By Edgar Lopez
Team Vendetta’s shining guitar leads, beefy bass and rattling clashing drum beats produce a brain stimulating sound.
The Boyle Heights-based, self-proclaimed listener’s choice, rock band is glued together by a trio.
Front men Andrew Gastelum, a student at East Los Angeles College, plays guitar while Erik Gomez, a former Elan, plays bass.
Although the drummer is not usually considered a front man, Diego Javier could certainly fill the spot.
In fact, it seems as if the two front men are split to their far sides so the crowd can watch Javier smile beat after beat.
He has an uncanny resemblance to Yogi Bear.
Students passing by turned their attention to the band as their amps roared the commencement of their gig.
The band played two back-to-back gigs at East Los Angeles College.
Although all members of the band alternate on vocals, Gastelum is the primary vocalist.
Gastelum’s vocals sounded much better on the first gig as the second gig had rather cold, teenager-going-through-puberty, raw types of vocals.
Although a back-to-back gig can be tiring, Vendetta’s songs were entirely entertaining throughout both days.
The first gig though, lasted a little too long.
One of their most popular songs is a college-inspired song called “Studying.”
The song has a good melodic intro with good heavy bass and dead-on crisp drumming.
The vocals, although some say they enjoy them, are inconsistent in quality.
The worst part of the vocals, which occur at the chorus, sounded as if Gastelum’s throat was stretched and burned out.
However, at every other part, the vocals seem to find their groove.
A friend said this song was really sad, but it seems more like a touching heartfelt song.
Another of their popular songs is “720 Underwater Box.”
This song’s best qualities are the guitar’s lead and the distorted bass.
It is the type of song you wish to run in a circle to with its solid bass solos.
When it gets to a certain bridge, the song seems as if it has overstayed its welcome, but it turns catchy.
A dropped drumstick could have ruined the song, but the bassist picked it up and handed it back to the drummer and still made it in time to catch his upcoming solo.
This song was orgasmic, but the next song was equally good.
“The Strip” was dedicated to the strip at ELAC.
It is the main vein at ELAC between the E3 and E5 buildings.
It starts off with a welcoming guitar similar to “Studying.”
The bass sounded buff, while the drum section had excellent crisp hi-hat hitting technique.
The vocals were terrific and pleasing.
Bass and guitar played in unison as the audience danced away.
The song seemed to have sped up which did no justice for it.
The band also played a cover of Wipeout, which seems to be the most popular song of the strip.
The bass intro was great as were the drums and guitar.
The short vocal intro was a fantastic crowd pleaser.
Possibly the greatest aspect of the cover was the drum fills.
It was a melting song.
The greatest song though could perhaps be “Me Vale.”
This song is sung by the drummer, who has a stupendous, dreamy voice, in Spanish.
It had the greatest vibe of all songs and even though the drummer was singing primarily, he retained his human metronome ability.
The guitar had a great awakening as it seemed to punch your lights out.
And although some of the song endings were rather lame, this song had a miraculous ending.
Team Vendetta played last Wednesday at noon near the lunch truck and last Thursday at afternoon at the Di-Composers’s third club event at the Black Box Theater.
The band members have been in the band since high school, but have known each other before then.
They have been together for years, and their chemistry shows it.