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3tards

Punk / Hardcore / Rock

Band Pic of The 3tards

When you’re a complete fucking idiot like I am, your dream has got to be to sing for a punk band one day. Kinda tough to do that if the musicians you know well live in Vancouver or have not been in your life for almost ten years. As a kid my best friend Mike (who would later become disgustingly wealthy as Mike Tard) played guitar and did it well. The problem is we were far too stupid to put two and two together and start a band! So I just sat and watched him learn his trade, and I sang in the shower and listened to my walkman really loud while walking on the train tracks in Brampton, Canada.

Mike and I are 34, so most of our favourite bands are from the ‘80s or before. Well after going to college with Mike (for two days), and living with him for years, he fucked off to Vancouver for almost a decade. Then one day in 2001 he told me he was moving back.

Immediately my brain started to turn. I asked him if he would like to be in a punk band and he said sure. So now we had a guitarist and a singer. Then I called up my wife’s brother Rich and asked him to play bass. He played a bit of guitar, but had never tried the bass. He bought one and we started jamming in his and Mike’s basements as… THE TROUSER SNAKES!

Remember, we had no drummer yet, so Mike would turn on the drum machine and we would play songs we would never hear again. I think the only song that survived the Trouser Snakes era is Little Dog Big Dick (our first song). After rehearsing for a bit we figured it was time to find a drummer. I knew just the guy – Rob Mills, drummer from Razor and a great friend growing up. One phone call and he was in.

By this time the name of the band had been changed to THE 3TARDS. We all agreed we liked this name a whole lot more. We would play our first and last show with this lineup on Saturday, May 25, 2002 at a local Brampton pub, Harry Flashman’s. We played 3 songs – a total of 7 minutes of music – but our set was 22 minutes long. All of us but Rob were drunk off our asses, me more than the rest. I spent 15 minutes just telling the crowd to fuck off, blah blah blah. I was so drunk I introduced a Dead Kennedys cover (When You Get Drafted), following which Mike Tard looked at me and said “we just played that one.” Oh well. The video of this show hurts to watch, but as time passes it becomes funnier to me. The bar was like a 40-plus singles club. People were eating dinner all over the place – not a friendly 3TARDS environment for sure.

Drama hit in a big way right after that gig. Rich Tard would leave the band. He didn’t really want to leave but he wasn’t committed enough to our jam schedule. In a friendly way he fucked off to Orangeville to pursue his lifelong dream of bongo playing.

Now this gets a little complicated. Rob Tard moved up to bass and I asked our friend Gus (who would also make zillions as Gus Tard) to play drums. Now we had the drummer from Canada’s premiere thrash band – Sacrifice – on drums and our bass player was from another top Canadian thrash band, Razor. With Mike Tard on guitar I believed with the talent of that lineup there would now be no looking back.

This lineup played its first gig show at an outdoor BBQ in Brampton on Sunday, September 1, 2002. Great time all around, but because of all the kids and elderly people in the crowd, I had to change half my lyrics so that we wouldn’t get killed. So we performed Little Dog Big Stick that night for the kids, the first and last time that would happen. We did introduce a brand new song that night, The Mullet, which has become Mike Tard’s absolute FAVOURITE song (kidding!)

We would play nine more shows with this lineup, seven in Toronto. Our first T.O. gig would be an absolute disaster! Saturday, March 29, 2003 at Third Floor Reilly’s. Absolutely NO ONE came. It was so sad. We just hung out with the other bands before and after our set. Great night, but not a real good ego booster, that’s for sure.

On Saturday, July 26, 2003 we would headline our first Toronto show, at the incredible Kathedral at Queen and Bathurst. But it would be our last with this lineup. Rob would leave the band, creating a tough hole to fill. We had just headlined a Toronto gig with six other bands, so we had to move quickly to get right back on the horse. I began calling everyone I knew in the scene about finding a new bass player. So many people were interested but none wanted to travel from Toronto to Brampton, where we jam every week. One name kept popping up, some prick named Fox. Supposedly he was a huge fan of the band, played bass, and was willing to do the weekly travel.

I posted flyers and ads everywhere, ordered two party-size pizzas, and waited for the huge turnout at our jam space on audition day. Only two people showed up. Mike Tard’s brother-in-law, and Fox. In the end Fox would get the gig and wear the handle Fox Tard proudly to this day.

His first gig would be Saturday, September 20, 2003 at Sneaky Dee’s in Toronto. He would play completely naked on stage that night, at least for ten seconds until the bouncer stormed the stage and screamed “PUT YOUR FUCKING PANTS ON RIGHT NOW!” He would play naked again not too long afterwards in Hamilton, but at the request of our drummer Gus Tard, that would be the last time, as Gus doesn’t want to have to look at Fox Tard’s naked ass all night again. Understandable.

As of this writing, we’ve played 19 shows with this lineup to over 5000 people; had live appearances on Ed’s Night Party, CIUT 89.5 and 102.1 The Edge’s Dean Blundell show; recorded our first album - THE GREATEST HITS, VOL. 2; shot the music video for 3TARDED; and played with The Misfits, as well as the Dayglo Abortions not once but twice. Not too shabby. We are currently working on our second CD project (CRYSTAL BALLS), which we will be recording in August.

We are EXTREMELY proud of what we have accomplished so far and our next CD is no exception. We’re going balls deep with this one.

Thank you for your interest. You should feel appreciated, because you are.