 Childhood friends Thomas Hardy Morris and Walker Howle have played together since high school in Augusta, Georgia and along with Morris's brother Dawson hooked up with Jason Scarboro and Brantley Senn to form Redbelly in college in 1997.Redbelly's original lead singer Dawson Morris left and the band eventually went on to release its self-titled debut in October 2003 (recorded in Augusta in December 2002).At this point the band was primarily a southern rock-influenced jam band whose songs would often be 20 or 30 minutes long and were styled between Neil Young and Pink Floyd.