The Music Buddies

Erik: bass guitar TJ: guitar, vocals Derek: drums Taken from their release page: "Nobody can remember the exact origin but we think the band name came from a relative of Erik’s, who said it as a quaint diminutive as he left for practice with a previous band—“Oh, are you off to practice with your music buddies?” The three of us (Erik, TJ, and I) were living in a group house in Kalamazoo, between bands and dutifully enrolled at the local college, when he shared that anecdote. Guffaws were had. When we learned that TJ had a notebook full of lyrics devoted to how various scenesters had done him right and/or very wrong, it seemed a bygone conclusion: we had a name, we had a unified purpose, we had instruments and a basement and post-adolescent malaise and thus, we had a band. The Music Buddies was born. We were around from late fall of 1996 into the spring of 1997. We practiced a handful of times, usually late evening affairs that felt a lot like I’d imagine my dad’s Thursday night bowling league felt. We maybe played two shows—one a vegan potluck, the other at the legendary Comet Cafe. Somehow we were the subject of an intense, one-sided label bidding war that cooled only because we wouldn’t cede to Charles’ demands that we change our name to “Bacne.” We also recorded a demo with Ian, which he kindly helped us to mix in preparation for the either digital or lathe cut version you might be listening to right now."