2004
Hamerex started in August after having the names Hellbound, Skab and Metal Fear. At this time Hamerex consisted of Steve Blower - Vocals/Guitar, Tom Parkin - Lead guitar, Mel Wales - Bass and Shane Cartwright - Drums. Mel and Shane only just joined the band at this point and so a practice was booked at Audiozone which went quite well thought Mel couldn't practice as she was having trouble getting a bass.
In September Mel decided to leave and a few days later Elliot Fleet joined the band on Bass. From then the band improved and everyone enjoyed playing together.
In December the band took a month and a half break for the holidays which gave chance for some new material to be written.
2005
In January the band got back together for practice with new songs being written. There was around 9 original songs to play but mainly the Metallica covers and 'Ghostly Plains' and 'Waste Away' were being played.
In February, Pontefract New College announced a Comic Relief Battle of the Bands for March. Talks about doing it happened though started looking unlikely due to problems with work for Tom. A day or two after Steve mentioned mentioned to Elliot about doing it as a 3 piece. Elliot then put Hamerex down to play on Wednesday 9th March.
The Day came and everything went well seeing as the band was a man down. The set was: 'Waste Away', 'Master Of Puppets'/'Ride The Lightning' Medley and 'For Whom The Bell Tolls' which was cut short due to running over. As much as Hamerex was liked, the band didn't get into the final unfortunately but a good enough recording was made of 'Waste Away' of which good feedback was recieved but was also told the song was abit long so Elliot took the liberty of shortening the song. Since then, newer original songs were being played at practice and then talks were risen again about finding a singer so Steve could concentrate more on guitar so the band would sound and play better.
Around the end of May Chris Moules tried out as the singer and a week or 2 later Hamerex were asked to play at the Jockey due to a band having to cancel. The gig went well seen as it was sort notice and that it was the first gig with a full band. 'Waste Away', 'Ghostly Plains' and 'In My Eyes' were the orignals played on the night along with Metallica and Iron Maiden covers.
Chris was officially in the band and a week or so later Hamerex were asked by November to support them at the Jockey. The turn out was impressive and the response was nothing short of amazing. The band played an hours set and was suprised to see crowd surfing and moshpits in such a small place and only on their 2nd gig with a full band. The band enjoyed a great response from just about everyone in the place especially with the suprise of everyone singing along to 'Calling All Monsters' which was the first time it was heard by anyone outside of the band. It was also the first time Hamerex was asked to sign things.
Not long after the gig Elliot managed to get Hamerex on a local band night at Bradford Rios. Hamerex unexpectedly ended up headlining the night as the headline band had to pull out and the band ended up playing an hours set with the new addition of 'Nightmare' to the set. The gig went extremely and everyone seemed impressed. The day after the gig Hamerex were offered to support In:Audium and Dekedence the following Tuesday and the gig was probably the best the band had played with set consisting of all original material.
In September Hamerex were booked to headline at the Snooty Fox. The Hamerex Demo 2005 was made available for gig which included 'Ghosty Plains', 'Calling All 'Monsters', 'In My Eyes', 'Waste Away' and 'Nightmare' along with t-shirts which were in the design of the front cover of the 2005 Demo. There were people from all over the country for this one and managed to pull around a hundred people in. The gig itself wasn't the best one due to a couple of technical difficulties though 4 new songs ('Demons', 'My Judgement Day', 'My False Fairytale' and 'Not The End Of Me') made their debut.
The next couple of months were quiet for the band as Elliot went to University and couldn't make it to practice which gave sometime for some writing then came the songs 'Live Forever', 'The Headless Horseman' and 'Souls Of Yesterday'.
The band was offered 3 gigs for December and the 3 new songs were played as a preview for the demo which was being planned for the next year. The gig in Huddersfield saw the band play with no support and played 2 sets which saw the band onstage for an hour and 40 minutes. On December 17th the band travelled to Stockport to play Raised Horns Festival 2005 at the Thatched House. Hamerex went on first and played and hours set and for the comical value saw Elliot get his hair in Tom's headstock during 'Nightmare'. The final gig of the year was X-Mas Up Your Ass at the Snooty Fox which was organised by Metal Team UK. Hamerex played a great gig and finished the year with a bang playing 2 covers and the rest of the set with originals.
A few days after Christmas Elliot announced that he would be leaving the band due to being unable to be as commited to the band as he'd like with being at university. The new year saw Hamerex on the search for a new bass player.
2006
The new year started off slowly for the band without a bass player The songs 'Seas And The Skies' and 'The Gates Of Hades' had been written and the band were ready to start to rehearse them.
