These up and coming, deadly talented, barely post-pubescent, BC Dinner Jacket and Bunny Hug clad Canucks are Harlan Pepper - a band named after Christopher Guest’s backwoods North Carolina bloodhound raising character in his 2000 movie “Best In Show.” The band (Jimmy Hayes (guitar, pedal steel, harmonica), Dan Edmonds (banjo, keys, vocals), Thompson Wilson (bass, vocals), Marlon Nicolle (drums, vocals)) was formed by kids at Westdale High School in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. They’re still hitting the homo milk and are not yet old enough to buy a two-six.
Harlan Pepper has been called “[j]ust another Hamilton-based hillbilly boy band” by contributors to the Canadian Music Wiki, however, it is more than that. The new CD, “Young and Old” is stripped down, old-time, acoustic-based American folk music with a youthful twist. There is a hint of Bob Dylan and the Band (in fact, Edmonds looks like a young Dylan), a smattering of Gram Parsons, a pinch of Hank Williams, and a helping of Buck Owens mixed with a taste of acoustic Neil Young and Jack Johnson. It is a band that would be right at home at venture capitalist Warren Hellman’s wonderful yearly musical gift to San Francisco, the “Hardly, Strictly Bluegrass” festival.
The nine track CD is a mixed bag. Some of the music soars with wonderful bare melodies and folk instrumentation. Others show that the band is just learning how to write for the masses, perform and make the sum total of the band more than its constituent parts.. The nine tracks cover topics ranging from home to travel to love to drugs to overwork. In other words, it is a rather good reflection of the experience of a young working band trying to break into the popular music business. In a recent interview that you can hear on the Harlan Pepper website, the band members even say they are still learning to play their instruments.
You can stream the entire CD directly from Harlan Pepper’s website. If they are this good right out of high school can you imagine what they will be like in the future? I suspect they will make quite a few loonies if they stick with it. This dog, unlike Christopher Guest’s bloodhound, can hunt.
1.elevated or lofty in thought, language, etc.: Paradise lost is sublime poetry. 2.impressing the mind with a sense of grandeur or power; inspiring awe, veneration 3.supreme or outstanding
It's almost hard to imagine a set of musicians making an album like this anymore. In this day of fast paced, fast produced, overly-glossed Super Bowl half-time shows where sparklers and space suits take the place of music and craft, no one is supposed to care about their art anymore. No one is supposed to create music of this tenor. It's all about the quick buck. All about the download. The YouTube clip.
Well let me be the first to tell you, any YouTube clip from these New Jersey natives, The World Concave, will never eclipse 1,000,000 hits. Few of the short-attention-span web cruisers would dare to have the patience to let even one track from this album unfold. Harbor goes against everything that is "the way" in the music industry today.
Perhaps that's why I'm so in love with this album.
Recently Robbers dropped a soul-searching bomb on me like this. Before that, years past, The Blue Nile used to routinely break convention with a similar works of somber beauty. Today, we have The World Concave.
This is an album of hidden beauty. An album that doesn't just reward repeat listenings, it requires them. To "get" this album, I had to peel back all the preconceptions of my stoner/metal mind, clear out the clutter and the noise and allow the album to become my world. I had to step inside it, as if it was some magical kingdom inside the wardrobe. And once I did, a vision of fantastic lushness opened to greet me.
Guitars chime and layer and percolate. Bass leads in gently; no pushing, just gently pulling -- drawing me closer. Piano keys clink and resonate with stark isolation and beauty. Drums don't pound as much as they provide a heartbeat, a pulse. Meanwhile, airy vocals float above it all like a celestial being, shining down upon all creation.
Sublime.
Nothing is rushed with this album. Each note is given space to inhale and breath, as if taking a life of it's own. Ambient space is just as important an instrument in this work as is the guitar or bass.
And that brings up one of the many dichotomies and contradictions of the album. For all of it's space and airiness, Harbor is actually crushingly heavy. In tone, in mood, in lyric. Despite it's beauty, this isn't an album of light and joy and promise. It's an album of open wounds and exposed nerves. In many ways, Harbor is as heavy as many metal albums, and in many ways, Harbor is more daring than many metal albums. Rather than relying on force or growling or ferocity to convey angst, The World Concave display their pain amongst tickling pianos and hushed tones.
Trust me, that can me much more powerful than some tattooed guy screaming at me. Lost amongst the gorgeous harmonics of the guitar and brushed drums, "4:44 A.M." drops in lyrical bombs like "I wish I could escape/ my body's been abused/ in nature's way a fuck you." Not what you'd expect to hear, and that's the point.
The violence lies in the peace. The despair hides in the beauty. It's in that dichotomy that the album works so well. Think of it as ambient metal. Metal sans the noise, just the tone.
And none of this talk of "space" and "beauty" and "airy" really means that these guys can't rock out. They don't do it very often, but when they do, it's all the more powerful because of the time it took to get there. Beginning with "4.44 AM." around 3:00 in, the guitar tone suddenly changes. It's subtle and only lasts for about 10 seconds, but damn is it heavy. It's ominous, like some nearing beast, a threatening breath upon the nape of my neck, a deathly cold hand placed on my shoulder. Then, as quickly as it emerged, it's gone, back to the acoustic picking. The hushed tones. But still, in the back of my mind it lingers.
