Vices is my debut album that I wrote and recorded during the COVID-19 Pandemic. It's a concept album with the common link being various vices and evils of the world. Each song is about a different vice.

Production started in late 2019 and the final touches were added in the spring of 2023 shortly before its release. A few of these songs were written as early as 2017 but were tabled until the pandemic when I had more time to develop them.

Rushing Around

Vices

I wrote the lyrics to this song driving home from my Mom’s birthday dinner with her. She is responsible for educating me about narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) after she did a bunch of research on the subject. I had the wherewithal to start writing lyrical fragments on my phone in the car as we were talking. Those fragments started to coalesce into lines and I finished writing the song in about two hours!

NPD is a personification of narcissistic personality disorder that’s written in first person. I take on the role of NPD in what is the darkest song of the album.
This song is inspired by Anthrax, Black Sabbath, and Metallica. There are plenty of tritones, a slow tempo, and the darkest of undertones.

I got the idea to write three short songs after a friend showed me an assignment from her gender studies class. But I also wanted to do something unusual and ambitious by putting the short songs together and calling it a suite. Crosby, Stills, and Nash did it in 1969, so I figured why can’t I? Part 1 is called “Women”, Part 2 is called “Men”, and Part 3 is called “Procreation for Recreation”.

My friend later told me that I inspired some of her answers to the assignment. So I helped write the inspiration for what would become my own song! This song was a true case of “help me, help you”. But I didn’t know I had helped her until we talked about the assignment and she showed me her answers.

This song is heavily influenced by the mighty Black Sabbath. I wrote the bass, drums, and melodies for the whole song after messing around in D Standard tuning late one Saturday night. My vocal style was inspired by Ozzy Osbourne as I go into the tenor range.

Pornographic World Suite

My therapist said to me that couples don’t think straight during the honeymoon phase of relationships. This song represents how I felt about my now-friend during that time. Despite my declaration of independence three songs earlier, I had to write what became the first love song I ever wrote.

The idea of a slow burning flame came from our first date. We ended up on the beach in San Clemente, CA at 1:00 am and there was a bonfire slowly burning. She got excited and wanted to see the bonfire. We ended up laying on the beach together for about an hour and I realized that my relationship with her was going to be slow if I wanted it to last.

This song draws from several influences musically. It’s also the least heavy song on the album (just the way Heather likes it). The bass was inspired by Jimi Hendrix’s “Fire” and the solos were inspired by Boston. My vocal style was inspired by Elvis Presley because it’s a love song and that’s how I wanted to sound.

Slow Burning Flame

I was running out of ideas for this album while I was dating my now-friend. So one night when I had some free time, I decided to go through some old content that I recorded before the pandemic and the Vices sessions. “Ice Queen” was the best song of the bunch and it’s an homage to The Doors. At the same time, it’s about the deep subject matter of porn addiction.

Ice Queen

So I decided to record whatever came to mind and call it a bass solo. I figured that I have improved so much since the last time I recorded a bass solo that I would do another one. I felt like Cliff Burton and Geezer Butler while I was playing the solo, which was incredible.Sometimes you just have to celebrate life. This was the inspiration behind this song that I wrote spontaneously on my 29th birthday. It’s called Rickenbacker 10 because I recorded it on the 10th anniversary of receiving my beloved ruby red Rickenbacker 4003. It was also the 14th anniversary of me becoming a bassist in 2009.

That night, I decided to record whatever came to mind and call it a bass solo. I figured that I have improved so much since the last time I recorded a bass solo that I would do another one. I felt like Cliff Burton and Geezer Butler while I was playing the solo, which was incredible.

Rickenbacker 10

It was March 2023. I was driving to a student’s house one afternoon and the lyrics just came to me. I made it to my student’s neighborhood a half hour early, so I pulled over near a local grocery store and wrote the lyrics. I even recorded a demo with the final two lines of each verse because I already had the hook in my head.

I was feeling frustrated about my failure with relationships and disgusted by the thought of being in one. Then I realized that I really don’t need a woman in my life and that a girlfriend is a want. This frustration comes through musically with the distorted bass line, piccolo bass solo, and the use of just three chords. It also has an incredible punk rock ethos that was inspired by The Ramones. The twangy intro was inspired by Duane Eddy’s twangy guitar sound.

Independent Man

Admittedly, I was feeling frustrated about getting burned so often in my dating life. The first line of the song is an ironic reference to two love songs that sound quite alike: “Thinking Out Loud” by Ed Sheeran and “Let’s Get It On” by Marvin Gaye. These are two songs that I felt that I had NO BUSINESS listening to because I had no prospects of getting laid.

This song is slow and heavy. Led Zeppelin, especially John Bonham’s iconic drums on “When the Levee Breaks”, was a huge influence. The distorted piccolo bass makes it very heavy. And the opening piccolo bass power chord was inspired by “Caught In a Mosh” by Anthrax.

Marshmallow Above A Fire

One day in July 2022, I went to Irvine Spectrum with my brother and I was telling him how great I felt after taking GABA supplement for the first time. I told him “I feel like my brain went on vacation”. Almost six months later, I remembered that line and it became the basis for the song. The song itself is a paean to GABA, which freed me from many of my intrusive thoughts and lots of anxiety. It’s a poetic description about life before and after I found it.

Musically, this song was one of the heaviest ones I wrote to that point. The bass line was inspired by Joey Vera from Armored Saint and Steve Harris from Iron Maiden. And the piccolo bass solo was inspired by Kirk Hammett from Metallica. Despite its complicated solo and moving bass line, it’s very simple as it’s just three chords and the truth.

My Brain Went On Vacation

I wrote this song about a woman who I briefly dated in 2022. The lyrics tell the story of my two dates with her, how we broke things off, and my first post-break up interactions with her months later. After seeing her at the pool for the first time, I had a long texting conversation with a mutual friend of ours. Our friend also worked with her at our local pool when we dated. So she had plenty of firsthand insight about her. Needless to say, she had internal struggles that she needed to get over. I truly dodged a bullet by not pursuing her further!

Red Lust

Anthony Bertucci is a bassist and singer who specializes in hard rock and heavy metal music. Anthony released his first two albums (Vices and AB3) in 2023 and is currently producing his third album.

For more information, please email Anthony at ab3music@protonmail.com.

Anthony Bertucci

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