Bam

1966-2024

Some eloquent words from bandmate Michael Cornelius about Mike Sversvold shared from his Medium Blog.

Bam wasn’t a good drummer. He was not a great drummer. Bam was a magician. He was capable of the percussive equivalent of pulling a rabbit out of his hat (or pulling a rabid rabbit out of his high hat?). He could manifest invisible drum beats out of thin air with a stick twirl and a toss of messy black hair. He wasn’t a drummer you would complement for holding down the beat or setting a groove. He put on a show. If you were there to see the show your most likely reaction would be slack-jawed amazement. How did he do that? WTF.

When JFA started Bam was 14 and I was 21. From the beginning there was never a time I thought he could have done something better. Even as a kid he elevated whatever we were doing with ruthless energy. Any bass riff I wrote for the band would have to be mastered at a pace above where I thought it might go. Just listen to the JFA song I-10. There is no way it started out at 300BPM!

We spent those early years crafting a secret language (skaterock) by skating all day in the desert heat then playing wherever and however we could at night. Some of the tribe picked up on the new lingo and started spreading it far and wide. We played over 50 shows in the first year of playing out. From House parties to the Whiskey-a-Go Go it was a wild ride that’s hard to comprehend happening in such a short span of time. We toured. We endured each other on the Burly Green Bus. We complained about parking next to Waffle House dumpsters in the summer heat. We skated.

All of it forged a bond that is beyond friendship. A brotherhood.

My heart goes out to Mike Sversvold’s family, friends and all of the others he forged a musical bond with.

Michael Cornelius