The Starting Line

The Starting Line

The Starting Line are an American emo and pop punk group from Churchville, Philadelphia, formed in 1999. The band’s line-up includes Kenny Vasoli on vocals and bass, Matt Watts on guitar, Mike Golla on guitar, Brian Schmutz on keyboards and vocals, Tom Gryskiewicz on drums, and Ryan Altmiller. They are associated with Lineage Recordings and are known as a US rock act.

Career

The group begins with an AOL instant message from Matt Watts to Kenny Vasoli, who is then a young vocalist and bassist in Smash Adams. Within weeks, Vasoli is rehearsing with Watts, Golla and drummer Gryskewicz, and the band starts out under the name Sunday Drive. They tour with home-made merchandise and a self-recorded demo cassette called Four Songs.

Their first official release is a three-way split with The Jimmy Tuesday Band and The Commercials, issued on KickStart Audio in 2000. They then record a session for We the People Records that is intended to become a debut full-length, With Hopes of Starting Over, but the material later serves as demos for future releases. In 2001 they sign to Drive-Thru Records and release the With Hopes of Starting Over EP under the name The Starting Line, after discovering that Sunday Drive is already in use by another band.

Albums and key songs

Their debut album, Say It Like You Mean It, appears in 2002. It includes songs about stage performance, homesickness and relationships, and it produces the single “The Best of Me”, which becomes a popular release, along with “Leaving”. The album also brings the track “Island”, which later becomes a 2007 rock radio hit. The band follows this with the acoustic EP The Make Yourself at Home, recorded in several sessions between 2002 and 2003 and issued with both CD and DVD versions featuring a live set from Skate & Surf 2003 in Asbury Park, New Jersey.

After signing with Geffen Records, the band releases Based on a True Story in 2005. The album marks a shift away from the earlier relationship-led writing, and several songs express criticism of Geffen and its executives. Their major label run is followed by the Nintendo Fusion Tour with Fall Out Boy. They are later released from the Geffen deal and then sign with Virgin Records in 2006.

Hiatus, side projects and later activity

In 2008 the band announces a break so members can work on other projects: Vasoli and Schmutz focus on Person L, Watts and Gryskiewicz on The Seventy Six, and Golla on The Traded Series. Vasoli also concentrates on Person L, Gryskiewicz records with Cheap Seats, with Watts acting as manager, and Golla works on The Traded Series. The band issues its first live concert CD and documentary DVD, Somebody's Gonna Miss Us, in 2009. Later that year, it plays reunion shows in Philadelphia, and the group continues to tour intermittently.