The Sapiens are in their third year as a band. The dance rock band from Chicago has recently made several must-hear lists, and was even chosen by the Chicago Sun-Times as one of the top ten bands to watch in 2008. With a show in Chicago tonight, Thursday April 3, at The Note (for more info visit www.thenotechicago.com), Shotgun Reviews had a conversation with the band’s lead guitarist, Charlie Nadler. Read on for a look at the band’s roots, plans, and dreams, then head over to their site to have a listen.

Shotgun Reviews: First thing’s first. How and when did The Sapiens become a band?

Charlie Nadler:The band formed in 2005 as a foursome of Columbia College grads who had left other various projects to start something new. I’d embellish this with an anecdote about our first show or something, but I didn’t join The Sapiens until about a year later. So I won’t.

SR: What does your band have to offer that the music industry doesn’t already have?

CN:I’d say that every band with a unique sound has something to offer that the music industry doesn’t already have. Or if not a unique sound, at least a sweet gimmick. We don’t really sound like anyone else right now, so the question is: Does anyone want what we have to offer? I think so. People are ready for something different. (more…)

Well, folks, it’s been fun. Troy wanted me to take this one and let you all know our exciting news. We hit the radar of several companies, as we recently made some large jumps in viewers of the site. We took several bids, and Home Depot won out.  Now, I know that seems like a weird fit, and it is, but they’re looking to diversify. You’ll see the color scheme change first thing- we’re going to Home Depot Orange. You will see a few Home Depot ads, but nothing too obstructive. So don’t worry, and welcome us to the Home Depot family. Also, it should be noted, Shots in the Dark will now be an all hardware podcast. The Geek news was fun, but hey, nothing lasts forever.

Ahoy! Shots in the Dark IS the official podcast of Shotgun Reviews, so we thought we’d hit you up with an all review episode (after the Gatling Geek news segment, of course). We went a little outside the box, though. First, Janelle reviews The Sims 2: Freetime, the likely final expansion pack to The Sims 2, and even gives you a sneak peak of The Sims 3, due out next year.  Then we take a deep look at the first 7 “episodes” of Warren Ellis and Paul Duffield’s FreakAngels; the completely free webcomic. Head over, take a listen, subscribe through any and all podcasting services, and be a better human being. Or Warren Ellis will send the arse eels. It’s your choice.

 Listen Right Here!!

Full Disclaimer: I am a former soldier and an Iraq War veteran.

In watching CNN Headline News this morning, I saw Robin Meade report the new U.S. death toll in Iraq: 4000. In addition, at least 80,000 Iraqis have died, and that’s to say nothing of the 4.5 million, MILLION that have either been forced out of their homes or even the country. Now, don’t get me wrong, Saddam Hussein was a ruthless, vicious, waste of humanity. He genuinely needed to be taken down (though not like this, but that’s a whole different discussion). When oh when will we step up and acknowledge that this just isn’t going well? The worst stat Robin put out there? Last year, 2007, was the BLOODIEST for the U.S., with the death toll hitting over 900 during that year alone.

But hey, the surge is working…

We held off on an individual spotlight for a bit so we could bring you a HUGE spotlight: it’s the Shots in the Dark team! In the shot above, pictured clockwise from left, are Vince, Janelle, Imoticon, Lucas and Michael Madsen. Yes, the REAL Michael Madsen. The Shots in the Dark crew doesn’t mess around. Read on to meet Lucas, Janelle, Vince, The Viceroy, Imoticon, and John after the jump, or watch the latest episode right now!

Name: Lucas Siegel

Shots in the Dark team position: Co-Producer, Booking

Specialty: Comics, tech, anime, random knowledge

Things I do: Newsarama.com, ShotgunReviews.com, Truman College Newspaper Arts and Entertainment Editor, Generally kick-ass, Get linked to by Rolling Stone

Interests: Comics, video games, writing (creative and journalism), all the geeky stuff we talk about on the show, Da Bears, making fun of Vince, trolling/giving negative karma to JB on our forums (found at shotgunreviews.com/shots/forum)

Name: Janelle Siegel

Shots in the Dark team position: co-host/token girl

Specialty: smart assery, comics, saying “your mom” at inconvenient moments, video games (The Sims 2 in particular), manga, and using my boobs to get my way.

Things I do: copy-edit Newsarama (can I say that? I think you know the link but might want to clear with Matt), Shotgun Vlog (http://www.youtube.com/user/SitDShow), write for Shotgun, and co-host SitD. To pay the bills: office administrator for fashion designer Andria Lieu - website still in development.

