Joseph Guzman
Equinox Staff
Last Sunday, one of Keene State’s biggest bands, Afterimage, played a performance at the Worcester Palladium in Massachusetts. “It was crazy, to say the least, we had an opening slot so we had to warm the crowd up. But we were booked with Death Metal giant Morbid Angel. Let me tell you, I’m singing songs about broken hearts, and their whole set is about either dying, wanting to die, or being dead. We knew going in it was going to be interesting, but we had a great time. We also had a really good response from the crowd, and someone even called us ‘brave for performing at a death metal show.’ Overall it was great for perspective and stepping out of our comfort zone,” said singer Griffin Romprey.
The band themselves are composed of Brandon Curcio on guitar, Casey Daron playing bass, Jason Coburn on keyboard, Andy LeCuyer playing drums and lead singer Griffin Romprey. Romprey had this to say about their origin, “How we came together was pretty simple, to be honest. Our bass player (Casey Daron) wanted to participate in the Keene State Battle of the Bands competition. So he asked a few people that he knew had an interest in music, and in doing so he recruited four members. Andrew Lecuyer (drums) Brandon Curcio (guitar) Cole Pestana (Rhythm Guitar) and Reuben Meister (Lead Singer).” Romprey continued, “It was after that battle of the bands that the group realized that they wanted to take it a little farther than just a one-off event, so they started to practice more and more. It was around this time that they lost their original singer due to commitment issues, and wound up being stuck with me. In that exact same time period, we also picked up our keyboard player, Jason Coburn. We gigged out here and there over the course of our freshman year and lost our rhythm guitarist in the process. That was the last change in our lineup, however, and have been rather solid over the course of these past two years.“ He also confirmed that the Palladium was the largest venue that they have ever played at, seating 2,160.
In terms of people who helped get them along the way to reach feats just as this Romprey explained that, “Douglas Flood from the Pizzastock Music Festival, The band Gray Haven (a band made of Keene State Alumni) and the Oasis. Mike Carp of Rambudikon Productions, our boys over at Revolution Bar and Grill. We also want to thank every one of you that actually enjoys our music, it’s because of your support that we have made it this far to begin with. Also to those that hate us, because you make us appreciate those that don’t.”
With all of the support of the people that help them along the way, the boys themselves practice three times on average “on a good week.” The band also recognized the struggle of being full-time college students, “…We also have other commitments that can sometimes get in the way, whether that [is] college or just the typical twenty-year-old priorities. But we enjoy creating and refining our sound because it’s actually starting to hit a point where the people who have stuck with us since the beginning have been noticing the growth. So practice kind of has that positive reinforcement now.”
Afterimage lastly wanted to add that, “We are hoping to release a professionally produced studio single in the summer. We just have to keep playing gigs and working on our sound in the meantime.”
Joseph Guzman can be contacted at
jguzman@kscequinox.com
