WarBand!

[rIHaD martaq]

- At least, that was the near-constant chant of the 45 fans at the Battle of the Bands on Feb 2nd 2003 in Clearwater, FL for much of the night 

Has anyone here ever heard of them? They are a small independant band based here in Florida, they do regular rock music most of the time, but since they're also big Klingon fans, (The lead singer is a fleet commander if I recall correctly) - They occasionally do K'Filk songs. For those of you that don't know what
K'Filk is, it's when you take a song, keep the same melody, and if it's not an original, change the lyrics to whatever you choose.

Feb 3rd they were at the Battle of the Bands competing with 10 other bands to open for an 80's band called Great White at their farewell concert. Regrettably, Warband didn't win, but they did place 2nd.

What a treat is was to watch and listen to them play! They rock! They've been playing for about 5 years, and the experience shows. The promoters had originally asked for Warband to do a 9 song set lasting about 45 minutes, but since the 1st band had bailed out with no notice, and Warband was originally scheduled to be the 2nd band, and they were there well before their scheduled tme, they went on first instead. Since the 3rd and 4th bands were also no-shows, Warband played their spots too... Fans got treated to a 30 song set that lasted 3 amazing hours!

Out of all the people there, Warband had the most fans *by far*...  Outnumbered our closest rival (If you can even call them that) fan-wise by about 9 to 1. At the club level, that's unprecedented.

I took my camera with me and burned up a roll of film on the band, they have some of my pics on their site as of right now, if you want to see what you missed.

http://war_band.tripod.com/frames.html

Click on "Enter" on the main page, then on "Pictures" in the left hand menu... In the large right hand pane that comes up, scroll down to the bottom and you see and entry for the February 2003 Battle of the Bands, click on it.

Also, they have a set list on the site, showing what they play - They're adding more to their inventory as they have time. (Time being precious, as they are not a full time band, all the members work full-time jobs.)

Plus of course a listing of upcoming events that they're having - Word from the concert on Sunday was that it piqued the interest of some influential people, and they may soon have some more gigs.

When I have time, and can get around a maddening failure of my PC cd-reader to read their CD's, I'll post their demo CD's (Two of them, 5 songs each) to the 'Net, with the band's blessing no less. I do have their K'Filk CD, but it's legality is hazy at the moment. Currently, it is legal if it is given away, but not if sold for profit. Because of that, and the band's obvious discomfort when I brought up the subject of posting it online -
I'll leave it out for now. However, K'Mel has 3 of the tracks from it (It has 8 tracks) on his website athttp://www.thewebfool.com/kmel/.

I'm not exactly sure how K'Mel worked it out, but as I understand it, he just pestered them mercilessly, lol

Got a t-shirt from them too.. It's an awesome looking one, too 

Have fun ya'll.....

Qapla'!

[baHwI]

I am really happy to read your text, I like "Warband" very much, but it is nearly impossible to buy a cd here in germany. I only get the songs from K'Mel.
Do you have an idea, where I can get the text of "The day, Gowron died".
Tried to listen, but after the first few sentences it becomes impossible for me.
Would be very great, if you could help me.
baHwI'

[maltz]

This is Brig. Maltz, Lead singer for WarBand....

Here are the lyrics for the Day Gowron Died...I warn you this takes a
bit.

A Long, Long time ago
I can still remember
How we used to make those Kuve cry
And I know if I had my chance
That I could make the humans dance
And maybe I’d be happy for a while
But Deep Space makes me shiver
With every Weapon I deliver
Bad news on the sub space
I couldn’t stand one more face


And I can’t remember if I cried
When I heard the Chancellor just had died
Something touched me deep inside
The Day, that Gowron died

Chorus


So Kai, Kai the Black Fleet's in the Sky
gonna grab my bat'leth and scream out my war cry
The Dominion’s in sight and now they’re gonna learn why
Today is a good day to die



