Capping Day was formed in 1987 by Laura Weller and Bonnie Hammond. They played a few gigs as a duo until one night while playing at Squid Row had the good fortune to meet bassist Joe Ross and drummer Norman Scott (both recently of 64 Spiders) who were running sound and convinced the girls that they would be the perfect rhythm section.
With Ross' and Scott's connections they booked studio time at Reciprocal Recording with Jack Endino where they recorded six songs in September 1987. Of these first recordings, "Mona Lisa" and "Slow Fade" were released as a 7" single on Green Monkey Records and "Brian In The Darkroom" was included on the Secretions LP on C/Z Records.
Seattle radio station KCMU entered "Mona Lisa" in a national song writing contest and it won first prize which was a recording contract with EMI Records. Negotiations commenced with lawyers and pre-recording rehearsals began with EMI producer Rick Wills. Tragically, A&R men, big wigs and other third party boneheads got in the way and in the ensuing fiasco Capping Day finally told EMI where to shove their contract. Free at last from EMI they recorded the new songs in 1989 at Egg Studios with Jon Auer (of the Posies) producing. But the bad experience with EMI created a rift within the band. Ross and Scott departed and were replaced by Terry Morgan (the band's manager) and Mike Musburger (of the Posies) on bass and drums respectively. They re-recorded "Mona Lisa" and released a five song CD, Post No Bills on Pop Llama Records in October 1990 containing the new version of Mona Lisa and four songs culled from the Egg sessions.
By the end of 1990 the original line up with Ross and Scott were back. In 1991 the band recorded an excellent set of new songs at Red Farm with Gary King producing. With the high quality of the music and even higher expectations within the band, egos and squabbling got in the way of releasing a proper full length and in the end only a 7" single "Downslide" b/w "Mission Line" was released from these sessions, it became their swan-song as they disbanded in late 1993.
Weller and Ross embarked on a new project with guitarist Scott Sutherland and drummer Scott Vanderpool (both recently of Chemistry Set) called Halcyon Days which failed to produce, though they enjoyed some success as Crumble with the addition of guitarist Orjan Loval in 1994. Capping Day continued to periodically reunite throughout 1995 --sometimes with Vanderpool on drums and Sutherland on lead guitar-- the highlight of which, was a Sonics pre-game performance followed by the girls singing the national anthem.
The original line-up reformed in 1996 briefly under the name Strawhead and then Famous Janes before once again settling on Capping Day. They recorded another batch of songs at Gary King's House Of Leisure which, to date, remain unfinished.
Weller, Hammond, Ross and McCullum continue to play as Capping Day.
