HOUSE SHOULD BE A RAFT
just before a secret show at rob bruces house out near where we'd all camp mostly in cousin of the gated community, kinder & gentler & in a different county officially- but it made no difference cause rob went to the academy somewhere half an hour drive, but also lots of the kids from my high school lived in this queens lake neighborhood, lots of trees, a marina where they kept boats. i was at home on wythe avenue in williamsburg va + gregg was there, we weren't playing; maybe eating or makin it up but gregg hadn't rocked a rock instrument yet before. leeanna showed up this afternoon bouncin + wondering what was going down in town, heard about rob's + then and there right then this afternoon decided we could would have a band, happenin disease bands were then. leeanna played guitar and everyone knew on account of her now and thens playing a familiar loved song like frank mills so we mounted up + i played drums on moms shiny new floor in the back of my parents house there. tall white walls, hot breathin + echo sheen- rad scene! we made up 4 songs from nowhere places. summertime in the swamp, we loved & no one liked us but we were stealthy. that night heronymus bosch + bizarro played. amazing, flawlessly, & the buttons was begun + we try try tried. debut in that there basement. outside we 3 decided we could be the nicest band ever. all 3 gentle and smily and alwys down for the clean fun. ha. cute as buttons, that was 1997 i think.when a month was over we had practiced more but leeanna was headed off to school not too far away, but dumb away, in richmond virginia. gregg + i remained in the our villeburg and high school + worked. the buttons was left and stuck in virginia to make, make, make. so we did diddid.

at christmas leeanna was home from school, we rocked the trinkle hall new years eve extravaganza, along with friends like bizarro, heronymus bosch, nocarsgo & the spartans, and 37. so much space in that place, we went on that year+, L and i went off to schools, she back to richmond, me massachussetts, gregg had stuff and diplomas to finish in williamsburg. but we rocked from a far, i mixed the four track stuff, and travis will made some cds. when i returned from massachussetts and leeanna was back for the summer we did some other shows- at williamsburg theatre, some at the shed, literary magazine, at the golf course home out in govenor's land. with good friends: 37, husband wife, willy, incommunicado, the cat / the mouse. another summer, a summer later. yard sale show, leeanna's birthday again. and then she took off for europe. the week before leeanna left we made sure to record some of that summer's songs: tiramisu, emelia's snowflake, downtime, and iquest. in the spring gregg and i joined leeanna in amsterdam and traveled around trying to play. we all kept journals. the week or so after we returned in separate trips, back to williamsburg we played a show (to be our last for a long time) at the meridian, the next day gregg split to baltimore for the next year. we joined up once more the 3 in maryland- UMBC & record one song on the equipment there, with keys as percussion + a snare drum, lyrics were about the trips mostly: the house should be a raft, one i have called matt, one i called fredrick, kidnapped at 15. leeanna & i ate a pickled onion from the shop there in ellicott city and sped to kate's graduation. just made it there to deliver a pocket knife gift.

since then leeanna has been in richmond + washington state and western va, gregg & i have bounced around bits cause itchy feet landing me in montreal + he in oberlin but we are both kinda bounce ready still, raring. so i pick out the cd & stick it into the mp3 pressing machine and then i'm sending it to the internet just cause. soon we're going on tour.

-brendan