After 12 years, Long Island metalheads Scatterbrain will be reuniting, along with Ludichrist, the hardcore/thrash band they formed for a Feb. 23 show at B.B. King's Blues Club in Manhattan.

Though the band, comprised of former Hicksville High School students, has entertained the idea for years, the logistics of a reunion didn't work out until a few months ago, when it all fell into place. "I've been trying to get it to happen for the past five years and Tommy [Christ, founder of Scatterbrain and Ludichrist] never seemed interested," said bassist Guy Brogna. "Then a few months ago, I got a call from him and he said, 'I've been thinking about the band a lot. Maybe we should do something.' Within three weeks from the time we spoke, we booked the gig."

The Feb. 23 date is the only definite show so far, but the band is kicking around the idea of adding more dates in other cities and even in other countries. "We're going to look to do some shows, a couple of weekends here and there, to see where it takes us," said guitarist Paul Nieder. "Maybe some festivals in Europe. Who knows where it could lead? When we were playing, we were pretty popular in Australia. That's a place I'd love to go to again, but we'll see what happens."

The group even toyed with the notion of writing an original song or two for the February show, but decided to make that a future goal, as they found themselves overwhelmed by having to relearn all of their old material.

"We're doing [Scatterbrain and Ludichrist] in one night," Nieder said. "That's 50 or 60 songs to go back and relearn and work them out... It's a lot of material to do, but we had enough time by ourselves to relearn the stuff, then had some rehearsals... It kind of just started to fall together. Some of the songs, of course, more difficult ones, need a little work, but they're coming together pretty well and we're really happy with it."

According to Nieder, the group has already been contacted by several labels interested in having the band put out new material, as well as tapes of unreleased material from years ago.

Ludichrist first got together in 1984, with guitarist Tommy Christ bringing the band together to release epic hardcore and thrash metal records Immaculate Deception and Powertrip. By 1989, the group had gone through so many line-up changes that Christ was the only member left from the original demo recording Ludichrist put together in 1985. Guitarist Glenn Cummings joined the band in 1986, while Nieder joined the group to tour with them after the release of Powertrip in 1988. Brogna, and drummer Mike Boyko, friends of Nieder's from Hicksville High School, came in to tour with the band in 1988.

This is when the group evolved into Scatterbrain. "When [Brogna and Boyko] joined the band, their musical taste was a lot different, not as thrashy and hardcore," Nieder said. "So when we started writing, the music was different and we couldn't justify keeping the name Ludichrist because the music had changed quite a bit."

With a new name, the group achieved even more success, its music influenced by everything from classical to country and jazz, while retaining its heavy metal core. Its hit, the humorous Don't Call Me Dude, was in regular rotation on MTV's Headbanger's Ball, but brought Scatterbrain even more acclaim overseas as a top-ten single in Australia.

Nieder said the new songs like Don't Call Me Dude took the band to a new level, but also alienated some of Ludichrist's original, truly hardcore fans. "Some of the really hardcore fans were like, 'You guys sold out,'" he said. "But we didn't sell out; it was just something that truly evolved... A lot of the stuff we did was a wide variety of styles. We did lose some of the contact with the hardcore community, but we gained in other respects with the crossover."

"There are bands like the Rolling Stones that made a career of 40 years doing the same thing," Brogna said. "For us, it was just a progression. No one sat down and said, 'Let's do a song like Don't Call Me Dude.' It's just the way it worked out. I don't think you can plan something like that."

The group started out on the small, Queens-based label Relativity. But because of the success of its first album, Here Comes Trouble, the band felt a move to a major label would be the best thing for them. So they signed with Elektra Records. "Things were going so quickly and Elektra was flashing a lot of money," Brogna said. "Metallica and Motley Crüe were on the label and we figured it would be really good to be on that label to take us to the next level."

The band was soon disappointed by the move. "That kind of was a bad move for us," Nieder said. "We were a small fish in a big pond. We kind of got lost on that label. The people who signed us got fired after we were brought in, so we were stuck in the middle of nowhere. It was difficult for us to take that further step."

The group soon learned that being on a smaller label might sometimes be the best thing for a band, as there will be more people working for a band. Brogna said that Elektra did nothing for them and they often would show up for gigs to find that the label had done nothing to advertise their shows. "We did radio shows, TV shows and interviews with the smaller label," he said. "Elektra did absolutely zero for us."

Scatterbrain got out of its contract with Elektra and attempted to move back to a smaller label, minus Cummings, releasing Mundis Intellectualis on Pavement Music in 1994. But the band as a whole had enough at that point and decided it would be best to break up. "Everybody was feeling the same thing," Nieder said. "We had our day. We did well, traveled the world, had a great time. So we said, 'Let's not push it.' You see so many bands that just keep going and going. It's like, give up already."

The guys kept in touch over the years. Some took on normal jobs; some stayed involved with the music industry, working behind the scenes as producers. Brogna eventually opened All Music, a music store in Plainview. But they all kept in touch over the years and finally, now is the time for the reunion the group's fans have been waiting for. "Look for us coming back, playing around the area quite a bit," Nieder said. "We look forward to getting back in touch with all the people we hung out with. We used to have some really great times. We're looking forward to coming back and doing it again."