Matt Forgione

It all started when I flicked the T.V to MTV at the right second to see a Metallica music video called St. Anger. I was instantly hooked. I downloaded a couple more of their songs from that album and couldn't get enough. I wanted more. So i started downloading their older stuff. That was even better then St.Anger! What I noticed the most was Kirk Hammet's unique and extremely fast way of soloing and James Hetfield's heavy as hell rythem playing. So i thought to myself "man I wish I could play guitar, I could probably get chicks like crazy". Then I looked over at my dads ratty old banged up acoustic guitar. Yep theres my first guitar. So I take the acoustic up to my room, sit on my bed and played it for a solid 6 hours. At this point my fingers were almost bleeding. The next day I grown a calus on my fingers so I could play longer. But I didn't feel like playin that long so I only played for an hour or two. I gradually started losing interest in guitar. I even broke a string shortly after and just gave up. Then summer came and my uncle came to visit. He brought me a pack of strings and showed me the basics of guitaring. He taught me how to chord and variate and to tune by ear. That was all I needed. From there on I was obsessed. I got up sometimes early in the morning to practice. Then a couple weeks later I was shattered. My long time girlfriend broke up with me and I couldn't even bring myself to even touch my guitar. At that time Justin and I been talkin for a while. He was there helpin me through that break up and he also shared his interest in music with me. Thats what kept me goin. Then he kept going on about a band. A band? well first of all we don't have a name. so he just comes right and says "Psychotic Reaction". Well I was actually surprised that he came up with a name that quickly. But the fact was he was thinking about the band for a while. So there we were. Two guys, an acoustic guitar... what the hell kinda band was that? But we were determined to go on with the band idea. Then school came along. When school came along the ex girlfriend who shattered you also comes along too. I became very depressed and nothing really mattered. The band, guitar, nothing. But we kept working and working. We even had a song made. The thing was...We needed another guitarist and a drummer. Justin was our vocalist so we had that covered. The other thing was. Justin didn't have a bass either! But after Justin bugged his parents long enough they finally got him a bass and we were on track! we had a whole bunch of songs written and a song complete. It was awesome. But....I was still usin the ratty acoustic my dad had. I was gettin into heavier and heavier music like Korn and Seether. I wanted to play that...But I don't think I could do that on an acoustic. I really wanted to get an electric guitar. A couple weeks later we got big shot Max Cranford as our lead guitarist (before we had a girl guitarist but she didn't give a crap so we got rid of her without telling her..sorry heheh). Then shit happens and I break a string. But this was probably the best thing to happen to me. On the weekend we went to a nearby guitar shop to get some strings then....I seen the most beautiful guitar in the world. A dark blue Jay Turser stratocaster. It was calling my name. My dad stood next to me and said. "You wanna try it out Matt?" next thing I knew I was in the amp room trying it out. I liked that guitar, alot. So my dad made a deal with me. If I worked hard enough and chopped all the wood it's mine on my birthday. So I worked my ass off and before I knew it the guitar was mine all mine! It was perfect. We had a rythem guitarist, a bassist, a lead guitarist and a....wait...we didn't have a godamn drummer yet. And our productivity of the band went down alot....we all barely cared about the band really we just all went off and did our own thing...So the dumbass that I am...I quit the band..When I quit the band the band was basically shafted. That was really the dumbest thing I ever done that year (and I did some pretty dumb sh*t). A couple weeks later there was a winter carnival variety show going on and I thought to myself. "Hey im pretty good, I think I can go it alone on stage and play a song". Yeah at that time I thought I was hot sh*t. Anyways. Justin thought it was a pretty dumb idea so we got in an arguement. Then Max wanted in on it. Justin hated the band that he was gunna play TNT by AC/DC for so he quit that and joined us. So basically...The band got together again just for the show. But...what about a drummer? Well Max knew some drummer named C.J. who could only play a couple AC/DC songs so we got him and decided to play highway to hell by AC/DC. So this was gunna be some big AC/DC off. The day we rehearsed we screwed up badly so they gave us another chance. The second time around we got it thankfully. But we weren't called psychotic reaction we were The Windows. I thought that was pretty cool to finally play in front of an audience. but Justin didn't at all. He dreaded every second of it. When the day came we looked like idiots playing an instrumental of friggen highway to hell as the windows! But it made me feel better knowing the other band looked even more retarded actually dressing like AC/DC on the back in black tour. C.J. screwed up so badly he caused this chain reaction to screw me up. Then Justin didn't know when to switch because he was on the other side of the drums and couldn't hear me and Max. Then Max screwed up on the solo. Oh well. That was a stupid song anyways. After the show me and Justin went to work quickly just like the old times. We even re-did "Rage!" a song that we worked on when we were the psychotic reaction. Then me and Justin decided to play smells like teen spirit by Nirvana and the other song was going to be a song that he doesn't want to remember so I wont mention it. So we scratched that and did rage. The thing was...Max didn't like rage and acted like a friggen jerk about it the whole time. So it was just me Justin and Sam doin it. But rage was just going to be an instrumental. Smells like teen spirit was going to be sung by me and this time we actually had some *practise*. And this time we didn't have a stupid name like the windows. We were called Sonic Assault! But I was really looking forward to playing rage because its just heavy as hell and fun to play. It's got some crazy riffs and a ripping solo. So the big day came and..WE BROUGHT THE F*CKING HOUSE DOWN. We kicked the other bands ass and the crowd went nuts. And now we're going to get rid of Max because we obviously were better as a trio. And next year is going to be even better and I'm looking forward to being on stage again.