History

Bigger than a Breadbox was formed in the summer of 2000, when the-organist-formerly-known-as-John-Freund (a busy musician on the NYC scene) got fed up with performing everyone else's material and decided to finally get his own compositions heard. (Composition sounds so elitist, there really just songs - good ones mind you).

So he recruited Bean on Drums (Well, really he just asked him to do it, recruiting is what the army does), with whom he was playing in a band called TheHealers!, NYC's finest blues band. John then got Jay Gogan on Guitar, Jay and John had played together with a two other "instru-mental cases" in the band Xmembers. (That group has unfortunately disbanded, so now they are the ex-members of the Xmembers.)

With these two in place John decided not to add a Bass Player and instead to take up the time- honored tradition of playing Bass pedals on The Hammond Organ. (For those of you unfamiliar with this tradition it means that while John is playing the organ with both hands, his feet are playing the bass lines. He manages to do this and sing at the same time while trying to look cool. He usually fails on the cool part but everything else is right-on). This gives the group a different sound and groove. (It also cuts down on arguments since there are only three people involved. Hmmmm. Bigger than a Breadbox doesn’t have a bass player, and Xmembers didn’t have a singer….not too exclusionary, are we?)

The band started rehearsing diligently for several months (okay so it was actually kind of half-assed but they got the job done) before making their debut at the legendary  BitterEnd in NYC. Since then, we have recorded a 2 song demo. and have set about recording our first full CD worth of material. (We realize this is what everyone says - so we can't lie: We aren't actually recording at this time but we might some time real soon).

Soon there after Bean unfortunately left the band { boo hiss } and has been replaced by Andy Sannesi, Andy is a great guy and a great drummer and we feel his  sound fits very well with us.

The sound of the band has been likened to such artist as Medeski, Martin and Wood, Soul Coughing, Ben Folds Five, Frank Zappa, and numerous other adventurous artists. (Actually, we don't REALLY sound like any of these bands, although we feel that if you like them you’ll like us and if you think they suck then we don’t sound anything like them so check us out anyway.) If you like music that is a little off beat and quirky but at the same time something you can sink your teeth into (that’s not meant to be a pun, just a cliché) then this is the band for you. (If not, then you are really wasting your time on this site. Maybe you should check out rickymartin.com and see what he's up to.)

Just listen to what the Critics have said about Bigger Than A Breadbox:

"Great Songs with Instrumental Hijinks" - Noel Rockwood (superstar)

"They’re not as loud as I thought they’d be" - Mrs. Freund (John’s Mom)

"You guys f***ing rock" - Bill (A drunk at our last gig)

Just listen to what real people have said about Bigger Than A Breadbox:

From the web:

"Definitely the best music I've ever heard come offa mp3.com"

– B3Nutsy Collins (Hammond Organist and silly-dog owner)

                               "I WANT TO HEAR THE ALBUM!"

– Mark Traynor     (famous Scottish organ tech) (ed. note: Uh-oh.)

"Dude! I loved…Dude in a Mercedes  (Like) Dan Bonow's funky Fleetwood Song… ‘Oh I like to ride in the Fleetwood, because it feels good, to me. But if you really want to know, I drive a Peugot, 403! Woooooo, woo-woo-whooooo, oh yeah.’"

– ScotttheOrganFreak  (organ freak)

From the gigs:

"These guys are my favorite new band!" - Seth Cooper (well known producer)

"You guys f***ing rock" - Dave (A drunk at our first gig)

But don't let the critics run your life for you, come on down and see for yourself what all the fuss is about. You can find out where we are playing by clicking on the word Gigs and we hope to see you real soon.