Fletcher (1993 - 1996)

I've attached some Fletcher songs. I'll do it in two batches. It's only four. I should figure out yousendit or zip files but I haven't yet. Anyway, this is our 7-inch. The songs are

1) Teenage Keg Party

2) Sheep

3) You're a Tramp and I Own Half This Fucking Town

4) White Trash Quiz Bowl Champion

It came out in the summer of 1995. We recorded it at night on the stage of the Dalton Center on the WMU campus. Todd Carter worked the knobs.

Fletcher got together in the fall of 1993 but it took us a while to get our act together. Maybe we never did. At first we were

Bryan Charles--guitar, vocals

Paul Bayer--bass

Dan Storchan--drums

Our first show was at Dagobah Square, sometime early in 1994. It was an all-ages benefit. Wick was big on those. We played with twitch, the Sinatras and one other band. The Deconstruction, maybe? We were the first band to take the stage at Dagobah. Shellac was the last. For a long time we were terrible but I think we got better. I still kind of like the 7-inch songs.

Dan quit the band in 1996 and Paul and I took a hiatus. That summer we got together again and wrote a whole set of all-new songs. The songs were a lot better than what we'd ever written before. Around that time the Deconstruction broke up and Paul and I and Sean Barney, the Deconstruction guitarist, would play. We showed Sean all the songs and we learned some of his. Paul Wartella had always been after me to play music with him. He was playing in Quixote at the time but swore up and down he could handle the action so he became part of Fletcher. Wartella was a powerhouse, way better than Dan. He was maybe a little too tricked-out and aggressive for us--Paul Bayer and I always had more of a pop sensibility--but he gave us a louder sound and it was good. Barney wasn't into it, though, and he dropped out after a while so we were a power trio again. We played all the songs and got better and better. We played some great shows at 31G, including one with the Promise Ring where I think we held our own. Joan of Arc opened for us. We were all excited but of course Wartella was spread too thin and I don't think the Quixote guys were into sharing and Paul B. and I wanted some real commitments and a tour and so forth. Wartella kept flaking but never saying he wanted to quit and some other shit happened and it got sort of strange and finally there was some kind of big two-band meeting with everyone in Fletcher and Quixote except me and it was somehow worked out that Wartella would play only with Quixote. Our last show was at Club Soda with Dead River Drag. It was their first show. This was December 7, 1996. I remember driving around that day and one of the big modern rock radio stations in town ran a stadium-rock-style spot for the show. TONIGHT! AT CLUB SODA! DEAD RIVER DRAG! WITH SPECIAL GUEST! FLETCHERRRR! It was like they were announcing some monster truck thing. But our name was out in lights on the marquee. I took a Polaroid. I'm looking at it right now.

Bryan Charles--guitar, vocals

Paul Bayer--bass

Dan Storchan--drums

• Um, read above

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LT EXCLUSIVE - FLETCHER

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