Half Lip

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Published on 4/26/2008

By THE ROADIE April 18, 2008

After playing all over eastern Pennsylvania — Harrisburg, York, Allentown — the guys from rock/hip-hop combo band Halflip just never got around to playing locally. So when they take the stage at Lippy's Xtreme Sports Bar tonight for the bar's Original Music Series, yeah, they'll be pretty excited. Related Stories * HALFLIP VIDEO HALFLIP MEET THE BAND: Eric Hogan, 24, of Reeders, lead rapper, guitar; Steve Denig, 25, of Tobyhanna, screamer; Dan Barone, 25, of Tobyhanna, lead guitar and vocals; Ben Wine, 27, of Reeders, rhythm guitar; Chris Eliat, 25, of Mount Pocono, bass; Paul Lynch, 25, of Bethlehem, turntables; Curt Morris, 23, of Mountainhome, drummer and William Larsson, aka, Beast Da Brilliant, 25, of Tobyhanna, hypeman and crowd control. WHERE TO FIND THEM: Halflip is playing its first true local show tonight at Lippy's Xtreme Sports Bar in Jay Park in Marshalls Creek as part of the original music series. NEW ALBUM: Halflip's first full album is coming by the end of the summer. It will have 12 songs — and some bonus stuff. "We have some interludes," Hogan said. "Maybe some skits too.." BE CAREFUL!: So what exactly does "crowd control" mean? "I keep everything in order, makes sure everything runs smooth," Larsson said. The rest of the guys say Larsson is the one who gets the crowd going at shows, having no qualms about crazy dancing. ON THE WEB: www.myspace.com/halflip151 "It's hard to believe that we've been playing for a while now and this is our first local show," said lead rapper and guitarist Eric Hogan, 24, of Reeders. "But it is. It's a really exciting night for us." That's not to say the band hasn't been close. Halflip has played Crocodile Rock in Allentown a bunch of times (the band opened for Vanilla Ice in December) and the guys in the band have played with other bands locally. But the seven (or eight, if you count hypeman William Larsson) members of the current lineup — most of whom graduated from Pocono Mountain High School — just haven't gotten around to playing a local show. "It's exciting," said guitarist Dan Barone, 25, of Tobyhanna. "We've wanted to get back in town for a while now." Halflip actually started as a side project between Hogan and Barone to pass some downtime they had with other bands. But when they recruited a couple other musicians to help them with a show last summer at Main Street Jukebox in Stroudsburg, a funny thing happened. "We liked the Halflip stuff we were playing more than we liked the stuff we had with our other bands," Hogan said. "We realized it was better than what we were doing at the time." So the search began for others who would want to join in on this side project that had quickly escalated to a main band. The guys knew some other musicians looking for some work and by the time everyone joined in, they liked the sound being created even more. One by one, each of the members came aboard until the band was ready to play. Already — thanks to MySpace and the Internet as a whole — the band has developed quite a following, with almost 17,000 MySpace friends. That kind of audience is bound to make people take notice, and after the band played a recent show at Crocodile Rock in Allentown, they met with some promoters and booking agents. "But right now, we're concentrating on putting our album together," Hogan said. Halflip has 12 songs recorded (with a few bonus tracks) that it is ready to put out in its rock-rap style, having recently finished up recording at Soundmine Studios in Otter Lake. The band hopes the CD will be out by the end of summer. Until the album comes out, Halflip will be invading local and statewide venues getting the word out. The emphasis, for now, is local. "We're planning on sticking around," Barone said. "It's always more fun when you stay close to home."



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