Cathedral of Tears

About

Darkwave band formed by singer Jack Grisham and keyboardist Greg Kuehn after they left T.S.O.L. in 1983. They were joined by Mike Patton (The Middle Class, Eddie And The Subtitles, Adolescents) on bass and Phil Maturano on drums. According to Grisham, he wanted the new band to be more pop-driven and to appeal to the masses and to women. This lineup recorded a 4-song demo in 1983 and built up a local following, playing regularly at the Concert Factory (formerly the Cuckoo's Nest). They got a recording deal with Enigma Records, but Kuehn and Maturano left the band and Grisham did not want to record songs they had co-written, so he wrote mostly new ones for the band's self-titled 6-song EP and recorded it with a new lineup consisting of himself, Patton, keyboardist Eddie Sedano, guitarist Mark Ford, and drummer John Guerrero (Mike Borens and Jon St. James also played guitar on the record). Enigma was displeased with the result, so Grisham, without permission, gave a mixed copy of "Black Emotion" (the one song on the EP written by the original lineup) to KROQ DJ Rodney Bingenheimer, who began playing it on his "Rodney on the ROQ" program. It became the #4 most requested song on the station. The band dissolved soon after. Grisham went on to other projects, eventually relaunching T.S.O.L. In 2019 Pine Hill Records released Cathedral Of Tears' 4-song 1983 Demo.