Ethan was one of Jeremy's closest friends. He broke the news to Jeremy's "online/scene" friends by posting the following to the Phantasy Tour message board on 7/7/03. To read the rest of the thread, please go here.
Hello Biscuits fans and family. One of our very good friends, Jeremy Wainland from Boca Raton, Florida, passed away on Sunday. He was 30. His mother called me tonight and told me Jeremy suffered an aneurism Sunday afternoon. He leaves behind a brand new baby daughter.
I first met Jeremy in early 1999 on DiscussBiscuits when talk of the band visting Florida first popped up. I was railing away about how bad a state this was for live music and how the band should never come play here, and Jeremy emailed me privately to let me know there were other Biscuit fans in the state and I should do everything I could to get the band here. The first show Jeremy ever saw was at Jack Straws on 5-7-99. Afterwards Marc came out and hung out with us, talking for awhile about the common thread the 3 of us had, all of us being unescapably Jewish with said Jewish mothers. It was quite a fun night. The next night we went to Ziggy's and partied a little too heavily, and Jeremy was stuck driving us around Winston Salem at 3am trying to find Chris Woody's house. Needless to say, he ran a red light and cut off a cop, we were pulled over, and Jeremy, using the inbred bullshit card all of use Jews learn by living with said mothers, managed to talk the cop into giving us a warning and letting us get on our way.
I saw many more shows with Jeremy over the next 4 years, we flew to New York for the infamous Irving Plaza show, and Jeremy was one of the very first people I called, giddy with excitement when I told him I was bringing the Biscuits to Florida for the first time last fall. He caught the Culture Room show, and then, what I think was his last show, in Gainesville. His baby was due in a few weeks, and I remember vividly what he said during the show. "I never ask for songs, but I asked them to play a HAB'ber for me." Jeremy's grandmother had passed away a week earlier, and everythign in his life was coming to a head what with the baby coming, his new job, basically everything in his life changing drastically, and I remember when they started playing Hot Air Balloon, the tears running down his cheeks as he watched his favorite band play this song for him, I went over, gave him a great big hug, and said good for you.
Jeremy was a great supporter of what I started doing down here 3.5 years ago, and I dont think anyone besides myself was happier that night the Biscuits played at the Culture Room in October.
I'm really stunned right now. This is the 2nd friend I've had die on me in less than a year and it's really scary. I guess when my friend Dan passed away in september the reality of life hit me, and now it's finally set in. No one ever knows how long we have, so live every minute fully. The funeral is on wednesday, if anyone would like to send a message to Jeremy's family please email me ethan@southfloridajams.com and I will print them out and give them to them