Did you write the book of Kor
And do you have faith in Battle’s Roar
If Kahless tells ya so
Now do you believe that Heads can roll
Can combat save your Klingon Soul
Can you teach me how to kill
Real Slow

Well I know that you’re in a fight with him
Cause I saw the blood on bulkhead 10
You both broke all your knives
Now you’re fighting for your lives

I was lonely Warrior in a rut
With a Par’ma’kai that could kick my butt
So I knew I was out of luck
The day, that Gowron died

Chorus

For six months we’ve been on our own
While Martok’s holdin’ down the throne
But that’s not how it used to be
When the K’uve danced
for Gowron’s glee
As we fired our weapons
At their feet
And we laughed as
they begged from
You and me..

And while Gowron was looking Down
Worf just killed him with a Frown
The bastard got away
We’ll make that Feddy pay


And while Worf felt the Empire was a lark
Martok went and made his mark
But we sang dirges in the dark
The day that Gowron died

Chorus


Helter skelter in an unknown sector
The ship flew off in a fall out vector
Warp 5 now and running fast
It crash landed on a rock
We all tried to kill the pet’oghs
But the Feddies blew their own ship way too fast


Now the Bridge air it was Sweet perfume
While Warriors screamed a fighting tune
We all got up to fight.
But got blinded by the light
Cause the Feddy blew across our firing field
Then what was left just tried to yield
But, we can't  fight cowards and heels
The day that Gowron died


Chorus


Oh, and there we were all in one place
Wishing we’d watched Lost in Space
With no time left to start again
So come on, Worf be nimble Worf be quick
I’ll light Worf with this candlestick
'cause fire is the fek’lyr’s  only friend

Oh, and as I watched him on the screen
My hands were clenched with chunks of Breen
No Warrior steeled in h*ll
Could break that Fek’lyr’s spell

And as the flames climbed high into the night
We screamed the sacrifical rite
I saw fek’lyr laughing with delight
The day that Gowron died

Chorus

I met a Band that sang the Blues
WarBand played those snappy tunes
but they just left for Earth today
I went down to 20_backward
where'd I killed some Kuve years before
but K'Seuss said that the Kuve wouldn't plaaaaaayyyyy



And on the Bridge the watch just screamed
the Stewards cried and the Captain dreamed
Not a word was spoken
The Disruptors all were broken


and the three ships I admired most
the Dark Shadow, the Runner, and the Fire of course
they set course for the Neutral Zone


The day that Gowron died

So Kai, Kai the Black Fleet's in the Sky
gonna grab my bat'leth and scream out my war cry
The Dominion’s in sight and now they’re gonna learn why
Today is a good day to die


Kai, Kai the Black Fleet's in the Sky
gonna grab my bat'leth and scream out my war cry
my enemies in sight and their gonna learn why
Today is a good day to die

[baHwI]

Thank you very much, you can´t imagine what a favour you did to me. Every
night, just before my pc goes down I switch off the light, take a
cigarette, lean back and listen to this excellent song. It is a ritual and
even my cat knows, when this music starts, I finish my daywork.
Gowron is more than a phantastic klingon, he inspires me every day.
I wish you many honorful days.
baHwI' Kia M'Rel

[rIHaD martaq]

Thanks, Goldy!

Just to let any interested parties know.. I have worked around the cd
reader problem, and now have WarBand's two demo cd's as WMA files (Similar
to MP3's, but smaller) on my computer, waiting to be posted.

[Klythe]

    I am forced to wonder what makes otherwise capable warriors pronounce
"kuve" as  the awkward and weak "quvey" instead of the powerful
monosyllabic "quv".    All of the best slurrs and epithets are monosyllabic
you know.

   If Zan Ford had intended that it be pronounced "quvey" he would have
probably spelled it koovay instead of kuve.   The word was undoubtably
written for English speakers to look at it an pronunce it correctly without
having to define a phonology for Klingonaase.

    How would you want to see kuve spelled to make the "quv" sound?  Koov?
That looks really dumb, and would tend to sound more like cattle noise than
a warrior tongue.

