Quatrain was a Garage band out of the San Fernando Valley and was originally organized
in 1963 as a folk duet called The Fourth Shadow, by Senneville and Pease. Lekas joined in November of 1964 to play drums and sing after a stint as a young aerospace employee and surf band and jazz trio drummer. Bassist Mark Johnson and lead guitarist Bruce Epstein were added in early 1965 when Pease had been drafted into the military.
The group, still known as The Fourth Shadow, covered a lot of British Invasion tunes with the usual au fait and de rigueur black turtlenecks and sport coats, hush puppies and corduroy. School hops, parties, and beer bars were typical venues for The Fourth Shadow.
From 1965 to 1967,dpersonnel changed often and the band's name changed regularly as well. Other members of the Quatrain evolution included guitarist Tim "Rainbow" Bell, singer Cary Brent, backup singer Doug Webb, and most importantly, Steve "Buff" Lindsay, bassist from the popular San Fernando Valley band called The Boss Tweeds.
Lindsay became a solid part of pre-Quatrain, having replaced the departing Mark Johnson. More beer bar gigs ensued. Turtlenecks gave way to funky garb.
In 1966, the group, then known as The Berries, which at the time was holding court as regulars at The Middle Earth nightspot in Reseda, formerly The Yum Yum Tree, was signed by Doubleshot Records of Hollywood and renamed The Human Jungle by the label to record a national radio jingle for a Pillsbury breakfast product called "Gorilla Milk, " which went nowhere, much like their single, "Let Me Love You" b/w "City Girl" on the Doubleshot subsidiary label, Whiz Records. Producers Joe Hooven and Hal Winn had previously struck gold on Doubleshot with Brenton Wood's "Gimme Little Sign" and "The Oogum-Boogum Song," and Count Five's "Psychotic Reaction," but no such luck for the boys who would eventually become Quatrain.
Hooven and Winn booked the boys as The Plastic Zoo to play a dance one night in Pasadena, and the humiliation and embarrassment of performing under that name for one gig was obviated in retrospect somewhat by the fact that they had shared the bill as one of five groups with a then unknown and up and coming Three Dog Night. The Plastic Zoo and Human Jungle debacles ended, fat radio jingle royalty checks notwithstanding, almost as quickly as they had begun, and the boys thankfully returned to playing clubs around the Hollywood and San Fernando Valley areas as The Berries, and even The Rubber Band. Quatrain was still over a year away as 1966 came to a close.
