The three original members of
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, lead guitarist
Will Knauer, drummer
Philip Dickey, and bassist
Tom Hembree, met in high school in Springfield, MO, thanks to a mutual friend, and soon formed a band. It was
Dickey who came up with their name while shopping with his mother one day in the local mall, and he also wrote most of their songs. Once in college, the trio added singer/guitarist
John Robert Cardwell and bassist/recording engineer
Jonathan James, and the band's debut album,
Broom, recorded in
Knauer's home and originally only meant to be a local release, came out in 2005. However, after the band posted some songs on its website, SPIN got wind of the group and soon
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin's name was all over music blogs. Their song "Oregon Girl" even ended up on an episode of The O.C. in the spring of 2006. A few months later Polyvinyl Records signed the band, remastering and reissuing
Broom later that year, though by this time both
Hembree and
James had left (the latter still played with them when he could), turning
SSLYBY back into a three-piece but with a rotating cast of additional guest musicians.
James joined back up with the band full-time, however, for their second full-length, Pershing (and
Hembree actually did the cover art), which was released in April of 2008. ~ Marisa Brown, All Music Guide