The Groggies

Half fueled by lager and ale, the other half fueled by caffeine and aspartame, THE GROGGIES are a hardcore punk band formed by the brothers Shular, Eric and Keith. Years of touring the gruelling local bar cover scene had taken their toll on Keith and Eric. It was time to blow off a little steam with some hardcore punk. Keith managed to coax former bandmate, Glenn MacGarvey out of retirement with the promise of Tim Hortons coffee and cheeseburgers. In the mid-90s, Keith and Glenn played together in a side-project, Andrea Zuckerman's Lost Virginity, while Glenn's band, Phallocracy, was on hiatus so their drummer could pursue his book learning. With the competent drumming of Eric and bone-rattling bass of Glenn in place, it quickly became apparent that we would need some wild shirtless lyrics to complete the band. Glenn knew just the guy, Ian Taylor. Glenn knew Ian from watching a couple of his shows in the band The Abazors. Glenn brought Ian out to a jam, and shortly after dropping him off at home received an e-mail with lyrics for a bunch of songs. We had our singer. Glenn's suggestion to name the band "The Groggies" seemed to capture our state of mind during Saturday morning practices. With Glenn usually heading to practice Saturday mornings right after a Friday midnight shift, Keith and Eric shaking off a few Friday night pints, and Ian barely able to stay awake for the drive from Barrie to Orillia, the name worked. We've been asked many times what we sound like. "OLD SCHOOL HARDCORE PUNK" is usually our answer, not just because we're old, but because we have a lot of that in our sound. Our songs are heavy, fast, angry, noisy, melodic, and short. The last half of 2012 saw us recording, mixing and mastering our fist 10-song EP, GROGGIESTYLE, in Keith's basement. It also saw us recording 12 songs at a Studio 3 Session for CIUT FM (University of Toronto) which aired on Equalizing and Distort December 16. The year 2013 promises to be a busy year for The Groggies. The Groggiestyle EP was released as a 30-CD limited print on February 8, 2013. We are set to begin recording our second 10-song EP for release in June. And, we are also writing our third EP for release in December. We'll be playing some shows to test drive some of the new material. Half fueled by lager and ale, the other half fueled by caffeine and aspartame, THE GROGGIES are an old school hardcore punk band from the Barrie/Orillia area. thegroggies@gmail.com