My first childhood memory of music was hearing U2 humming from the speakers outside my room at 110 N. State St. Delphos, OH. That would be the beginning of my interest in it, and later in this story, I’m sure you’ll all have a laugh.

Rock’n’Roll was what I was brought up on, my dad loved The Stones, so how couldn’t I? Music was always around, whether it be the radio, vinyls or this whole new concept called ‘CD.’ I have so much respect for my parents because of this influence, because it formed who I am musically, that is a fact.

When you’re from the middle of nowhere in America, you can be trapped by the social isolation to certain types of music. Thankfully, I was born to a family where my grandfather was a lawyer, and a jazz drummer on the side. This has always stuck with me as a point of pride, and a reason that I took up an instrument myself.

People grow up fast on music in the states, and as I grew into my teenage years the prevailing winds turned to rap music. I have a bit of nostalgia for some of it, but there was a lot of garbage. Unfortunately for me, I couldn’t avoid it among my peers. I grew to like some of it, in a bite-my-tongue kind of way.

Fast forward to high school, we were all downloading free music on Napster, Kazaa, imesh, and the like. Teenagers dying for music, and also dying for a connection to anything other than their current existence. I had joined Sony BMG music club and I remember ordering every Oasis album I could after hearing, ‘Wonderwall.’

I can remember the exact moment that I heard my favorite song of all time. I put the first Oasis record ‘Definitely Maybe’ on my 3CD Stereo and pushed play. I liked what I heard, but after enjoying the beginning of the record,  I turned from my computer and squinted to see which track it was on that disc, It was number 3.

So I got up and checked the song, ‘Live Forever’ it was. In so many ways, this was the beginning of the rest of my musical life. This was at a point when I had never seen a band live, I was so into sports and I was okay with that at the time.

My first concert was ‘The Foozer Tour’, with Foo Fighters and Weezer. I had the opportunity to see them in Cleveland with Kaiser Chiefs, who are very good.  For the money, I can’t really compare it to other shows I’ve been to. It was amazing, road trip and all.

Then we all went to College…

We started drinking and then there were games and then we woke up and then there were games.

Well, for me, that was Guitar Hero.

In college I was up to party whenever, but one weekend we made a road trip to Bowling Green to see some friends. To tell you the truth, this 2 bedroom apartment is the ground zero of me learning to play guitar.

A friend of mine and I stayed up way past midnight playing a game that had just come out called, ‘Guitar Hero’

The next week I went and bought the game, unwittingly annoying the shit outta my roommates at the time.

At the end of that semester, I got a message from my best friend, asking what dorms were the best at Toledo. His name was Andrew Katbi.

At this point, I put in transfer papers on the first day it was available, and lucked out. Now my best friend would be my roommate.

It was amazing, he was extremely frustrated that I dominated him in guitar hero at first, but with our competitive nature and history, how could you expect any less?

By the middle of the Semester, we were both on expert guitar hero, and I was bored. I ordered a squire telecaster to learn the real thing. It took forever, but yes, I did learn it, and at this point, we need to fast forward a bit.

In our Senior year of College, we find a singer, and possibly the best one ever. Let’s call him Mark. After we found Mark, we knew we had a singer. The only problem was he was a pre-med student and had limited practice time. Putting the rest of us into a subservient role.

By ‘the rest of us’, I mean, Andrew, Kurt, Geoff, and myself. After a year of disorganized ‘jamming’, we started to get serious. Every free weekend I had, I would make the journey down I-75 from Toledo to Ada. I was the only one traveling, so I would bring only the essentials, Natural Light, Bread, Mayo, and Ham. Mark would eventually coin the term, ‘Miracle Whip Rock Fuel.’

The five of us would go on to practice for hours Friday night, Saturday night, and whatever hours that Mark could provide. This setup often ended up with us ‘practicing’ after the bar. I have to say, some of those sessions were pretty good, despite the lack of an audience, and the unfortunate appearance of the police.

The goal was always to have our show, ‘polished.’

By the time we got a gig at Little Mexico in Ada, OH for the first time, we were polished.