Weekly Nostalgia: Christie Front Drive
 

Some bands come about and have more influence on music than many would like to give credit to. Unfortunately, many of these artists fall off too quickly and are only honorary name drops amongst some of our favorite artists. With the anticipation of the next Jimmy Eat World album, we can't forget a little band from Colorado. Christie Front Drive were shaping the forefront of the indie/emo hybrid around the time of bands such as Texas is the Reason, Mineral and Boys Life. Only releasing a handful of 7" and splits (including one with the big time aforementioned band), the band's only proper full length is dark and brooding with plenty of heart on the sleeve vocal crooning. With the reissue of the self-titled (also known as "Stereo"), here's hoping some give a bit more credit where credit is due. Watching the accompanied DVD of the band's last show (included in the reissue), it brings up an interesting question: What's more important, the longevity of a band or the impact of the work? On May 22, 1996, where were you and what were you contributing to the whole? Christie Front Drive were making one last foreshadowing footprint of what was to come over the next two decades.

Fuck yeah. This is way back. I saw the guitarist for that band play in another that opened my first JEW show.

There was a good band named Jejune from San Diego floating around at that time too.

any recorded bytes? like to check out.

This band is really good.

No dice. It was my first show and I wasn't tech savy. I just remember they played with another band called Anderson. JEW headlined that show here at the Pomona Glasshouse near Los Angeles.


Did you ever like Mineral or Penfold?

solid solid stuff.

more folks 'round gotta get into this, if they haven't yet.

The Power of Failing is one of the best records. I know people tend to like ES more, but there's heart to that first album that's just...oh man, it's sometimes hard to describe...

Theyre definately both amazing albums. POF was a little more raw. That gave Chris's vocals a better interpretation of the angst and emotion he was trying to convey lyrically. Im a production freak so I really liked ES too. I know some people were turned off by them opting to have a more produced piece of work but I personally feel it was a more complete album in that respect.

I met Christopher Simpson four years ago when he began his solo project with Zookeeper. He is one of the nicest, most down to earth human beings you could ever hope to meet.

Freaking love these guys.

I think he lives here in Austin nowadays. Maybe one day I'll run into him and be like, "Dude, MINERAL!!!!' hahaha...but I liked The Gloria Record stuff too...hahaha

Love/miss this band so much.

Theres a funny fanboy story to all of that, actually...


He was scheduled to play the Hotel Cafe here in Los Angeles as Zookeeper and I had been raving about it to my friends for weeks. The night before I was to go to the show, I went to a little bar in Loz Feliz with a promoter friend of mine who was passing out flyers for his friend's bar. Some dude comes out of the place smoking a cigarette and It took me some time to notice he looked exactly like Chris did in his photos, except he had grown his hair long again like in his days with Mineral. So I approached him and before I could say anything besides "Excuse me, Is your name Chris?", his friend was like "Yeah, its christopher simpson" hahaha

He was totally cool about everything and I saw him play the next night. His friend was just laughing because he said that tended to happen at least once every night they were here randomly. His band members were cool fucking beans too. Good stuff.


I think he works as a waiter to this day in Austin. He lived his whole rock career serving food haha

bummer. I'm trying to get out of that business myself. kudos for him for getting through it for so long.

This band is great, love Stereo. Btw, to the dude above who mentioned Penfold, band is also sick.

Field <3