The National Splits

the national splits is the solo recording project of me, mike downey. the splits originally formed as a guitar/drums duo of myself and dan marsden in late 2000 after i had left the band wolfie. over the next year or so we played occassional shows and self-released an ep. but, we also had our hands in a four piece band called the new constitution and were trying to establish that as well. once the new constitution started playing shows regularly we quickly realized that we could not take on both bands at the same time. this is when i took on the splits as a solo project. after releasing my debut full length and 7" i started to tour solo, breaking the songs down to their core and performing them with an acoustic guitar. these solo performances dwindled as the new constitution's schedule became more involved. for the release of "fontana" the new constitution played as the national splits for the first ever full band splits show. i really have no idea if this will ever happen again (or if i'll perform solo either), only time will tell. live performances aside, my heart is in this project and i hold it very close and hope to continue releasing material on a regular schedule as long as i possibly can. thanks for checking in . - mike downey 10/03