First thing you should do is check out the Scruffy the Cat prehistory provided by Eric Coleman , (who swears that every word is true, even the things he wrote about himself). It has info about Scruffy's Iowa roots, the band's ties to the Young Fresh Fellows and Charlie Chesterman's pre-Scruffy band called the Law.

Scruffy's first appearance on record was the tune "The Oldest Fire in the World" on the Throbbing Lobster Let's Breed compilation, which was released in 1984. After signing with Relativity, the band released two EPs and two full-length LPs. The six-song High Octane Revival, which was produced by Dave Minehan of the Neighborhoods, came out in 1986. 1987 saw the release of Tiny Days, which was produced by Chris Butler of the Waitresses, and the EP Boom Boom Boom Bingo. Scruffy's swan-song, the 16-track Moons of Jupiter, was produced by the legendary Jim Dickinson and released in 1989.

The band's lineup was pretty steady over the years. It included:

• Charlie Chesterman -- Vocals and guitar
• Stephen Fredette -- Guitar
• Mac Paul Stanfield -- Bass
• Randall Lee Gibson IV -- Drums
• Stona Fitch -- Multi-instrumentalist
• Burns Stanfield -- Piano/organ

All of the band members were credited with writing songs, which makes Scruffy's consistent tunefulness that much more impressive. Fitch, I should point out, left the band sometime around 1987.

Like most bands, Scruffy did their share of touring. They of course had a rather loyal following in Boston, and the group was apparently pretty popular in the mid-west. Despite generating a good deal of national interest (there was even an article in Newsweek), Scruffy never really got their due, and sometime during the early 1990s, the band called it a day.

For some informative quotes from Charlie Chesterman about Scruffy's demise, check out this article from No Depression written in 1997. (this link is dead - if anyone has this article please send it along to admin@tinybum.com )