Wolfie

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American indie-pop group with a brief run at the turn of the millennium — cheap keyboards, fast hooks and sugar, done and gone by 2001.

Wolfie formed in Champaign, Illinois, in 1996, part of the same central-Illinois pop scene built up around Parasol Records, the label that put out most of the band's records. The city's small scene produced a run of similarly minded pop groups through the late 1990s.

The group worked in the overlap between twee and power pop, pairing boy-girl vocals with short, hook-heavy songs. Wolfie was often grouped with other American bands reviving the jangly, lo-fi end of indie pop at the time, sharing that scene's cheap keyboards and fast tempos.

Over five years, Wolfie released three full-length albums, an EP and a handful of singles, and toured nationally in support of them. The band dissolved in 2001, ending a run that had built a small but consistent catalogue rather than a single breakout release.

Afterward, members scattered into new projects: The Like Young, Beaujolais, The National Splits, The New Constitution and Mathlete all trace back to Wolfie. Joe and Amanda Ziemba, who shared vocal duties in the band, also ran a side project called Busytoby during the same period.

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