Montez Williams, Christian Kyle, and Jason Westbrook met each other in Oklahoma, and played together in Brave New World. They moved on to start their own band, Blunderwheel that recorded one album,
Roly Poly, and promptly moved to Austin, TX. The album was released in 1993 in Austin by Humongous Fungus Records. The band added drummer Jayson Altman and eventually changed the name to Schatzi in 1996. This lineup recorded their first album,
Joanie Loves Schatzi, Their song "Death of the Alphabet", that included back-up vocals by Adrianne Verhoeven of
The Anniversary, received heavy airplay on Austin's
KROX-FM. This allowed them to get a spot in the KROX Christmas concert. The band and its EP became the subject of major-label bidding in 2001, and they were ultimately signed by
Mammoth Records, who re-released their EP (produced by
Ed Rose) nationally. V. Marc Fort and Mark Ford joined on bass and drums, respectively, between the release of the two versions. Four songs from
Death of the Alphabet made it onto their 2002 full-length album,
Fifty Reasons to Explode. Released by Mammoth,
Fifty Reasons to Explode reached #1 on the "Radio 200 Adds" chart of
CMJ New Music Report in March 2002 and appeared on the magazine's "Radio 200" list for 11 weeks during that year, peaking at #20.
CMJ New Music Monthly called the album "well produced pop punk that has just as much in common with
NOFX and
Lagwagon as it does with
Jimmy Eat World and
Braid."
The Post and Courier's reviewer cited the record's "power pop gems and compared the band to
Foo Fighters,
Superdrag,
The Ramones, and
The Posies. In 2003 they released a split EP with
Motion City Soundtrack on Doghouse Records. That same year they recorded their third full-length,
Snow Is for Saving Hearts, in Lincoln, NE with producer
Mike Mogis and featured Orenda Fink of Azure Ray on a few tracks. The album was shelved by Hollywood Records after
Mammoth Records was dissolved. After the departure of Williams, the band continued touring through 2004. Their final show was in 2005 with Motion City Soundtrack in Austin. Throughout their career they played and toured with the likes of
The Get Up Kids,
Motion City Soundtrack,
Shiner,
Superchunk,
The Promise Ring,
Hey Mercedes,
Jimmy Eat World,
At The Drive-In,
Ultimate Fakebook,
The Anniversary,
Ozma,
Cadillac Blindside,
Seville among others. ==Post-breakup==