The true (and long) story of how Wrong Way came to be begins at a restaurant in a little town called Athens, Georgia. Every year, the employees of this restaurant, the Grill to be exact, would get together for their annual Christmas Party. The tradition was that the employees would form a band to perform at the party. Anybody who could play an instrument was welcome. The Grill Band would learn any song that any other employee wanted them to, provided that the person requesting the song had to sing it with the band at the party. In 2004, three soon to be members of Wrong Way (Scott on drums, Doug on bass, Joel on guitar) performed at the annual Christmas Party. While each of those individuals was involved with a number of other musical projects, they realized that the chemistry was there and they had a blast playing together.
In early 2005, shortly after the Grill Christmas Party, an opportunity arose for one of those individuals, Scott, to play a show at a club called Last Call. He contacted Doug and asked him if he was interested at all. The idea was to play an entire set of Sublime songs, strictly as a side project and possibly only as a one-time thing. Doug agreed. Scott found two other members, Phil (guitar) and Blake (vocals/guitar) to round out the group. They played their first show together isometime in February 2005. The show was packed. People from all over turned out to show how much they loved the music of Sublime.
Unfortunately, things didn't really work out with the original lead singer Blake and after that very first show, he and the band parted ways. The band then held auditions. During those auditions, they heard a singer who they thought was fantastic. J.T. was a member of yet another original band in Athens, Sounds of Silence, and after seeing him perform with his own band, they knew he was a great fit. Once they had the singer position filled, they went back to Last Call to play another show. Again, it was packed.
Quickly, they realized that this thing was a lot bigger than they initially intended. Within 2 or 3 months of forming, they were being contacted by booking agents with show offers in nearby towns. So, they did what any musicians would do, and they took the show on the road. During this time, Doug also contacted his childhood friend Geoff to see if he would come out and play keyboard/samples on some of the songs. Geoff agreed and from then on he became the fifth member of the band
In the later part of 2005, Phil, who was also involved with his own musical projects, needed to take some time off from the band. Doug and Scott immediately thought of Joel, whom they had played with the year before at the Grill Party. He was performing with several bands (Bling the Children Back Home and Grogus) so it seemed like a long shot, but they tried anyway. Luckily Joel was interested. As it turned out, Joel quickly became the full time guitarist/vocalist for the band!
After nearly another year and a half, JT and the band also decided to part ways. He wanted to focus more on his original project, while they wanted to continue to grow and tour. It was then that they met Mike Sparrow. Mike was a singer of yet another Athens-based original band called Dark Horse. He was introduced to the band by their friend Daniel, owner of Pigpen Studios in Athens. Mike showed up to an early rehearsal and impressed the band by knowing nearly every lyric to every single song that they played. His vocal nuances and his ability to sound like Bradley were uncanny.
It was at this time that Scott, also decided to leave the band to focus on his original band, We Versus the Shark. Fortunately, his brother Brady had already been filling in for the band when Scott was touring with the Sharks and so he was a perfect fit as a replacement.
For two years this new line-up toured all over the Southeast and beyond. Their chemistry only got better and better. Their fan base grew and they had a blast playing shows every weekend. In those two years, they performed nearly 240 shows.
Then, in early 2009, tragedy struck the band when they found out that their friend and fellow band mate, Mike Sparrow, had taken his own life. Faced with such a tragedy, the band questioned whether or not it would continue on. Not knowing what else to do, they continued performing. They contacted JT and asked him if he’d be interested in filling in for a few shows. Fortunately for them, JT was willing and still knew all the material.
Only weeks before Mike’s passing, the band had also met another very talented singer, Anthony, who was also working on his own original music at the time. Anthony, who had been friends with Mike, expressed interest in joining the band and after a few months of rehearsals, Anthony became the new, full-time singer for the band.
And that is the long version of how Wrong Way, in it’s current incarnation, came to be.