SEPTEMBER 2006: Just got back from Brucefest III, where the Egg played three Springsteen covers to a packed house in honor of the Boss's Sept. 23 birthday. The event, conceived, organized, and MC'ed by the one and only Rick Wormwood (of Rick Wormwood and the Rumbling Proletariat) has become a Portland, Maine institution. Some of these tunes may make it into our set in the future.

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THINGS THAT WERE ARCHIVED IN AUGUST 2006:The unreleased Thunderegg track "Go to Sleep" is featured on a great lullabye collection released by Blog Up Musique. It's called Have a Good Night and the whole thing is available for free here. Jerome, the compilation's creator, is a really cool Parisian guy celebrating the birth of his daughter.

We're now on temporary touring hiatus. In August we will be in the studio wrapping up an EP with Nate. We'll be back onstage toward the end of September.

Thunderegg's masterpiece to date, the illustrated 108-page Open Book lyric book and CD-ROM, is ready now. You can read more about (and please buy) this piece of history by clicking here. The signed, numbered, limited-edition package includes 231 mp3s, almost nine hours of music: Support independent music while simultaneously getting the best music value you've ever experienced.

The perfect complement to Open Book is the debut full-band CD, A Very Fine Sample of What's Available at the Mine, also available here. It reprises ten classic Egg songs with clutch performances by a brilliant cast. Here's a very fine sample.

Jen has a fun blog. Check in often. Adrian's Uganda blog is great, too.

The 2005 Song of the Week project has reached its inevitable conclusion. Click here for the list of all 52 songs. Thank you to everyone who followed along, sent feedback, and spread the word. The best 18 tracks from the year's 52 offerings have been selected and mastered in preparation for This Week, the next and very possibly finest Thunderegg album yet.

Click here to download "The Envelope Pushes Back" live video from the Webster Underground, Hartford. Bob Porri, ladies and gentlemen. Bob Porri on lead guitar. (quicktime)

Click here to see just how close Will got to his four-track idol Liz Phair, thanks to JANE magazine.

THE THUNDEREGG TOP TWENTY, 2005

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UPDATE, DECEMBER 2005: The time has come to revisit the project's title track, previously heard in a much slower version way back at week 3. (The song was originally written to be fast, but in January Greg Zinman, in a visit to the studio's lounge area, wisely suggested an interpretation that would allow a musician to simultaneously play guitar and hold a Jack and ginger.) The new edition was recorded on Sunday, December 11, 2005, at Manhattan Bridge Four-Track Operation in Brooklyn, NY. In a Rust Never Sleeps tribute move, both versions may wind up on the This Week album in 2006.
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UPDATE, OCTOBER 2005: It's October: time for sweaters, crisp apples, and great baseball. In recognition of all the truly good things this wonderful month has to offer, we present this week's song, "Tim McCarver Must Die." It was recorded by Will at Manhattan Bridge Four-Track Operation, Brooklyn, NY, on October 10, 2005. Inspiration courtesy of the compilation LP New Jersey's Got It? (Buy Our Records, 1985), which was recently purchased for fifty cents at a neighborhood stoop sale.
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UPDATE, JULY 2005: This week Keith's brother, DJ Yosamite of Dallas, generously provides our song: a special Thunderegg remix featuring elements from "Deliverance from Crack Rock" (from Sweetest One, 2004), "Just Another Joe" (from Universal Nut, 1995), and an ultra-rare 1993 recording of a song called "Clown" (he sampled his big brother's drums). Big thanks to Yosamite and to all of the Woodfin family for being so supportive of the Egg.
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UPDATE, JULY 2005: This past Friday night, Thunderegg played its first official show in a very long time. We were a six-piece this time: Will, Jake, and Keith, but also Bob Porri (pedal steel), Jonathan Chatfield (keyboards), and Tim Kane (trumpet). We set up right in the middle of the Kehler Liddell art gallery on Whalley Avenue, plied the audience with Miller High Life, and then worked our way through fifteen songs. We weren't perfect, but often it sounded very cool anyway. The next night we played Portland, Maine, as a three-piece and were about as tight as we've ever been. But the future sound of Thunderegg lies in that New Haven set, so that's where week 27's song, "In the Loft," comes from. Like Week 25's offering, it's very, very low-fi—but hopefully it will give you a rough idea of where the sound is heading.
