Bread – Why did the bread bake on the top like spongs and higher than the bucket in the bread maker

There are some previous questions with good answers like this one, or this that go into much more detail than I'm about to.

You said your bread didn't rise with the first rise, if you don't have a first rise you can't go onto the next step. If your yeast was old, or the temperature was cold in your kitchen or you used cold water in the dough, or the yeast came in contact with salt then its action could have been slowed down drastically and it would take much longer to get a rise. I've had a first rise take up to 4 hours in the past because of these factors. The times given in recipes are just guidelines, you have to be result-driven. Active dry yeast also takes longer than quick yeast to activate. When using active dry instead of quick yeast you would get better results by mixing it with the water before mixing in. I'd recommend using quick yeast as it's milled into smaller grains and you can mix it directly into the flour.

Of course your yeast may have simply been dead, or killed by salt or heat. Get some good fresh yeast and store it in the fridge to keep it fresh long-term.

Also, using all whole wheat flour isn't going to produce anything like a baguette. Whole wheat flour is very heavy compared to white flour and will take longer to rise. A half and half mix would work better. I'd recommend sticking to the recipe first, then gradually modifying it over time until you get your desired result.

http://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/bread-baking-tips-making-the-most-of-your-oven/ This post suggests to me that the dough was moister on the outside as it was baking, which probably allowed the bread to spring more than a regular bread dough. I am guessing that this is a function of the eggs and butter that are in brioche dough. In reading about butter in Ruhlman's Twenty, some of this may be the butter coating the flour, and preventing the stronger gluten strands that might have kept the spring from happening.