In February Steve signed Hamerex up for the Wakefield Battle Of The Bands 2006 which was due to start at the end of that month. Rob Butcher got in touch with the band after hearing about the departure of Elliot and shortly after followed up with a few try outs after learning the songs very quickly. As the time got nearer Elliot was asked to fill in on Bass as the band didn't want to put Rob under any pressure with it being a Battle Of The Bands gig.
In March the gig came and even though Hamerex only had around 20 minutes to play 4 of their most popular songs at the time played probably one of their best gigs ever. Unfortunately after it was over the band lost out again.
As April started the band went to Audiozone for 2 all nighters to record their new demo which was originally meant to have 6 songs but due to time and a dodgy recording Souls Of Yesterday had to be cut. The nights went well and Hamerex came out with decent recordings of Live Forever, The Headless Horseman, Demons, Seas And The Skies and The Gates Of Hades.
In June Hamerex was asked to play a gig with Snake Eyes and Equinox at the Snooty Fox which would be the first gig with Rob and the first gig playing the new songs 'Seas And The Skies' and 'The Gates Of Hades'. The gig went down well with who turned up and stayed to watch. During the gig Chris announced that Rob was the new Bass player which was a suprise to Rob as he thought he was being tried out in a gig situation. As the month went on everyone was preparing for a 2 week tour to play gigs in Huddersfield, Wakefield, Nottingham, Hull, York, Coventry and Bradford with Icarus and Hallowed Point.
The tour went of to a decent start and as time went on it started to get better and better with a better performance from each band member and each band on the tour. The only downside to the tour was that not many people came to the gigs apart from the first week which were home gigs for the bands. The tour ended on a high note at Bradford with all 3 bands playing brilliant sets. The tour was a success and everyone involved with the tour had a great time.
The next gig was at the Turks Head on 1st August which was due to have support from Hallowed Point and Dekedence. Both bands pulled out at the last minute leaving Hamerex with 2 sets to do most of their material. Everything that could've gone wrong went wrong with everyone rushing around trying to get a PA just a couple of hours before the gig was due to start as the PA there stopped working. The standard of the gig wasn't that good which was the start of a bad time for Steve with the band and he started to lose interest with what was going on. The gig after was at the Tut 'n' Shive in Wakefield on 28th August and despite the many attempts at getting trying to get in touch, Rob didn't turn up for the gig but the band carried on without him doing a good set and afterwards deciding that Rob was out.
During September Steve started to do some writing again to try and get some interest back to the band. During this month Andy Firth offered to help out the band until a replacement was found.
On 10th October Hamerex returned to the Snooty Fox with Andy doing his first gig with the band. The gig went really well and impressed the crowd. The next gig that followed was on Halloween at the Turks Head again. Everything ran smoothly for most of the night until there was some confusion over equiptment which ended up with Andy being without a bass amp. Then the set was sevearly reduced which was originally supposed to be an hour then ended up being 30 mins.
On 2nd November Shane quit Hamerex after being in the band for just over 2 years. Claire Williams soon after offered to help out and practice started to get alot of the songs ready for the next month which suddenly saw 3 gigs to end the year off. Steve started to feel better about the way the band was starting to take shape and by the end of the month Claire joined the band after having a fall out with her previous band.
December saw Hamerex start to get back to form with another gig at the Turks Head co-headlining with ex-Bassists Elliots band Megawatt Winged Avenger which saw 2 new songs added to the set 'Desert Skies' and 'Screams And Pain'. The next gig that followed was at the Snooty Fox headlining with support from Icarus. Both bands put on a great show and MP3's from Hamerex's set were made available on the Hamerex Live! Myspace whichs included the new songs. To end the month Andy decided to join the band and the band went on to do a good set at Clinks Boxing Day Bash.
2007
After the first band practice of the year in January Tom decided to quit the band. The band started looking once again for a replacement. Tom agreed to fill in for some gigs which included a headline gig at Bradford Rios and the Old Turk in Dewsbury.
As the year progressed the band played some great gigs as a 4 piece which included supporting Asomvel at the Snooty Fox. Plans for a new demo started not long after with a number of songs already written by Steve. Towards the end of May Phil White got in touch with the band about trying out on guitar and came to a practice.
As April approached Hamerex were invited to play at the Metal Blast Promtions The Battlefield All Day Festival. The gig came after a long day of travelling and everything went fairly well with the band playing a 40 minute set and making some new fans. The band then went on to play at the Snooty Fox with Phil trying out in a gig situation for the first time with the band. The band played to an amazing crowd with everyone going mad which showed Hamerex at their best after a rough 12 months and showing the band were as strong as ever. |
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