June Star

Sun Reporter

October 19, 2006

Hometown: Baltimore

Current members: Andrew Grimm, guitar and vocals; Jay Filippone, guitar; Ryan Finnerin, bass; Tom Scanlan, mandolin; Seth Brown, drums

Founded in: 1998

Style: folk and Southern rock

Influenced by: Lou Reed, Tom Waits, the Velvet Underground, Bob Dylan

Notable: Grimm, the band's driving force, is shooting for a spring release of the latest album, Cora Belle. It's a fictional small town, kind of like Bel Air, where Grimm grew up. Grimm drew his inspiration from people he's passed and observations he's made in the past decade or so, he said.

Quotable: "They're almost like mini-short stories, most of the songs," Grimm said. "In the majority of it, the characters are looking for a way out. And it's always through some dissolution of a relationship. There are songs about one person leaving another for somebody else. There's the town drunk. It's almost like Andy Griffith."

The band: myspace.com/junestar