Artist description Jam band from South Dakota playing a folk inspired form of groove rock.

Music Style Jam band play folk inspired groove rock

Musical Influences Phish, Rusted Root, Grateful Dead

Similar Artists Phish, Jayhawks, Rusted Root, Grateful Dead

Artist History A BRIEF HISTORY In the mid 90's Tom Whillock left a thriving music career working with groups like Children (with Kory Van Sickle of Kory & The Fireflies) and Ghost Dance in Sioux Falls to move to the Black Hills. Shortly after arriving in Rapid City, Tom began to play…mostly acoustic music at first…then with a great band…Toadstool Jamboree. Formed during the recording of the folk inspired CD "Homegrown" (now out of print), Toadstool Jamboree's core of Tom Whillock on guitar/vocals, Pamela Hemmingsen on vocals and Chuck Loos on drums later met up with Mike Brennan on bass and saxophonist/accordionist Mike Monahan. This is the Toadstool that rose in popularity with the release of "Tongue in Groove" in late 1998 and the subsequent year spent playing everywhere imaginable from the Black Hills Heritage Festival & Sturgis Rock Fest to opening for the The Kentucky Headhunters and many bars & festivals in between. In the fall of 1999, after selling a couple thousand CDs and playing what seemed like as many dates, Chuck Loos had an offer to manage a recording studio in Idaho, and Mike Brennan was looking to go to Oregon. That's when the band decided to called it quits at a final show on a cool fall night on the Firehouse Brewing Company patio. Parts of these final shows are forever immortalized on the now out of print "Warts and All: The Last Official Bootleg" cd…a disc reminiscent of the bootleg tapes the band would hand out every New Year's to some loyal fans. Toadstool Jamboree obviously thought they were done…but time changes everything. In the summer of 2000 the band was asked to open for Joan Jett & The Blackhearts at Sturgis RockFest IV. Tom decided to have some fun since Mike Brennan had just returned to the Black Hills. So they found a drummer to fill in and took the gig. Chris Cady, the guitarist who played with Toadstool that final year was going strong with his own band "Brother Otis" and was unavailable, so Tom recruited Corey Ward to fill in on lead guitar having done an acoustic show with Corey that St. Patrick's Day. After that successful opening act gig, Kory & The Fireflies called to have Toadstool Open for them at the Central States Fair. That same day Chuck Loos was returning to the Black Hills and agreed to play the gig. By the time they played the Steven's High Homecoming that next month, the band was virtually back in business. Tom Whillock had written a few more songs and had a couple he wrote with Kory Van Sickle so he wanted the band to work them out. After a couple months, studio time was booked, a distribution deal was cut, and Toadstool was off recording "Naked in the Rain" and ready to play more dates. Summer 2001 has come, and "Naked in the Rain" marks Toadstool Jamboree's return in a big way with a powerful album of original music…some familiar to Toadstool fans…some new…all good. So the groove continues. Listen to the cd or come to a show and you will quickly be caught up in a Toadstool groove.

Group Members Tom Whillock - Guitar/Vocals/Songs Chuck Loos - Drums/Percussion Pam Hemmingsen - Vocals Mike Brennan - Bass Mike Monahan - Sax/Accordian Corey Ward - Guitar

Instruments Guitars, Drums, Bass, Sax, Accordian,

Location Rapid City, SD - USA

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