“We can all be Two Beasts at any given moment...” - Chris Shaffer, March, 1998

Melody is the driving force behind The Why Store. No matter if they boost the volume and tempo (as with “When You’re High,” “Everybody” and “Working” on their new disc, Two Beasts), slow things down (“Story Song,” “Two Beasts”) or groove on a theme for 10 minutes (as they’re wont to do at times), melody is always right there. “We’ve always put the song first, the melody first,” states Chris Shaffer, The Why Store’s chief musical architect. “We want to be able to sing the guitar solos. We like to have our jam sessions during the show, but we really love to focus on the melody.”

The Why Store’s roots can be traced to 1989, when Shaffer, Greg Gardner and Michael Smith, who was a drummer at the time, met as students at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. Initially calling themselves Emerald City, Shaffer, Gardner and Smith - who’d since switched to lead guitar - soon outgrew the local circuit, and armed with a showcase in New York City, they sought out the best drummer in town. That was Charlie Bushor. Together, the foursome toured incessantly and made enough money on merchandising to record three albums on their own. Keyboardist Jeff Pedersen, who guested on the second and third CDs, was made an official member at about the same time their not-yet-released third album came to the attention of upstart Way Cool Music (a subsidiary of MCA Records).

The Why Store signed a deal and spent 1996 amassing solid national radio support from the mainstream Rock, Active Rock and Triple-A formats. In fact, “Lack Of Water,” the first single from their self-titled major label debut, ultimately gave The Why Store a Top 20 track at Rock Radio, a Top 20 album for the year at Triple-A Radio and a #1single at Triple-A Radio. Sales of roughly 200,000 gave everyone reason to expect big things from the follow-up.

“I was actually kind of frightened, because we had a lot to live up to,” Shaffer admits of the expectations as they wrote and culled more than two dozen songs for the August, 1997, sessions for what became Two Beasts, their sophomore national release. “Everything was on the band’s and Mike Wanchic’s (John Mellencamp’s longtime co-producer and guitarist) shoulders as far as producing this record. So there was a little bit of pressure. I was confident, but in the back of my mind I was going, ‘I hope we can do this, man.’ But what was really beautiful was that once we got in the studio, that all went away.”

Taking their already impressive record-making skills up a sizable notch, Two Beasts comes more than two years after their 1996 self-titled debut. One reason for the delay was that they never really slowed down long enough to get it done-Shaffer figures they did about 250 shows after they’d finished touring to support that 1996 album. An imposing figure onstage, Shaffer is the focal point of Why Store shows, along with the unabashedly flashy Smith, who lets fly a tasty array of soulful licks, speedy riffs and tuneful solos that have the capacity to bring musicianship and panache back into vogue “Michael’s basically a genius freak on guitar,” is how Shaffer puts it.

At a time in pop music history when we’re bombarded with a steady flow of Johnny-come-lately bands who rise and disappear before they even learn to play their instruments, it’s refreshing to hear a CD like Two Beasts from a band like The Why Store. Replete with stellar songs played by talented musicians, Two Beasts is an album in the classic sense, holding up well under repeated listenings for many reasons, especially that inescapable melody