Forged in the flames of Balki Bartokimus and an unsolicited subscription to the "most brutal" metal magazine "on the planet", Shag Bark Hickory in many cases owes its inception to ABC's original "T.G.I.F." lineup and The Wild Rag.
     It all began on a lazy summer afternoon, an afternoon in which three losers I mean guys from Jamestown wanted to see how long it would take to lose their voices. And they wanted to make a demo tape.
     "If Henry Lee Summer can play the Boone County 4-H Fair," exclaimed Bishop Lawrence. "Then we can have a demo tape."
     The instant they finished recording, the three residents of rural Boone County knew they had given birth not simply to a very special little rabbit with large teeth, but to a very special little rabbit which was bount to procreate.
     "That analogy doesn't work at all," says Caesar Salad. "A.J. Foyt is a fat slob. His favorite phrase is 'BASHUDA'."
     "My favorite song is 'AW YEAH'," said Circus Boy after listening to tape #1. "Do I want to do another tape? AW YEAH I do."
     And so the beat went along, as Cher might have said in 1973 when she was 57 years young, and song ideas began to blossom into flowers that were tapes and the three musical elves would daily water the "flowers" (wink wink), thereby encouraging them to produce pollen, by which I mean music. SBH thus planted and tended its garden, its garden of art, some might say, yes, an Art Garden, fertilized with Jamestown.
     It certainly didn't take long for Cap'n Munchies to gaze upon this garden from afar. Having returned from a regular stint in the amazon (poaching elephants for ivory), Munchies resigned from his chief of mutilation position in order to go "full-time" with the "band".
     "At first I had to spend a lot of time hosing down the monkeys, you know," says Munchies. "We spent a lot of time watching and laughing at Sanford and Son. And I was the team batboy for a while. Eventually they worked me in as a DH, if you konw what I mean, and I think you do. The fact that I was born on the day the music died was a big plus for me, you know, on the resume."
     With Munchies on for the long haul, the steam locomotive which was SBH began churning, chugging, charging along the Colorado woodlands, producing jet black exhaust which would bring forth such, uh, NEAT songs as "Pagan Bells" and "Peanut Butter Cereal."
     "My favorite movie is Rambo," says Circus Boy. "Sometimes I try to look like him. In fifth grade I had this shirt with a bull dressed up as Rambo and printed under the bull was the word: 'Rambull'."
     "Yar," said the sea Captain from The Simpsons. "I don't know what I'm doin'."
     CONVERSELY, somewhere along the great shining path of the great monster trucks, the magic of SBH thereby began to quiver. Scathing commentaries began to fill a few internet guestbook entries over at least two or three Western Boone High School-related websites:
     "My name is Tyler. I'm 14, I live in Sarasota, I listen to a lot of Pulp, and I've been reading Waiting for Gidot. Shag Bark Hickory...if this is a joke, I don't get it. How quaint. You know, guys, do us all a favor and go back to your jobs at Wal-Mart."
     "My name is Bobby Shelton. I playwith Go-Bots. Shag Bark Hickory? More like ShagBARF HIS-TOR-Y!"
     Bishop Lawrence recalls the hard times: "We found ourselves in the basement of a church--we wanted to record something good, but we just kept writing on chalkboards and speaking broken french to one another. I am not making that up. It is the actual truth. And could you please stop speaking in King James English? I mean, you're from Georgia or something, right?"
     "I think college and X103 had begun to take their toll," recalls Caesar Salad. "And the fact that we had beaten Munchies to death four times."
     The turning point came one morning when Circus Boy and Cap'n Munchies were submerged in their daily routine: 10am, all you can eat breakfast buffet at the Lebanon, IN Holiday Inn.
     "After I had eaten fourteen apple fritters, we got to thinking about all the songs we wished we would've done," says Circus Boy. "You know, songs like 'What About Guy Ritter?' and 'I Could REALLY Go For Some Fancy Feast Cat Food Right Now', and you know, we just couldn't let it go that easily. I mean, we had that brilliant Puking Horse concept album from our Rockumentary--or maybe thatwas just one song, I can't remember...But, dude, we never tried it, man!"
     "I was all, 'Yeah, man, we can't stop now'," adds Munchies. "If we stop now, we'd just be smooshing our dreams like a pancake*."
     (*bold phrase later added by Foyt for dramatic effect)
     And so, like the PUSHIN' BROOM cited by Metal Blade Records great Gary Lenaire, SBH "pushed" on, indeed like a broom being pushed. Through dirt. Pointing to bands such as No Sugar for the Dog and Arbitrage, the band held up posterboard signs reading "So long as Jimmy P. Brown II and Hot Lips Hoolihan are getting contracts, we have to keep doing this." That was about the time I bitch-slapped Arie Luyendyk.
     "Eventually," says Caesar Salad. "We got back on track with I think it was called The Abusement Park (Only the Strong Survive). It was inspired by Jeff Gordon shaving off his thin, ratty mustache. Really, it was. It didn't take much to 'inspire' us. Hey, Circus Boy went to high school with Jeff Gordon, and all I got was this worthless 'state championship' medal from the Tri-West High School Academic Decathlon team."
     "Yeah, from then on we turned out some pretty edgy material," adds Bishop Lawrence. "Lots of stuff abotu Red China and politics, you know. Real issues. We had to cut a few songs like 'Willie Nelson is a Fucking Hilljack' and 'For All I Care, Neil Young Can Blow Farm Aid Out His Ass' just to keep it marketable to the rich college student fan base, but it was a pretty inspiring return. Stanley Spudowski had a lot to do with it too, I think. Steve Austin and Stanley Spudowski."
     Munchies continues: "Finally all of our HARD WORK and long hours on tour and in the studio paid off in the final burst of, say, art, we put out--the Reload series, that thing in Adam's garage, and, of course, our final tape. Absolute genius. If I'm not mistaken, I was shirtless for the duration of our last recording session. We were so happy we threw this party and Spuds McKenzie was there and, uh...2 LIVE CREW played."