5 song demo recorded during the spring and summer of 1986.
Matthew Sigmon – Guitars, Bass, Percussion, Programming, Vocals
Julie Anderson – Keyboards, Vocals
David Howie – Guitar (Remembering), Coronet, Percussion, Vocals
My first band, The Basics, broke up in late 1985. A few days later, my older brother died unexpectedly. It was a tough year.
Driven by questions of purpose and meaning, and a desire for new opportunities, Jules and I, along with David Howie, a friend and former roadie for The Basics, packed up and headed south. We landed in a secluded A-frame house, hidden in the Appalachian foothills of North Georgia.
The spring and summer of 1986 was a time of intense introspection. The recent losses drove me into explorations of philosophy and spirituality–and the influence was evident in the new music I was writing.
If my time in The Basics represented a social and creative coming of age, this was its spiritual equivalent.
By summer’s end, we had written and recorded five songs—a diary of transformation capturing the essence of how we were growing. We packaged them in a demo tape titled, In The Garden. Only two copies were sent out—with the second one landing in the hands of Chris Hensley and Ritchie Gold.
In less than a month they became our friends and managers, and together, we collaborated on a string of demos that would soon earn us a recording contract with Epic Records as the group Rain People.