Las Vegas Weekly

December 13, 2009 · 4:19 PM

Under arrest and on tape: An adventure with Eyes Like Diamonds

By April Corbin

Photo: Fred Morledge

Whatcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do when they come for you?

If you're Eyes Like Diamonds standing outside in the freezing cold at a gas station in Hawthorne, Nevada while a K-9 unit sniffs through your vehicle, the answer to that question is simple: Start filming.

The local screamo band was en route from Las Vegas to Portland in early November to record their upcoming album, Frequencies, when the police pulled over driver and lead singer Diego Perez. Unfortunately for the frontman, an expired driver license and a subsequent search of his car that turned up a pair of brass knuckles led to his arrest for possession of a harmful weapon. Oops.

Luckily for us, a film student has been following Eyes Like Diamonds since March, filming a documentary the band hopes to release in conjunction with its upcoming CD. The videographer broke out his camera to capture the law enforcing in action, as well as some humorous responses from Perez's band mates. The edited video, now available on YouTube, is 2 minutes, 11 seconds of Cops-meets-Jackass embeddable goodness.

In hindsight, Perez says the incident was little more than a headache for him, his "badass lawyer" and his band, which was forced to rent a crappy motel room in Northern Nevada while Perez posted bond and renewed his license. As for his 14 hours inside the Hawthorne clinker, Perez says he saw it as forced rest and relaxation after the five or six hours he'd been driving before getting pulled over.

All of it makes for a great story. According to the video and Perez, the band was informed that the arresting officer recently caught one of the criminals featured on America's Most Wanted. Unimpressed, Perez said, "In a small town like [Hawthorne,] I guess that means something."

Still, Perez can say he has something in common with one of America's formerly most wanted. Talk about street cred.

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