Photo courtesy of Nathan James

We met through a chance match on Tinder, which I'll admit is an unconventional way for a band to meet. We both connected over our love of music. Greg was pursuing a career in musical theater at that point and I was trying to make it as a singer-songwriter. Our first date lasted over 12 hours and soon we became a couple. We immediately bonded over our shared music tastes as two gay men who were into emo/pop-punk music. Many of our first dates involved going to open mics and singing together. That was nearly seven years ago, back when we lived in New York.

We spent nearly a year as a couple before we played our first show together. After seeing so many cabarets in New York that were, frankly, terrible, we put up our own cabaret called "You And Me (But Mostly Me)". It ended up being a massive success, and we toured it in Austin and it even went off-Broadway. Through that experience, we had another opportunity to play a musical residency together at a fancy hotel in SoHo and things grew from there. In spring of 2019, we got signed to Sony Music Latin and started working with a Grammy-winning producer.

We continued to make music under the name of Fab The Duo until 2022; going through a global pandemic, a failed record deal and a cross-country move to LA together. We had some incredible experiences with that band, including touring the country and even opening for our idol, Betty Who. But our music style changed so much from the start of Fab The Duo that we could no longer justify being the same band. We started as flamboyant pop artists, wearing high heels and bright colors at every show. But we always knew deep down that we weren't popstars and didn't fit in that world - besides, JoJo Siwa hadn't even invented Gay Pop yet!

We started to feel like imposters and started to relate less and less to the music we were making. So after completing a full-length album, we took a break from music to take time to figure out who we really were. We knew we would always want to make music together but we had to go back to our roots and start over to become the emo rock stars we always knew we were supposed to be. We eventually started over as BOYR!OT, an edgy, in-your-face, pop-punk band, and released our first single, “MA!N CHARACTER”. This time, we're doing it our way, writing the music we want and working with the people we want to work with.

To make a long story short, there were hundreds of little moments that led us to this point but I think deep down from the second we met, we'd always be making music together. As Greg asked me on my first date what I've always wanted to be, I told him something that I'd never told anyone before, that would change our lives together.

"I want to be a rockstar," I told Greg.

"Me too," he told me.

XOXO, Brendan