JAMES O'CONNELL vocals, keyboard & synthesizers

James was born in November of 1962, spitting distance from Disneyland, in Santa Ana’s ill winds. His earliest memories are of Cinderella’s Castle and an irrigation ditch filled with venomous spiders. The first song he remembers tuning into was When You Wish Upon A Star. Or was it the S&M romp These Boots Are Made For Walking by Nancy Sinatra?

Eventually, his mother took him back to the right coast, where his parents were originally from. After his mom remarried, they settled in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Since both his father and new stepfather were Soul music aficionados, James grew up listening mostly to Motown, Atlantic and Stax records. He remembers his father showing off Jackie Wilson’s stage moves in the kitchen, remembers seeing Sly and the Family Stone at The Cape Cod Coliseum. Still, once he got hooked on AM radio and K-Tel records, a lifelong obsession with the three minute pop song began. It even stayed with him through his detour into 70s punk and 80s “college radio”, its sugar magic melodies running through his head and heart as he brooded uncomfortably among those who wore black and read Rimbaud.

Besides a few sad clarinet lessons in 4th grade, the only music James made in his school years was on the drums—actually, one snare, an overturned garbage pail and a wire book rack. From his spot-on version of the drum solo from Wipe Out!, played on the dashboard of his uncle’s car, he figured the drum would be his instrument. But the drumming was more or less confined to his basement. There was then a brief fling with the 75-dollar Casio keyboard. But the singing didn’t happen until later.

Primarily interested in pursuing film and writing, James attended Emerson College in Boston. It was there that he met Hugh Simmons, his musical soul-mate. From their free-form atonal dormitory jams to 2 minute ditties recorded on boom-boxes, the two began building their 26 year repertoire. more >>