New faces

New Cork band, Commizerate, are starting out in the biz with some songs, some dreams and a lot of raw energy and eager to tell everyone about themselves.

Let me introduce you to Commizerate. The five new members of Cork's hottest new rock band are all buzzing with energy. It's six o'clock and they just begin to warm up for their first gig in front of a pub full of drinkers and music-lovers. Despite non-stop rehearsing and countless soundchecks, they are all bright as buttons and raring to go.

In the run up to this, Commizerate have been working their socks off to get the band of the ground. The band is made up Eoghan Hennessy on bass, Adam Hussy on drums, James Keane on guitar and Robert Mehigan on vocals. The band is very young. They sing all their own original material as felt that the audience would "be more appreciative of the fact they could write music as well as play it".

Commizerate was formed in the early part of 2003, a group of 4 that started off in a small garage, guitar, bass, drums and vocals came together to write new original music to appeal to the masses. But far from tiring of their life as rock stars, they're relishing every minute.

"It's been really busy," says Eoghan, settling down after a long rehearsal. "But we know that we've worked hard enough and long enough for this and, hopefully, we will be reaping the rewards soon. We know there's a lot of work still to come but we're ready for it.

Robert adds, "We just think what we could be doing if we weren't doing this? It's great getting attention from the locals and our mates and we have started to see new faces already. Because we people are beginning to appreciate us and support us we are happy to work very hard."

Commizerate recently won a very prestigious Battle of the Bands competition in Midleton in East Cork with four songs. The four songs they played there really represent the heart and soul of Commizerate, the melodic soft sound of 'Why flows' into the relentless movement of 'Hate' and then onto the hard, deep disturbing riffs of 'Soldiers cry'.

Commizerate follow on the success of local Cork bands Cyclefly and 2:13, but people might ask whether we need another rock band, but Commizerate are offering something a bit different. Bassist Eoghan Hennessy explained to me that they weren't going to "change their image for anybody". He, charmingly, went onto describe their music as a "vulgar display of power".

The search now continues for that new sound "which will help us to maintain our existing fan base and to expand it worldwide."

by PJ Ahern