Last year, Joe Loeffler quit Chevelle for a while because he was sick of all the fighting. But the fighting had been going on much longer than the eight years he'd been playing bass in the band. His band mates are his older brothers. And they like to fight.
"It feeds the music," says guitarist and singer Pete Loeffler, 25, who remembers his brothers Joe, 21, and Sam, 27, throwing punches in the van during the band's first tour. "We're getting along better than ever right now, but I would never recommend this to anybody." Chevelle - one of the hottest attractions on the second stage of Ozzfest this past summer - make heart-on-their-sleeves metal, a mix of thrashing guitars and growing pains. A few of the songs on their second album, Wonder What's Next, tell their story: "Family System," "Send the Pain Below," "Closure." Is this metal or Oprah?
The Loeffler brothers grew up in suburban Illinois with a carpenter father who built hot rods and took the boys to auto shows on weekends. They started playing local parties in 1995, and they named their band after their dad's favorite ride. When Joe quit last year, he moved home to their parents' house. "He spent the summer delivering pizzas," says Pete. "Then he thought, 'What the hell am I doing?' So he asked to come back in." Pete pauses. "It was the right move."