Crowd shot masthead ApologetiX Logo Keith Haynie plays bassBill Hubauer plays lead guitarJ. Jackson sings leadJimmy Vegas Tanner plays drums

Why do you sing "We're in Bob Flaherty's band"?

The opening song on the "Adam Up" CD, "We're in a Parody Band," has a cryptic line in the final chorus that says, "We're in Bob Flaherty's band." So who is Bob Flaherty?

Bob was the third official ApologetiX drummer, following Jeff Pakula and Rick Servocky, and you can hear his handiwork on our "Ticked" ("Rolling Clone") CD. He played with us from May 1995 (first concert was in Herndon VA) through September 1998 (final concert was in East Pittsburgh, PA). He also was our soundman/roadie/driver from the spring of 2003 through the fall of 2004, when he moved to Indiana. Bob still helps us out on occasional trips in the Midwest, and he is a perpetual part of the ApologetiX story. He is affectionately known as "Punk" to most of the ApologetiX children, but J.'s two-year-old daughter couldn't pronounce that, so she renamed him "Honk."

Bob was a fan and a friend of the band long before he joined us (J. first met him in late 1989 at a church they both attended), and he continues to be one. He attended his first ApologetiX concert in 1992 and began helping out with sound and roadie work in 1994. When Rick retired in April of 1995, our longtime friend Keith Harrold filled in temporarily but couldn't play our May 27 concert in Virginia, our first ever out-of-state gig. We didn't know what to do and were prepared to play the concert without a drummer, (We had to do our very first concert in 1992 without a drummer, too), although not looking forward to it. However, Bob shocked us by asking to audition the night before the concert. We knew he'd played some drums before, but he didn't own a drum set and had never mentioned any aspirations of joining the band. Well, it turned out that Bob had secretly bought a drum set and started practicing, and, as a long-time fan, he knew all the starts and breaks in our songs. Karl auditioned him the night before and was impressed enough to let him play in Virginia. The show went well, and Bob became our drummer from that point on.

Bob has a razor-sharp sense of humor and is very skilled at contracting, construction and mechanics. He's also extremely generous with his time. He's helped all of us with our home improvement projects and auto repairs at one time another. Furthermore, in the second verse of "We're in a Parody Band," we refer to our van breaking down in Philadelphia (in 2000). What we don't mention is that it broke down again the next night when we got within an hour of our homes. We called Bob in the middle of the night, and he came to our rescue and drove us to safety.

We wrote that line in "We're in a Parody Band" as a tribute to our old friend, fan and fellow band member, Bob, because we wanted more people to know who he was ... plus "Flaherty" rhymes with "parody!" Ironically, at the time we wrote it, we didn't know that Bob would be returning to the fold as our soundman/roadie/driver shortly thereafter. But God did.

Thanks for everything, Bob!