Paul and Storm

From Homestar Runner Wiki

Revision as of 19:41, 29 March 2007

DaVinci's Notebook

Origins	Arlington
Genre(s)	A cappella Comedy
Members	Bernie Muller-Thym Storm DiCostanzo Paul Sabourin Richard Hsu
Discography	Bendy's Law The Life and Times of Mike Fanning Brontosaurus
Producer	N/A

DaVinci's Notebook (DVN) is an a cappella singing group consisting of Bernie Muller-Thym, Greg "Storm" DiCostanzo, Paul Sabourin, and Richard Hsu. Two members of the group, Paul and Storm, performed Ballad of The Sneak. The song is available on a CD entitled "Paul and Storm: Shame and Cookie Dough."

The group was formed in Virginia in 1994 and has performed at stages and festivals across the country. For personal reasons, DaVinci's Notebook is no longer touring. However, Paul and Storm are currently touring with Jonathan Coulton.

The Making of Ballad of The Sneak

DVN discovered the site through a link on Memepool.com (listed on July 4, 2001). Almost immediately, the band became Homestar Runner fans. According to Greg "Storm" DiCostanzo, this was well before The Brothers Chaps started doing the Strong Bad Emails. They have been fans of The Brothers Chaps since. According to Storm, the subject of which band member actually brought Homestar Runner to the band's attention first, is a subject of debate amongst the group.

Storm states that Paul more or less stalked the Brothers Chaps because DVN thought the Brothers Chaps were utterly hysterical, and because Paul had a talent for getting in touch with interesting people. Paul wrote that he "used his mad Interwebs stalking skills and a phone book...and it was early enough in their career that they were more flattered than creeped out when I tracked them down." They eventually convinced them to come see one of DVN's gigs when they came to their town, and a friendship was born.

The Brothers Chaps at one point said they'd love DVN to contribute a song. Later, the Brother's Chaps specifically asked DVN to write an Old-Timey themed song for The Sneak. Aside from describing it as Old-Timey and being about the Old-Timey version of The Cheat, the Brothers Chaps just let DVN do their thing.

Paul and Storm passed lyrics back and forth (over email, mostly). The song was very loosely based on The Skate Party's The Cheat Theme Song. It was recorded at Paul's house, and the vocals are mostly Paul. Storm recalls that they wrapped it up pretty quickly, though they worked on it in between a lot of DVN projects and tours over a month. The actual work time was a handful of hours. Paul added that the many random sound effects were put in the song mainly to see what they would end up doing with them.

Paul noted that the chronological inconsistencies (references to Tammany Hall, the Hully Gully, the Kaiser, prohibition, etc.) were, for the most part, intentional; partly to keep with the overall feel the Brother Chaps had established with the toon. The goal was to contribute to the overall Old-timeness and partly to see if people would point them out.

Storm recalls being very excited to see how the song would be interpereted by The Brothers Chaps. They wondered if Ballad of the Sneak would match what they had in their heads (It pretty much did). About a month from when DVN sent the completed song to The Brothers Chaps, Ballad of the Sneak toon appeared on the Homestar Runner site.

External links

DaVinci's Notebook