Who's That Girl?

Hello! This is Sylvia, the better other half of the band. My real name is Joanne (and even that isn't my actual first name), but I chose Sylvia as a nickname in middle school after finally growing sick of being confused with Joan (pronounced jone), Joan (pronounced jo-ann), and Joanna at school, and Joan (pronounced jone) and Janice at church. I could have used a shortened version of my first name, but there were people both at school and church who had that name too, whereas I'd never met a Sylvia my age.

But enough ruminating about nomenclature; I'm a childhood friend of Chris' (and also responsible for his nickname, Holden - wait, I said no more ruminating about nomenclature!) and we basically grew up as the church misfits. We grew apart eventually (college, etc.) until last year when we met up for pasta in North Beach and began meeting up for food (and usually - on my end - drinks) and then at some point we started meeting weekly and conversing about anything and everything but usually existential suburban twentysomething angst. From those conversations we decided to start a performing arts project - originally a comedic cabaret of sorts - and after my best friend suggested to Holden that he do something with his musical interests, we decided on doing a one-off concert.

One day, I showed Holden a picture of the actor/singer/songwriter/musician/Japanese pop idol/eternal-17-year-old Kazunari "Nino" Nimomiya dressed in Japanese period costume for his film Ooku, which Holden pointed out looked like the costumes worn by Kenny Blankenship, the host of the show Takeshi's Castle Most Extreme Elimination Challenge because of the pointed shoulders.

Thus, Nino Blankenship was born!

Oh, and I also happen to sing and play three instrument families (percussion, guitars and keyboards/piano) which is why I am in the band. Well, other than my debilitating existential angst/failed romantic relationships/commitment-juggling burnout/spoiled-only-child insecurity/general quarter-life crisis issues that inspire Holden to write songs for the band, of course.