Artist description Four guys out of Parsippany, NJ just looking to jam out some tunes.

Music Style Rock/Jamming

Musical Influences Phish, Beatles, Led Zeppelin

Similar Artists Phish, Beatles, Led Zeppelin

Artist History Outlet was first formed in 1995 by John Kleinchester, Tim Bullock and Frank DiGiacomo. This Outlet, merely one acoustic guitar, one electric guitar and a $300 drum set, was the foundation that started everything. Without a bassist, and with a big lack of talent, the three still relentlessly met hardly being able to pluck out a jam. They went on, meeting every once in awhile in John's basement. Around the summer of 1996, Corey Sanders joined the ranks as the bassist. He gave a bit more variety to Outlet...now they actually had a full band. The only problem was the talent. Once Corey joined, the band met a bit more often then before, and they slowly progressed, cranking out a few nice jams. The next summer, Outlet decided that they were ready to perform for the public. The foursome, John, Corey, Tim, and Frank signed up for the Parsippany Hills High School Variety Show. They had to try out to make it into the show, though, so this was to be a test for the band. They began rehearsing for the tryout and this is when it became apparent that the band needed a change. Their drummer, Frank DiGiacomo, was hardly ever able to make it to a practice because of prior commitments. They needed a drummer though, so they had to drop Frank from the Outlet ranking. Frank understood completely and is still a good friend of the band. To replace Frank, they brought in rookie drummer Ian Sheppard, a good friend to the entire band. Ian had hardly ever played drums and only knew a few of the basics. Frank's set remained at John's house, so Ian used Frank's set to practice for the Variety Show. They soon tried out and made it in covering Third Eye Blind's "Semi-Charmed Life". It was a popular song, so they figured it was the safest for them to get over with the crowd. In October of 1997, Outlet made it's very first public performance. It was mostly a success, thankfully for the members. It was certainly not a spectacular outing, but it was something. In October of 1998, the new Outlet line-up decided to give another try to public performance, this time covering the rock-ballad "Two Step" by the Dave Matthews Band. This year, they were joined by saxophonist Jeff Quinn, who stole the show with an excellent solo. All in all it was a decent performance, as was well-recieved when it opened the 1998 PHHS Variety Show. October of 1999 rolled around, and the members of Outlet decided they would want to to play again, since it would be their last Variety Show in high school. A problem arose, however. Drummer Ian Sheppard would not be available for the performance due to prior commitments. That's when (also) rookie drummer Jeff Quinn stepped in. After performing with Outlet the year before, he knew what he was getting into. With very little drumming experience, Jeff and the rest of Outlet took the stage without Ian to perform "Sample in a Jar," originally by Phish. Anyone in the audience that night could tell that Outlet was slowly improving. After the Variety Show in '99, the musical tastes of Corey, John, Jeff, and Tim grew even more similar as each began listening more and more to Phish and other talented artists. Ian, however, did not like Phish and therefore it became somewhat of a problem to play all together with three out of the four members wanting to cover Phish songs. In early 2000, Outlet decided it would try it's hand at the PHHS Gong Show, since it would give them one last opportunity to play at their high school. Tim, Corey, and John had talked about it, and decided that they wanted to play some Phish. After approacing Ian with this information, Ian decided that he did not really want to play any Phish. Jeff Quinn then resumed his role as Outlet drummer and they proceded to cover The Beatles' "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," and Phish's "Down With Disease" and "Reba". The performance was personally Outlet's favorite, as they felt it was their most musically superb thus far. As 2000 went on, Jeff continued as the drummer as Outlet continued practicing their improvisational skills. In the meantime, Outlet inducted it's third drummer officially as Jeff Quinn replaced Ian Sheppard. In August of 2000, the four Outlet members went their seperate ways to college, vowing to play during every break.

Group Members John Kleinchester - Bass; Tim Bullock - guitar, vocals; Corey Sanders - piano, vocals; Jeff Quinn - drums

Instruments Electric guitar, Acoustic guitar, Bass guitar, Keyboard, Piano, Organ, Drums, Percussion

Albums None

Location Parsippany, NJ - USA

Copyright notice. All material on MP3.com is protected by copyright law and by international treaties. You may download this material and make reasonable number of copies of this material only for your own personal use. You may not otherwise reproduce, distribute, publicly perform, publicly display, or create derivative works of this material, unless authorized by the appropriate copyright owner(s).