Mike Shannon stumbled onto the band name 4th Ward during his '98-'99 recording sessions with Eddie Z, held over at the original Playroom Studios…which were located above a fish store in 4th Ward, Charlotte, NC. Mike reflects: "Just for a moment I thought about going with Fish…just to piss off Phish fans. But I figured I end up being sued by Country Joe (of Country Joe and the Fish)."
4th Ward's self-titled 2000 release ranked #20 of the top 200 adds on the National CMJ charts. "The album of the day. Imaginative and well crafted", wrote Dominick Miserandino of Celebrity Cafe. Creative Loafing's Tim Davis referred to the group's tunes as being "original without trying to be trendy."
Chick Tsikouras joined shortly after the initial 2000 release. The group played throughout the region - opening for Hootie and the Blowfish and Angie Aparo. Both Mike & Chick co-wrote the follow up release Wonderland (2002). But the release never fully got out of the gate due to legal, financial & personnel problems. By 2004 4th Ward was heading in a new direction. Chick offers: “Wonderland’s is a good record of what we were doing back in 2002 & 2003. It’s to bad hardly anyone heard the CD back then…cause now people are checking out the tunes but we no longer sound anything like that disk”
With 4th Ward now done, Mike & Chick spent 2005 working on new material, a new direction and name, Big Bus Dream. 2005 was also spent in the studio with Jamie Hoover (Spongetones, Smithereens & Hootie and the Blowfish.) The debut, self-titled release is being released on the new independent label, 4th Ward Records.
