The year was 1978, Fabricio Ravelli was born in the city of Sao Paulo-Brazil. Raised by his mother, aunt and grandmother, Fabricio started the passion for drums at the age of 10, after watching, at his granmother's house, a video clip from the american band Kiss "everything in Kiss was so perfect and when I saw Eric Carr playing I said "This is it, that's what I wanna be".



Starting to go to drum classes, after a few months, Fabricio Ravelli found out that his style was more about the unleashing of all his feelings on the drums, and that, he never would learn is any school. "My teacher, Percio de Sappia was/is an amazing drummer till nowadays, he was a Kiss, Deep Purple, Rush fan so we were talking at the same level and he always told me about that 60% feeling 10% techinique and 30% sweat type of thing", the year was 1991.



In 1992 Fabricio Ravelli's album collection was already quite different that the one he started with. Kiss was mandatory, but you could find his future drumming influences just by looking to his albums: Metallica (Master Of Puppets), Testament (The New Order), Anthrax (Among The Living), Napalm Death (From Slavement to Obliteration), Morbid Angel (Altars of Madness), Sepultura (Beneath The Reamains), Slayer (Reign In Blood), RDP, Discharge, Black Sabbath, and Deep Purple among others.



Still in 1992 Fabricio Ravelli formed his first band, they were playing covers and one original song, titled "Burn In Hell". That's when he played his first live concert in a small city near Sao Paulo. There were about 50 people and the band played covers of Nuclear Assault, Slayer, Testament, Metallica, Diamond Head, Misfits and the original one "Burn In Hell".



"It was fun, we played for about 50 minutes and after we got out from the stage, was the first time that someone said "hey man, good drumming dude" I was stoked my first complement, I went backstage just to tell the guys that someone had just made me a complement". After this show, many other shows would come in Fabricio's life and his determination to find bands and musicians who would really be up to do what it takes to make it.



In 1996 Fabricio Ravelli was already involved in the music industry in Brazil, and on a trip to Argentina he was playing with a few friends in a Theater and when he left the stage, a lot of people kept telling him about this one big band that was audittioning drummers, the band called A.N.I.M.A.L., Fabricio gotta hold of the manager to scheduled an audition that's when, on the same day that Fabricio was coming back to Brazil, he went to the band's studio to audition, 5 minutes of a drum solo, that's what it took to the manager to start to clap his hands to the drummer "I was stoked, we left the studio to eat something and I felt awsome, the singer was already asking me if I was able to commit myself with the band's schedule, it was great, I was going to the airport and the manager was already saying "I'm gonna take care of your papers with Warner (their previous record label) and you pack your stuff to come back ok?"



I was stoked man". But then the tragedy, Brazil and Argentina was going through some really difficult political times and the manager didn't make it. "He called me up almost crying, he talked to my mom and then with me, saying that the political situation in between both countries didn't allow me living there in that situation, it was hard man."



More shows, more interviews, more recordings, more experiences, Fabricio Ravelli also recorded a song for the brazilian movie "Solucos e Solucoes" between 1996 and 2000. The video clip was shown on the credits of the movie at the movie theater. But it was in 2002 that Ravelliá mind started to change about the music business.



Ravelli was proudly playing with the Brazilian band called Harppia, Harppia was the first band in Brazil who started playing heavy metal singing in portuguese in 1984. With Fabricio on the drums the band and himself shared the bill and jammed with bands and musicians such as: Grave Digger, UDO (ex Accept), Andreas Kisser (Sepultura), among others.



In 2004, Fabricio Ravelli was elected the sixth best brazilian drummer, on a election made through one of the largest brazilian magazines called Roadie Crew, people from all over the country picked their favorite musician and sent their vote to the magazine. Right after that the decision had to be made, Fabricio Ravelli was happy with all that was going on, but he knew that was hard to go any further and he always wanted music to be his life, his living, that's when he dicided to take a step further in his career and life.



"That was, I believe, the most important and difficult time that I've ever went through in my life, I was about to leave my family, friends and fans to go to a place that I've never been before, try to make contacts having problems with the language, but I had to do it, that was my life that I was talking about".



October 2004, Fabricio Ravelli, a few days after finishing a very successfull show with Harppia celebrating their 20th anniversary, Fabricio went to the airport heading to America and a completely new life. Getting in America, Fabricio stayed in a hotel for a few days and moving in with some new friend's apartment that he met in Hollywood.



Finding a job right away, Fabricio Ravelli was having two lifes, one as a vallet parker and the other, the contact maker. Rainbow, The whiskey, Roxy, Key Club, Fabricio Ravelli was going everywhere looking for musicians. The new chapter of his life started with tribute bands, his first audition was for a Queensryche tribute "I was dying at the studio, I had a side job doing moving and I never did it in my life, I was playing with them feeling my back totally sore, but I got the gig".



Other tribute bands came such as: Pantera, Scorpions, Sepultura, Slayer but Fabricio was looking for original projects, that's when the opportunitty to play with Neil Turbin (ex-Anthrax) popped up. "It was great, a friend of mine, Dario, introduced me to Neil and me and him (Neil) went to see Megadeth and talked at the first practice I was playing Metal Thrashing Mad and thinking, wooww, right on but things didn't work out very long."



Fabricio Ravelli had a problem that he didn't realize that he had, his legal situation in the country. "Neil called me up telling me about the Sweden Rock Fest, I think(?), and I was all excited to do it than he asked me about my visa, that's when everything went down the gutter again".



Right now Fabricio Ravelli had one more mission, become a citizen in the country, lot of things happen this time "I was working like a dog as a vallet parker, hearing things that I've never heard in my entire life like: "you're a loser kid or why don't you go back to your country, you don't make any difference here" those things start to mess up your head man, when you hear that every freakin' day, no matter how strong you are, the worse part is, when you start to believe it".



After all that, Ravelli's paperwork got straightened out, being free to go anywhere, anytime, being able to travel inside and overseas Fabricio started to record his drumming package and sent it for the bands and that's what he did. "I sent my drumming package for a few bands but I knew they already had a drummer but I didn't stop trying, 'cause the worse that I could hear was no". In the meantime Fabricio got to jam with one of his favorite bands Prong. "It was great, they already had a drummer but we jammed anyways and played songs like, Another Worldly Device, Snap Your Fingers, was a trip". Fabricio gotta hold of the singer of the band Hirax who asked him if he wanted to audition for the band.



"I went over to his house and he gave me a few cds and I was listening to the tunes over and over again to learn the songs, I went down to the studio, we played for one hour and than on the next day they told me that within a month we would be flying over to New York for our first gig". Already touring around the whole United States and overseas and sharing the bill with bands such as: Helstar, Tankard, Seven Witches, Raven among others Fabricio has been working a lot and there's more to come.



Fabricio Ravelli will be, along with Hirax, recording 2 new songs for the two first tracks on a compilation cd that will be released by Heavy Metal Artillery Records until the end of the year.



This story doesn't end here once this is just the beggining.