Sorting
Through the AIS Band Family Tree
Better
Than Zero Perform on December 7, 2001 at TÜWI (Photo
from http://traunsee.com/PUNK)
Sunday, May 9, 2004 (Originally)
I just started summer vacation, and I’m bored as hell. After listening to some Unlike You tracks that are stored on my computer, I sort of wondered what was going on with AIS Vienna (my former high school) bands these days. I remembered from when I was a senior that there was a band called Better Than Zero. I also remembered listening to a band at the beginning of my summer vacation last year but I didn’t remember their name.
I decided to check out garageband.com and see what I could find. I quickly found the now defunct Unlike You, and I also found Better Than Zero. There was one downloadable song called “Reset,” which I immediately recalled from introducing the band during our class’s cabaret in April of 2002. I remembered hearing that the band had changed names so I looked for other punk bands in Vienna and found Three Simple Words. Little did I know that there were tons more bands that basically all somehow derived from these two previous bands. Eight of the sixteen punk bands listed under Vienna are AIS related!
I could never tell which band was up-to-date as none of their respective garageband.com sites said that they had broken up. I found Project 05, The Empty Space Orchestra, Rejects and Rocket Science, the VALIDATORS, and AnotherTragicCase. Rejects and Rocket Science and AnotherTragicCase both claimed to be formed in the fall of 2003, and had some of the same members, so I immediately assumed that these bands were coexisting or that one of the names were temporary and it was quickly abandoned for another name. I was confused as hell. Thankfully I found a site called Mandela Coin, which has band reviews that cleared it all up for me. I found out the VALIDATORS and AnotherTragicCase both played a gig in April of this year, which leads me to the conclusion that they both are the currently active AIS bands.
I decided to map this all out into a family tree-type diagram. This was absolute hell. I kept messing up and ended up cutting out the pieces of paper with band names on them to move them in the right order. I finally thought I had it all right when I realized I sort of forgot James Hersey, who was part of Three Simple Words, was absent from The Empty Space Orchestra, but reappeared in the apparently only-on-paper Rejects and Rocket Science. So I decided to start all over, as this latest mistake would have cost me another ugly whiteout line. The second time I made very few mistakes and I think I finally got it all right.
The AIS band family tree diagram I created (second attempt)
So here’s my conclusion: The granddaddies of all twenty-first century AIS bands were Better Than Zero (Sam, James, Ben, Sean) and Unlike You (Ed, Seby, Elliott, Markus). After the 2001-2002 academic year Unlike You broke up (I believe due to geographic separation), and Better Than Zero lost their guitarist Ben Wilcox, due to his family moving to Kansas (He's now the rhythm guitarist for a band called The Fall of Athens). So, Better Than Zero went Ben-less for a while, calling themselves Three Simple Words. Then, however, some major shifting occurred… Try not to lose me!
The Empty Space Orchestra performs on May 16, 2003 at Aera (Photo from Mandela Coin)
Sam from Three Simple Words and Elliott from Unlike You, along with two new guys, Jeff and Chris, became Project 05. At least that's what I thought. But here is the truth from Sam himself:
So basically I was pretty close, except that Elliott was already in Three Simple Words and Chris didn't join the Project 05 "branch" until they were known as the VALIDATORS (see below).
Sean from Three Simple Words along with three new guys, Eddie, J.T., and Philip formed The Empty Space Orchestra. I saw these guys in concert on May 16, 2003, so they did exist! These band formations occurred in the 2002-2003 academic year. In the fall of 2003, Retards and Rocket Science was formed, although, as far as I can tell, only on paper. It consisted of The Empty Space Orchestra (minus Eddie) plus four new guys, Thierry, Jarett, Adam, and Paul. James from the original Better Than Zero / Three Simple Words jumped aboard again as well. AnotherTragicCase also claims to be formed in the Fall of 2003, and seeing that there is evidence that they actually have played at least one concert, it appears to me that these were the guys that actually became a band out of the Rejects and Rocket Science listing. They are Sean, Thierry, Jarett, J.T., and Philip. According to the band’s pureVOLUME profile, J.T.’s brother Alex has also been added. This profile also mentions an upcoming show on June 5, 2004.
Uncertainty (Added 5-10-04): According to the web site of Requiem Reqords, The Empty Space Orchestra is coming out with an album in early June. Therefore they probably do still exist as well. Unfortunately no links work on the Requiem Reqords site, so I have no clue what's going on. My guess right now is that they're coexisting.
But we’re not done! There’s still the Project 05 branch of Sam, Elliott, and the new guy Jeff. Luckily this one’s a little easier. They’ve stayed together and simply renamed themselves once, added an Austrian called Chris, and are now known as the VALIDATORS. They played at the same concert as AnotherTragicCase in April of 2004, and released a new song on May 11, so they are also currently active.
Here are some links for you to trace the AIS band past and present:
Unlike You:
http://garageband.com/unlikeyou (3 songs available for download)
http://www.angelfire.com/apes/unlikeyou
Better Than Zero:
http://garageband.com/betterthanzero (1 song available for download)
Three Simple Words:
http://garageband.com/3simplewords (1 song available for download)
Project 05:
http://garageband.com/project5 (6 songs available for download)
The Empty Space Orchestra:
http://garageband.com/teso
Retards and Rocket Science:
http://garageband.com/secondfromtheback
AnotherTragicCase:
http://garageband.com/anothertragiccase
http://purevolume.com/anothertragiccase (1 NEW song available for download)
http://anothertragiccase.tk
the VALIDATORS:
http://garageband.com/thevalidators
http://purevolume.com/thevalidators (3 songs (2 NEW) available for download)Requiem Reqords:
http://geocities.com/requiemreqords
http://purevolume.com/requiemreqordsThe Fall of Athens:
http://garageband.com/artist/thefallofathens
http://www.myspace.com/thefallofathens
http://geocities.com/thefallofathens
http://rockkansas.com/thefallofathensGron:
http://garageband.com/artist/cbatts (2 songs available for download)
http://soundclick.com/bands/6/gronmusic.htm (3 songs available for download)
The following picture site might scare the hell out of you! These are pictures of Unlike You and Better Than Zero playing in December 2001. That’s right… 2001, when Better Than Zero were freshmen. The audience picture really freaked me out.
The Class of 2005 when they were younger (Photo from http://traunsee.com/PUNK)
Remember, all the "information" listed on this site is simply from my own research (except where backed up from a primary source), mainly using garageband.com, the sites linked from the bands' listings there, and the Mendela Coin reviews. Therefore, any or all (although I doubt too much) of it could be wrong. If you want primary source information, contact the bands directly.
