Former Toad Members Work On Solo Projects

07/28/1998 3:00 PM, Yahoo! Music
Craig Rosen

(7/28/98, 12 p.m. PDT) - Following the split of Toad The Wet Sprocket, which was officially announced Friday on the band's House Of Toad website, the band's longtime manager Chris Blake says singer/ guitarist Glen Phillips and guitarist/ vocalist Todd Nichols are working on solo projects in Santa Barbara,Calif.

"They were the two creative forces in the band," says Blake. "Todd wrote or co-wrote many of their most popular songs." According to Blake, the 12-year-old Santa Barbara, Calif.-based band decided to call it a day due to "musical differences. That's a saying that is used to cover of a lot of other ills," he adds, "but in this case, it defines the situation."

Although Toad The Wet Sprocket were initially dismissed by critics as R.E.M. copyists, they went on to establish their own identity and scored a gold record with the 1992 album Fear, which included such hits as "All I Want" and "Walk On The Ocean."

While Blake says that Phillips is planning to collaborate with "a variety of different people," Nichols is working with former Toad bassist/ multi-instrumentalist Dean Dinning.

Contrary to published reports, Toad are still under contract with Columbia Records. "They were nowhere near the end of their contract," Blake says. However, it has yet to be determined if Phillips and Nichols will record for the label. "That's for lawyers to work out with other lawyers," Blake says. The manager says both former Toad members are "well into" their respective projects, but he doesn't expect either to be released until next Spring at the earliest.

Meanwhile, it is conceivable that Columbia could package a Toad "best-of" collection. "We're not opposed to that sort of thing," Blake says. "And, there's some really outstanding unreleased material that may work its way into a package of that sort. I can't speak for the record company, but it could come out this year."