HISTORY

Tom Gallello was born on November 10th, 1991 in New York.

His parents would play The Beatles and Nirvana a lot when he was a baby and his love of music stems back all the way to those diaper days.

He scored the lead role of Woody in a preschool production of Toy Story and became fast friends with the little boy that played Sid, Mike Brescia. Though they went to different school districts, they remained friends for many years and Mike took up the drums at some point. Tom got his first electric guitar at the age of 11 and the two began playing “music” in Mike’s parent’s basement. Tom gladly told everyone that he was in a band and his dream was to be a rock star.

Tom learned the electric bass in 9th grade and by the next year, was making demo songs using Windows Movie Maker under the name Cripple Past.

Mothra became a cult hit around the hallways of Lakeland High School. One day while skipping gym class, Tom struck up a conversation with Mash Blabbater (great stage name) and they found that they had a lot of musical tastes in common. Tom played Mash an early Windows Movie Maker version of Zebras and Mash instantly heard the potential. A few weeks later Mash would be drumming in Tom’s basement and the rest, they say is history.

Cripple Past became Crippled Past and featured Tom on bass/guitar/vocals, Kevin Gonzalez on lead guitar and Mash on drums. Kevin moved away in the summer of 2009 leaving Tom and Mash to record a bunch of songs under the name Exploding Popes.

Tom and Mash made videos for the songs Ride You, Fat Albert’s Revenge and Haast Eagle. They caught the eyes of Mike Grippo and Zac Vanacoro who were in another high school band called Sit Back Cellar. In October of 2009, Mike and Zac joined Exploding Popes as lead guitarist and bassist respectively. They played a few gigs, recorded a lot of material and even placed second in a local battle of the bands. In the fall of 2010, Zac went to college and was replaced by Josh Norberto on bass. This line up played local dive bars and even opened for a band that featured Shaq’s girlfriend at the time.

By the fall of 2011, Tom, Josh and Mash formed an experimental punk trio called Birdo & The Knees. Exploding Popes were still somewhat active but Tom’s heart was in the freedom and experimentation that Birdo allowed. During this era, Tom honed his artistic vision into what it is today. He began making avant tinged songs under the name Tom’s Gravy with the intention of playing them live with Birdo. This highly prolific time saw Tom writing many songs which would become live staples today.

Exploding Popes played their last gig together in 2015 but Tom, Josh and Mash continued on under various names until deciding on Dumb Echo in 2019. Tom and Mike recorded an industrial album called Charade You Are. Tom had to put all of his creative ambitions on hold in 2018 when his grandparents both needed his care. Tom became their full time caretaker for the next 6 years, ensuring that they had a loving, peaceful and comfortable final trips around the sun. During this time, Tom also began writing fiction novels and hopes to one day see them published.

In 2022 Zac Vanacoro joined Dumb Echo as bassist.

In 2023, Dumb Echo uploaded their first EP to streaming services. They titled it “Byrdo and the Knees” in order to avoid being sued by Nintendo. The EP exceeded all expectations, and got nearly 3,000,000 plays in just under a month. The distribution service they had used got greedy and decided to steal their revenue from this release and take down the EP as well as all of Tom’s solo albums. This was a crippling blow to the band, even more so for Tom, who had lost his grandmother a few days before receiving the heartbreaking Email. Between planning a funeral and going back and forth with an entertainment lawyer, Tom had felt hopeless.

In February of 2025, hope had been restored. After being in legal limbo for nearly two years, Dumb Echo as well as all the Tom Gravely solo albums were finally re-released on all streaming platforms.

With a bright future ahead of them, Dumb Echo is looking for management and a home on a record label.