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R.I.P. - Chris Wrobel, Freaz Dried Rabbi

friends

You might ask me what makes me an expert on breakfast cereals.

Five years ago today, a good friend of Michelle's, Chris Wrobel, died of an accidental death.

cover of Freaz Dried Rabbi s/t album from 1992 Besides the intense personal connection, Chris' death, at 24 years old, was particularly sad for two other reasons: he was a victim of how bad "the system" can really be and he had an intense creative flair that was forever lost.

Chris had a herion habit and, as I'm sure you've heard, that's a hard horse to shake. Chris weaved in and out of jail; there was a traffic stop in Chicago where a dirty cop planted drugs in his vehicle and a number of arrests for ridiculous things like loitering. He should have been flagged for rehabilitation... but he wasn't. He didn't ever really get a second chance, just jail.

liner notes for freaz dried rabbi freeze However, something that got lost in all the commotion, was the creativity of a short-lived band that Chris was a part of: Freaz Dried Rabbi. This trio consisted of Chris on bass and vocals, Leanne Fisher on guitar and Bob Rozsypal on drums. Their sole, self-titled album, was recorded in a dingy tiny-as-hell studio onto cassette in 1992... when they were all 16-17 years old.

Of course, few people not close to the band have ever had the chance to hear this remarkable piece of early punky grunge rock. Well, considering that the rest of the band is around, somewhere, living normal lives, and that this stuff is just too good to fizzle into obscurity, I've digitized the entire album from the cassette and will now let it loose onto the net... if you participate in file-sharing, please consider injecting this into the milieu:

Freaz Dried Rabbi (s/t)

  1. Dead Aquatic Corpse - 128kpbs, mp3 [4.4 MB]
  2. A Lawless Bread - 128kpbs, mp3 [6.1 MB]
  3. Town Whore - 128kpbs, mp3 [5.4 MB]
  4. Random Walk - 128kpbs, mp3 [6.4 MB]
  5. Womenhead Blues - 128kpbs, mp3 [4.8 MB]
  6. Sirens - 128kpbs, mp3 [6.5 MB]

Note: I most certainly do not have the authorization from the copyright holders of this work to distribute these files. I am operating under the assumption that they don't care or would actively encourage the duplication of their files. I post these here to 1) keep the creativity alive after the creators have ceased to exist and 2) stimulate discussion about the preservation of our culture. If you are the immediate family of Chris, Leanne or Bob and would like this material taken down, please don't hesitate to contact me.

UPDATE [2004-12-16 12:57]: Ms. Wrobel wrote below to correct a few facts I had wrong and to give thanks for spreading the music. I apologize for the errors.

UPDATE [2005-04-06 09:14:08]: Like the true idiot I am, I neglected to digitize these tracks in stereo. However, as I always correct my mistakes in time, I've uploaded new versions of these tracks (links above) that are transcoded in stereo... you'll be amazed at how much is there that was lost with only having one channel.

UPDATE [2005-06-20 17:09:57]: Changed the media links to the Internet Archive.