Our band name...that's an interesting question. When this band began, it was known as "V". Under that name, we recorded a couple albums, and all was good until our former frontman screwed us on a record deal. Needless to say, he's not here anymore, and we didn't want to carry the stigma of bearing anything that remotely reminded us of him, yet, we didn't want to completely lose our identity, so we chose a name that still contained the "V" and yet exemplified for us what music is, it's like a drug, a narcotic, and the name Verbal Narcotic was born.

Hell yes we play live! One of the biggest thrills for us is to see the looks on the people's faces when they're enjoying our music, there is no better drug than that. We play all over the place, but mostly in the midwest to date, although that will change soon!

I think the internet is a wonderful thing for musicians who are struggling to make something of themselves. It offers exposure that wasn't possible before, easy access to information, and a simple way to allow others to hear you, others that might not have ever heard of you at all.

Absolutely. We're always hearing crap about how the record companies are screwing people, but what's funny is that those same people complaining, are still buying the albums of their favorite bands. One thing everyone should remember, is that the record companies do work very hard to bring their particular styles of music to the public, and spend a lot of money doing it, and in case everyone's forgotten, that's what makes the world go around, commerce, and what can be better than the business of music?

Verbal Narcotic is a Lebanon, MO based, self professed, genre defying Gothic Death Metal band, with a wide range of individual talents.

The roots of this band are actually deeply imbedded in a pure gothic rock band known as V, which some of you may remember, or may even possess one or both of the two albums released in 2002, FACES or SHADOWS. After a wild ride and quick climb to the top , we learned the hard way how difficult and cutthroat the music industry is. Ironically, we never dreamed the throat cutting would come from inside the band, and yet, there we were, taking a good screwing from our very own frontman Craig Brake, or otherwise known as Christian Brak, who took it upon himself to screw us without our knowledge........Basically, we, and the fans, were left wondering what happened to V? So, rather than let one scumbag get us down because of his own delusions of grandeur, we decided to reform, rename, and get on with what we do best. MAKE MUSIC!

The first thing we did was change our name, and yet, even while doing so, we wanted something to embody what we were originally, and yet exemplify what music is for us, an addiction. And so, retaining the V, Verbal Narcotic was born. And the music we are making now is far beyond anything we ever accomplished with V. Each of us vowed to do what we wanted to do to begin with, go HEAVIER!! The music is now better structured, the sound is more aggressive, the vocals are by far more forceful, thanks to the addition of frontman Shaun Jenkins, and as a band, we were far better suited for success than we were before.

Of the original V line-up, only one member remains today. Original guitarist Tom McCulloch, left for personal reasons, and original drummer Clayton Lemoine left the drum riser for his inability to travel to far away gigs, and to his wife's pregnancy and impending birth. The only remaining member of the original V line-up is Tatt, the bass player from hell. Tatt is also the voice of the band, handling PR, shows, and many more aspects of the band, and band business. After a trial and error on the part of the guitar void, the band introduced into the ranks two new guitarists, who mesh perfectly on-stage, one, Justin Smith, a seasoned veteran from the band Common Hate, the other, Richie "Dick" Johnson, a former bassist from the band Downcell. The drum spot was auditioned for, and seized easily by the hardcore antics and pure madness that emanated from the skins as new drummer Matt Chodes placed his marks upon them. His unique and odd double bass style created a completely new sound for the band, spinning off in a totally new direction. However, the drum throne too changed with Matt's need for some personal time, and he vacated the drum throne to deal with some things that needed attention in his personal life, leaving the spot open for yet another drummer. We didn't even have to look this time, as a new face was quite literally thrown in our laps. Shane Jenkins, who was the brother of our vocalist at the time and had been drumming for roughly 9 months or so, was self taught, and was quite frankly a drum prodigy, offered to fill the drum spot. At almost 18 years of age when he joined the band, this guy was one of the fastest and most insane double bass drummers I'd ever seen. His timing was impeccable and he easily seized the songs and made them his own, and to prove that point, after only 1 week and 1 practice, he played a major show with us and though there were seven bands, and a huge crowd, he played flawlessly, and his addition to the band was spelling major evolution for Verbal Narcotic. The line-up was rounded out by frontman, vocalist Shaun Jenkins. His raspy, forceful, chords swept out over the crowd, grabbing and shaking everyone present in one way or another. His extremely hardcore, up front and in your face style both pleased, and pissed off entire crowds. Shaun was an integral part of Verbal Narcotic until early 2005 when a huge misunderstanding that got twisted into something ugly took him away from us. It spelled the beginning of an entire year of turmoil for the band. At the same time that Shaun quit, we also lost Shane on the drums. With shows booked this put the remaining two members, Nathan and Tatt in a huge bind.