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UPDATE, JUNE 2005: Sunday was open mic at Sully's Pub in Hartford, and it was the first time Thunderegg played live since the August 2000 Farm Party in Ringoes, NJ. The guys before us did some pretty tight Dave Matthews covers, then we came on and were allowed to play four songs. As per Egg tradition, we messed up a lot but remained buoyant. Then the next band, essentially a showcase for a sick six-string bass player named Conrad, stepped onstage. Anyway, just to prove that we actually did play, here's a very, very low-fi recording of our opening number, "The Scheduled Show." It was recorded to a tiny little Panasonic hand-held recorder by Alicia Fournier. After that came "If I Went on a Diet," "If You Knew Me So Well," and "Glass of Water." Then we were pulled off the stage, and out stepped Conrad with his bass.
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THIS JUST GOT CUT FROM THE "HISTORY" PAGE: It's true that Thunderegg's path to glory has always been deliberate, even meandering. But after more than ten years, the band is tighter than ever. As they like to say, the burn may be slow, but the Egg is still blazing.
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UPDATE, JANUARY 2004: Thank you to all who voted for your favorite Thunderegg songs this past fall. On December 13-14, we started recording the two winners up at the Shed. Once they're finished, the debut full-band album--eleven tracks in all--will be ready. There are also ten brand-new songs that nobody's ever heard, so probably 2004 will see two Thunderegg releases: the full-band collection "A Very Fine Sample of What's Available at the Mine" and the four-tracked "Sweetest One."
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UPDATE, SEPTEMBER 2003: Congratulations to Nathan and Bridget: On August 13, beautiful Avery Mae Gohla was born. Avery politely waited to make the scene until Dad had finished up all the tracks for the Thunderegg debut, so even as Nate and Bridge are up to their eyeballs in nappies, the album is safely in the hands of the mastering people. We figure to have the whole thing pressed and ready by year's end. In the meantime, new songs are incubating and autumn, historically Thunderegg's most prolific period, has begun. It's been a long time between albums, but we've learned a lot. The sophomore effort should come quicker.
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UPDATE, MAY 2003: The weekend of May 17-18, Thunderegg laid down some more tracks with Nate at the Shed in Manchester. Once those songs are completed—two classic Egg tunes, this time featuring Tom on rhythm guitar and Tim on trumpet—the much-awaited full-band Thunderegg debut album will be ready for mastering. Then it will be yours, Then we'll get to work on our follow-up, "Deliverance from Crack Rock." We have about eight new songs written for it already.
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UPDATE, NOVEMBER 2002: A special warm welcome to any of you who might have landed here via Jane magazine. For our fans not in the know, Thunderegg's "If I Went on a Diet," featured here, won a slot on Jane's Reader-Produced CD, which is being given away by the magazine as a promotion. We should have a few copies of it, too, so if you can't get one from Jane, we might be able to broker the deal for you.
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UPDATE, AUGUST 2002: Five new full-band recordings now available here! We know it's been a while since we checked in. That's partly because we've been trying to get the real site, www.thunderegg.org, up and running, but mainly it's because we've simply been spending too much time rocking to be able to check in. The first full-length, full-band Thunderegg album is more than halfway finished; last weekend Natronic Productions and the group finished mixing three more tunes, among them "Pardon Your French" and "In the Loft." We have one more stretch at the Shed in Manchester, with maybe three more songs--this batch with horns--and then we're taking orders. We'll even take orders now, if you want. Do keep an eye on thunderegg.org. We started plunking down that monthly server fee recently, so now we're more committed than ever to getting the site up and cranking. Rock on.
