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Happy Birthday to Marshmallow Tree!

Three kids walked into a bar as childhood friends on Friday the 13th, October 1995. They walked out as a band.

Marshmallow Tree was born this day in 1995. Today is also the day one of my nephews is getting married. He's 23, the same age I was when I walked into Sam's Cavern that night long ago in Rock Island, Illinois. For me, getting married was the last thing on my mind at that age. It's no surprise that it took me another almost 16 years to the day to find and marry the love of my life. Happy Anniversary, honey!

Chip Schumann and I were there to see our friend, Mike Cordell, play in a country rock band. Half the band didn't show up so Chip and I got up onstage to help out on guitars while I sang a few songs. Our music was decidedly more punk and alternative, playing songs by The Cure, Green Day, and the Smashing Pumpkins. The semi-drunk crowd wasn't too hip on that.

A girl came up to the stage and said, “Either you guys stop playing or they're going to come up and beat the shit out of you.”

We left. And a band was born.

Chris Currie joined in May 1996, rounding out the quartet on drums. He was studying computers in school and created our first website later that year. Thanks to the Wayback Machine, a few pages are still accessible. Yes, they're very 1996!

Marshmallow Tree Official Site

We captured a few shows on video, mostly Hi-8, including one at Safari Club in Des Moines on Sat., Sept. 20, 1997. We turned over the camera to one of our fans, David Hicks. He did an amazing job capturing our first few songs. I think he'd seen a few bands in his time so knew exactly how to shoot it 😉

Marshmallow Tree – Live at Safari Club – 9-20-97  – (CLICK LINK TO PLAY)

Here are some clippings from over the years. Many thanks to Sean Leary and Toni Wilson Wood for all the coverage. Extra special thanks to the Blue Cat Brew Pub for allowing us to take so many pictures in your bar!

Our final show was June 25, 1999, with Gel from Chicago opening up.

1 Comment

  1. Mike Cordell says:

    Ok, so the reunion is when?????

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