Rat Skates

Rat Skates Documentary Overkill Film

Rat Skates (born Lee Kundrat, on May 17, 1961 in Summit, New Jersey) is a filmmaker, writer and musician. He is most widely known as a director of music documentaries and his contributions to the thrash metal genre as the founding drummer of Overkill.

Overkill’s early success has been attributed to Skates’ songwriting presence and creative efforts. He was voted one of the top-ten drummers of 1987 by the Japanese publication Burrn!, and his drumming on the songs “There’s No Tomorrow” and “Feel the Fire” were the first recorded songs in the thrash metal genre to encompass non-continuous 16th note double bass drum patterns. The Overkill logo was drawn and colored lime green by Skates in 1981, and is recognized as one of the most famous heavy metal logos. He noted that when he removed the cross emblem from between the words in his original logo design, he never connected the two words “Over” and “Kill” together, and that is it was never resolved as being a one-word or two-word name, suggesting that Lemmy from Motörhead would know the answer. Skates declined offers to join Megadeth, M.O.D. and Mind Funk; he never attempted to return to Overkill and stated that his only regret was “being naïve to trust”.

Skates freelanced for the Suburban Cablevision television network as an audio engineer, live mixer and cameraman from 1988 to 1992; departing due to creative conflicts. In 1999, he studied digital audio production and non-linear editing from Trish and Chris Meyer, Jay Rose, and Adam Wilt, and designed and wrote advertising media for television, radio, print publications, performing arts societies, Fortune 500 companies, record labels and recording artists. As an independent filmmaker, he co-produced, edited and animated designs for the documentary Get Thrashed (2008, Lightyear/Warner Bros. Entertainment) and Born in the Basement (2007, MVD Entertainment Group), receiving twenty-one screenings in eight countries, winning six awards and pay-per-view broadcasting.

Skates conceptualized Rock-Un-Rold, a musician’s television talk show with colleague David Ellefson (bassist, Megadeth), and filmed a demo shoot at The Studio in New York City on October 28, 2007. They moderated two discussion panels of six recording artists and pitched an edited version to a Viacom representative who declined the concept due to the content being “too intelligent”. In response, Skates began filming interviews in 2009 for the documentary film Welcome to the Dream- The Rude Awakening of Rock Stardom for release by the MVD Entertainment Group in 2012. The films preview teaser excerpts interviews from Grammy-award winning guitarist Vernon Reid (Living Colour), Mike Portnoy (Dream Theater), Anvil, Jay Jay French (Twisted Sister), Karl Wilcox (Diamond Head), Dr. Patricia Basczcuk (Psychologist) and Robert J. Pisarek, Esq. (Attorney), and an excerpt from his commissioned work for Lynyrd Skynyrd. It is sponsored by the International Documentary Association.

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Episode 24 Rat Skates

Rat Skates Documentary Overkill Film

This week it is my pleasure to welcome Rat Skates to the program and to continue our conversation with Alan Myers on FED ED. Rat is a conservative, Christian, filmmaker, writer and musician. He is most widely known as a director of music documentaries and his contributions to the thrash metal genre as the founding drummer of the band Overkill.

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Episode 9 Michael DeLeon

Michael-DeLeon

We are happy to have Michael DeLeon on this episode. Michael is an award-winning filmmaker and has directed and produced four documentaries on addiction, focusing on the opiate and heroin epidemic in America, marijuana legalization and Addiction Recovery. His memoir, “Chasing Detours” will be released in 2019. There are numerous other film and book projects underway.

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Michael DeLeon

Michael-DeLeon

Michael R. DeLeon, a successfully acclimated ex-offender who after nearly 8 years of drug addiction and gang involvement, spent 12 years in state prison and half-way houses for a gang-related homicide. Since Michael’s release from prison, he has earned 3 Associates Degrees, a Baccalaureate Degree in Business Management, with a minor in Criminal Justice and a CADC Educational Certificate. Michael is now in the process of obtaining his Masters Degree in Addictions Counseling at Liberty University as well as pursuing his LCADC.

He is the founder of Steered Straight, Inc. A non-profit organization formed in 2000 designed with the intention of carrying a prevention message to youth and young adults regarding the extreme dangers of drugs, gang-involvement and criminal activity. Michael spends his time developing Steered Straight by stressing the importance of young men and women making sound, rational decisions in their day to day lives. Michael also founded the Project Pride Program while incarcerated in prison. After pitching the idea for this program to then Commissioner Jack Terhune, he worked to develop the message that consequences can be severe and life-lasting. Project Pride which is still in existence at the New Jersey Department of Corrections, is the largest prison outreach program in America.

Michael has spoken to over seven million students and young adults as a motivational speaker in many facilities delivering evidence-based student programs around the country. He has presented in centers and schools in 48 states thus far.

Michael speaks and presents to youth, parents, educators, law enforcement, medical professionals and community groups throughout the country. He presents to in excess of 1.5 million people each year. He created two additional educational arms of Steered Straight: Recovery Army and Faithing Addiction, both of which target specific audiences throughout America to educate and prevent addiction and build and support Recovery.

In addition to being a speaker and presenter, Michael is an award-winning filmmaker and has directed and produced four documentaries on addiction, focusing on the opiate and heroin epidemic in America, marijuana legalization and Addiction Recovery. His memoir, “Chasing Detours” will be released in 2019. There are numerous other film and book projects underway.

Along with all of his other works, Michael is a Television Talk-show host, in his fifth season on “Road to Recovery”. Airing in the Philadelphia market, Michael hosts the second most-watched show on the SNJTV network and discusses addiction and recovery-related topics with weekly guests.

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