"Jehovah's Witness Protection Program," picks up where those haunting tones left off. Echoing guitar leads us in, as if walking though a darkened haze. Suddenly, the pace picks up with some serious time shifts and strumming guitar. It all seems so effortless, as the melody picks up into what is probably the most immediate song on the album. Gorgeous harmony vocals float through the mix, like some disembodied spirit, not sure if it wants to join the proceedings or not. "You think I'm lost/just leave me lost," our narrator moans, tossing away the leaflet advertising his true savior. Then, as we near the end, we get the explosion. "I'll find my meadow without your cattle run!" the vocals urge. Finally, we have the payoff we've been waiting for. Brief again, but the anger and emotion in that vocal passage makes it all worthwhile. With the drums driving underneath, the pace is intense, as is the mood.
I've already written more than I intended to, so let's be brief. "I Sold My Life," has just a freaking fantastic structure, with it's neo-jazzy framework, layered acoustic piano, and stuttering drums and bass. Probably the best vocals, and some gorgeous female harmonies as well. Simply a killer song full of despondency and pain, but tempered by the sheer beauty of the arrangement. "Personal Day," is one of the more languid tracks with it's near chill-funk bass, ambient tones, and is truly worthy of anything The Blue Nile ever did. Toss in some polyrhythmic percussion and a truly memorable line "I'm taking a personal day", and we got another winner.
"Holiday," and "Digging The Honest Dirt" keep the dynamic tension high with alternating passages of gentle splendor and tempered aggression, all leading to the ambient-jazzy instrumental outro.
Harbor definitely isn't an album for every mood, time or day, but when that proper time and space come about, I'll have a hard time finding an album I'll reach for quicker.
Hanging out with Eric Michael Cohen from Industrial sex slaves, Cancer Killing Gemini:
What have been your musical epiphany moments?
I remember the first time I heard, Jane's Addiction, NIN, Faith No More.... I had been listening to Bon Jovi, Van Halen and whatever else Boston radio had to offer. There was no alternative station then, and to be honest, I didn't even know college radio existed. So all of a sudden (to me) there's this music that's not about bikinis and bullsh*t, and it sounds awesome. Then the whole palette of alternative opened up: The Cure, The Cult, The Replacements, New Order, The Stone Roses, Violent Femmes, Ministry, Big Black, etc etc etc.
Talk to us about the song-writing process for you. What comes first, the idea? A riff? The lyrics? How does it all fall into place?
I start with melody and simple accompaniment, usually bass. I'm not really a riff writer. For me, the melody is the most important element of the song. If you start with a riff, it can force the vocal to go in certain directions. If you can create a killer melody, the chords almost write themselves.If I don't start with bass, my second choice is usually Rhodes (vintage electric piano by Fender). When I write on Rhodes, the end result is often very slow and sad. A nice balance to wall of guitars.
Who has influenced you the most?
Ask me that question every 5 years and you'll get a different answer. Kurt Cobain and Trent Reznor were there closer to the beginning. More recently, it's been Silversun Pickups, Ben Folds, Fiona Apple, The Jesus Lizard, Mutemath...
Where do you look for continuing inspiration? New ideas, new motivation?
Everywhere. The trick.. the skill.... can be taking the mundane and making it interesting, or taking a great story and not wrecking it by putting it in a song. I'm trying to move away from always writing about myself and instead writing for other people. Does that make sense? I'm hoping to try to start a conversation with a song. We'll see how that goes.
How do you see your music as different that other artists in your genre?
I'm hoping to do what we can to leave genres behind (and yes, I know how pretentious that sounds). There's a loud industrial edge to much of the first record, but there's also down tempo, post-grunge, electronica / dance... As the band progresses (especially the live band), more and more genres are going to enter into the equation. I like electronic music, but my roots are in rock, and rock is a giant "genre" with thousands of styles. The band has the ability to jam, not like Phish or The Dead (thank God), but to take a song section and just bury you with it. "Christcontrol" (from "It only hurts when we breathe") now has a monstrous break in the middle that totally kills.
I was in an electronic project before Cancer Killing Gemini where some keyboard parts and loops would play from a sequencer. If forced the song to be the same every time we played it. No deviation or there'd be a trainwreck. This time is different. Everything is live on stage.
What is you musical intention? What are you trying to express or get your audience to feel?
Subversion / perversion / distortion of your mainstream. Bringing the fringe of society to centerstage through music. I really enjoy pushing the boundaries of people's comfort zones and seeing how they react. More and more of that in CKG's future. Come on, share with us a couple of your great, Spinal Tap, rock and roll moments?
I wish I had specific Spinal Tap moments I could think of.... there's definitely stories in my past, but I don't think they're all funny. I had a drummer hang himself in jail in a previous band, I dated the singer in kittymonkey until she switched sides / became a lesbian (not my fault... well maybe), in another band my ex-girlfriend became the bass player's wife (awkward!)....
You worked with Julie Simone on your recent video for "Should I tell you that you're pretty?" Stories please!
