Ben Lance and Seth Woods met each other in 2002, at a church book club in Houston, Texas. They were both part of a relatively small Christian community that met in the Montrose neighborhood near downtown. Seth was planning a move to Austin later that year, but when that was postponed at the last minute he needed a place to stay. He wound up moving into a community house in an old converted chapel on Taft Street with five other folks from the church, including Ben Lance.

Seth recalls the first time he heard Ben play the guitar. “I was coming home from work earlier than usual one day, and walked through the front doors of our little church house, and heard this massive otherworldly sound filling the chapel.” He rounded the corner to see Ben in his Coca Cola delivery driver uniform, hunched over his pedal board with his red Guild Starfire on his lap. “I couldn’t believe all that sound was coming from one guy!” At the time, Ben was looking into attending North Texas University to study painting. “I knew I had to convince him to move to Austin with me,” Seth says. “I knew whatever kind of music I would be making in the future I wanted to make it with Ben.”

The two moved to Austin at the beginning of 2003. They found a musical home at the Mosaic church community, where they played music for the liturgies every Sunday evening. “Mosaic was such a foundational community for us as musicians,” Seth recalls. “The opportunity to play music together once a week, in a contemplative and sometimes improvisational environment with like minded people was priceless.” Their friend from Houston days, Lee Kitchen, had moved to the hill country as well, attending Texas State University in San Marcos but making the drive to Austin on the weekends to work as a pedicab driver and play music with Ben and Seth. The three men began playing together on their own, in Seth and Ben’s apartment, and the core of what would become Sad Accordions was born.

The Mosaic community ended up providing many vital elements for the band. Peter Kusek was a recent transplant to Austin from the Washington D.C. area, and wound up at Mosaic via his old friend Joe Gill. Pete was a talented multi-instrumentalist, ranging from keys to guitar, sampler and banjo, and most importantly: lap steel. He began sitting in with the band on Sundays, adding an even greater seat-of-the-pants quality to the music. About the same time, Joy and Nathaniel Gallagher started coming to the liturgies. Nathaniel had played drums for years, but had never played in a band before. “Nathaniel was hungry for making music,” says Seth. “He had a passion to grow as a drummer, and it really felt like you could hear him improving and challenging himself in new ways every time we played together.” Joy had a similar passion for music, that at first she kept to herself. When she finally worked up the courage and sat in with the band on keyboard and synth though, the final pieces fell into place.

Sad Accordions began playing out in Austin, with some trips to Houston and San Marcos peppered in. At the same time, Ben and Seth both began playing with Mineral’s Chris Simpson and his new solo project, Zookeeper. It was through this band that they met recording engineer and producer Erik Wofford. Erik runs a studio in East Austin called Cacophony Recorders, where Zookeeper had done some sessions. In the spring of 2006, Sad Accordions went into Cacophony for five days of initial tracking, followed by a few days of overdubs. They laid down a whopping 16 songs on Erik’s 2 inch reel-to-reel tape machine, 12 of which became their debut full length album, A Bad Year For The Sharons.

ABYFTS was released the summer of 2006, right before Seth hit the road for a four month U.S. tour with friend and songwriter Alex Dupree. During that time, Sad Accordions continued to play together, writing new music together as an instrumental group, and playing shows under the name Nelray. This was a formative season for the band, one which would change the dynamics moving forward. ABYFTS was largely comprised of songs written by Seth alone, with one or two exceptions. Going forward, the band built songs out of instrumental jams and ideas that came from playing together weekly at their rehearsal room in Joy and Nathaniel’s house. This new dynamic opened up a greater collective songwriting palette, allowing members to bring pieces and song scraps to the group to form something whole and unified.

Around this time, Peter got married and left the band to pursue his education in New Media Arts at the University of North Texas, and then attending the Art Institute of Chicago where he received his Master of Arts degree in Visual Critical Studies, and his Master of Fine Arts degree in Film, Video, and New Media. The hole in the band’s sound that Pete’s departure left was yet another deciding factor that shaped the band’s path moving forward. Joy started playing electric guitar alongside her keyboard duties. Ben began adding more vocals, including lead vocals on a song or two. The new songs were flowing, shows were being booked regularly (thanks to the band’s newfound manager Michael Maly), a tour was in the works… it was time for a new record.

2007 to 2011 were busy years. The band recorded their The Colors And The Kill EP at Precision Recording (now home to Estuary Recording) with Andrew Hernandez at the helm. They toured the midwest with Houston experimental noise duo The Dee Use. They released a split 12” on Mt. Inadale Records with fellow Austinites Monahans. They shared the stage with national acts including Karl Blau, LAKE, Vic Chesnut & Elf Power, Colour Revolt, The Smith’s bass player Andy Rourke, and Balmorhea.

Sad Accordions played their last show (to date) in September of 2011, the week before Seth and Ben went to the U.K. to tour Seth’s solo project The Whiskey Priest. Seth had relocated to Albuquerque, New Mexico in May of that year. Joy and Nathaniel had their first child in October. Lee got married soon after and moved to Kerville. Ben and Seth continue to collaborate on music long distance to this day, on Ben’s Uncle Tumpy project as well as Chris Simpson’s current outings as Mountain Time, and on the No Cielo recordings.