Following his departure from the classic rock three-piece Haelah, Albert Menduno set his sights on Chicago with only his guitar and a handful of songs. Musically focusing towards more of a textured, complex structure with a lyrical content of remorse, Menduno took the moniker of A-Set and captured these feelings in the studio. Along with Joan of Arc frontman Tim Kinsella on guitar, Menduno took the pump organ, lap steel and microphone and recorded six songs that would eventually make up the EP The Science of Living. Released in 1999 on Tree Records, a split with Sweden's Cobolt quickly followed that same year; the 7" The Blue Room arrived in 2000.