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“It’s like a half used, broken, roller car with a hopeless,
hopeless end. When falling off my track the only option is to get back on. I
slide farther from personal achievement only to realize how far we have come.
Bro Sure is Dead.” – Marc
Bro Sure started from Coy (bass) reuniting with guitar
player Andrew Cowden (original BS guitar player). They each traveled from
Virginia, just out side of the town Dave Matthews Band is from. Marc (current
guitarist, previous drummer) answered a very small ad the two placed in the
music newspaper, Public News. “Groove oriented bass player and funk guitar
player looking for drummer, call Coy”. It was the only ad he replied to, and
the only ad they placed.
For the first rehearsal they blew Marc off. After
convincing them to audition him, finally the slot was secured and the three
became Bro Sure. At this point, Martin (Marc’s brother and band percussionist)
joined the line up. The name was totally a joke. Andy always said “are you
down, sure bro” Unfortunately the name stuck. Then the ad went out for a
singer.
PHYVE showed up at Marc’s apartment (this is where they
rehearsed for about a year, surprisingly never getting evicted) where he lived
with about 5 people in a two bedroom. Just out of school and working about 6
hours a week, it was pretty much a huge party place. On PHYVE’s first audition
he did not even talk, let alone sing.
The band started playing like crazy with, then unknown,
Moses Guest, Zwee, Global Village and a ton of other bands. There was
definitely promise, but when you are putting your heart on the line for a room
full of people who could not care less, it will begin to wear on you.
Talks began about a full length record. We had recorded an
EP, entitled “Well Sir…”, a few months prior to this and had no trouble selling
it at shows. The problem is when you are in a band you progress faster than you
could ever record and produce an album. That is why taping and bootlegs are
really the best way to “get to know” a band. If you can watch them grow you
learn to love the bad nights as well as the good.
The next step is to raise the money for this record. So we
played and played and played. We were at the point where people called us for
gigs. No need to book, just wait for the phone. This in itself is an
accomplishment for any band. In such a large city with hundreds of bands
willing to play for free we had the paying clubs calling us.
Seemed to most of us things were really moving forward.
The studio time was booked. We had our first of many “investors” (all of which
inevitably fell through) putting up the cash. The partnership was starting to
bloom. But, at this point we could tell that Andy was unhappy and felt the ball
would never really roll. Exit Andrew Cowden - half way through the recording
process; just when things were really moving forward too.
Moses Guest asked them to play the CD release party for
American Trailer House Blues, Zwee asks them to open for a NYE party and they
are asked to play in Florida on the same stage that Ziggy Marley played on the
night before. They were all unstoppable performances.
Then our search began for a new member. The record will
sit on the back burner and we will move Marc to guitar and search for a new
drummer. We felt it was the easiest transition. To find a guitar player that
would happily learn the parts the way Andy wrote them, would be much more
difficult than to replace a rhythm instrument. Or so we thought.
We placed dozens of ads for funk drummers. Every time we
got a reply it was the same thing. “I know funk, I am so funky I stink, you
NEED to try me out. I am the one!!”
Then he would show up and if it was not a drum solo the
entire audition, he played like we were Metallica - not that there is anything
wrong with that (THINK SEINFELD).
This happened about twenty times in one year. We even got
pretty far with a couple of really good drummers. They would learn just enough
of the material, but then would not show up at the gig. Pretty embarrassing,
although I do understand. We had taken a year off and were back to the “no
pay” gigs. It’s all an investment.
Finally we received an email from a young drummer from
Louisiana. Daniel Beatty tried out on two separate occasions. We loved his
playing but he was about to go into the National Guard. This would set us back
too far. So we tried looking a bit more to no avail. We saw that Daniel really
wanted to be a part of this project and decided to go with the gamble of time.
We knew he was worth the wait, it was just killing us that we had to finish this
record and wait to play it.
So the band went back into the studio while he was gone.
Marc fronted the money for the record and rerecorded all of the guitar tracks
replacing Andy’s. There are a few of Andy’s on there still but it’s mostly
Marc. We had decided on the name of the record to be “Urban Ocean”. Inspired by
the endless sea of freeways in Houston.
Enter Little Brother Project
Daniel leaves for the Guard and we have eight months before
Bro Sure can play again. Coy and Marc decided to do a side project to stay
busy. We wanted it to relate to Bro Sure but not be Bro Sure. Hence the Little
“BRO”ther Project, aren’t we tricky. We found a club that would allow us to get
paid to practice improvisation, which was our goal. We lucked out from some
very good connections and secured a home at Deans Credit Clothing, an old
clothing store from the 1940’s that has been converted into a bar in downtown
Houston, TX.
Each week we play three sets of all instrumental funk and
groove based improvised psychedelic music. (That’s a mouthful. Try explaining
it to someone). Over this period of time, Marc and Coy changed musically and
LBP started to gain some steam. Daniel came back to reclaim his throne and the
Bro Sure record was ready to sell. It had been two years of work on the record
and over a year since a real Bro Sure show.
We did some small shows and realized that our fans were a
little confused. We had definite Bro Sure fans as well as LBP fans. We were
playing under both bills and trying to keep it separate. PHYVE would show up at
some LBP shows to sing a song and Bro Sure had become much more jam band
styled. That is when we realized that it has all been so closely intertwined
that it really was the same band. It got to the point where if you booked Bro
Sure you got the new band, Little Brother Project and vice versa.
This is when we realized that there was no more Bro Sure.
We had grown into a much more freeform and jam style band with 40 minutes of
improvised jams and 20 minutes of 4-5 actual songs. No two shows will ever be
the same .We are making both fan bases happy. PHYVE sounds better than ever and
the band is at its best with musical communication.
Bro Sure is dead. It died with Andy’s departure. We just
carried the torch and reinvented the wheel. LBP plays all of the Bro Sure songs
because we wrote them all. The record sounds great and gives you an inside look
to who we are and how we will continue to grow. You will never know what to
expect except bigger and better things. We have just found out that Marc has
been nominated in this years Houston Press Awards for “Best Guitar Player”.
We have always been the best of friends. When we aren’t
playing we are hanging out. Andy was always one of more creative members of the
band. It is understood why he felt the need to move on. We wish him the very
best.
I would like to thank all of you for nominating me in the
Houston Press Awards. It means more to me than you will ever know. Thanks,
Marc Reczek
P.S. The first 100 versions of “Urban Ocean” will be
printed as Bro Sure with an alternate cover. Get yours while they last. Once
they are gone they will all be printed at Little Brother Project. Don’t see it
as a silly marketing strategy from Marc’s clever mind, see it as something you
can sell on Ebay in 10 years. Woooooooooo whoooooooooo.
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