‎"I remember reading a record review of snail's debut release in some small zine back in late 1993. It was a small review but everything the reviewer said about the music was everything i was interested in. That set me out searching record stores for the release. It was only available on CD so i searched every local record store until one had a copy. bought it brought it home and dug it from the first ultra fuzzy guitar note of my favorite song on that release "deep sea fishing". I wrote the band to get more info and Matt and i traded music. I sent all the Fu Manchu stuff that i had. I think Matt gave me a copy of their new 4-track stuff at a show we played in San Francisco at the starting of our tour. I listened to the snail cassette tape over and over on tour. Favorite song from that tape was "Cleanliness". I was glad that they re-recorded it for their "blood" release a few years ago. Still love that song. The 4-track tape is awesome and I'm glad to now get a louder version. Still have the tape!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

scott / fu manchu


"Fu Manchu was in S.F. playing at the Bottom of The Hill, I was standing just outside the venue when Eddie walks up with this guy. Turns out that guy was Matt Lynch from SNAIL. In the era of cassette's, SNAIL was already in heavy rotation in the deck of FU MANCHU's van, so naturally all of us were stoked to have made a connection, however I did not exchange info with Matt that night. This turned out to be a big mistake on my part as soon after that FU MANCHU split up. I found myself at a crossroad, trying to figure out my next move as Eddie started playing with some Hollywood "fashion first" Hipsters of that time. I was on my own and the first thing that came to mind was maybe "SNAIL", I would dig being a part of that and who knows, maybe they need a drummer? I had to ask, so my hunt started. Scott Hill is a very particular person in his organization skills and I reckoned that he would have written Matt's contact down, but due to the nasty split that was going on we were not speaking. There was no way that even if he had the contact that he would even pass it on to me. The hunt was really on! I pulled out SNAILS "All Channels Are Open" disc, tried to find a contact at "Big Deal", the label that released that disc....... NOTHING! The record was produced by Jonathan Burnside whom I had worked with before, but again I kept no records or contacts for him, what a BUMMER!! SNAIL became just as elusive as BIG-FOOT and CHUPACABRA put together. My hunt came up empty handed with bags packed and ready to go, my prey had eluded me. I would have been at my all time low if Eddie hadn't realized that those Sunset Strip Studs he was playing with were lame, we never would have re-joined forces to start Nebula with Mark. However, to this day I still wonder what would have happened if I would have been able to find them."

Ruben Romano / Fu Manchu, Nebula, The Freeks