Phoenix-based Wretched Pinhead Puppets was formed in 1993 by best friends Russ Graves and James Holm … The mission was to create songs and albums with concepts … they felt that every song should have a compelling story behind it.

Graves and Holm started recording all the demos and got a group of friends together to fill out the band. Yet, shortly after the demos were complete and after just a few live shows, Graves lost his battle with depression and took his own life.

The band quickly fell apart and Holm spent the next 20 plus years as an independent commercial jingle writer and voice over talent … always carrying with him a few boxes of his old tapes and writings that he started to fill afters Graves’ death that he thought might become something one day.

When Covid-19 struck in January, and when the commercial work dried up, Holm thought about those boxes filled with old cassettes and with his old writings collecting dust under the bed!

The box was opened and after a few hours James joked to himself and said, “I have everything here in this box to save the world!”

Six months later, over 15 new songs were written and recorded … and in Memory of Russ, James decided to bring back the name Wretched Pinhead Puppets.