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UPDATE, FEBRUARY 2002: New tracks feature some sweet-sounding organ from Mystery Feet keys player Jonathan Chatfield. They're also underpinned by Woodpile's new woodpile: A gorgeous Pearl Session Custom with vintage-fade finish. It sounds as good as it looks. The first batch of newly recorded, full-band songs--and the first of three EPs for 2002--should be finished by early March and includes "If I Went on a Diet," "In the Loft," "Pardon Your French," "The Envelope Pushes Back," "Just Another Joe," and "Ephemeral." We're planning the second EP now, and after the third one comes out, the best songs from the EPs will be selected to make up our debut full-band full-length. Then the EPs go out of print. So don't turn your nose up at the EPs: Once they're gone, you'll have to wait until we're rich and bloated and putting out our very own Pisces Iscariots to hear the non-LP tracks. Judging by Thunderegg's deliberate path to greatness, that could take a long, long while indeed.
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UPDATE, JANUARY 2002: New year's resolutions included writing a song a week and stepping up the full-band recording projects. Both have so far been adhered to. It's January 14 and there are two new songs; we also just spent the last weekend with Natronic laying down rock-solid new versions of old ones, including "Just Another Joe" (1995) and "Ephemeral" (1994). All is well with Thunderegg. We'll put new MP3s up here pretty soon. In the meantime, as always, if there's an old track you think we ought to dust off and record properly, cast your vote.
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UPDATE, DECEMBER 2001: We challenge, here and now, the people of thunderegg.com to softball. The only consulting they'll be doing will be when they have to yank their pitcher after Bite and Flag hit back-to-back BOMBS! The second order of business is that now POWDER TO THE PEOPLE (1998) is available on CD, joining NEW ENGLAND MUSIC (1996), PERSONNEL ENVELO-FILE (1997), and the companion series IN YANISTIN and THE ENVELOPE PUSHES BACK (2000). Order your copy today! All CDs are $5 each, except for ENVELOPE, which is--and always will be--free. Really, you should make an order. These handmade albums are produced in extremely limited quantities, usually no more than fifty per run. (The exception, of course, is the especially radio-friendly ENVELOPE, 116 copies of which are in the hands of the faithful.) Just because these CDs are available now, which they are, does not mean they'll be available forever. Third: The mobile Thunderegg sound lab is completed. It's a 4-track and a bunch of effects bolted into a handsome varnished carrying case, complete with a power strip that has an adapter that can plug into a car's cigarette lighter. That means we'll be able to drive out onto the beach and record there. Fourth: Thunderegg hits the studio again in January. It's a really nice studio. The sound will be great. Stay tuned for updates about that.
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UPDATE, NOVEMBER 2001: Sorry it's been so long since the last update. There is a melange of excuses, available upon request. But there IS some news. The archival LPs NEW ENGLAND MUSIC (1996), PERSONNEL ENVELO-FILE (1997), and IN YANISTIN (2000) have been repackaged and are ready for you, in case you want them. You can get them either straight from the band (thundereggrules@yahoo.com) or from our friends at Orange Entropy Records (www.orangeentropy.com). By January, all seven albums will be available through those same channels. (They've been available all along, really, but now they have prettier covers.) Then it's back to the studio to record a full-band LP of all-new material. I came home for the day and as I'm writing this, my father is watching television. "Nice shirt, jerk," he's saying to Ed Bradley. "Where's your sissy earring?" He's just mad because I got here too late to rake the leaves, and because he doesn't like my sideburns one bit--doesn't like anything about them. Then an ad came on for the Mitsubishi Montero. It had this crummy song playing in it. The music Thunderegg's going to record this winter won't be like that at all.
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UPDATE, SEPTEMBER 2001: Given how difficult we all know it is to reduce a band's entire sound down to a punchy one-line description, imagine how happy we were when we received the following response from the Berlin-based journal Artefakt, to whom we'd mailed a CD: "It's nice, but it's not at all suitable for Artefakt, since we focus on experimental electronic explicitly non-vocal music only." Thunderegg: Nice. But not German enough. We're back from our summer vacation now, and we're ready to pick up where we left off in May: New recordings, new songs, new equipment, new promotional push. In the meantime, if you don't yet have a copy of THE ENVELOPE PUSHES BACK, send us your address and we'll mail you one. While you're here, why not sign in? We haven't had a comment since April 12, and that one was fraudulent.
