Beating Las Vegas into Submission
By Joe Pacheco

The scene is a smoke-filled bar. Amongst the sea of sweaty bodies a musical fusion is heard. The music hypnotizes the audience. The fans have no choice but to give in and do what the band wants. They are being beat into submission and loving it.

Submission, out of Las Vegas, features vocalists Henry Harvey and Danny Garcia aka Danny Boy, guitarist Dave Dades, bassist Nathan Kinkaid aka Nate Dogg and Tracey Lockwood on drums.
The band started six years ago with Harvey and Dades. Garcia and Kinkaid joined two years ago after leaving their former band. Kinkaid played drums but made the switch to bass. Lockwood was brought in a year ago when their old drummer quit and the rest is history.

The old saying is that America is the melting pot of the world. Submission is a microcosm of that saying with influences from heavy metal to gangsta rap. “We are hard rock with a hip hop element,” said Harvey, “Talk with funky beats.”

Their songs are a collaboration based on people’s everyday emotions. Lockwood comes up with a beat and Kinkaid and Dades add their ingredients. Harvey and Garcia write their lyrics based on what they’re going through at that moment. Because their words are based on the perspectives of two people, they have to be compatible. They call themselves “night and day.”

“We write about relationships, friends and partying,” said Harvey. “We want to make songs where people will be listening in their car and say ‘hey that happened to me’,” explains Garcia.

Submission has played at the Joint inside the Hard Rock Hotel and at the Whiskey on the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles. Looking back Dades recalls, “Playing the Whiskey was cool. The Whiskey made me proud.” And knowing they have played, taking the same stage, where bands they respect have played, takes thing up a notch. “The Whiskey and the Joint fulfilled me,” says Dade, “We kicked it in the rooms where all the other great bands chilled.”

Locally, they built up a following playing Saturday nights at Tom and Jerry’s. “Our first show at Tom and Jerry’s there were 25 people,” said Harvey. “The last show we played there had a head count of 700 people.” Lately they’ve been playing at the Cheyenne Saloon.

They are always eager to get on stage and perform for their fans. “I like to see the people screaming and singing the songs,” said Dades. “For me it’s about the nod,” said Harvey. “To see people getting into your stuff.”

“What it is for me, is after you play the song and the response that you get,” said Garcia, “Cause they’ll yell til’ your next one.”

The band has grown in its six years of existence. “There’s a higher confidence level,” said Harvey. “We’re all seasoned players. We’ve been playing for years now together. I think that comes with playing shows, having better shows and being around for a while.”

They are proud of their perseverance and what they’ve accomplished. The group is always looking to improve their live shows and constantly coming up with ideas to make them better so that people will have to come and see them. “We have ideas that people haven’t seen yet,” said Garcia. “We’ll eventually put them out there for people to trip on. We put on more than our music, we play our music, we are our music.”

Musically they would like to try and create some slow songs. “The slow stuff is what sells you,” said Garcia. “The big record labels eventually want all the hard bands to make a love song, a nice ballad to sell to the radio.”

Their future goals are to make it big. “We plan to be rich with nice fat houses,” said Garcia.

“I just want to be a known musician,” said Harvey. “I want to be a household name. The things that come with it are nice but more than that stuff I want people to know that when they talk about our band, that Submission worked hard for what they got and look at them now. They’re good musicians and their music’s good. I just want to produce good album after good album of stuff that people like, that they can hear, that’s got meaning.”