Hermano

Hermano formed in the Ohio River Valley, late in the summer of 1998. When the idea for bringing together a few of Dandy Brown’s great performers to do a rock record surfaced, he did not think of all of the road blocks which stood in the way of putting the album together. In order to understand the story, one must know the parts. So here is a description of how it all began.

Steve Earle is the first piece of the puzzle. Brown’s history with him goes back to the days of Earle rolling through Europe with the Afghan Whigs and finding himself mesmerized by watching him play. In the years after, they worked on a number of sessions together which left him amazed with his style and versatility. Back in the days of Kyuss and Black Cat Bone, Dave Angstrom and John Garcia were label mates on Chameleon/Electra. In 1996, Dave and John came together in a group called Supafuzz. Dave’s guitar work on that record and John’s voice on backing vocal tracks sweated of something for a project somewhere down the road. Hermano was that opportunity. The final piece came as a surprise. Brown first came into contact with Mike Callahan after watching a group he was producing open up for Disengage. After overcoming his exhaustion with some hard liquor, he heard the opening sounds of Mike’s guitar and ended up staying until the club closed, knowing that he had found the second guitarist for Hermano. Blown away by his energy, he approached Mike in a near stupor and slurred something about wanting him to be a part of the project. Brown left wondering if he thought he was full of shit and was amazed when he called a few days later. With Brown relinquishing his orquestrator duties to play bass and organs, Hermano was finally complete.

Having the dream to put together a group such as Hermano is one thing, but the realities of scheduling around three working bands, plenty of session performances, and the few thousand miles which divided them bordered on mania as they moved further and further into the process. After overcoming these difficulties, the rest was logistics. The members were forced to pass tapes across the country for seven months previous to entering the studio. More than fifty percent of the collection was written in a matter of hours. It wasn’t until April of 1999 that the group finally came together in its entirety. Meeting face to face for the first time at UltraSuede Studio in Cincinnati, Brown had no idea of what was going to happen once the tape started rolling. Being the axle upon which everything had spun to that point, Brown knew that these personalities he had brought together would blend, but was overwhelmed by the depth of the music which blossomed from the moment they met. Inherently, Hermano is the only appropriate name for this group.