THE HISTORY OF THE FISH - page 1

Vast swirling clouds of space dust slowly coalesce, forming the sun and the planets. On the third planet, once the surface cools, simple one-celled organisms evolve. Somewhat later, Rock & Roll is invented.

Mike Ward is born in Allentown, PA on October 22nd.

John Hagan is born in Chester, PA on the 10th of February.

Dan Kirchheimer is born in New York City on May 9th.

Mark Litwack is born in Philadelphia, PA on May 17th.

John Bradley is born in Philadelphia, PA on November 16th.

Hagan receives his first set of drums, apparently a gift from an enemy of the family.

Litwack invents the QuackMoPhone, a musical instrument that is not only widely regarded as "ground-breaking", but also as "virtually unplayable".

Mark moves to Media, PA, where he meets John Hagan. Sharing a common love of both music and "blowing things up", they form a duo act, the Lone Masters of Electricity. Unfortunately, one of the very first things they blew up was John's drum kit. Deciding that it was "pretty cool", Hagan swears off music to pursue his dream of "blowing up something really big."

High on Boone's Farm Strawberry Hill and oregano, Mike Ward dances like Mick Jagger in front of several hundred people at a high school dance.  A performer is born.

Litwack destroys the QuackMoPhone in a rage, largely due to the fact that in the five years of its existence, he had never successfully tuned it.

In retrospect, this is hardly surprising, as most modern music scholars agree that a performer would need a minimum of seven hands in order to play a single note.

On a side note, Mark sells the plans & schematics of the QuackMoPhone to the Hanna-Barbera cartoon studio, which builds one of their very own.  It is not known what fate eventually befalls this "rogue QuackMoPhone", but it is featured on a song by kiddie-group The Banana Splits.  Sadly, the evidence would suggest that they were no more successful at operating the instrument than Mark was.

Encouraged by the Mick Jagger experience, Mike and three friends form the band Gern, a band more intent on getting stoned than on playing any actual music.  They play one gig and disband.

Hagan's parents conclude that John's aptitude for mathematics would best be encouraged by making John learn the piano because "they read it in a book, or something." A lengthy series of piano lessons, and piano teachers, ensues.

After years of pretending to play the guitar, Bradley decides it might be nice to actually know how. And Mel Bay sells yet another copy of his book...

Having abandoned the QuackMoPhone, Mark embarks on an ambitious attempt to self-learn the piano, hammered dulcimer and the pan flute, simultaneously.

Mike enrolls at Kutztown State College, a backwater school more highly regarded for its shoofly pie than for any tradition of academic excellence. He hooks up with two high-school friends to form the soft-rock trio Silver Lake.

Dissatisfied with the number of freshman girls he'd been able to seduce, Mike decides a harder edge is needed for Silver Lake. A drummer, bass player, and a second electric guitar are added to the mix, and Breakfast of Champions results.

After years of intensive study, Hagan can solve linear, quadratic, and cubic equations in his head, but still can't reliably play "Born Free" on the piano.

Having single-handedly proved that there is absolutely no correlation between math skills and music, Hagan decides that the piano is "a tool of Satan", and abandons the instrument. He claims that music is "totally lame", and vows never to play again.

Of course, in 1978, music was totally lame.

Realizing that there is little point to being "the other guy who plays the pan flute, but isn't the master of it", Mark pursues his new goal: becoming "The Master of the Squeeze Box". Cites "a lack of competition" as a motivating factor.

Relying on his ability to get "acoustic" gigs, Mike inexplicably books Breakfast of Champions at a campus coffeehouse. The horrified onlookers are treated to 20 minutes of overly aggressive James Gang and Blues Brothers songs. Campus security is called.

Subsequent gigs elicit similar results, and the band soon dissolves.

Armed with a somewhat-iffy ability to play songs no one wants to hear, Bradley joins his first band, Departure. The band was well known in certain circles, primarily because they took an impressive inability to play the song "Free Bird" and combined it with a burning desire to do so anyway. 

After completing a tour of the band members basements, the band broke up, claiming a number of artistic differences.