Red C

In early 1981, Tomas, who had just moved to the D.C. area from Switzerland, was walking down M street and smoking a pipe when he ran into a whole crew of D.C. punk rockers. They were being interviewed by the Washington Post for an article on the punk scene. It was through that meeting that he was introduced to Eric L., from Potomac, a suburb in Maryland. Eric was looking for a drummer and Tomas was looking for a band, and they ended up forming Red C with Leo and Toni. Leo only played a few shows with the band and was then replaced by Pete, who had been rumored to have been a member of the mysterious band The Stab, along with John from GI.

The name Red C may well have come from a favorite Ethiopian restaurant in D.C. called Red Sea, though there were other theories floating around and the band wasn’t telling. They had a unique approach to music and this resulted in a sound quite different than what most of the other bands were playing at that point in time.

Red C only played six or seven shows before breaking up, but they managed to record a demo tape at Hit & Run studios at some point during the summer of '81 and songs from that session appeared on the "Flex Your Head" sampler. There may have been a second demo recorded in their basement that featured more of their songs, but the tapes disappeared after Toni died of pneumonia in the mid-80's.