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Artist
Phreeworld
12+ albums
ProgressiveProgressive rockUSANeo-prog
about
Biography by Stanton Swihart (All Music Guide) The roots of what became Phreeworld began coming together in 1976, though the members did not officially become a band until 1990. Brian Phraner (vocals, bass, acoustic guitar, keyboards, drums) met and started playing music with drummer Donovan Michaels (formerly Don Freeborn) around 1975, when Michaels went to play with Phraner and guitarist Bruce Main in a progressive rock trio called Medusa. Dave Wheeler (vocals, guitar) had met Brian Phraner earlier in high school. Brian's brother Mark Phraner (vocals, bass, guitar, keyboard) was also around. The members of Medusa, by this time, were college students playing in the college jazz ensemble by day, while rehearsing original music, along with the occasional PFM or Led Zeppelin cover, at night. Medusa eventually broke up and the bandmembers went in their own directions. Wheeler played with jazz fusion/progressive rock outfit I Am, and wrote songs about everything from J.R.R. Tolkien to Arthur C. Clark's Childhoods End. (Some of these songs eventually became the basis for Phreeworld songs.) Mark Phraner collaborated with Bruce Jones from 1984 to 1989 in Eternia, whose music ranged from symphonic to hard and progressive rock, writing songs that would later find new life as Phreeworld tunes. Michaels played in numerous bands, some of which toured throughout America. Following the breakup of Medusa, Brian Phraner (a prodigy on bass) played in various bands, engineered, and designed
