Music
Press
Review of Fate's Got A Driver: Coming in at just under 30 minutes this 1996 album release pulls the fibers of my very being taught with emotion. Even after listening to it for over 13 years I still cannot get enough. When I need a pick me up I put it on. I have found myself driving down midnight freeway’s singing at the top of my lungs along with front man David Moore’s eloquently powerful lyrics many, many times. This is my fourth quarter album, my go to album, the album you listen to when nothing else sounds good. Oh you might need a few listens to get into it, but once you do you will be hooked – those are the best kinds of albums aren’t they? Actually I just started listening to it right now, guess it’s time for a break. - Indierockreviews.com
Review of Fate's Got A Driver: "An emotional hardcore sound that blankets when you are cold, and grabs you by the throat when you need a good shaking... Fate's Got A Driver teems with meditations on halcyon Midwestern days gone by, and with the emotions underneath a seemingly simple, homespun life - Magnet
- Magnet
Moon My Saddle (Essential albums of 98 feature):
"The Moon My Saddle proved the biggest factor separating Chamberlain from their post-hardcore peers was the fact they could actually play instead of merely posture. Although the band's entire catalog is essential, The Moon My Saddle remains to be their most incendiary release because it literally captures the moment the band were growing up discovering who they were musically.
- Alternative Press
Discography
For The Love of The Wounded 1993)
Songs You May Or May Not Have Heard Before (1994)
Fate's Got A Driver (1996)
Old Pike split 7" (1996)
Go Down Believing single (1997)
The Moon My Saddle (1998)
Fate's Got A Driver (Deluxe Edition) (2009)
Photos
Bio
Split Lip was possibly the most important emotionally tinged hardcore band to emerge from the Midwest.
Alongside Endpoint, Split Lip helped prove to an international audience that a band could effectively combine the chunky thrash of the coastal straight-edge hardcore scenes with the warm emotional depth of certain, more popular music, emotive drive, and political slant of D.C. bands like Embrace.
Split Lip's songs were mosh-pit inducing, yet often elicited tears and scream-along empathy from audiences. The band formed in the Indianapolis suburb of Carmel, IN, in 1990, with vocalist Steve Dujinske, guitarist Clayton Snyder, bassist Curtis Mead, and drummer Charlie Walker. They recorded a poorly circulated demo, but didn't really get moving until vocalist David Moore and lead guitarist Adam Rubenstein came aboard. Still in their teens, this lineup crafted heartfelt, chunky hardcore songs addressing political and personal issues, making a demo tape and then signing to Toledo, OH-based label Doghouse Records. They released their Soul Kill 7" single in 1992 -- complete with an essay that was heavily critical of Christopher Columbus, in commemoration of the 500-year anniversary of the "discovery" of the "new world."
In 1994, the band debuted their first full-length album, For the Love of the Wounded, which blended the guitar dexterity of Metallica with the passionate, affected vocal approach of David Moore and his increasingly more poetic lyrics, which set them apart from the pack. It is perhaps the definitive record of the emocore genre. The band grew in popularity, becoming a headlining act at Ohio's More Than Music Festival and touring with the likes of Samuel, Shift, and Colossus of the Fall. Split Lip released their second album, Fate's Got a Driver, in 1995, just before deciding to change their name to Chamberlain. The album signaled the gradual change of the band into a more roots rock-inflected, radio-oriented outfit.
The band marked its new moniker on a split EP with Bloomington band Old Pike in the fall of 1996. Snyder and Mead left the band just after the release of The Moon My Saddle in the fall of 1998 and were replaced by guitarist Stoll Vaughn and bassist Seth Greathouse. Vaughn, the nephew of John Mellencamp guitarist Mike Wanchic, left the band in March of 1999.
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