[rIHaD martaq]

I am forced to wonder what makes otherwise capable warriors pronounce
"kuve" as  the awkward and weak "quvey" instead of the powerful
monosyllabic "quv".    All of the best slurrs and epithets are monosyllabic
you know.

   If Zan Ford had intended that it be pronounced "quvey" he would have
probably spelled it koovay instead of kuve.   The word was undoubtably
written for English speakers to look at it an pronunce it correctly without
having to define a phonology for Klingonaase.

    How would you want to see kuve spelled to make the "quv" sound?  Koov?
That looks really dumb, and would tend to sound more like cattle noise than
a warrior tongue.

heh Klythe 
Pick, pick, pick. You pose a worthy question, and I'll alert Goldy to it
when I finish writing this.

Though I cannot speak for him, perhaps it is because he just did not know
the proper spelling, or he mangled it in the name of art?

[Kesvirit]

Great lyrics! (Though I didn't get all the references -- Par'ma'kai? K'Seuss? This may be due to my affinity for 'Old School' Klindom...)

Kai the bard! Long live filk!

Has Don Maclean weighed in with his two darseki?

I am forced to wonder what makes otherwise capable warriors pronounce "kuve" as the awkward and weak "quvey" instead of the powerful monosyllabic "quv"... How would you want to see kuve spelled to make the "quv" sound? Koov?

The final "e" is usually read as a silent "e", as Klythe  (not "Klythey") claims, to produce "quv". There are also minor differences in dialect in which it is pronounced "quv' ", "quva", or even "KOOV-eh".

That looks really dumb, and would tend to sound more like cattle noise than a warrior tongue.

Does the one confuse his bovids, meaning instead to refer to qatlh?

[Klythe]

Though I cannot speak for him, perhaps it is because he just did not know the proper spelling, or he mangled it in the name of art?

     I'm not saying it is incontravertably wrong, only that I personally question it.  It may very well be as Kesvirit has said (and she has a much better understanding of phonology than I do.) an allowable regional variant, or even the perferred pronunciation.   I have heard others pronounce it the same way, and I took this opportunity to attempt to refute one argument, perhaps in favour of another explaination.   I do not claim to be an authority on klingonaase or TlhIngan Hol around other well read Klingons.   I have no canon to back up my claim, only a hopefully logical argument.   I still reserve the right to be wrong...


Kesvirit:  I dunno about K'Seuss (Maybe a Dr. Seuss reference?)  but Parmachkai (exact spelling unknown) is the pet netnickname that Neelix exchanged with his Klingon lover in the episode where Belanna's child is the chosen one... can't remember the title of hand...   Probably a derivitive of the DS9 episode titled, "Looking for Parmach in all the wrong places."

pet’ogh ?= petaq

Yes, I am an unoriginal uncreative nitpicker.   I dunno why I'm so bad with filk, because I'm a huge fan of Weird Al.  And Gowron...  I should be able to sit back and really enjoy this song...   But enough of my personal nuerosises...  I dunno if all of filkdom just hits me in the wrong spot between making the references casual audiences will catch and the level of correctness  loopy fanboys like me...

    I'd better stop now, and hope I haven't already unintentionally insulted the bands much deserved honor.

[maltz]

To reply to the apparent controversy surrounding my lyrics...

First, I recognize and respect that this is a language intensive
forum...therefore, and somewhat necessarily, people will be picky about
word choices.  I respect that and henceforth state publicly that my Klingon
Language abilites SUCK.  I have never claimed otherwise.  Also, I live in
an area where KLI is merely a website not a reality.  Our resources down
here for hearing Klingon spoken correctly are few and far between.  I am a
College Graduate, so I'm not an idiot, but I make NO claim of being a
linguist and regretfully English is my only language.

So, if you want to approach our music from a standpoint of language
precision and correctness of grammar (word choices) you're right...it
Sucks.