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UPDATE, JULY 2001: In honor of our friend Hans Schiller's upcoming nuptials, we now feature the unbelievable bootleg recording of Thunderegg's forebears, Larry (featuring Bite, Flag, Woodpile, and Winky), covering Peter Schilling's "Major Tom (Coming Home)" at the Trumbull Buttery in April, 1995. Hans just showed up that night, told us to "watch him for the changes" (kind of like Marty McFly before striking up "Johnny B. Goode"), and we were off. Commentary on this version, which is a lot louder than the actual music, is provided by Phil Dunlop and Burr Harding, and pointed commentary it is: "Ozzy, man. Fuckin' Ozzy." GlŸckwunsch, Hans!
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UPDATE, JUNE 2001: Here's the rundown: 1) Thunderegg is a rock band that doesn't practice quite as much as it should. It consists of Will Bite (vocals, egg), Jake Flag (thunder, vocals), Natronic (egg, console), and Woodpile (woodpile). 2) Because of logistical problems, the first seven Thunderegg CDs were recorded, between 1995 and 2000, by Will alone to a four-track in one of the eleven bedrooms he occupied during that period. Lately, however, the music has been recorded by the full band and sounds much better. 3) A new album is in the works. 4) Thunderegg is not a popular band by any stretch, though we are good songwriters, critically acclaimed, very friendly, and enjoy "partying." 5) Click on "Band E-mail," give us your address, and we will send you a free CD that you will find surprisingly pleasant. 6) Keep your eyes on www.thunderegg.net. Or, if you prefer the less bourgeois route, thunderegg.org. There, you'll be able to find new MP3s, lyrics, merchandise, bulletin boards, contests, a journal, WEGG radio, downloads of rare, out-of-print non-Thunderegg joints, and links to a whole bunch of other cool stuff. You'll see.
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UPDATE, APRIL 2001: By popular demand, "Just Another Joe," 1995 version, is now featured. Live edition, for your comparison and contrastison, to come. Also, by no demand whatsoever, the not-on-any-album, yet by no means definitive, 1998 recording of "My Mad Hatter" that had fallen through the cracks until now. There were hopes of attaining that classic Scholz-Goudreau sound with the stereo guitar leads. Maybe it's because Sib wasn't in the picture, but the only Boston it ended up sounding like was, maybe, that dude Daryl who played for the ChiSox from around '85 to '89. No. Come to think of it, he had a lot more soul than this. Though, like us, he never quite got that starting job. Many other things will be sprung on you soon. New album. New website. New full-band sound. Zeugmatically, hold on to your faith and hats.
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UPDATE 3/21/01: The thousand monkeys behind the thousand upright pianos at the Thunderbrill Building really haven't come up with much commercially ready material lately, but that's not to say they're not working. There's some stuff on the dictaphone that might turn into the third part (tentatively titled JOURNAL AND CRANKSHAFT) of the POWDER TO THE PEOPLE/IN YANISTIN song-snippet dualogy which nobody owns, not that it's not available. One new cut, "Blazin' in Princeton," might even become an actual song. Special sneak preview sample lyric: "Blazin' behind the library on a rainy day/Flip through new arrivals at the Record Exchange/I'll take my parking validation/And I'll see you at the Haven, come on/Blazin' in Princeton." So there's that. Also, at a recent recording session at the Ward School of Technology in Hartford, the old staple "Her Shotgun Life" (first performed in 1994 by Larry, Thunderegg's favorite atavists) got a geek-to-chic makeover and suddenly rides like a '72 Nova with a jacked-up rear suspension. It's not on this site yet because there are still some glitches, but you'll have to trust us. It was rad. There are also nice new full-band recordings of some of your other favorites, lovingly engineered by Natronic. Big hits like "Ceiling Fan," "In the Loft," and "Rutting Season." Let us know if there are any other old songs you'd particularly like to see dusted off and given the full-band treatment. The question is, Is this all just a bunch of talk? Perhaps. But it's talk that rocks.
