WATCHTOWER / SPASTIC INK Guitarist Ron Jarzombek has issued the following update

"The deed is almost done! The BLOTTED SCIENCE - The Machinations of Dementia recordings are nearing the final stages. Alex Webster finished his bass parts a while back and is rolling out on tour with CANNIBAL CORPSE again shortly. Charlie Zeleny (BEHOLD...THE ARCTOPUS, JORDAN RUDESS) turned in his last tracks on New Year's eve and, like Alex, is totally shredding on the tunes. I just finished production on the drums last night at somewhere around 3:30 AM; all that's left is for me is to write and record melodies/solos, tie up any remaining loose ends, and then start mixing. Graphics are also nearly completed.

We have not yet decided how exactly we're gonna get this album out. We might release it on our own through various distributors, or we might consider signing a licensing deal with a label for at least some of the territories. It really kind of depends on what the labels are willing to offer. We should have a couple advance tracks ready for shopping purposes very soon. Those of you expecting to hear some brutal and technically demanding material - prepare yourselves!

On another note, I'm really looking forward to the upcoming European tour with my friend, MARTY FRIEDMAN. Except for a couple of festival one-offs with WATCHTOWER (Bang Your Head!!! in 2000 and Headway in Holland in 2004), I have not done any live work over there since 'TOWER toured with CORONER way back in 1990 in support of the Control & Resistance album. As some of you may recall, I was also with Marty's band for the Guitarevolution Tour which, unfortunately, never got extended after that run of Southwest dates we did in the fall of 2003. Chris Catero (ex-WARDOG) is also back on bass, and we've got the amazing Jeremy Colson (STEVE VAI, ex-MSG, DALI'S DILEMMA) on drums who played on Marty's new album, "Loudspeaker" (which is one HEAVY mofo!). We will be recording these shows for a live album so I hope all you European guitar heads are turning out in force and make yourselves heard! Confirmed tour dates so far include:

March

31 - Turock, Essen, Germany

April

1 - De Lantaarn - Hellendoorn, Netherlands
2 - Underworld - London, UK
3 - Le Trabendo - Paris, France
4 - Colos-Saal - Aschaffenburg, Germany
6 - De Boerderij - Zoetermeer, Netherlands
7 - Theater Club, Tel Aviv, Israel
8 - Rock Cafe - Prague, Czech Republic
10 - Stazione Birra - Morena (Roma), Italy

Please check www.martyfriedman.com for any updates.

On a more local front, due to the closing of H & H Music (where I have been teaching for the past 15 years), a few fellow instructors and I have opened a school/studio on the far northeast side of town. Actually, it’s in Universal City, TX where the majority of our clientele is. It will be called either Universal Music Studios or R M Studios.

I have not been working on my upcoming DVD, Theoretically Speaking, mainly because I'm trying to get the Blotted Science stuff completed. And my hard drives (all 4 of them totaling something like 250G) can only take so much. I have a total of 94 pages of material transcribed and I will get back to the video taping as soon as "The Machinations of Dementia" is in the can. The focus of the DVD(s) will be the progressive/technical aspect of writing and playing, with examples and insight for material from both Spastic Ink CDs, my solo CDs, and Blotted Science, of course.

Last but not least, I’ve also started to get ideas for the multimedia solo adventure that I want to tackle once Blotted Science and the DVD(s) are done. I'm currently looking for a graphic artist to illustrate 6 "arcade/video game" characters. If anyone is interested, please send me an email at ronjarz_at_satx.rr.com."

For more info visit: www.ronjarzombek.com