The Yell Leaders came together, essentially, as a recording side-project. Though still rather young at the time, Joe Vent, Bobby Tanzilo (ex-Blowtorch drummer), and Brian Wooldridge (bassist for Squares) were already veterans of various working Milwaukee, Wisconsin bands. The three went into the studio to cut a few pop songs that Vent had written between gigs with other bands (Squares, Jamesons, Blowtorch’s Forces of Victory). Since the sessions went better than expected, the three decided to become an official gigging combo. Their first two 7” singles on Don’t Records (co-founded by Wooldridge and Vent) garnered rave reviews from Billboard and the BBC's John Peel, among others, The Yell Leaders toured regularly throughout the upper Midwest, where they shared the stage with the likes of Semisonic, K's Choice, Del Amitri, Evan Dando, Whiskeytown, Citizen King, The Verve Pipe, Cheap Trick, and others. Columbia/Tri-Star Television tapped “Windchill,” the opening track on 1996’s Up For Steam, a six-song CD EP mixed by Brew City wünderkind Mike Hoffmann, for use in an episode of Fox Television’s hit youth drama Party of Five. In fact, though only including six songs, that EP yielded several song uses, for film and television, worldwide….most recently for the Japanese/Korean film Clap Your Hands If You Are Happy, in 2006. The band released Cornelia Street, in May 1999, on indie OneFifteen Records. The 12 original songs track the group's maturation since Up for Steam, again working with Hoffmann….but this time, utilizing his skills as a full-blown producer. A cover of Bruce Springsteen's “I Wish I Were Blind” was featured on one of the singles culled from One Step Up/Two Steps Back, the EMI/Right Stuff tribute to The Boss. Noxajoy, released in 2002, was chock full of soul stirring, quirky, melodious pop/rock craftsmanship, in the vein of Del Amitri, XTC, Elvis Costello, Rolling Stones, and even Fleetwood Mac. Comparisons to other artists, however, were not entirely fair. Noxajoy also marked The Yell Leaders' debut at the helm, as they co-produced the disc with Milwaukee legend Bill Stace, at his Walls Have Ears Studio. Though much of the raw energy of a live show is detectable on Noxajoy, it is a studio album in the grand tradition…overcoming the sonic limits of what the (then) four-piece could accomplish live. Vent and Tanzilo continued working on new recordings for what should become an edgy, yet tuneful new project.