I’ve known this guy named Scott for some time now.  We are like minded individuals with like minded passion for our music scene.  Though we used to see one another frequently in the early part of the decade, I now see him in unexpected places, which ironically has become expected of him. This guy, named Scott, waved the flag for Texas Rock and Metal before Lone Star Metal was even an idea.  Wm. Scott Deaver started RemuS Radio a year prior to the beginning of the 21st century.  That translates to the year 2000.  In a time when the world thought we would be thrown back to the stone ages in the wake of Y2K, Scott Deaver dared to look ahead and trust the World Wide Web enough to start an internet radio station.  The RemuS Diaries are his look back at the scene [as much as he can remember] in a different time than today. – Rusty Conner

I know it’s been a while but like I told Rusty a few weeks ago, writing is definitely a discipline and by my not having a, albeit self-imposed weekly deadline to meet like I did while operating RemuS Radio “back in the day”[sic], the writing thing along with the discipline required for such was the first thing that escaped me upon closing the website and retiring into obscurity or as some folks affectionately called it – Pasadena, Texas.

Prior to RemuS Radio (www.remusradio.com) [don’t click it] and more realistically prior to 2000, I led a rather simple and boring 80’s kind of married life with my first bride Theresa (RIP). We worked…..okay, she worked and I looked for reasons not to work. In those days I felt that my time was better spent getting stoned and figuring out what I wanted to be whenever I decided to let myself grow up. That, and watching bizarre and highly questionable video materials with my downstairs neighbor across the way when she and I lived at 12225 Bissonnet at Roark Rd. in lovely Southwest Houston from 1984 thru 1987. Some of you might not know where Roark Rd. is exactly so let me simplify it for you – The Sam Houston Tollway.

I grew up in a very County & Western/Baptist Hymnal music filled home and despite all of that, somehow I managed to have two very critical events that turned my musical direction elsewhere.  The first being somewhere around age 8 or 9 when I bought a few Beatles 45s at a garage sale my Grandmother was having. I’m not one of those die hard and hardcore Beatles fans but they get the full credit for turning me towards Rock n Roll in the first place. The second time was in 2000 when at age 38 I divorced my 1st wife and took off on a musical odyssey I call “The RemuS Years” and it was in that time that I actually met Rusty, Crystal and most of the true-blue friends that I have now including my sweet baby-girl, Brandi.

I had something nagging at me during the last few years of my 16 year marriage to Theresa but I didn’t know what it was. Something was calling me to do something with music at some level but I didn’t know in what capacity it would be or how to go about it or anything because (1.) I play no “Rock” instruments and (2.) I had never done anything or even worked in the music business at any level. I knew that I was ready for something different, something challenging, something creatively fulfilling and most importantly, something that ROCKED!! That was an absolute must because that is what I was born to do – I’ve known that since I first heard rock n roll music so from that point on I was basically a wandering minstrel with nothing to menstruate until the day finally came that I would discover what it was I was supposed to do……at least from 2000 through 2005, anyway.

Segue ahead to July 2000 and I’m freshly divorced, making decent money for a high school dropout and looking for something to do in my off time. A few months earlier I had discovered Shoutcast and had downloaded their software so that I could actually broadcast music onto the Internet and I did so with much vigor. Between my own CD and album collection and the stuff I was getting off Napster I had a great catalogue of shit to broadcast and did so 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

I was working for North-point Communications at the time and when I did a DSL install at someone’s house or business, I verified to the customer that their shit was working by tuning in my own broadcast on my laptop.

 The first revision of Metallica’s original lawsuit against Napster listed my IP address and ISP as one of the defendants but I actually paid money for their music, I owned their music fair and square. I can’t help it if the people downloading it from me didn’t send a check to Metallica. Needless to say, this lawsuit changed a lot of things including the broadcasting of music, even on the Internet and even if you did it without making any money at it.

There went the only thing I had as a hobby in those days, now what?

My buddy Ray and I had been hitting some bars in our area and watching local music shows and having a grand ol’ time. Theresa and I practically never went out so I was really eating this shit up. Some of the bands were good, some of the bands were bad, some of the bands were downright awful and were the point of much drunken laughter on our way home. We were hitting places like Coach’s on Bissonnet & Cook Rd.(future Bobby’s), The Caricature (Creature) Club in Spring Branch, Backstage/Cardi’s at Bissonnet & 59 and a few other places that escape me right now. One night we were going to Bobby’s and there was a sign on their door saying they had moved to a new place near Beechnut and Hwy 6 so we went to check it out. They were open but without liquor license and you know what that means when a bar does that?

That’s right – free beer as long as you’re tipping…..and we tipped.

Well, one night at the Creature Club we were checking out Mystic Cross, their bass player at the time turned out to be

an old church/school friend from Huntsville (Bobby Cayton) and at some point in their set this long haired Hispanic dude dressed totally in black gets up there with them and just starts wailing out Ronnie James Dio and totally turns the joint upside down. Ray and I are freaking out because this guy is just killing it and we’re throwin’ high five’s an shit, doing shots and basking in the glow of our new discovery of a true “Metal God” and wondering just “who the hell is this guy that wandered into this dive ass bar in Spring Branch and promptly took ownership?”

We didn’t know this guy, we didn’t know anybody. We just knew that this guy was the shit, the real deal, and we wanted more of what he was peddling. He handed out some flyers and spoke “on mic” of a Judas Priest tribute show he was doing in the very near future at the new Bobby’s Extreme Sports Bar at Bissonnet near Hwy 6.

Dude we know that place, we’re there!!

A week or so passed and the night finally came and Ray and I were right there, front and center, beers in hand ready to go. The band was aptly called the “Metal Gods” and believe me, that night this well-oiled machine of metal demonstrated that they came by this name honestly and they weren’t about to take any prisoners. They absolutely killed it and Ray and I both just stood there with our mouths open, horns up and our heads just a bangin’ away uncontrollably. It was the first time I ever experienced what I would later on call being at “Metal Church” – This band had complete control over the audience and we were all on the same metaphysical plane where nobody else in the world even existed – it was just us and the band and nothing else.

It was also the first time I ever experienced an aching neck the next day……

The man that wandered into the Creature Club that night in Spring Branch, his name was James Rivera and his band was made up of Joel Gregoire and Ajax Rodriguez on guitars, Shane Dubois on bass and Matt Kanzler on drums. After that show I knew exactly what I wanted to do with my spare time and that was to begin collecting music from local bands, broadcasting it on the Internet from my house in Sugar Land, and doing whatever else I could to get behind and promote our local music scene.

No question about it, this night truly changed my life forever.