Welcome back to the KRB Blog. As it is January 11th, I though it only fitting to tell the story of how our debut “Two Twenty Two” got its name. While I’m no John Steinbeck, this album and its title have quite the back story. You’ll be happy to know that this story will not be as long as most Steinbeck novels, nor is it set during the dust bowl. It may, however, take your mind off of today’s cloud of misinterpretations and biased headlines and provide you with three paragraphs of undisputed facts (albeit trivial) for the next however many minutes it takes you to read. So here we go. . . 

A long time ago, in a living room far far away, lived a MacBook Pro with long lost recordings of songs I forgot I had written. While listening back to songs that should have been forgotten, I stumbled upon a recording of an electric guitar playing a just a chord progression. No drums or bass, no lyrics or even or a hint of a melody, just a progression in its supernova phase. The recording was very rough using only the onboard laptop microphone to capture the sound. The progression was broken in many places with several stops and starts that were pieced together to create something closely resembling music. But the recording captured both Wayne and I instantly, again. There was certainly a reason we had not deleted this particular session. Recorded on February 22nd, we called the song 2-22 as a working title, placed it in the catalogue, added it to the rehearsal lineup, and moved on. Then something strange began to happen. Mike, Wayne, and I began to see three 2s everywhere. Known as the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, or selective attention bias, this complex suddenly focuses your mind to see something of which you have recently become aware. Maybe you are searching for a new car and like the look of a particular vehicle. Now you see that particular model on every road you drive. While science can explain this frequency illusion complex as a normal trick our brains play, we began to see it as a sign. Literally there is a  massive sign on the PA turnpike outside of Reading for route 222. It has always been there since the exit was made, but now that route number had meaning. After months and months of seeing three 2s everywhere, we made the decision to call our album 222. 

Somewhere along the way, I fell out of love with that title and began searching for an interesting lyric or song title to name the album. I even scrapped the artwork idea I had for “222” and started contemplating photoshoots and design options. I had narrowed the options to a select 3 and began drawing up plans for cover artwork only to realize the 222 theme was in that artwork. Luckily, I had quite a few years to make a final decision as we kept recording and not being satisfied with the results. Like Edison, we knew 2000 ways how not to make an album, we unearthed a successful recording method and just in the nick of time. As recording sessions were going well, I was having a conversation with my cousin and about the same time realized that February 22nd, 2022 fell on a Tuesday. Job done. That small piece of winning the galactic lottery settled the years long debate with myself as to what our album would be called. It also solidified the release date for the album. We still see three 2s in many places which confirms two things: First, science exists; Second, we’re definitely on the right track.