is:
I guess in some ways, drawoff could be musically considered a punk rock band. The music DOES have punk rock roots... so why not? But we, as a band, don't think it would make sense to call our music "punk". Sure, we have some fast songs and stuff, but to be a "punk band" is such a restriction!
We sure as hell started out as a punk band though! In the middle of 2000, in Timmins, Ontario, Canada, Jeff Bertrand, a singer/guitarist, and Pete Ryan, a bassist who had just moved down from Kirkland Lake, decided to start up a band to have some fun covering and writing songs. After asking around for a bit, they found a second guitarist named Ryan O'Hare and a kick ass drummer named Adam Jones. By this time it was near the end of 2000, and these four guys started practicing together in Adam's basement. But it wasn't long before Ryan ended up leaving the band and getting replaced by a friend named Andrew Sutherland. Those guys also didn't last too long before Andrew ended up leaving around March 2001. Things looked pretty bad for a while and not much was going on, until a guitar player and singer named Brad Martel quit his band and asked to join drawoff .
Once the band accepted, this lineup started learning a bunch of cover songs and eventually hoping to play a show. Brad and Jeff even wrote a couple of original songs together. In December of 2002 they played their very first show, immediately (and almost too quickly) followed by two more in the same month. Since then, the band has been keeping quiet, but working hard on new songs and getting a little tighter as a band. The guitars are getting cleaner, the melodies catchier and the rhythms heavier.
We're no longer afraid to try something slow; non-distorted guitars aren't so bad anymore. The confinement of a melodic punk label has been lifted. All of a sudden punk music just isn't punk music for drawoff anymore.
