I seem to have contracted some sort of mild sickness over the past day or so. Kind of stuffy, sniffly, snotty, some pressure, and a little cough. I guess this means it’s time to take a break from the spirits a severly cut down on the tobacco for a few days. It’s kind of hard to believe that, so far on this tour, there hasn’t been a single day I haven’t imbibed some sort of alcoholic beverage. It’s not like I’m getting drunk every single night, but a few after show beers or a nice sipping whiskey never hurt anything right? WRONG. I should take care of myself a little better. At least I’m eating super healthy and walking up and down countless flights of stairs every day. That counts for something, right?

Today we’re in Annecy, France. I would love to walk around and see the city, especially since we have some time to kill today, but alas, it’s raining once more. No matter what awesome city I’m in, it’s never pleasurable to walk around in the rain, especially with this plague festering in my nasal cavity.

So, I figure I should let you guys in on a little information about myself. I figure you might want to know a little about the person who is maintaining this website. Well, here is a “Snakepedia” if you will.

Birth Name: Brent Benedict
Nick Name: Snake
Hometown: Longview, TX, USA
Current Home: Denton, TX, USA

I guess I should let you guys (and gals) know where “Snake” comes from. Ages ago, some friends and I were having a conversation about how one cannot give them self their own nickname and have it stick. My quick rebuttal to this was “Fuck you guys! I’m only going by “Snake” from now on. Now, this was just the first name that popped into my head. This had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I had be previously playing Metal Gear Solid, and had watched both Escape from NY, Escape from LA, AND Big Trouble in Little China (I know Snake is not a character in this, but Kurt Russell is a bad ass nonetheless). Anyway, I would only answer to Snake from this point on, never to my birth name, Brent. I thought this was quite funny. Others did not. The name slowly started to fad away until I started working at a music venue in Denton. After a few adult beverages, I explained to them I had this nick name. The staff all thought this was very funny, and decided to put a jar up on the bar labeled “Snake vs. Boy” (up until this time my nickname at the venue was Boy since I was young and the new sound guy in town). The point of this jar was to raise enough money to legally change my name to Snake for one year. Unfortunately, due to other employees not knowing about the Snake vs. Boy jar, it fell by the wayside. Ever since then, it’s just kind of been my moniker. I guess it’s a little strange that most people call my by a ridiculous, self-given nickname, but oh well, I find it mildly entertaining (and from a business since, it makes myself more memorable for future job prospects).

Now other things about myself:
I took my first college class at the age of 12 at the University of Kansas in Lawrence. It was with a program called the Duke University Talent Identification Program, or Duke TIP as it was known to us. This program was for children who had achieved a certain score on the SAT test in the 6th grade. This program is sort of a summer camp for nerds. I loved it. I actually still keep in contact with a few of the friends I made there. I attended this program for 3 years, 12, 13, and 14 respectively. I took mostly math classes, and one psychology class. It was a great time. After that, I decided to leave High School after my Sophomore Year to enroll in a program at the University of North Texas called TAMS (Texas Academy of Math and Science). This is a program where you take an actual college course load, along with the rest of the student body, and get credit for both high school and college. After this I kind of decided that academia wasn’t for me, and that audio was my passion. I had played in punk rock and rock and roll bands up until this point in time, and was very passionate about music. I decided to enroll in Mediatech Institute: Dallas Sound Lab. This was a great school for me. It was very hands on, I learned a lot, and was able to get familiar with some really nice equipment. After my run at Mediatech, I worked a few rock clubs around the DFW area.

Fast forward a few years to when I met WHY?

I had earned a house sound engineer position at an awesome rock club in Denton called Rubber Gloves Rehearsal Studios. It’s a great small-capacity rock club who has hosted a slew of great bands who ended up hitting it big. I was privileged enough to mix some great bands there: The Meat Puppets, Smog, Joanna Newsom, The Draft, Gaslight Anthem, High on Fire, Baroness, etc, etc… On the eve of SXSW 2008, WHY? was playing there (coincidentally the day Alopecia was released). I mixed a great set by them. Little did they know, I had never listened to them before. After the show, I mentioned that I was going down to SXSW to work a few shows and that it would be great to see them again, and maybe grab a beer after one of their shows. At this point, they asked if I would want to mix them at their showcases. SXSW is always chaotic, and it’s really really nice for a band to have their own engineer during the festival. I jumped at the chance. I had never been a band’s engineer before, and I felt like that was the next step in my career. I had toured a little big before as a no-pay TM, and twice playing in my own band, but never for sound. I had already booked a tour with another band later that year which would be my first to mix and run into large format mixing consoles, but that’s another story for another day. Anyway, the first show with WHY? was on the big stage at Emo’s. I was shaking in my boots. My nerves were going crazy. At this point in time, I had never mixed anywhere outside of tiny rock clubs, and definitely not an 800 capacity legendary venue! The show went great though! As did the rest of the SXSW show. That was such a memorable time in my life. I met a lot of people for the first time who I consider good friends now. I mention to a few of the guys that I’d love to tour with them some day. They kind of say, yeah that would be cool, we have some other guys we’re looking into, we’ll get back to you, etc… This is when I realize I need to kick it into high gear if I want to be their engineer. And honestly, what else do I have to do? They had planned a summer European festival tour, and I had planned on taking a personal vacation there at the same time anyway. So, I contacted the guys, and I asked if I were there would they want someone to mix for them. They hesitantly said yes, and I flew to Europe. That was a really fun and memorable experience for me. We spent a lot of time in Berlin, and I fell in love with that city. The joke is during this time I hired myself, and told them I would be touring with them from that point on, and it happened. I’ve always tried my best to be professional and I feel like I’ve grown leaps and bounds as a sound engineer, and as a person from my experiences touring with WHY?. On the first show of the first US tour I did with WHY?, I met my girlfriend, Hillary. She’s Yoni and Josiah’s little sister’s best friend from high school. Since I’ve been with her touring with this band has been something completely different than any other tour I’ve been on with other bands. There’s more of a family sense with this band. We all know each other very well, each other’s siblings, significant others, and parents. We all look out for each other physically and mentally. It’s a wonderful job, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world. Anyway, enough sentiment.

I fell like this has gone on long enough, I hope I didn’t sound too self-absorbed in what was supposed to be a brief explanation about who is writing this blog. Time to go load in to the venue. Day off tomorrow in Reims.

Cheers guys!

EDIT: I also thought you guys would like to know that I have a personalized license plate that has a cobra and my name airbrushed on it. It was from one of those airbrush stands in the mall. It’s awesome.