By the summer of 1999 that handful of experimental songs was enough for the two to consider a full-length disc.

Work, still sluggish, benefited from instrumental performance: "It didn't take long for each of us to get the need to construct a song from hitting pots, pans and an ottoman totally out of our systems. Gabe could play guitar and a little drum and piano; I could plink on the piano was competent on saxophone; and we could both sing. We invited a mutual friend, Nicole Born, to provide some vocals. Electronic and atmospheric treatments became part of a synthesis that would yield songs in the styles Gabe and I never really got away from — pop and rock."