Syghe

Here’s a sample from one of our 2008 studio tapes. This is the best cut from a song we were working on called Gutpack. If Syghe were ever going to release more music, I think we’d start by finishing this one, it rocks!

This is going to be a long story so get ready:

When Syghe broke up in 2007, David and I agreed to keep syghe.com up and post news about our respective projects on it so the fans wouldn’t have to go looking for us. Unfortunately the site was owned and operated by our then manager, Roy. When we broke up, he stopped returning my calls and eventually the domain expired. I tried to register it myself, but a domain squatter had already gotten a hold of it.

The squatter wanted $150/month for use of the domain, and that wasn’t something David and I were willing to do. I lost hope about ever having syghe.com back. I am glad to say that the squatter got bored of holding our domain, and it’s finally ours again!

A lot has happened in the last 5 years, and I’ve received many kind messages from all of you. Let me answer some of your questions up front.

1. Syghe is not back. Unfortunately David and I are still not making music together anymore. We each have our own projects though, David writes under Flying Castle and I write under Genre. I will be posting tracks from both projects here on this site, as we originally intended.

2. Syghe has more music. Despite not writing music anymore, David and I got together at a studio for kicks in 2008 and recorded a few demos. I posted three of them on our Soundcloud, which you can check out in the Music Section.

3. YES WE FIRED ROY. He was the worst manager I think any band has ever had the misfortune of having. He stole our money, neglected our work and failed to publicize our projects. We took him to court but because we never had a firm contract, we ended up losing. Either way he’s gone now.

4. We have T-Shirts. A lot of people have asked about our shirts. We had them available at one point, but I think they’ve gone down now. I will do what I can to get them back up again.

5. The old site is gone. I’ve added all the posts I had saved on my old computer to this new site, but the old site died when Roy lost the domain. That includes all the old comments, pictures, and everything else you don’t see here.

I think that’s just about it. I just got back from LA so I’m pretty tired. I’ll write up some more and keep adding to this site this week. Keep it real and Syghe for your Lyghe!

-Rodger-

As of October 29th, Syghe is no more. It’s awful when a band’s biggest obstacle is time, but it can be an insurmountable obstacle. David and I jointly agreed we can’t put in the time Syghe requires at this point in our lives, and after a long debate, decided not to lead the fans on any more.

That being said, I have been working on a few things on my own time, which is easier to find than joint time with David, and I know David comes up with his own riffs on his own already. David wanted to make sure it was well known that we would still be putting out music, but not together, at least not for a while. I think for now we’ll continue to update this site with both of our solo projects, and if either of them take off, we’ll let you know where to go for updates.

As it stands, David will be heading up a project he likes to call “Flying Castle” and my works will be released under the handle “Genre.”

To all you devoted fans out there: I’m sorry we never got t-shirts, I’m sorry we never finished the album, and I’m especially sorry we couldn’t put in the time needed to make Syghe great. Maybe some day when we’ve got some more free time we can pick back up where we left off, but I don’t think that will be for a few years at least.

-Rodger-

Undertone is a song that David and I recorded several months back, just after the lawsuit against Roy began. We neglected to put it up because we thought we might expand the idea of the song further, but it was eventually decided that this would be a great intro track for West Nile Virus.

-Rodger-

We are excited to finally have syghe.com back up. I will be able to post about our newest material and ideas as soon as David and I sit down for a few minutes (you’d be surprised how hard it is to find even a few minutes both of us aren’t busy!) and talk about the band. Long live Syghe!

It’s finally done! Well mostly, anyway. I took the sample David and I had last week and put just a few finishing touches on it, but he’ll probably want to mess with it some too. I ran this version by the manager, who said it sounded a lot better than the raw original we had. Hopefully you guys will like it too.

-Rodger-

So here’s the deal. David and I spent countless hours working in the studio these past few days, and then many more hours slicing up some songs digitally. I’m sorry to report that we could not complete any songs yet, but we’re really close on two of them. We were also working on song order for the album, and testing out a few older tracks as an intro. Most of you probably don’t remember Syghe as it originally was.

Originally, Syghe was a jam band. Not only were we a jam band, but we were a chillout indie jam band. We didn’t write Pentegrax until just a few months ago (which is a completely different sound than we used to have). David and I really like our new sound, but I just don’t think we need to make all of our songs for the album 100% new. I really like a few of the jams from old shows; I think they’d make great Syghe songs.

In any case, we’re going to be tweaking things here and there to get these couple tracks ready for the site. I honestly wouldn’t feel comfortable putting the song we have now (Cubase) up yet, because it’s just not good enough. It’s just not Syghe yet.

-Rodger-

Still a few kinks to work out, what do you guys think?

::Update:: Changed the text so it matches.

-Rodger-

I got a call from David a few days ago. He said he had been talking to the manager (shock!) earlier that day about starting work on a few shirt ideas and designs. The manager had a few ideas, but I figured I’d post what I’ve done, see if anyone likes it.

Moved both ideas to the Pictures section.

-Rodger-

This is only going to be up for a week or two, but I figured all the loyal fans would see this (hell, they may even have this already). I found an old demo tape of The R’s, and got Mike’s permission to put it up here for you guys. “Verbed” was the working title of this one. Enjoy.

-Link Removed-

-Rodger-

Again I’ll say that we were shocked but very honored about all the hype after we posted our first studio track. I just want to take a moment and say thank you to all the old fans, and all the new ones! It wasn’t easy recording another track with all the pressure to make it as good as Pentegrax, but I’m not afraid to say Sputnik may be even better.

I want to take a few moments to tell you about Syghe’s original drummer. He wore tattered clothing and always loved to party. He was a really fun guy to have around, and a fantastic drummer. He had run away from his foster family when he was 16 and as soon as he was 18 he had changed his name to “DR-5” so no one could find him. I never knew his real name but we all called him Dee.

We found Dee drumming for a speed metal band and playing in hole-in-the-wall clubs. He wasn’t happy, but he was getting by. We invited him to come jam with Syghe for a night, and to our surprise he accepted.

We were blown away by his talent and the amazing energy he brought to our music. I wish we had recorded any of our shows back in those days (if any of you have the few dozen bootlegs floating around, post in the comments).

Towards the end of a tour in 2002, Dee was going really hard one night. I could tell from his playing that something was on his mind, but I didn’t have a chance to ask him after the show. I don’t blame myself, but I’ll always wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t gotten distracted after the show. When we got back to the van, Dee was gone, which wasn’t unusual. In the morning he was still gone, which almost never happened. David and I walked around to a few bars and strip joints to ask if they had seen Dee. Finally one bar owner said he had seen someone matching Dee’s description. The bar owner said Dee was totally strung out for most of the night and was eventually kicked out when he vomited on the floor.

I think that’s when I knew for sure. Dee hadn’t used in almost two months, and he was doing really well. But bright stars burn out fast, even if their glory lives on forever in the memories of everyone they touched. David and I got to the hospital as fast as we could and sure enough, we found Dee being moved to the morgue.

Sputnik is about the amazing two and a half years Dee spent with us, and I hope, captures Dee’s untamable spirit.

Thanks again to everyone.

I can’t believe how many of you have listened to our first track. It’s only been 5 days and we already have nearly 50,000 downloads. Thank you so much for all your kind words and support. I had no idea there were so many of you who would remember us from our old tours.

I promise we’re working on more music as I type this and also looking for a suitable manager.

I can’t say it enough, thank you thank you thank you!

Still getting used to putting music on this site instead of our MySpace account, but I’m proud to announce Syghe’s first studio track is finally available online! Please feel free to listen and download the track, we’re very excited about it.

-Rodger-