Point Of Ares
Description : Progressive rock/art rock. Hard rock with a progressive edge.
Brief History :
Drummer Ryan DesRoches joins band on August 21, 1998.
Kevin leaves on May 9, 1998 due to health problems. Bill assumes role as drum programmer for recording The Sorrows Of Young Apollo.
All Point Of Ares and Karen Michalson releases obtain national distribution through WSI Distribution, April 1998.
Point Of Ares chosen by The Blue Room as Artist of the Month for March 1998.
Enemy Glory receives airplay and critical acclaim throughout the United States, Canada and Europe, 1997. Live performances are packed.
"Threle" charted #3 for six weeks in Summer 1997 on CKLU 96.7 FM, Sudbury, Ontario Canada.
Voted Best New Artist 1997 in The Worcester Phoenix Best Music Poll.
Point Of Ares chosen by Rock Online as Indie Band of the Month for February 1997.
"Slouching Towards Chaos" nominated by The Worcester Phoenix as one of the ten best indie singles of 1996.
Released Enemy Glory on October 31, 1996.
Demo version of "Slouching Towards Chaos" charted #1 for five weeks in Spring '96 on WDOA 89.3 FM, Worcester MA.
Karen released Of No Importance on January 6, 1996. Sold out its first run.
Decided to drop covers and dedicate themselves exclusively to writing and performing original material on September 7, 1995.
Formed June 1993 as a classic rock cover band. Original members: Karen Michalson (bass/vocals), Bill Michalson (guitars), Kevin Dion (drums).
Before the invention of printing most people saw no separation between literature and music, and most artists who practiced one practiced the other. In fact, the ancient Greeks recognized this unity in the god Apollo, who presided over both. Their first storyteller, Homer, was also a musician. By combining original spoken word pieces with rock n' roll, and writing a concept album based on Karen Michalson's unpublished dark fantasy novel, Enemy Glory, Point Of Ares place themselves in the tradition of storyteller-minstrels,except that they're definitely rockers, not folk players.
Having been often told that rock music is a much more Dionysian than Apollonian endeavor, Point Of Ares offers the following little recognized fact: At Apollo's oracle at Delphi lay the grave of Dionysus. It was believed that for three months out of the year Apollo went north to the land of the Hyperboreans, and his shrine then became holy to Dionysus. In many parts of Greece, Apollo and Dionysus were not viewed as opposites, as reason vs. emotion, but as literally manifestations of the same deity to be honored at different times of the year, often surprisingly, with the same symbols.
The Boeotians (and others) honored both Apollo and Dionysus at the same place: on Mount Parnassus, where they understood both the Delphic oracle of Apollo and the caves of Dionysus to be dedicated to a single god. It took a nineteenth-century German philosopher like Nietsche to separate them while announcing that God is dead.
If you're interested in this sort of thing, read Walter F. Otto, Dionysus: Myth and Cult, trans. Robert P. Palmer (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1965) 202-208 and Macrobius, The Saturnalia, trans. Percival Vaughan Davies (New York: Columbia University Press, 1969) Book I, Chapter 18, 128-132.
Point Of Ares honors their Apollonian-Dionysian sensibilities as noncontradictions, as manifestations of the same impulse. They think with their feelings and feel with their thoughts.
They are also very much a pro-freedom, pro-individual liberty oriented band. They consider themselves small "l" libertarians, and as artists they especially decry growing government censorship of speech and other means of expression on the Internet and in other areas of life.
What's Next:
Expect to release second album, The Sorrows Of Young Apollo, on Arula Records by the end of 1998. Official release date: January 1, 1999.
Discography :
The Sorrows Of Young Apollo (Arula Records) due out by the end
of 1998. Official release date: January 1, 1999.
A virulent, hard-edged rock odyssey through the myth cycles
of Apollo and Dionysus. Shattered gods, fallen heroes, and music
that rocks with the tension between reason and passion, this album
rocks on the hard side of the progressive rock genre.
Enemy Glory (Arula Records) released October 31, 1996
A concept hard rock / prog rock album based on Karen Michalson's
unpublished dark fantasy novel of the same title. The songs and
spoken word pieces represent selected emotional experiences told
or sung from the point of view of the characters in her novel.
The songs on the album are haunting, violent, and strange essays
in magic, fantasy, good and evil, and the power of rock n' roll.
Of No Importance (Arula Records) released January 6, 1996
Spoken word recording from band leader Karen Michalson. The story
of a brilliant dancer who is persecuted and destroyed by the forces
of mediocrity. Trenchant commentary on the envy and persecution
of genius. Dark fantasy.
Contact Information :
c/o Arula Records, PO Box 332, Southbridge MA 01550 USA
TEL: (508) 2481799
WEBSITE : http://www.ultranet.com/~ares
EMAIL : ares@ma.ultranet.com
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