But the heart and soul of Verbal Narcotic is unbreakable and we began auditions for both the drum spot and the vocals. This turned into a complete nightmare to say the least. Auditioning artist after artist for months on end, searching, seeking, placing ads, flyers, talking to everyone we knew, we just couldn't seem to find what we were looking for. At long last, a vocalist capable of taking the sound where we wanted it to go joined the ranks. Enter Teddy Landrum, who though young, had a killer set of pipes for good death metal. He had the look. He had the presence onstage. So all we were lacking was someone on the skins that could handle a double bass pedal, and that search proved to be fruitless. Finally a drummer appeared, referred to us by Steve, frontman from Springfield, MO metal freaks Apnea. A call was made and suddenly we found ourselves with an explosive and highly talented drummer named Eric Willcut, a long time madman from Missouri punk band Ralphus, who was at that time, defunct, and have since come together again. Eric helped to change our music yet again...his style was phenominal and brutal, punk influenced and it made our music very interesting. In fact, when we lost him, which we did after only a couple of months to finance problems, we retained the influences he left with us. Now, a most interesting footnote in our band history; with the departure of Eric, just 2 weeks before a major show in Oklahoma City, we were left hanging with no drummer. Desperate we cast about wildly and a call came in from former long time drummer Matt Chodes. His life was back in order, and he wanted to play, and was willing to put out the effort. A windfall for us, since Matt was the drummer who originally played the music we were still playing and would be playing in Oklahoma. We thankfully welcomed him back, and he surprised us with a renewed vigor and mastery behind the skins...he had gotten even better than before! Unfortunately, his style didn't sit well with the still new frontman Teddy, whose head had begun to swell at an amazing rate, and whose arrogance had already been unsettling to say the least, and who made the decision that he wasn't going to be in the band unless Matt changed his style to the only style that Teddy had ever worked with, and that was the style of recently departed Eric Wilcut. At that time, we made the decision that he could go f*** himself if he wouldn't allow musical creative individuality with the drummer, and so we sent him packing. Now, we have no vocalist, a week and a half before the show, so we decided to do the vocals ourselves. At that time, another idea came upon us...we thought, "Hey, our Heavycore brothers and label mates Black Buffalo will be at this same show playing the night before, I wonder if one of their vocalists would be willing to do a couple songs to help us out?" Huge, huge props to TREE from Black Buffalo for not only coming through for us, but for getting his fellow vocalist Shane "8 Ball Jester" Mason onto the bandwagon as well. We went to Oklahoma and played our set, with Nathan singing one song, Tatt singing another, and Tree and Jester doing the rest of the set. They saved us and we had a blast. But the euphoria was short lived. When we got back, we still had no vocalist. What to do, what to do? After auditioning a few "never sing metal" people, recently departed Teddy Landrum found his way back into the band. This was an unstable, and probationary deal at best. We did one show with the old music and began to write the new album Dead Album. This proved to be a nightmare since Teddy, in record time this time, began letting the band know that he wasn't willing to change any of his vocals or lyrics, but insisted that every member of the band make changes in their style for him. then he and Matt began to have disagreements, because Matt felt he should have creative control of his drum style, and Teddy didn't like that. Teddy's head began to swell again, as he forced his "frontman" status into a position where he wouldn't help set up or breakdown, (because none of it was his equipment and so why should he, the vocalist have to make an effort?), and then began his short lived reign as the most knowledgeable person in heavy metal history, the greatest vocalist that ever lived, the master manipulator, the toughest guy who could kick your ass 8 different ways, mister immaturity himself. Seriously, this is metal. Not a boy band, or a bunch of boys who were willing to take that sh*** from anyone, and bye, bye Teddy became the phrase of the day.

Back where we started once again with no vocalist, we began another search, and still continued to write new material. To offset the loss on the microphone, we began trying to do vocals ourselves during practice until we could find another vocalist. And what did we discover? That we could do ourselves just fine. Nathan proved to be awesome on the microphone and so he was given the task of writing new lyrics, and playing and singing at the same time. Practices became fun again, and our music got ferocious because we were opening up and letting it all out. After two years of playing the same music, an entire new album and set had been born...enter the reign of Dead Heaven and a completely new style for our band. Evolution at it's finest. The band has progressed to an amazing point. We've built a monster fan base of loyal fans who stuck by us through this year of turmoil and to all of them we'd like to say thank you. They make us whole without a doubt.

Although the old music we were doing was good, with influences ranging from Black Sabbath, Venom, KISS, Ozzy, ACDC, Mercyful Fate, WASP, and other older metal bands, to Disturbed, Godsmack, Marilyn Manson, System of a Down, Dimmu Borgir, COF, Taproot, and many newer bands, we feel that this new style of music is much better.

This is a new reign and completely new style we've managed to come up with, a feat that is hard to do today, but something that we just easily fell into. Nathan's style is unusual at best, with brutal speed and perfect accuracy, lots of timing and tempo changes, odd bridges, a confusing use of sharps, flats and wild accents, and heartfelt influences from his life and people around him. Join that with Matt Chodes' weird and unusual offbeat but well timed drumming style ( a style all his own I assure you), and Tatt's dogged determination and single-mindedness on the bass, and you have the recipe for uniqueness............we're very proud of the new sound we've created at this point.

We've always played and felt more comfortable on the darker side of things. Both our lyrics and our music reflect a profound ability to grasp life by the sensitive side, and twist until it screams.

We hope you enjoy our efforts, and we look forward to seeing you at one of our performances. It's worth checking out, but be warned.....It's an Addiction!

Our influences are all kinds of metal ranging from Black Sabbath, Venom, KISS, Ozzy, ACDC, Mercyful Fate, WASP, and other older metal bands, to Dimmu Borgir, Arch Enemy, COF,Iced Earth, Bongzilla, Cryptopsy, GWAR, Exhumed, Candlemas, Death, and many other bands.

Wherver we're playing live! It's like magic!!

Our band consists of two guitars, a bass, a double bass drum, and vocals from hell.

We are managed by Rock M. Hard Records

www.rockmhardrecords.com