He begins to open the over-sized boxes that were just shipped to his house. He already knows what’s inside, yet excitement still overwhelms him.
Sophomore Jack Windler was ten years old when he received his first drum set for his birthday.
“It was like Christmas,” Windler said. “The feeling of opening a drum set and seeing the color and the set itself for the first time is indescribable.”
That set the stage for his drumming career. Now, he is playing his favorite songs in front of hundreds, sometimes even thousands.
“I never thought that I would ever join a band and be playing in big venues,” Windler said.
He started out his drumming career playing at church and practicing various Mass songs on his drum set at home. Then, Windler evolved from soft Gospel to hard rock. He took a year of lessons at Mozingo Music, where he met his current band mates.
“We thought we were all pretty talented,” Windler said, “so we got together and formed the band.”
The Brink, as they call themselves, plays anywhere from 1970’s to current era rock ‘n roll.
Windler’s job as a drummer is to keep the beat throughout the course of the song. However, when covering famous songs like “Basket Case” by Green Day or “Working Man” by Rush, he knows that he has the free will to do whatever he wants with the song.

He and his band have played over 20 performances at venues like Cicero’s, Blueberry Hill and Sky Music Lounge. His favorite of them all was in Ballpark Village, where he played in front of 1,200 people, something that he thought he could only do in his dreams.
Jamming a set list in front of friends, family and complete strangers with his band mates is all he could have ever asked for.
“A lot of people think that it would be nerve-wrecking to play in front of that many people,” Windler said. “But we’re just jamming and having fun. We don’t really notice that anybody is out there. We’re just doing what we love.”