The appearance this week of Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi on the campaign trail with Senator Kerry underscores the long rock ‘n' roll roots of John Kerry.

45 years ago the teenage John Kerry and two school-friends at St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire formed a garage-rock band called The Electras. Over the following three years a total of 13 different musicians played as members of the group and they even recorded an album. But the core of the band was always John Kerry on bass – and his two guitar-playing pals Larry Rand and Jon Prouty. In fact John Kerry was the band's only bass player. The band broke up in 1963 when the boys graduated high school. And they have not played together since.

With the rising prominence of Senator John Kerry - the band is planning to have a full band reunion - including their famous bass player - in Washington in January 2005 – as part of what they hope will be the inauguration of President John Kerry.

As a warm-up for that full reunion - John Kerry's closest pals from his FIRST “Band Of Brothers” – The Electras – are reforming for the first time in 43 years and will give their first-ever TV performance this coming Friday (October 29 th ) on “Wolf Blitzer Reports” – airing on CNN 5pm-6pm ET.

Viewers will see John Kerry's two co-founders in the The Electras - Larry Rand and Jon Prouty - performing one of the tunes that they first performed with John Kerry 44 years ago.

They will also talk about the personal qualities of John Kerry that they observed from four years close-up experience of Kerry in his important formative years – as fellow pupils in boarding school – and as bandmates.

Comments Electras co-founder Larry Rand:

“We haven't played together in over 40 years so we're a little rusty! With our first-ever reunion looming we thought we should have a warm-up! We are thrilled to have this opportunity to give viewers a flavor of the fun that we had with John Kerry when he played bass guitar with his FIRST ‘Band Of Brothers' – The Electras!

“I don't think we were ever quite as good as Bruce Springsteen! If we had been we'd have gone professional! We were just kids doing that most American of activities – playing in a rock ‘n' roll band to entertain others and have a little fun.”

“John Kerry was a great guy to be in a band with. He was a team player who always showed up for rehearsals and learned all the new tunes. He was a very quick study.

“He wasn't a bass guitarist when we discussed forming the band with him. He was actually quite a good guitar player. But we already had two guitarists – so we asked him to play bass. It wasn't a glamour role in a band – but he was quite selfless that way. He didn't mind not being in the limelight. He just wanted to be a member of the band and have fun. I always remember that about him.”