BEFORE THE WAR - history

Before The War is a fansite for the band Mercury Rev. It was created by a guy named Gavin (http://defgav.com/) on September 19, 1998, inspired by a CDnow contest to "creatively advertise" Mercury Rev and their (then) forthcoming album, Deserter's Songs. It worked! Gavin won the contest, scoring himself an autographed CD, a folded up poster, and some glittery stickers. The site remained active throughout "the Deserter's era" and into the dawn of "the All Is Dream era," with somewhat frequent updates.

Then for a long time, nothing happened. After All Is Dream was released, Gavin got lazy/busy and stopped trying to keep up with news and updates. Server switch-ups resulted in several sections disappearing. An English fansite came along and picked up the slack, so nobody really noticed. Then that went away, but a French fansite came along. Then that went away, too. Before The War isn't as happening as it once was, but it's still here!

BEFORE THE WAR - updates

March 2023 - Just popping in to show I'm still alive. This site went downhill years ago when Russian bots overtook the forum. And I haven't gotten around to adding recent releases to the discography or anything, but really, who consults fan sites for stuff like that anymore? In any rate, I just tried to clean up some dead links. Thanks for visiting and I hope you enjoy this old site!
February 2010 - Attempted to get the discography up to date. Gigography update. Also added Snowflake Midnight lyrics.
August 3, 2008 - The website has moved! Instead of being at members.cox.net/divercity/rev/, we're now at defgav.com/rev/ I've done some updating here and there as I've moved stuff over. The old URL will still work for a while (redirecting to the new address), but will likely die in mid 2009.
July 2006 - Added a new and improved forum, replacing the very old message board. Also revamped the homepage a little.
May 15, 2005 - Added some new article links. Also, minor updates to discog and faq.
February 27, 2005 - Added The Secret Migration lyrics.
March 20, 2004 - The first substantial update to this site in literally years! Actually there's not a lot of new content, I just got around to finally reviving those lost sections. They are: FAQ, Articles, Lyrics. Hurray! I also tinkered with the Discography a bit. There's one new thing in the Articles section: a little piece I wrote on Shady Crady. 'Who are they,' you ask? They were Mercury Rev before Mercury Rev was Mercury Rev. Not a lot is known about them, but I compiled what I could find. I think it came out ok, and you may find it interesting if you're into the band's old stuff.