Big Head Todd & The Monsters came by their lengthy career the old fashioned way: they earned it, through extensive touring and quality songwriting.
The band — singer, songwriter, guitarist Todd Park Mohr, drummer Brian Nevin and bassist Rob Squires — met at the now-infamous Columbine High School near Denver and formed the band in 1986 (they added Jeremy Lawton on guitar and keyboards in 2004). With a sound built on a foundation of rock, and augmented by elements of folk and the blues, and smidgeons of R&B and soul, Big Head Todd & The Monsters straddle many musical categories; their legendary live performances, in which they generously show off their chops, get them lumped in with the jam band crowd most often.
BHTM has had its share of hit songs, notably "Bittersweet," "Broken Hearted Savior" and a cover of John Lee Hooker's classic "Boom Boom," which they recorded with the bluesman himself (coaxed to the session by The Talking Heads' Jerry Harrison, who produced the band's Beautiful World disc).
Since Crimes Of Passion — their most recent studio offering, recorded at Mohr's solar-powered studio — The Monsters have written and recorded a song for the Space Shuttle program ("Blue Sky"). They're working on a new CD (slated for 2008), and in the meantime they've released a compilation of rare, unreleased early songs called From The Archives Vol. 1.
Provenance: Littleton, Colorado
Latest release: From The Archives Vol. 1 (2007)
© 2007 Nigel Music Media LLC. Used by permission.
Big Head Todd