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UPDATE 2/13/01: Very sleepy. There's a new featured track here, recorded February 12 by Natronic in Hartford and featuring the full band: Woodpile, Flag, Bite. Tootsie Rolls to anybody who finds and downloads it. Thunderegg management believes we're looking at the tail end of a long streak of dreariness, lyric-wise. Future songs will address more cheerful matters--like the story of the guy who lies in bed listening to his next-door neighbor who, in the summertime, mows his lawn at three in the morning. It doesn't always wake the guy up, but the sound of the motor does eventually wend its way into his dreams, the smell of grass mingles with the night air, and the crickets never sound sweeter than the moment after the neighbor finally, and always suddenly, cuts the engine.
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UPDATE 1/21/01: To make up for a whole month's worth of quiet, Thunderegg presents the 1987 nugget "Love One Another, With a Pure Heart, Fervently." The unexpurgated version is available upon request, as are "A Reading From Genesis" (1985), "God Be Glorified!" (1983), and, if there's enough demand, "Selections From The Trenton Cathedral's Annual Production of 'Amahl and the Night Visitors'" (1987). THE ENVELOPE PUSHES BACK is now officially available from Orange Entropy Records as well as through Thunderegg mail order. We printed up 33 brand new copies, upping the total in existence to somewhere around 80. Plus, the liner notes for the back-catalogued CDs (see the bottom of this page) are finally being put together. Contact Thunderegg to place advance orders for such classics as PERSONNEL ENVELO-FILE and the fourth, eponymous album THUNDEREGG. Finally, if you dig internet radio, you might also want to check out Orange Entropy's radio station WOE ("Radio That Kills") at http://members.aol.com/Woeradio. Due to OE boss Steve Zimmerman's batty taste, you'll hear all kinds of Thunderegg stuff unavailable here (including "Sparkling Wine Regrets," "The Technomancer," and "Hardly Needs Ironing!"). You'll also hear the latest from Nudge Squidfish, The Great Glass Elevator, Mike!, and Duf Davis, among others.
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UPDATE 12/17/00: Spirits were low at the Command-Q/Typewriter Repo/Thunderegg central offices today, but we won't dwell on that! What fun the future has in store! It's OK to be sad sometimes! Last August "The Revolutionary Manifesto of Thunderegg (Judy Collins)" was recorded in the Princeton studio and later became track 43 on the extremely rare IN YANISTIN album. At the time of its composition it really was believed to be a revolutionary convergence of dictaphone ramblings, Dr. Rhythm-fueled 4-track folk-riff-rock, tape manipulations meant to convey a sense of multiple self, and Judy Collins renditions of songs later made famous by Alice Cooper. This is the revolutionary manifesto of Thunderegg, people! is at least what we were trying to get across at the time. (Incidentally, the lower-case letter "i" of the second "is" in the previous sentence is not a typo. It's being used per Chicago Manual of Style, 5.20.) Did it work? True, only four or five people own the album, but no one has yet weighed in on whether they were smellin' it. Therefore we feature "TRMOT->JC" this time around, so you, the only person who has checked out the site all day--and we cannot begin to say how grateful we are for that--will be able to download it, give it a listen, and tell us whether you a) want to join our revolution or b) feel the message needs to be conveyed a little more clearly before you make a decision.
