Mojave 3s founding members are vocalist/guitarist Neil Halstead, bassist/vocalist Rachel Goswell, and drummer Ian McCutcheon.
The band broke cover in 1995, when a six-track demo impressed 4AD sufficiently to offer them a deal, despite a then-prevailing musical climate of bumptious Britpop that seemed totally at odds with what Mojave 3 were doing.

Their incongruence was hardly surprising given that Halstead, Goswell and McCutcheon had formed as members of definitive shoegazers Slowdive, while guitarist Simon Rowe had previously served with dreampop kindred spirits Chapterhouse.

Mojave 3s debut, Ask Me Tomorrow, was a refreshingly stripped-down collection that changed little from the original demos. Halsteads melodic, folk- and country-tinged songs drew favourable (if lazy) comparisons to Nick Drake, Cowboy Junkies