User talk:Alex D'Onofrio

The figure of Darrin Bradbury smoking on a street corner with his loose plaid shirt and shaggy brown hair should be imposing, but it isn’t. In the next second he stubs out his cigarette and rushes into the club with a borrowed guitar, a child's enthusiasm and an artist's soul. An artist, not a bartender or a gas station attendant, though he has worked as both. Born in Union City on December 14, 1986, Darrin moved to the suburbs when he was five. There he was raised vegan by his mother, a clown for Barnum and Bailey's Circus, who he used to watch walk up and down the street in stilts. Darrin's father, a coke dealer and the son of an immigrant "lady of the night", was only first introduced to Darrin when he was in prison for failure to pay child support for Darrin's step siblings. As an adult, Darrin is the sort of man who orders a pig, chicken, and cow fat" wrap with a mock glare demanding, "I was raised vegan, I earned this. What the hell have you done for the animals?"     Darrin grew up listening to folk rock legends Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Merle Haggard and Towns Van Zandt, along with Johnny Cash, David Dondero, The Clash, and the Violent Femmes.  At age fourteen Darrin began playing guitar. When asked how he got his start performing he said, "I started in a punk band… I don't want to talk about it." He has since played Beantown, The Bitter End, CBGBs, Montclair, and Rutgers in addition to touring open mics up and down the northern east coast in 2006. Though he has played major venues in New York City and opened for Teddy Thompson, his proudest moment as a musician involved a small coffee house in Oradell, NJ called Cool Beans. As a boy, Darrin used to come in on Sundays to watch the band “Hours” perform to a packed house. This, thought Darrin, will be my measure of success, when I can pack Cool Beans. Years later he has become a regular performer there with a strong following singing along with him. He has officially released four albums, all available for download at his website. Darrin has the rare quality of being able to take his business seriously without taking himself too seriously.