FREE BIRD
FORMED: In the Fall of 1975.  I'd of been 12 years old.
FOLDED: In the Summer on 1980, although it was never official.

 

MEMBERS
Danny Phillips Guitar, Vocals 1975-1980
Matt Kinnaman Drums, Vocals 1975-1980
Scott Reed Bass, Vocals 1975-1978
Jeff Heuby Guitar, Vocals 1977-1980
OTHER MEMBERS
Bob Barker Guitar, Vocals 1975-1976
Daryn Lewellyn Bass Guitar 1978-1980

     

THE STORY

     I was asked to join the band just after 7th grade had begun.  I really didn’t know any of the guys (Matt, Scott, and Bob).  Turned out that I was the only one who had an instrument of any kind!  They were big time Kiss fans while I was a headstrong Beatlemaniac.  Our initial band names were Speed, Fire, then The Rocks, and Barracuda before settling on Free Bird.  Matt’s parents house became our home away from home each weekend.  Once everyone stopped arguing on who was going to play what, we started jamming!  We couldn’t play anything so we did stuff we had written.  Bob wasn’t around long (he had only a home made guitar from wood shop class!).  We were a power trio for the most of our duration.  I have very strong memories of sleepovers at Matt’s where we’d jam late into the night because his parents would go out dancing.  Once they returned we had to ‘settle down’, which was always hard to do with 3 guys and a couple more friends hanging out.  We’d always sneak out and roam the streets talking about being rock Gods, making all sorts of money, and touring with Aerosmith and Angel.

          Eventually we did do covers, although for the longest time we didn’t sing anything!  We started playing parties and school function by our freshman year in 1977.  We had become the ‘pet’ band of the school.  There weren’t any other bands in school, and especially with our age.  The older girls always called us cute and would sit and watch us….we were loving that!  Along the way we added Jeff Heuby on second guitar.  We had gotten to know him at a party we had played in Dugger, Indiana (his hometown).  I liked having two guitars, and Jeff was a great guy as well.

          Unfortunately, as we grew up, we fell into different crowds.  There were more disagreements amongst us…Music had always held us together though.  The bottom fell out in March of 1978.  Scott Reed has disappeared after a party on a Friday night.  He was missing for 3 weeks before he was discovered in a field.  To this day no one knows what happened, and I could write a whole website on those events.  Needless to say, at 15 years of age, it was a traumatic experience.  I still get an eery sad feeling every year in March.

          Daryn was brought in through Jeff from Dugger, and he and Jeff alternated on guitar and bass.  Daryn was a great guy as well, but things were kinda different from then on.  We didn’t break up though, we forged on.  Eventually we moved over to practice in Dugger, and for all extensive purposes, FREE BIRD was over.

                    

BIGGEST MEMORIES
          Off the top of my head:  Playing in the high school band room mornings before school.  Everyone would come to hear us, including all the upperclass girls!!; Sitting around watching Matt draw up stage specifications that would rival Kiss for our world tour; Jamming at Scott’s parent’s basement; The party we played without a bass player because Scott had quit!!!; Hanging out at Monical’s pizza with our guitars thinking we were cool!; Doing a big post football game show at the local hangout (Bowling Alley)…people were mad because we weren’t singing!;  The last practice we had with Scott was strange because we recorded it all…thank goodness I still have that tape; Watching Matt’s parents dance while we played in his attic;  Crashing a cymbal over Bob’s head when he fell asleep; Matt’s mom bringing in doughnuts the mornings after all nighters;  Going to Beasley’s music to do any kind of chore they could come up with in exchange for a mic cord or strings; the cool Free Bird backdrop we debuted at a freshman dance with lights and all;  The comeback show we dedicated to Scott in 1978, with everyone sitting on the gym floor watching us play….I am sure there are a lot more!
MY GEAR
          Wow.  I first had a cheap guitar from Danners Discount.  Kind of a pychedelic sunburst strat thing…along with a little amp.  I think it was a total of $40 for both that I worked a summer doing lawn work for my dad to buy.  I thought it was the shit!  Not long after getting in FREE BIRD, I put a Kay red SG copy and Kay amp on layaway at Beasleys…and they let me do odd jobs to buy it.  It looked like a real guitar and the amp was like a mini-stack.   I used to go home after school and practice in my room every day trying to impress the babysitter.  Finally for Christmas in 1978 mom and dad got me a Kustom Kraft Barracuda Les Paul copy (black) that was awesome to me!  But even better was the Fender Princeton Reverb amp.   A real amp!  That was my gear for the longest time until I jumped up to a Fender Super Reverb I think…it had 4-12’s, and a tilt back.
WHERE ARE THEY NOW
          Matt, Jeff and Daryn all morphed into the next band.  We know what befell Scott.  Bob was still a good friend all through high school.