The
Fenwicks, are a 10-piece "Afro-Celtic Yiddish Ska" band
guaranteed
to make you giggle and sweat. Imagine Bob Marley being molested by
The
Marx Brothers, and there you pretty much have it. Insanely enough,
The Fenwicks were first formed when Lynyrd Skynyrd's drummer Artimus
Pyle, discovered Steven Schub singing for a punk band called "Jew2"
in Jerusalem Israel, and decided to fly Schub and his song-writing
partner, guitarist Jim Corrieri, to Jacksonville Florida. Within 72
hours, (and with a mere 3 rehearsals), The Fenwicks played their now
almost legendary first show: opening for Foreigner and Billy Squier,
in front of 8,000 confused classic rock fans. Listening to The Fenwicks’
cockamamie combination of ska, funk, folk and punk, and watching the
band's nutty, nearly vaudevillian stage show, those Foreigner fans
had no idea what to make of 'em. Over ten years, 3 CDs (on 3 different
record labels), and umpteen national tours later, much of the world
still doesn't. But tens of thousands of Fen-heads and 'Wick-heads
world-wide like it that way! With a hard-earned (and hard-core) fan
base, stretching literally from Baghdad (where soldiers have been
cranking The Fenwicks in Saddam's former Presidential Palace) to Jerusalem,
Sweden, Jersey and Hollywood, The Fenwicks have been able to carve
out a happy, if subterranean, existence for themselves as underground
underdogs, and one of the progenitors and instigators of 3rd Wave
Ska.
Some
Highlights from Fenwick History:
-Cover
story in Billboard magazine upon signing a record
deal with (now
defunct) record label Guitar Recordings, and a publishing deal with
Cherry Lane.
-Playing an unheard of 32 gigs in 31 days, each at
a different venue in
New York City.
-The Fenwicks' debut CD "Member of No Tribe" charts in the
Top 100 on
the CMJ radio charts, with airplay on over 200 college
radio stations.
-The Fenwicks tour nationally as the opening act for Two Tone
Ska
legends The Selecter.
-Singer Steven Schub, and The Fenwicks, star in the Sony Pictures
Classics film "Caught”
directed by indie film icon Robert M. Young.
Entertainment Weekly says: “Steven Schub is
hypnotically intense, an
electrifying debut.”
- Academy Award nominated director Bennett Miller (“Capote”)
directs
The Fenwicks first video for the song “Another Deadly Mother”. "Another
Deadly Mother".
-Academy Award winning actor (and former college room-mate of Schub
and Corrieri)
Philip Seymour
Hoffman records and sings with The Fenwicks.
-2001. The Fenwicks release their self-produced CD “eudaimonia”
on
their very own record label Flip-Dog Discs to national critical
acclaim. Dishwalla lead singer J.R. Richards
calls it, “One of the best
three albums of 2001”
-The Fenwicks play Town Hall on Broadway in New York City as part
of
the 2002 Toyota Comedy Festival, alongside Jon Stewart,
Colin Quinn,
and Lewis Black. The next night The Fenwicks play a sold-out live
show
at Arlene Grocery on the Lower East Side, and record and release the
concert, as a free download, on The Fenwicks’ website. Due to
overwhelming demand The Fenwicks are ultimately forced to release
a
live CD of the concert, 2003’s “Truth & Memory”.
CMJ New Music Report
says: “Lace up your dancing shoes, this album is going to light
a fire
under your seat!”
-The Ayn Rand Institute gets wind of The Fenwicks'
philosophical lyrics
and asks the band to play at its 2003 University of Southern California
Philosophy Conference.
-2004. The
Fenwicks liberate Baghdad. Citing The Fenwicks’
pro-Individualist lyrics, U.S. Navy Journalist Joseph Kane reports
on
The Fenwicks’ CDs being played, and Fenwick “Member of
No Tribe”
T-shirts being worn, by off-duty U.S. soldiers, in and around Saddam
Hussein’s (former) Presidential Palace.
-In 2005, The Fenwicks play all the dates on the Florida leg of the
Vans Warped Tour, and achieve what Warped Tour founder
Kevin Lyman
himself deems the“unprecedented”. The Fenwicks garner
a front page,
“above the fold”, headline cover story in The
Florida Times-Union,
feature stories in every city they play, live slots on the FOX and
NBC
affiliate Morning Shows and single-handedly become one of “THE
Buzz
Bands to see on Warped ‘05”.
-In 2006, Fenwick frontman Steven Schub stars in the indie horror
film
"Devil's Den" and The Fenwicks compose and perform the title
track
"Devil's
Den (Too Dumb to Die)".
-2007.
Schub Guest Stars on the Season Premiere of the global hit show "24",
and The Fenwicks' anti-Eminent Domain protest song "Preeminent
Domain" becomes an anthem for the world renowned think tanks
that argued the seminal case before the United States Supreme Court,
the "Institute for Justice" and the "Castle Coalition".
-With the support of the Human Rights Foundation, The Fenwicks tour
the East Coast as part of Big D and the Kids Table “Steady Riot”
Fall Tour. In concert The Fenwicks cover The Special AKA's 1984 ska
classic "Free Nelson Mandela" with the lyrics modified and
now directed at Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez. Entitled "Free
Venezuela" the song is an outright sing-a-long/dance-a-long
hit.
-2008 Steven Schub stars as Zombie Hunter "Buddy Budjinski" in the
film "Dozers", and The Fenwicks merry musical anthem for
Secular Humanism "No
One Is Coming" makes the soundtrack.
-The future? On the way, a brand new CD entitled “The Fenwicks:
Gods & Monsters”, and more of the same, but even more so!!!