But, I think you're losing the point.  What I'm trying to do is have
fun....as do all our fans.  K'Filk is about fun, not precision.  Likewise,
what ever happened to poetic license?  I can count NUMEROUS songs in
English where artists twist a word's  pronunciation to fit the rhythm/form
of the song.  Shouldn't Klingon music have the same flexibility?

To explain the other questions...K'Seuss is on of our Warriors...He's our
Fleet Mixologist and also my Deputy Fleet Commander.  20_backward was the
name of our bar. Par'ma'kai is my butchered spelling as you suspected.  In
fandom down here the term is used to refer to a lover rather than a mate
(perhaps this is wrong, but the term is in common usage here)
Pet'ogh is again a mispelling referring to a common insult used down
here.

Any other discrepancies I will explain as asked, but I warn you that I make
no claims of being Klingon literate....I do this for fun as a hobby, and my
focus has not been exactness of language.


So, if its necessary that everything is in proper syntax and grammar here,
I apologize for treading where I obviously do not belong.  However, I
thought what we were trying to do here was have fun and explore our Klingon
Natures.  

Also, I was refered here to answer a question of what the lyrics
were...this I did.  If they aren't worthy, then I don't know what to say.
Perhaps future lyric requests should be emailed to me directly at
vapor.dreams@verizon.net so I don't offend the Honored Warriors here that
are literate.

With that I apologize for butchering the language and withdraw

Maltz

[Kesvirit]

Maltz, I urge you not to withdraw! Filk is an honorable and intricate art
form, incorporating as it does lyrics, music, and poetry. Good filk makes
it look easy, and composing good filk ain't as easy as it looks.

It is also one of the few things that fans/fen can truly call their own,
corporate copyrights notwithstanding (I don't know what it's current legal
status is.)

You are adding to a long and honored tradition in which Trek is a dominant
force but Klindom is underrepresented. I've heard very little new Kfilk
since the days of the Dorsai Irregulars and the Klingon Diplomatic
Corps.

As for the language issue -- it is an easy topic about which to be
pendantic because it is one of the more "concrete" topics in Klindom and
one of the few in which one can be definitiely proven right or wrong based
on the holiest of canon (Okrand via Paramount). Some take it more seriously
than others. Don't let that interfere with your enjoyment of it or anything
else Klingon-related.

I would suggest that you link your lyrics to Maureen O'Brien's Darn Near All the
Filk on the Web page. Not only will it give your band some additional
publicity, but hopefully it will also inspire other klinfolk of a satirical
bent to put pen to paper and  fingers to instrument.

 - Kesvirit

[Klythe]

     I had hoped I was clear that it is my own personal problem that for
some inexplicable reason I am not able to enjoy otherwise enjoyable filk.  
I almost saw my surgeon specialist to see if this could be remedied, but he
would only accuse me of being weak and challenge me for my position...

   It was not my intention to question the creative licence of the band.  
I have no standing in music, and my comments were out of place.   I do
appreciate your efforts despite my affliction that prevents me from
enjoying the results.

   "I have dishonored myself in questioning your honor."  *Hands his
Daqtagh to Maltz, and falls to his knees infront of him.  Bowing his head
to the ground, stablizing himself by grabbing his ankles.*  "My honor and
my life is yours to do with as you please."

[maltz]

Maltz looks down and sighs....
"Get up...."
"There is no cause for this"

As he stands Maltz hands him his blade.  

"There is never dishonor in questioning that which you doubt."

"Perhaps my response was too harsh as well.   In any event, your death
would only weaken the Empire and would bring me no honor. "

"Your life and your Honor will always be your own.  You owe me no such
debt. "

"But, to prove there is no issue, I would offer a gift.  I'll bet you
didn't know that in addition to being in WarBand I am also High Brewmeister
of the Klingon Empire (proclaimed in writing by both Martok and Gowron).

Maltz hands Klythe a bottle of Qon'oS Amber

Now Brother, we Drink.

