My Happy Life started in the south suburbs of Chicago in 1988, when two guys — Scott and Michael — met in a music theory class at the local community college. Pretty quickly it became obvious they were wired the same way musically. What started as talking after class turned into “we should try writing something,” and then into a band.

From the beginning, My Happy Life lived somewhere in the alternative/indie/synth-pop orbit, with the kind of influences you’d expect of “new wave” kids of the ’80s: The Cure, Cocteau Twins and New Order, among many others — moody melody, texture, and whatever weird little turn makes a song feel bigger than its parts.

The early setup was as barebones as it gets: a keyboard, a microphone, a four-track tape recorder, and a handful of cheap guitar pedals. Once they realized the chemistry was real, they started meeting once a week and recording an entire song — start to finish — in a single night.

They never stayed in one lane. If a sound felt right, they chased it. Early tracks ranged from upbeat pop with a little Motown influence to psychedelic, shoegaze-leaning synth ballads, atmospheric love songs, and tracks heavily influenced by the late-’80s/early-’90s Manchester scene. 

Then life did what life does. People grew up, went separate directions, got married, had kids, started careers and My Happy Life quietly went dormant for nearly 30 years.