::1ST EDIT:: If you want a quick run down, just scroll to the bottom.
In the event you should wonder who is responsible for the updates of this particular xanga, I, Ricky Armellino, take sole responsibility for any outgoing comments made, entries written, blogrings, etc. That being said, I should get on the ball letting you guys know exactly what has been going on lately.
For the last 3 years, Bedford Exit has been one of the biggest parts of my life. I've helped write almost any of the guitar or bass parts you'll hear. I've written the lyrics. I sing (and yell) almost all of the vocal parts you'll hear on any given recording.
We've headlined our favorite local venues, played with more than a handful of bands we respect, made lots of close friends somewhere along the road, pushed tickets for shows, gained a short lived record contract, and recorded two CDs. All of these things are fine and good, but overall pretty worthless in the end.
When my old band broke up, I made Bedford Exit solely to play in a band with my four best friends: Sam, Nate, John, and Jack. When Nate left, we put in another one of our best friends, Evan. When John and Sam left, we put in other personal best friends: Mike, Tomy, and Chris. I love the members of my band because they are my best friends. Each one has so much heart about everything they do in life; playing punk rock just seemed like kind of a bi-product to everything else.
A few things have been kind of changing around, and being put on hold. I'm sure plenty of you have heard plenty of hearsay, so I'll set everything straight:
Bedford Exit will kind of remain invisible for a while. We will be playing our next few dates as planned, and remain a band over the next couple of months, and months after that to follow. Being from Allentown and without a car, Mike (the backbone of our whole band) won't be able to continue driving to and from Lancaster for every practice, hang-out, and show like the past year.
Tomy Lipka quit the band for various reasons (without any bad feelings from either side), and Asian has been filling the noisy void he left behind. If everyone could make Asian feel as welcome as possible and be really encouraging to the guy, that'd be awesome: He's a really great keyboard player.
As of now, without Tomy or Chris, our old 4 song demo seems kind of obsolete already (This is nothing new for anyone, I'm sure). We'll be getting it up on here for download as soon as we can, and hopefully some people might forward us a few bucks for a hard copy or two.
Evan has been on vacation a lot, I rarely really get to see the guy. I miss him a lot even though I live with him. It sucks sometimes. Jack has been practicing guitar non-stop and saving his money for some ridiculous gear. I've been doing vocal warm-ups every single day, and writing out the story board for the upcoming albums songs. Mike has been making cool artwork ideas and decorating his drums. Asian dances like he means it.
Anyway, the one thing I've noticed is that there's always some non-stop controversy about some of the things us or our friends, otherwise known as the "BTY" crew (which though is NOT solely Bedford Exit, we take any royalties for legal use of the name). We don't start needless drama without reason. We don't attack others. We don't come to shows in order to "make light" of everyone else's good time. Contrary to popular belief, we actually care about music and everyone who comes to our shows: we wouldn't have spent the last three years spending all of our money and time over our band just to make fun of anyone.
It's a really big shame the break has to go down at this current juncture: the last 10 shows or so have been a blast. Kids run around and dance however the hell they want, be it kicking or just running back and forth to frog hop eachother. I didn't see anyone get uptight about this scene or that. We made a lot of friends with a lot of talented kids around here. Our new songs were a lot of fun to play, and I actually started feeling comfortable with a microphone.
So is there an upside? Fuck yeah.
-We're writing new stuff, and working really hard. It's not even close to completion and I'm already both ecstatic and proud. Expect pure hot fire when the next album is completed. Also, like always, expect something new.
-You can get ahold of us any time on this thing or our myspace. I'll put dates up every now and then (our current ones still remain on our myspace), and we'll keep you up to date with the latest and greatests.
-BTY fucking owns everything in this town.
-If anyone wants to help us out a little with funds and other crap we need to worry about, you can chip in by buying a shirt, button, CD, belt or anything else we could try to convince one of our girlfriends to make for you.
-When we make our full onslaught of a debut (hopefully with Gwar and Planes Mistaken for Stars), I want you kids to punch everything, and anyone, in sight.
I couldn't ever thank everyone who supported us for this long individually, so I'll just get all Bane on you:
“I wish that I could spread my arms so wide that I could wrap them around everyone I’ve ever known and loved”
-Ricky, company, and not company | 