Interests: Your mom. Ha. Seriously: comics (love Fables, X-Men, Birds of Prey, and Suburban Glamour), manga (Fruits Basket, Ouran High School Host Club, Nana, Vampire Knight), video games (The Sims 2, Final Fantasy 2/4-8, SSX, Burnout, Smash Bros.), books (favorite authors include Stephen King, L.M. Montgomery, and John Irving), my husband, animals (especially our cats Monkey and Chicken!), TV (favorite show ever = Veronica Mars, favorite show currently on TV = Lost), movies (Empire Records, Gone With The Wind, and Lost in Translation), music (I <3 U2), and editing (I hates the bad grammars).

Name: Vince Scalabrino

Shots in the Dark position: Co-Producer, Marketing

Specialty: Retro video games, Non super-hero comics and pop culture obscura: Dr. Who, 80’s animation, vintage computer tech and games, robots, etc.

Things I do: Digital marketing (www.icrossing.com), voiceover acting (www.voiceofvince.com - Coming soon!), audio and video production (www.shotgunreviews.com/shots), writing (Right here on www.shotgunreviews.com).

Interests: See specialties. Vince is also a casual harmonica player, snowboarder and unabashed Karaoke lover. He blogs on very rare occasions @ vscalabri.livejournal.com. There are rumors he is also in the early stages of development of his very first novel.

Little Known Fact: Vince once got up in front of 500-some Motorola employees and their former CEO, Ed Zander, and sang 12 bars of Cole Porter’s “Night and Day”, in the style of Ol’ Blue Eyes. In case you were wondering, he no longer works at Motorola.

Name: The Viceroy

Shots in the Dark team position: Co-Founder, on-air talent, and random odds & ends support

Specialty: Video Games, Tabletop & Board Games, Collectible Card Games, random facts of nostalgia (Like Vince only more extensive & random!), as well as general geek-ese and geek-isms. Oh, and making everyone wonder who is the man behind the mask…

Things I do: Senior System Designer at an unnamed “super secret” video game company, part-time entertainer at Chicago Bulls basketball games, and Voice Overs if he ever has the time (demo tape is just about done!), typically speaks of himself in the third person

Interests: See Specialties & Professional sections above. In addition to those, The Viceroy also has an analyst streak in him and follows most of the Chicago pro teams (Bears, Bulls, Cubs). The Viceroy also dabbles with building with LEGO and has a fond appreciation Cartoons & Animation. The Viceroy would like to write again at some point as well…

Little Known Fact: The Viceroy could have been one of the ‘contestants’ on the TV Show “The Pickup Artists”, but decided against it.

Name: Imoticon AKA Steve Scalabrino

Shots in the Dark team position: On-Air Talent

Specialties: Movies, TV, Games (FPS,Action,Fantasy)

Things I do: Acting (stage, print and TV), retail gigs to cover the gaps (Starbucks and the like).

Interests: Airsoft, Movies/TV, All things of 80’s, good sushi restaurants, know any?

Name: Halcylon AKA John Stvan

Shots in the Dark Team position: Graphic Designer / Cinematography Lead, On-Air Talent

Specialties: Halo, Halo 2, Halo 3, Call of Duty Series (Any First Person Shooter, really), Star Wars (Movie and Book form), Graphic Art, Digital Art

Things I do: Graphic design (www.gravityforcegraphics.com), Video producing/ editing (www.shotgunreviews.com/shots), Bungie.net user/abuser (Halcylon’s Profile).

Interests: See Specialties. Anything involving the color blue (It’s the only color I can truly see well). I have read almost every book available regarding String Theory, partake in skiing in Colorado and have acted in plays and movies since high school (almost a decade of work in all). I have a fuzzy kitty named Sierra who is a dog in disguise (she barks and plays fetch). In case you didn’t already guess, I enjoy long drawn out conversations regarding anything to do with myself. =)

Just when you thought it was all over, the Gerard Way/Dark Horse vs. Hart Fisher plot thickens. After our initial coverage, Scott Allie of Dark Horse had this to say:

Wow. Show me one place where Gerard’s “denied” or lied about anything about Boneyard Press, or where we called this Gerard’s first comics work. Hart’s had mentions on his own site about Gerard since around the time Umbrella #1 hit the stands, if not before, and no one has ever asked us about it until you,. Hart never tried getting in touch with Gerard through me. Is there a story here? Or is the story just that Hart’s trying to get some ink of something cool he did 15 years ago by slagging the guy he did it for? Where did Dark Horse or Gerard do something wrong?

He and Way each then tried to contact Fisher:

Gerard called him three times and gave up.I wrote to him, said we never lied or denied anything, but would be happy to talk to him about it. I emailed him my office number and asked him to call, and offered to forward an email to Gerard if he was still interested in talking to him. He replied with a video link and a warning that I needed to be careful what I said to him. I figured my duty in this was over with that.

