PASS THE FIST, YO >>>

It's 2004, the apex of the Bush years. Greg Mudarri, Noah Wolf, Eric Gosselin and Dave Paige are unwinding in a Beantown basement after logging another practice session as Formosa. Mudarri, a gifted sculptor and origami artist, finds a wad of Play-Doh and forms it into a clenched fist.

"Noah thought that making something hard and aggressive out of something soft and innocent was an interesting idea," Mudarri recalls.

The four musicians - who had just elected to self-release an EP of wild, progressive violin punk - suddenly had a punny name for their self-started label: Pass the Fist.

But that Formosa EP never actually saw the light of day. As Wolf puts it, the band played "one chaotic, semi-disaster equipment malfunction of a show" and dissolved shortly thereafter. Mudarri moved to Tokyo, and Wolf, Gosselin and Paige relocated to Los Angeles and formed Wreck of the Zephyr, a band inspired by '90s alt-punk greats and named after a 1983 children's book by Chris Van Allsburg.

Wreck of the Zephyr will play Le Voyeur in Olympia Saturday.

To read Jason Baxter's full article, click here.