[Klythe]

   *raises slowly to accept the daqtagh(resheathed immediately) and the
Bottle and raises it for a toast.*   "Kai WarBand!  Without whose glrious
songs the Empire might forget what honor is!"  

[maltz]

Maltz graciously accepts the toast.  He drinks then speaks.

"If you are interested, I have placed our other efforts online...they can
be downloaded at the link below"

"I warn you....I head off the language issue here so as to avoid there what
happened in this forum.  No disrespect is intended towards you Klythe...and
I hope none is taken"

http://shadowfire2.tripod.com/mp3/download.html

[SoplaHtaHwI']

    I am forced to wonder what makes otherwise capable warriors pronounce
"kuve" as  the awkward and weak "quvey" instead of the powerful
monosyllabic "quv".    All of the best slurrs and epithets are monosyllabic
you know.

LOL!
Maybe the tlhIngan Holics already know this, but I just realised:

kuve = slave
quv = honored

A little stab in the face of one language from the other's creator?

[Kehlan]

Personally I have always read Kuve as Koovay - In my case there is a strong Spanish influence in the way I read non English words.

Maltz, I love the lyrics off your song.  I havent heard it play yet but will look forward to listening to it.

Kehlan

[tesseraktik]

Hey there, y'all; I don't have much to contribute, just wanted to clarify what is meant by "par'ma'kai" (mild DS9 spoiler warning):

As was suggested above, the term was first used in the Deep Space 9 episode Looking for Par'Mach in All the Wrong Places, where Jadzia dax described it as "Love, but with more aggressive undertones" (or something to that effect); I have always interpreted it as love with a hint of conquest, but that's really just speculation.  Anyhow, a Par'Mach'Kai is one's partner i Par'Mach, as Jadzia was Worf's and vice versa
Now, Klingonska Akademien's Klingon-English-Swedish Lexicon identifies the following two words, citing Klingon for the Galactic Traveler as its source for both:

parmaq - love, romance (n)
parmaqqay - romantic companion, romantic partner (n)

Not sure if it's important, but maq means "to proclaim", suggesting that a parmaqqay could be one's claimed one, and paqmaq the association between two who have claimed each other for themselves (this would make parmaq territorial, hence the "aggressive undertones").  Of course, considering par means "to dislike" and qay means "to use the middle finger", I'm not sure one should decompose words like this


Entertaining lyrics, by the way!  Really, this discussion is interesting to me because it seems to illustrate how fans of Klingons are not all fans of the same way of being Klingon.  Indeed, I would take it that the singers are fans of Klingons as they appear in shows usch as DS9, which are really quite different from what I like to call Okrandian Klingons (who are the embodiments of the spirit of tlhIngan Hol).  I prefer the latter type, so language is rather important to me (my view of Klingons is, after all, extrapolated from Klingon linguistics), but I still rather enjoy the more canonical Klindom.

[SoplaHtaHwI']

Not sure if it's important, but maq means "to proclaim", suggesting that a parmaqqay could be one's claimed one, and paqmaq the association between two who have claimed each other for themselves (this would make parmaq territorial, hence the "aggressive undertones").  Of course, considering par means "to dislike" and qay means "to use the middle finger", I'm not sure one should decompose words like this


Entertaining lyrics, by the way!  Really, this discussion is interesting to me because it seems to illustrate how fans of Klingons are not all fans of the same way of being Klingon.  Indeed, I would take it that the singers are fans of Klingons as they appear in shows usch as DS9, which are really quite different from what I like to call Okrandian Klingons (who are the embodiments of the spirit of tlhIngan Hol).  I prefer the latter type, so language is rather important to me (my view of Klingons is, after all, extrapolated from Klingon linguistics), but I still rather enjoy the more canonical Klindom.

LOL. Nope... you should not attempt to decompose every klingon word to it's smallest components... Although it is fun.
I do enjoy both the Hol and the qun of our favourite Trek Universe race. Especially the parts I can drag into my everyday life make it so much fun.

Hol = language
qun = history