A funny thing happened yesterday. You might recall that I mentioned how I had obviously been a bit lax in updating this site. After I posted that article I felt a bit silly even acknowledging that I’d been lax because I’m not really sure that anyone even reads what I post here. Sure, a couple friends do, I’m sure, I can tell by the comments. But how many strangers read this blog? How many people not already intimately aware of the events surrounding the items posted here actually care?
Welp, as I got home yesterday, I had an email from a fella named Thomas Kretchmar. What follows is his email. I thought it was generous of him to take the time to write down his own thoughts so I asked if I could share them here. He said yes!
Sadly, he couldn’t furnish me with a photo of himself from the mid to late 90’s to go with the email. I think that might be a fun project to work on. Here’s his email. Enjoy.
Wow, Brian. I started going to punk shows in Philly late summer 1995, and then really got in the mix of that scene that fall/winter and in the years thereafter. I never heard a Fracture track until some time in the winter of 97/98 when my friend JohnPaul played a track – might have been Non Serviam – on WKDU and I immediately called in to ask him “what the hell was that?” — the song he had just played, melodic but blazing, had totally blown my mind. When he told me it was a local band that I had “just missed” my mind was blown again.
I was pretty involved in the Philly scene by that point and spent the next year of my life trying to get a hold of any Fracture records floating around out there. Nobody would part with theirs. I finally got a copy of the second 7″ from Sean Agnew by trading him a cordless phone for it (which I guess were pretty expensive things at the time). Or maybe it was the LP, not the second 7″. Can’t remember which I got first. I just remember the phone seeming like a very reasonable thing to part with to finally own some Fracture wax. After many more months of work I think I finally ended up with two copies of the second 7″, one of Lime, and two copies of the LP. (Had to double up where I could; those records were like gold.)
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It killed me then (still does now) that I missed seeing Fracture live by what had to be the smallest window. I spent a lot of time trying to get information from people about Fracture, just to learn the story, etc. I heard some good bits here and there, but never a fully painted picture.Life moves on and I’m 34 and I’m in NYC and all professional and white collar and somewhat grown up, but I still listen to punk tracks almost every day at work and at home. Like everyone else, I think, from time to time I hit up google to try and learn something new about some song or band that I already know. I probably hadn’t googled Fracture in a year or so until earlier today when I gave the anthology a spin for the first time in a while. And, whoa — the GoKidGo page came up. The unbelievably detailed GoKidGo Fracture page. With a goldmine of Fracture information. Christmas in April for me. Well Hannukah, whatever.
Anyway I just wanted to drop a note to say thanks for putting all of those posts up. I noticed in the “information” section you say that you put the site up so that “the folks involved could revisit from time to time” — well, believe me, there are probably tons of people out there like me who you never even met who are extremely, extremely appreciative of the effort involved. Thanks so much. Finding this treasure trove really made my day. It’s unreal to me that 15 years after first hearing Fracture – who I’ve long called one of my favorite punk bands ever – I finally actually know the band’s story and its stories. Thank you.
Tom
Thanks Tom! And the photo above is of Fracture playing the 5 Arlington space in Ottawa Ontario the summer of 1995. Photo by the ever talented Shawn Scallen.
