With the help of fellow band mates: Joe Nicklin- Lead guitar, Martin Gilman – Acoustic guitar,Gareth Williams – Bass / Vocals, Dave Shipley – drums, Split Sofa was founded in September of 1999 releasing their debut maxi EP called ‘Angerlistic Pillow’, which contained all original songs written by Lewie throughout the Summer. In 2016 the line up changed with Alex Ganley taking over the drums and Pete Garyga joined on bass.

Between 2000 and 2001 the band built their own recording studio in Doveridge called ‘The Shack’ and shortly after they launched into their first full album called’ The Day After The Day Before’ which was released in 2002. The album was produced and featured Mick Strode (Band of Joy / Forevermore / Duke La Rue) who played throughout the album adding touches of Dave Gilmour-esque flourishes. Local radio DJ Paul Baker enthused about the album and played tracks from it on his sunday slot at Phoenix Radio.

Mick Strode played on the follow up album ‘The Sorcerers Lullaby’ released 2005 and he also produced it, but he would leave the band to live in France in 2006. The album sold well and again was picked up by DJ Paul Baker who invited Lewie for an afternoon of Sofa and played all the tracks with Lewie between segments on his show.

Lewie felt a change of direction in his writing and set about to record and release another album which got back to the original sound of Sofa. This was actually a step in the wrong direction; recording techniques were getting better , Sofa had already moved on and looking back shouldn’t have been on the agenda, but in fact Lewie delivered a heavy album in 2006 called ‘Draylon’ which was picked up by ARFM and played on Paul Baker’s show called ‘Soundscapes’. Again Lewie felt he had gone form one extreme to another and didn’t like the album with it’s harder edge although he did like certain songs for the album, he felt it lacked heart.

With a set of new songs which had been gigged, the band took them into OverDrive Studios in 2007 and recorded the EP ‘Dark Daze’ . The EP was sold at gigs which the band were now doing, sticking by the rule of only Sofa songs and no covers. This in fact proved to be a success, with followers and friends of the band becoming ‘SofaHeads’ – an group of Split Sofa enthusiasts that support the band with the Fan Club sec Lyndsey Walker at the helm selling merchandise and arranging transport for the live events.

The next project saw Lewie and Martin going back to basics in the writing phase, using acoustic guitars & multitrack recorder to produce demos for the rest of the band to work with and out of those session came ‘ The Seventh Level’ Released in 2007 which was sent off to numerous publishing companies and record labels, as well as celebrities like Jamie Oliver, Chris Evans & the Prince of Wales who all replied positively & with encouragement for the band. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.