Side full of aggro and mischief, my brother had his crew out in full force, kids were AMPED.


Erba dips back into the crowd for some classic FV mayhem

I also focused on booking the band like an old pro wrestling territory...instead of focusing on just drawing in Cleveland, we'd develop a circuit which consisted of Erie, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Louisville, Detroit, Columbus, etc. Easy drives, great kids, great houses, good bands to play with. Ben Frazier and Mike Ski had Erie drawing like crazy. McKaig, DJ and Guav did a great job in Syracuse, Manny ran a tight ship in Pittsburgh, Ian had Columbus humming and we could play those towns 4-6 times a year and draw great each show.

Other memorable shows...first two times we played in Louisville were great. It was us, Integ and Endpoint, 1600 paid in a Lazer Tag arena, kids going berserk, girls actually talking to me, Endpoint were over more with their hometown audience than perhaps any other band I've ever seen before or since, I mean it was fucking COOKING down there. Great band and great friends...Duncan just did some liner notes for the FV reissue. Second time was a slight fall-off in attendance, ONLY about 1200 paid, but that place was out of fucking control. Some rich-kid Hardline band called Limit actually FLEW in to that gig on a private plane owned by the kid's Dad.

Another classic show was in Rockford IL; we rolled up to the gig at a roller rink, there were hundreds of kids in the parking lot, we were stoked. It's getting time to open the doors and the lady running the roller rink decides at the last second that she dosen't want to be 'hardcore show promoter' and cancels the gig. The kids start getting pissed, so this girl calls her Mom who's some sort of city councilwoman and she shows up with a bullhorn and starts grandstanding about "these kids need a place to go! You're keeping these kids out on the streets!!" Coincidentally, as she's standing on a car yelling into her bullhorn, right on cue, a couple of TV camera crews show up to catch this champion of HC kid's rights having her say. At that moment, some dude screeches into the parking lot in a beat-up pickup and yells "Hey man, I own the Cherry Lounge down the street, you can have the show there, and it's FREE!! And $2 well drinks! Yee--haw!" The whole crowd lets out a whoop, and 200 kids book it down to this club, and us, Silence, and the Voodoo Glowskulls proceed to have a wild-ass gig that night.


Flyer for a great Middlesex County College show that unfortunately Face Value never ended up playing, flyer by: Tim DCXX