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UPDATE 11/29/00: Statistics tell the sad tale: People seldom visit this site anymore. Nevertheless, thanks to September's Golden Era, when people were downloading like crazy, IUMA recently sent along a quarterly royalty check in the amount of $1.93--nearly 70 times more cake than the previous time around! Rest assured that all profits, after taxes, will be carefully invested for the future. Improvements here since last time include a couple MP3s from the new LP: "Pardon Your French" and a re-recording of the 1997 chestnut "What Was I Gonna Do?" Also, near the bottom of this page we've added a definitive track listing for all the Thunderegg CDs, which were remastered this past summer. Now you know where to find all the songs you never knew existed in the first place. If you haven't yet requested your copy of THE ENVELOPE PUSHES BACK, Thunderegg's 7th studio album, what are you waiting for? It's FREE--just click "Band e-mail" and send your mailing address. So far there are 36 more or less satisfied customers and the album is on its 3rd printing.
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UPDATE 11/02/00: We had the whole high-speed DSL thing all ready to go yesterday, but at the last minute Verizon pulled out of the deal, saying the phone lines in this particular barrio can't accommodate our thunder. Disappointment. And a suspicion that there are certain neighborhoods where the phone company just isn't trying. Who can blame the fans if page viewership is way down (Rank: high 6000s)? There hasn't been anything new up here for a while. But have you listened to every single song? At a spontaneous busking gig on the downtown platform of the Broadway/Lafayette subway station on Sunday--net profit slightly under $3--positive crowd response was most pronounced after 1996's sleeper "Supergirlfriend." So this week we're featuring it, along with a few others you might have missed. And the offer still stands: Send your address, receive a limited collectable first edition of the new LP. (An LP, incidentally, that certain members of Thunderegg have never heard, while at the same time others wish to never hear again.) Major full-band sessions direct from the Manchester (CT) scene are imminent. Thanks for checking in every now and then. You won't regret being at the forefront of this movement, and your attention is greatly appreciated.
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UPDATE 10/24/00: The latest LP, THE ENVELOPE PUSHES BACK, is finished. If you want a copy, contact the band and you will surely receive one. It will cost you nothing if you seem to really want it. You might also want to check out the heretofore obscure so-called "snippets" albums--POWDER TO THE PEOPLE and IN YANISTIN--which feature tons of extremely short melodies that may one day turn into full-length Thunderegg songs. Vote for your favorite tracks, and we promise to flesh them out, and we'll try to be a little less pouty in the lyrics.
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UPDATE 10/14/00: On November 1, Thunderegg Labs will convert to a high-speed internet connection. Then watch out! You'll have so many downloading opportunities you won't know what to do--you may very well "freak out." In the meantime, THE ENVELOPE PUSHES BACK is basically finished. Please click on the "Band e-mail" tab and let us know if you want to place an order for this or any other Thunderegg album. If you have already placed an order, rest assured that it's been duly noted on a piece of paper scotch-taped to this monitor.
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UPDATE 10/05/00: Thunderegg spent the last couple weeks in recording session seclusion and emerges from that wilderness with 8 new songs, all of which will go on the new LP THE ENVELOPE PUSHES BACK. You might see them on this site, too, if we get our asses to the Princeton Engineering Quad, where we sneak in to do the uploading (their computers are fast). In the meantime, Orange Entropy, the group's noble recording stable, is working on securing Dutch distribution rights. This will hopefully translate into a tour of Holland sometime in the fall of 2005. Keep your fingers crossed!
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UPDATE 9/21/00: Site stats show that every day, five or six people view this page. That's an unbelievable horn section, right there! Honors: There's one particular oboeist fan out there, we won't name names, but this particular fan is officially Thunderfan of the Week. Thunderegg is grateful for the support. In the news, studio work on the new LP continues. Two new songs have been recorded this week, and they're both corkers. Stay tuned for more gobbledy-gook.
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UPDATE 9/14/00: Thunderegg's first six LPs will be released this fall on Orange Entropy Records, the best underground record label in the world (www.OrangeEntropy.com). Thunderegg CDs, formerly rare, will soon be easily available through all kinds of channels. You might have to pay for them, but you will at least get them, and we promise they will not be very expensive. This week, work resumes on the new album. Anybody who can play any type of horn, please contact the band. Thank you for all the comments and downloads. There are like 12,000 bands registered with this company and one day last month, Thunderegg even cracked the top 40 (34). Thunderfans Rule!
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