Leeds was the most exciting place to be in England in 2003 when we met there. The New Yorkshire scene was just finding its feet and everyone was in a band. We didn’t form OSA for a long time though. We were all playing in other bands and getting drunk at Blackwire gigs (and studying.) Sometimes people in music look down on us for having completed our degrees, as if we’d be far more interesting people if we hadn’t read so much Shakespeare but had smoked more crack. Fuck that.
Anyway we formed a three piece and moved to London only to discover various forms of anger, disappointment, and disillusionment about what all our glorious education had been for. We knew that religion, politics and philosophy were fucked so we thought we might as well risk it all on popular culture.
We found a derelict flat above a bar in Manchester, quit our mind numbing jobs, rang Mike and asked if he wanted to join us and changed our lives. We played music 10 hours a day, cooked on a camp stove, slept on the floor, bought 7" singles from Piccadilly Records, drank free beer in the bar downstairs, watched Clash documentaries, went to parties at the Islington Mill and generally worked and played very hard.
