Music Style Catchy progressive power pop rock

Musical Influences 70's prog rock, 90's grunge

Similar Artists Rush, Soundgarden, Tears For Fears, Genesis, King's X

Artist History It all started when Robert James bought a 4-track cassette machine and asked his piano teacher how to use it. A few lessons away from the ivories and at the helm of this recording device started the songwriting muse and with the help of 2 friends-Steve and Vito-things became Unreal. That was the name of the band and they soon had a rudimentary recording of the songs written the summer after graduation. Later, he’d be working at the recording studio his piano teacher owned and operated because of the quality of that tape! He now had run of the studio and took full advantage. These three guys weren’t trying their hand at Rush covers anymore, but recording with an 8-track and later a 16-track and had an album in mind. Sadly, these friends became mostly bandmates and went their separate ways in the summer of ‘90. With their replacements Jeff and Rob Durham, the band now had 2 lead vocalists and 2 principal songwriters. Half a year later, Rob and Rob started from scratch and had to find a new guitarist. With a need for a new batch of songs, James found himself writing that summer of ’91. Pat would join that August and they played their first gig at Montclair State by November under the moniker-3RDegree. Over the summer an old friend from Polygram Records became interested in these songs and in March of ’93 they had a cassette released on his Reindeer Records label. Nothing much became of this arrangement but at least they had a first album in the bag-included in its entirety here. One of the first things they started working on after The World in Which We Live cassette, was a conceptual track with six parts. Parts one, two and six would end up on CD years later but parts three, four and five were scrapped after the main tracks were laid down. Other tracks from around this time are represented in this collection. While “Misfortune On Main Street” was worldly, “Tomorrow” and “When All Else Fails” were more personal tunes that were close to finished before being cut from the Human Interest Story collection. It was at this time that they also recorded three Todd Rundgren songs for a tribute CD. One was never finished, another the “mystery track” on the next CD and “Kindness” which made the cut. Tired with the years of recording and things apparently going nowhere, Rob Durham decided to leave the fold in April of ’95, almost simultaneously with the hunt for a fourth member to handle the lead vocals. This decision was hinted at for years by Panetta and others to give the band an extra punch. Human Interest Story was practically finished by the time George Dobbs’ Gabriel meets Fagen-demo tape caught the ears of all interested parties but the re-recording of vocals and reworking of some songs with new lyrics and melodic twists by Dobbs would take nearly another year by the time the CD would be ready in April of ’96. With the arrival of Dobbs came a re-arrival by Durham. Most significant was the improvement in the live sound which was now played without any technological assistance, freeing up James-happy with the new arrangement-to recreate the demanding parts on stage. Haunted by those who didn’t get the progressive leanings of their music and often cast out by those in the 90’s prog-rock scene who saw them as not holding up the torch high enough, 3RDegree would go on to write almost another album’s worth of material in ’96. Taking these criticisms into account, they ended up with a somewhat streamlined sound of which two tracks are represented here. Despite glowing reviews and the feeling within the band that the songlist was “special”, the ever-increasing money pit of keeping the band competitive, the ever-excruciating process of getting people to come to live shows and other negative things that happen to 99% of bands caused 3RDegree’s founder to throw in the towel in January of ’97-much to his dismay-but saddeningly not many others. By November of the same year, James reformed the band for a one off recording of a Marillion track for a tribute CD. Here they were, back in a recording studio-just about the only place the band could ever get satisfaction.

Group Members George Dobbs-vocals, additional keyboards Robert James Pashman-keyboards, bass, backing vocals Pat Kliesch-guitars, backing vocals Rob Durham-drums, backing vocals

Instruments Drums, bass, guitars, keyboards, vocals

Albums THE WORLD IN WHICH WE LIVE-1993, HUMAN INTEREST STORY-1996, INNOCENT ENOUGH-2002

Press Reviews 3.5 stars out of 4 3rDegree has put together a very sound album full of progressive rock that shows most of the standard prog ingredients but without sounding derivative or redundant. For that reason alone, they are a certain breath of fresh air in the 90s prog scene. As for influences, I suppose that hear a little Yes and Rush in there, and I assume that the band has a thing for Todd Rundgren ("Fascist Christ" is a Rundgren track and the liner notes show that they participated in a Rundgren tribute project). The sound is mostly guitar driven, with keyboard backing adding texture. There's also plenty of good work from the bass and drums to keep things interesting. George Dobbs has an interesting voice, with a certain condescending quality that works quite well on the title track. He's augmented by four part harmonies in a lot of places that work quite well, even if they aren't terribly complex in a Yes/echolyn kind of way. The song writing here is fairly strong. The tunes themselves don't break any ground, but the band has a good handle on when to stop and move on. While a lot of 90s prog bands seem to insist on writing an epic every time out, 3rDegree seem to be content to let a song that should only be three minutes long actually stay three minutes long. In fact, if "13 / Mistakes" is considered two tracks, which it really is, then only one song here clocks in a longer than five minutes. There are some things missing from the equation, however, that keep me from raving a bit more about this disc. First, there is little here in the way of instrumental work, as most of the tracks are focussed on lyrics. The music that supports them does it very well, but the individual musicians don't show their stuff all that much. A notable exception is "Black Orchid", which is a very nice acoustic guitar and synth driven instrumental. The other complaint is that while everything here is pretty good, no tune really reaches out and grabs me. I can't point to one track that makes the disc essential listening. Having said that, this album was a pleasant surprise. I have no idea what happened to the band since the release of this album. The web site listed on the CD doesn't exist anymore, so I don't know if they are even still around. I hope so, because I'd like to hear what they did after this release. Written 2/27/99

Additional Info Robert James Pashman has a solo cd called RECOVERING DREAMER, and Pat Kliesch has his own disc entitled DYFUNCTIONAL FAMILY ALBUM. George Dobbs and Rob Durham continue to work on projects of their own. Robert James Pashman and Pat Kliesch formed PORTAL with Ceci Castelblanco in 1999. It is a trip hop project that yielded 2 songs.

Location Ridgefield Park, 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).