Father Figures is a project put together with a handful of friends that I have had since childhood. We grew up cutting our teeth and learning our trade in high school bands together, each gaining various levels of success, before getting busy in the next steps of our lives: getting married and having kids.

Over time the music took a back seat for each of us, either due to family responsibilities or industry burnout, but as time often does it pressed forward. Children got older, careers stabilized, burnout rejuvenated, and one day our drummer Joey called up a few of us asking if we wanted to get together and jam around. Nothing serious, have a few beers in the garage, reminisce about some glory days and dust off the instruments; see if we even remembered how to play.

Turns out the saying is true; it is just like riding a bike in that once you learn you never really forget. More important then just remembering we could play, we were having fun. Not just that, but fun in a way we hadn’t had since we were just kids in a garage. So, we decided to make jamming together a regular thing. We learned some songs from our childhood and eventually opted to play at a friend’s birthday party. Nothing serious, just a quick 60 minutes for a collection of old friends and family. At this point we had no intention of making anything more out of this. We were just here to have fun.

Turns out that fun was amplified ten times over when you perform for other people. So, we toyed with idea of booking a show, nothing crazy, just local dive in our old stomping grounds; shout out to The Britisher in Lancaster, CA for giving us our first slot, and from there things began to just snowball. One gig led to another that led to another, each getting bigger and better as we homed in on what it is we wanted to present to the world and what we wanted to accomplish.

Playing nostalgic tunes that you want to hear is super important, and the energy and packaging are all key points of what makes us us, but at the end of the day I think the number one north star for us is that fun though. We are not here with any agenda outside of having as much fun with as many like-minded people as possible. Any monetary gain or accolades are a welcome bonus, but I think I can speak for everyone when I say that is not how we measure success. That feeling of being a kid in a garage, playing with your friends, all hanging out and having a great time. That’s what success looks like to us. That fun isn’t just an ingredient, it’s thee vital component. It’s load bearing. Without it the whole thing falls apart. Smiling and laughing together is one of the most core experiences we have as human beings, and we count ourselves lucky to do it with every last person who comes to a show.