Okkervil River

Description

Okkervil River is an indie rock band from Austin, Texas, formed in 1998. <p>Okkervil River's founding members became friends in high school in Meriden, New Hampshire[1], and after parting ways for college moved to Austin, Texas to live together and start a band. The band consisted of songwriter Will Sheff, Zach Thomas on bass and mandolin, and Seth Warren on drums. Their first gig was at Steamboat in Austin on January 11, 1999. The band was named after a short story by Russian author Tatyana Tolstaya, and after Okkervil River in Saint Petersburg. <p>In 1998, the group self-released their first disc, the "Bedroom" (EP). Over the course of two weekends in the summer of 1999, they recorded a seven song self-released album titled Stars Too Small to Use, with recording engineer Jeff Hoskins. <p>They met Jonathan Meiburg at a gig with his band Whu Gnu at the Waterloo Brewing Company on December 3, 1999. Meiburg subsequently joined the band on accordion and later on pianos and organs. <p>On the strength...