All attempts to get a direct comment from Hart D. Fisher have been met with indirectness and quotes, some related, some unrelated.

And now, as said above, the plot thickens. The solicitation copy from Dark Horse Comics regarding the trade paperback collection reads

• Umbrella Academy is the comics debut of Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance!

Now, to be fair, it IS the comics debut of Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance, as his previous comics work for Boneyard and DC were when he was plain old Gerard Way. Dark Horse has once again been reached out to for comment. The full solicitation text can be seen after the break.

UPDATE 1, 10:12 PM 14Mar- Scott Allie is shocked, and not happy. He is currently working to remove  that from the solicitation materials. He stated that he did not see nor approve that text prior to its appearance. So I guess he’s not taking my “of My Chemical Romance” out, then.

(more…)

Certainly LOOKS interesting. The full text description about the book after the break.

(more…)

Posted at Shotgun Reviews 22Feb08:

Hart Fisher/Gerard Way part 1
and 23Feb08, with comments from those involved:

Hart Fisher/Gerard Way part 2

Posted on Lying in the Gutters 25Feb08:

FISHING FOR COMPLIMENTS

And you thought the Steven Colbert/John Stewart/Conan O�Brien fight over who made Mike Huckabee was ridiculous and clearly could not happen in real life?

Enjoy Hart Fisher on how he made �My Chemical Romance” and �Umbrella Academy’s” Gerard Way. How he first published Way. And how Way is denying his work on Fisher�s books and will be punished by embarrassing exposures as a result!

I read those comics. You know, if I was Way, I�d deny it, too.

You know, no one remembers his work for the DC Paradox Press �Big Book Of…” series.

When asked about the doubling up without credit, Rich replied that he’d “have to read” an article in order to note it. Funny, the Shotgun articles come up as 1 and 2 if you Google “Hart Fisher and Gerard Way.”

Don’t worry, Rich, you’re not the only one reading:

Rolling Stone got in on it, too.

They at least linked to us.

Update 1: Rich really didn’t read the previously posted articles, and took offense to the tongue-in-cheek nature of this post. Never did ShotgunReviews mean to imply Rich lied about not reading the articles; he apparently just didn’t go into the story quite as much as Shotgun did.

Update 2: Pulp Secret decided to get in on the act, Jealous that Rich and Rolling Stone were getting all the attention:

25 February 2008

Remember, you read the story here first. Before Hart goes to Rolling Stone, TMZ, LA Weekly, Spin, & MTV with his story. It’s going to get dirty.
-Jeaux Janovsky, Pulp Secret Keeper

Someone posted with a time stamp of February 26, 7:43 am, correcting them of their claim, pointing out that the story, in fact, was HERE first. As of 5:50 pm February 26, Pulp Secret has not corrected the statement. Google is your friend, people.

You may have seen this post yesterday, in which we detailed how Hart Fisher of Boneyard Press feels he’s not getting credit for Gerard Way’s first comics work, and claimed that Dark Horse was

touting these books by Gerard as his first foray into comics.

When contacted for statement, both Scott Allie, Senior Managing Editor of Dark Horse Comics and Gerard Way, lead singer of My Chemical Romance and the creator in question, gave an initial response. Please note they had not, at time of comment, seen the exact posts where Fisher made his claims.

Scott Allie:

I don’t see anything online where Hart says that we’re trying to suppress the fact that Gerard worked for him. Hart published Gerard’s first comics when Gerard was fifteen. I don’t think we’ve ever said Umbrella Academy is the first comic Gerard did—he did something for DC when interning there, but we haven’t talked about that. It looks to me like Hart’s had something on his website for a while about Gerard working for him—we haven’t tried to suppress it; no one’s brought it up.

When Gerard first told me about the project he did for Hart, he said Hart was generous with him, even though Gerard was a real young kid with no background. What I can find online with Hart talking about this, he seems to be pretty positive about it. I don’t see him looking for a slag match here.

On one hand, there’s some bragging rights for having a writing credit at 15—but it was a long time ago. If anyone ever asked Gerard what his first published work was, I’m pretty sure he would’ve told them about Boneyard Press. Mostly interviewers have asked about his art background, and his music. If Hart actually has a beef about this, please ask him to drop me a line.

So, Hart, if you’re reading this, drop Scott Allie a line.

Also, Gerard Way had this to say:

I sent [Hart] an email years ago, before we finished ‘Revenge,’ thanking him for believing in me, and never got a response. I think I emailed him once again as well…never heard anything back. I’m not ashamed of what I did for him, and wanted to see him in person and thank him. I’ve never had the chance.

Way is currently on tour with My Chemical Romance in South America, and may be difficult to reach for further comment.

Dark Horse has been contacted again with links and quotes of the original posts. Look for further update as it comes.