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Band The BellyGods hail from Birmingham, Alabama, featuring Tony Middleton on guitar and vocals, Brian Smith on the bass, and James Tunnell on drums and vocals. Tony and James have been playing together in various bands since 1989. Brian first joined with them to form Blindman's Holiday with drummer Steve Ranelli in 1995. Sometime later Corey McGraw came along to replace Steve, and singer Jonathan Darden joined the band, allowing the musicians to concentrate on their instruments. After Jon joined the band, they played several shows and even got some airplay on a local radio station. Soon, they found out that at least two other groups were using the name Blindman's Holiday, so the name was changed to Searching for Ground. Many great songs were written and many shows were played until the band broke up for good in May 2000... sort of! The members returned for one more show at Barnstormer's Pizza in May 2003. Barnstormer's was closed later that year and SFG died with it. Later in 2003 James, Tony and Brian decided to get back to music as the BellyGods with former Rade drummer Jason Gibson and vocalist Eric McGinty of Avery Ellis Exhibit(s). This group was to be a money making band and would be mostly if not all covers. Unfortunately, Eric had more to do than he could handle and was forced to quit, and Jason went on to other things as well before the band even got underway. Finally, James became frustrated with the problem of finding a drummer (there are a few others that have come and gone, not mentioned above). He decided that the only viable solution was to become the drummer himself. So, he bought a set of drums and cymbals and did it! Jonathan Darden returned for a while, and his vocal talents are featured on the first four-song demo that the BellyGods recorded in 2004. However, he has since quit the group again, and left vocal duties to James and Tony. Currently, the BellyGods are out around Birmingham playing a collection of new material and the best of the old SFG tunes. The new sound is more riff-based, a little reminiscent of Led Zeppelin but with a bit more modern flavor. Come check it out soon at a club near you! more
James Tunnell 22 January 2007 01:12