The Delevantes fused Everly Brothers-style vocal harmonies with hard-edged, roots-oriented arrangements to produce some of the most exciting music of the late 1990s. E Street Band bassist Gary Tallent produced their second album, Postcards From Along the Way, and later toured alongside the group, while Benmont Tench of Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers contributed keyboards.
Bob and Mike Delevante, sons and grandsons of General Motors workers, forged a formidable partnership after playing guitar since childhood. Their first stage appearances came as members of Wreckless Abandon, the Rutherford High School band known for delivering bluegrass renditions of Top 40 hits. Although the siblings briefly parted ways to attend art school, they reunited in the mid-'80s to launch Who's Your Daddy? and became regular performers on the Hoboken, NJ, circuit. A new music seminar in New York prompted them to test their material in Nashville, leading to multiple trips over four years before they relocated permanently to Tennessee's music capital in 1992.
After signing with Rounder, the Delevantes issued their debut album, Long About That Time, in 1995. The record quickly climbed to the sixth position on the Gavin Americana charts, establishing the pair as the first alt-country act to reach the Top Ten. Nominated for a Nashville Music Award, Long About That Time also earned Pop Album of the Year honors from NAIRD. Moving to the larger Capitol label, they sustained their momentum on the follow-up Postcards From Along the Way, which held the top spot on the Gavin Americana chart for four weeks. In the late '90s the brothers pursued separate paths, with Bob issuing the solo album Porchlight and Mike joining Jeff Black's band.
