All inquiries should be directed to fifthangel156@yahoo.com.

Disclaimer

This web site is the unofficial online home for the history of the band Fifth Angel. While the information presented herein is true to the best of my knowledge, any difference concerning facts on this site in comparison to a statement by a member or former member of the band, should be viewed with preference towards that band member.

All images and written accounts presented on FifthAngel.net are from my personal collection or donated by various individuals. Do NOT reprint or repost without express written permission from the site administrator (contact information above).

Credits

First and foremost, thanks to my wife, for sharing in my love of music history and having the patience to let me create this site. A big "thank you" also goes out to original Fifth Angel Lead Guitarist James Byrd, who was kind enough to clarify much of the band's history and donated various photos and article scans.

I'd also like to thank James "Evil Cheese" Fintel for the discussion forum work; Sian J., who went through a large magazine collection to send me a bunch of article scans; Rob Kotynski for my basic lessons in HTML back in the day; and the Douglas brothers on Long Island, for introducing me to Fifth Angel and getting me started on the right path as a rock music fan.

Fifth Angel: My Story

My introduction to Fifth Angel is probably similar to many other fans. Back in the late 1980s, I had a couple of close friends – Wayne and Jeff Douglas. They played me a dubbed copy of Fifth Angel's self-titled debut, which they had received from their older brother Michael, probably sometime in 1988.

I was pretty blown away by the guitar skill, raw power and emotion from the band and the singer, and was immediately hooked. At the time, I was (and continue to be) a fan of Queensr˙che, another Seattle metal band, having heard that band's 1986 release Rage for Order, but they simply didn't hit me at that point like Fifth Angel had.

A copy of that self-titled tape was like gold to me back then, as I sifted through the countless metal and hard rock magazines each month, looking for more information about Fifth Angel. After about a year, I saw a brief mention somewhere about the band working on a second album, due out in late 1989. Well, at that point, a cassette of that album was first thing on this kid's Christmas List. I distinctly remember asking my mother that if I could only have one thing, that was what I wanted.

I'll never forget that Christmas morning. I received the second Fifth Angel album, Time Will Tell, in my Christmas stocking. I had woken up at 4 a.m., found the tape and put it in the Walkman I had at the time. There was no happier kid that Christmas than me. I listened to it all the way through before going back to sleep. In fact, I don't even remember anything else about that Christmas, other than opening that Fifth Angel cassette.

Following that, I found a couple of articles about the band over the next year or so and of course, was happily surprised that "Midnight Love," a track on that second album, was the theme song for Howard Stern's late night TV show. I was a little surprised at the guitarist change from James Byrd to Kendall Bechtel, but Kendall could hold his own in my opinion, so at the time, it really wasn't a big deal.

I wrote a letter to the band at some point, I distinctly recall being so excited to send it, hoping they'd respond. That response never came and I found out in the months to come that Fifth Angel had broken up. For a kid so enthralled with the band, you would think it should have bothered me more. But by that time, I was also really invested in Queensr˙che, particularly that band's historic metal concept record, Operation: Mindcrime, so I simply latched onto them. But I never forgot about Fifth Angel, eventually finding my own original Shrapnel Records cassette of the band's initial release.

Although I had moved on, listening to plenty of other bands, I never forgot about Fifth Angel. When the Internet started really becoming popular in the mid-1990s, I searched for whatever information I could find on the band, coming up empty. In roughly 2000 or 2001, I finally hit upon the web site of Fifth Angel's original lead guitarist, James Byrd.

I took a chance and contacted him via e-mail, and to my surprise, he wrote back, appreciating the note. When I asked about Fifth Angel, he directed me to an interview he did with RockReunion, which explained the entire Fifth Angel situation leading up to the guitarist change to Kendall Bechtel. It was a bit of a shock, but if you stick around music long enough, stories like Byrd's aren't unique, unfortunately.

A couple of more years went by, and in 2003, I ended up interviewing Byrd for an article on Fifth Angel and his solo career for a music publication I was writing for at the time. Now in 2006, with the Internet still really void of any comprehensive information on Fifth Angel, I developed this site. Aside from being a huge fan, I'm also a journalist and a big fan of music history. So not only is this site a personal tribute to Fifth Angel, as the band that began my passion for music, but it also serves to document the group's history for fans who have never forgotten them.