Culture (US band)

Culture
Origin	Gainesville, Florida, USA
Genres	Hardcore punk Metalcore
Years active	1993–1998
Labels	Catalyst Records, Conquer The World, Good Life Recordings, Intention, Shadow, Toybox
Past members
Damien Moyal Kenneth Brian Joseph Simmons Floyd Beckham Timothy Kirkpatrick Richard Thurston Louie Long Mark Mitchell Jeremy Haynes John Wylie Steve Looker Gordon Tarpley Peter Carreno Stan Obal Josh Williams Jason Dooley

Culture was a Florida-based vegan/straight edge hardcore band. They formed in 1992, and lasted until 1998, when Damien Moyal merged the remaining members into the second incarnation of As Friends Rust.^[1]

History

Rich Thurston formed the band in 1992 with Stan Obal on bass, Josh Williams on drums, and Mark Mitchell on vocals. Mark left in late 1993, and Rich assumed vocals. The trio recorded a four-song Demo and quickly got signed to release a self-titled 7" on Shadow Records. Before the release, John Wylie joined on second guitar, and was credited in the line-up. Shortly after, Stan was replaced by Peter Carreno. Pete was then replaced by Gordon Tarpley, and Damien Moyal joined to relieve Rich of vocals. The five piece went in studio to record multiple versions of songs that would be selected to be released on Born of You and on the Split with Roosevelt. Damien left in 1995, leaving the band to have short stints with vocalists Jeremy Haynes and Louie Long for touring purposes. After the return of supporting the releases, Mark Mitchell returned to front the band, and creative tensions with John Wylie resulted in his starting his own band, Morning Again (the band would mostly be constructed of musicians that had been in Culture, or that would in the future switch to become Culture members), letting Steve Looker take his position. The new line-up recorded Deforestation, and went back on tour.

In late 1996, original drummer Josh Williams left and was replaced by Jason Dooley, and Damien, who had been asked to leave Morning Again, returned to Culture. This line-up started writing new material right away. The first of which was a re-recording session of selected Born of You songs, as well as two new songs. The band was approached by Sean Bonner who ran Toybox Records to tour with them, and possibly release records of their material. The band continued to write more material, that would be released on a split with Kindred and on Heteronome. The songs from the session of Born of You only made it to test press of Mike Warden Can Suck It. A year later, Rich, the only remaining founding member, left the band, moving Gordon to switch to guitar, Floyd Beckham to take over bass, and Timothy Kirkpatrick to join on drums. Very shortly after, Steve Looker and Joe Simmons traded positions in Morning Again and Culture, respectively. The band was to go to Europe for what would be their final tour, but Gordon could not make it, so Kenneth Brian temporarily joined as second guitarist.

Most of the final line-up, Damien, Joe, Gordon and Tim, followed Damien in his reincarnation of As Friends Rust.

Discography

• Demo (1993)
• Culture (1994)
• Born of You (1995)
• Split with Roosevelt (1995)
• Deforestation (1996)
• Split with Kindred (1997)
• Heteronome (1997)
• Mike Warden Can Suck It (Never Released)
• Born of You (1998)

References

1. ^ Review October 1998, unityhxc.com. Retrieved January 2011

External links

• Culture Myspace
• Culture on Good Life Recordings^{[dead link]}
• Culture/Kindred on Good Life Recordings^{[dead link]}
• Culture on Catalyst Records^{[dead link]}