Rock trio King's X is a putting a new twist on the practice of established bands releasing "pre-fame" material. The new studio album 'Black Like Sunday,' scheduled for release on May 20, 2003, on Brop! Records/Metal Blade Records, features freshly recorded songs written and performed live more than 20 years ago, well before the band changed its name to King's X and earned its first record deal. The band used two different names during this period.

NOTE: 'Black Like Sunday' is NOT an album of previously recorded but unreleased "vault" material. King's X recently recorded the songs in the studio; they are NOT live recordings.

Longtime fans had kept asking vocalist/guitarist Ty Tabor, vocalist/bass guitarist Doug Pinnick and vocalist/drummer Jerry Gaskill to bring these songs back to life by finally recording and releasing them, and the band decided the time was right.

The 14 songs on 'Black Like Sunday' include: "Johnny," "Bad Luck," "Danger Zone," "Finished," "Won't Turn Back," "Screamer," "Rock Pile," "Working Man," "Save Us," "Down," "Two," "You're the Only One," "Dreams" and "Black Like Sunday."

"These songs are from our first seven years as a band, and most are from between 1980 and 1983. We were based in Springfield, MO, and it was a really healthy market for original music," Tabor says. "There was a really intelligent group of music listeners there. I attribute that to Springfield being a college town. There were about nine colleges around. I think it's really unusual to have a city embrace original music any time, any place."

The strange thing was that record companies did not pick up on the Springfield scene, and Tabor is still baffled by this. It certainly wasn't like what happened a decade later when the music industry gobbled up the bands from the Seattle grunge scene.

"All of the biggest bands in Springfield did their own tunes. We were scared at first because there were no mediocre bands. The competition was awesome," Tabor recalls. "Bands did make their own records, were getting their songs on local radio and were getting those records in local stores.

"We did one record back then, but we didn't like it at all and weren't involved in the mixing. We did give copies away free at shows because we didn't want it sold in stores!"

Tabor, Pinnick and Gaskill were certainly gaining attention and building a strong following. For five of the first seven years together, they used Springfield as a base to tour west to Colorado, east to North Carolina, north to Michigan and south to Texas. It was by playing original music to these different audiences that audience favorites emerged, and some of these songs were resurrected for 'Black Like Sunday.'

"We've written hundreds of songs over the years and as we kept writing new ones others got left behind. Our song turnover was really fast. But every batch of new songs had a couple of fan favorites in them. We wouldn't really look back, but sometimes parts of songs would get used. With the knowledge we have now, we don't mind going back to rediscover these songs," Tabor says. "We're harder on ourselves now, and we've learned many things over the years.

"As for the songs for this record, there were some obvious ones that had stuck in our minds. We always find ourselves on the same page. The songs have not changed very much. The first day or two that we went through our old tapes of these songs we realized the original ideas are better than we thought they were. One thing we discovered was that it was more time-consuming to go back to these songs than it would have been to write a new record."

Tabor says that most of the songs were rediscovered by going through tapes of old live shows, and that Pinnick is the main archivist in the band.

The great news for King's X die-hards who inspired 'Black Like Sunday' is that there is enough vintage material for at least one more album.

"You never know what the people are going to like," Tabor says.

Be sure to catch King's X on tour with Fishbone this spring and summer. For updates, visit www.kingsxonline.com. Upcoming tour dates for King's X are as follows:

DATE                                CITY                           VENUE
Friday, May 2nd                 Tallahassee, FL          Floyd's Music Store (KX only)
Saturday, May 3rd              Atlanta, GA                Music Midtown Festival (KX only)
Sunday, May 4th                Nashville, TN               Exit/In
Monday, May 5th               Charlotte, NC              Amos' Southend
Tuesday, May 6th              Ocean City, MD           Brewmasters
Thursday, May 8th              Philadelphia, PA         Trocadero
Friday, May 9th                  Springfield, VA            Jaxx
Saturday, May 10th            Hartford, CT                Webster Theatre
Sunday, May 11th              New York, NY            Don Hill's
Monday, May 12th              New York, NY            Don Hill's
Tuesday, May 13th            Cambridge, MA            Middle East Club
Thursday, May 15th           Ferndale, MI                 Magic Bag
Friday, May 16th               Cincinnati, OH              Bogart's
Saturday, May 17th           Chicago, IL                   Abbey Pub
Sunday, May 18th             Flint, MI                       Machine Shop
Tuesday, May 20th            Denver, CO                  Cervantes Masterpiece Ballroom
Thursday, May 22nd          San Francisco, CA        Avalon Ballroom
Friday, May 23rd               Santa Ana, CA             Galaxy Theatre
Saturday, May 24th           West Hollywood, CA     Key Club
Sunday, May 25th             San Diego, CA              4th & B
Tuesday, May 27th            Las Vegas, NV             Huntridge Theatre
Wednesday, May 28th       Albuquerque, NM          Launchpad
Friday, May 30th               Dallas, TX                     Canyon Club
Saturday, May 31st           Austin, TX                     Backroom



www.kingsxonline.com
www.metalblade.com

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