My name is John Cullimore. I’m the husband of an amazing woman named Yvonne, and the father of 4 incredible little kids. Life is an adventure. My life is an adventure filled with short people who are very magical. The Kodama are magical beings. In the movie, Princess Mononoke, they were forest spirits who could seem pretty intimidating at first (if you’re a parent, you can relate to this in looking into the eyes of an upset little girl) but they also lead the main characters on some pretty incredible journeys. Not to mention, brought them to the feet of the Creator of the forest himself. Chibi means short, or small person or thing. Kids are short. ***usually*** So, the name refers to short, magical people who take you on adventures. Our music came from some pretty brazen inspiration. One day I was listening to a couple of my favorite, more kid-friendly Weezer songs from their first album on a drive with my family. Rivers Cuomo can sometimes have a real knack for a catchy tune, huge, rockin sound and deceptively simple lyrics that are dropping huge meaning. One of their songs, Surfwax USA was on. My then 10-year-old was belting out, “You take your car to work! I’ll take my board! And when you’re out of fuel I’m still afloat!” I was thinking, wow, this would make great kid music… but that’d be pretty lame to just rip someone off like that. But then I came across an article from Andrew Osenga of The Normals and Caedmon’s Call fame. He teaches a lot about songwriting. He basically said that all art, no matter in what form, is a ripoff. It’s true that there’s nothing new. Instead of pretending and deceiving yourself into believing that you can make something truly original, why not focus on what you like. Dissect it. Tear it apart. Remake it with your own lyrics. Yes… rip it off. So, I did. I studied the tones and sounds on the “Blue” album, and just had a blast writing some kids music. It was wayyyyyy outside of my box, and I’ve been loving it. It was a short little set of songs to start with, but over the last year and a half it’s morphed into far more than I thought. I started with a set of rules: basic rock setup, doing guitar tones similar to old Weezer/Smashing Pumpkins, and went from there. I wanted to make 90′s era, fun, poppy rock music that kids could enjoy with parents of our age group. Yes, They Might Be Giants can be fun, but sometimes you want a bit more. The songs are simple tales of what it is to be a kid. Tunes they can relate to, learn from, vent through, and skin their knee by. All of these have come from direct experience… and yes, children and parents were harmed, and hugged in the making of this music. We hope that you enjoy singing along and belting out some harmonies.