At one point I was going to go down to NY and meet her to shoot some of the footage for the video, but the timing didn't work out, so it was actually all done via email after email. I worked out a "plot" and sent her a slideshow. Bit by bit, the plot morphed, based mainly on suggestions from Julie until we had the final product. She has a specific way she wants to be portrayed. Victim is not part of that image. So, despite the male-chauvinist angle of the song, the video is more about femdom (doubt that word's in Webster's). The footage in the choruses is from her archives. I had an interesting time editing around the nudity, penetration and dildoes to make a video that could be played on YouTube.
What makes a great song?
If you want to immediately hear it again, there's a good chance it's great.
Tell us about the first song you ever wrote?
A prog rock anthem called "Sterile Rabbits" with a friend of mine. It was about sterile rabbits.
What piece of your music are particularly proud of?
Each piece of music I write has something about it that makes it my favorite, in a certain way. "Christcontrol" is just balls to the wall aggression, "Century" has this undeniable low key groove, "Prescription Drugs" is just plain fun. It's always the newest piece of music that's the best in the eyes of the writer, so right now I'm really keen on "Carousel", "You Let The Honey Out Of Me" and "University" which you should see in 2011.
Who today, writes great songs? Who just kicks your ass? Why?
Cee Lo Green. Fuck that guy. That song (F You) is awesome. Back Eyed Peas. Not great songs, but great pop music. Big difference. Phoenix. Can't understand half the lyrics, but man are they catchy. Silversun Pickups. Throwaway lyrics but an awesome soundscape.
Vinyl, CD, or digital? What's your format of choice?
It's not vinyl. Go ahead and shoot me. I don't want a non-faithful reproduction format that I can't play in my car or on the beach that degrades over time and has to be manually flipped every 12 minutes. Compact Discs are adequate but not awesome. Digital will be amazing once someone figures out a cool way to embed more stuff when you download a song (lyrics, photos, videos etc), so digital should be my format of choice, soon.
Whiskey or beer? And defend your choice
On beer I get sleepy and pass out. On whiskey I'm more likely to rage, then crash. Whiskey it is.
We, at the Ripple Effect, are constantly looking for new music. What's your home town, and when we get there, what's the best record store to lose ourselves in?
I'm in Boston. I don't do much record shopping but when I do, it's Newbury Comics. They're a local chain that understands alternative music.
Any final comments or thoughts you'd like to share with our readers, the waveriders?
Help out your favorite bands by telling them what you'd be excited to buy from them. We (musicians) don't care all that much about getting rich, but if we can not go broke as we create, that means alot. Do you want bonus tracks, T-shirts, signed copies of something, blood, pee, private concerts? Help us survive as the record labels die. And buy us drinks at shows.
Admittedly, I don’t know squat about Jethro Tull. I mean, Jethro Tull outside of songs such as “Aqualung”, “Cross Eyed-Mary”, “Bungle in the Jungle”, Locomotive Breath”, y’know . . . the “hits” as they may be called. Sure, I’ve owned and played, and replayed, and lost, and re-owned the band's M.U. Best of disc a hundred times over and I’ve lived with their music for the better part of my life as the songs have made their way through the FM rock station airwaves. But it wasn’t until recently that I realized that this is a band that I’ve always claimed to adore, yet knew in the most superficial way. Kinda’ like being in love with that hot chick on the far side of the mall but not knowing if she has any redeeming qualities outside of her outstanding looks. So, here I go. Manning up, walking up to her, asking her name, preparing for the eventual rebuff, and go ahead and fill in your own conclusion.
I’ve gone back and explored the sounds of Aqualung, Thick As A Brick, and War Child, and I’ve come to the conclusion that like most women, Jethro Tull are more complex a creature than one will ever truly know. In listening to Stand Up, all I can really do is marvel that this is music originally released in 1969, the same year that saw the first two Zeppelin albums, all three CCR albums, Abbey Road, Santana’s first, Let It Bleed, and countless other releases that changed the music world and the way so many of us actively listen and create music. The music from Stand Up probably doesn’t need any description from me, for I’m sure I’ll never be able to add any new or useful insight. I can, however, sit back and smile that I have been blessed with ears, and appreciate in some voyeuristic fascination that music fans world around have been blessed to have a group of young men who pushed the boundaries of folk and rock music to carve out their own cubby in the world of progressive music. Gentlemen, thank you from the bottom of my heart. Every spin of your records is a musical safari through lands, cultures, and ideas that I never would have imagined.
This re-issue, and especially this particular package, of Stand Up is beyond cool. The original re-mastered version of the album needs no introduction other than to say, “Woof. Incredible”. The bonus material to this package, on the other hand, is above and beyond the price of admission. If you’re like me and somewhat versed, but not really, in the ways of Tull, then go through the CD and familiarize yourself with the tunes that make up the gem. You should immediately recognize tracks like “Fat Man” and “Nothing Is Easy”, and you’ll probably sit back in some cosmic orgasm when you hear “Bouree”, but these tracks aren’t what makes this particular package so fucking cool! Kick that disc out and insert disc 2 . . . yeah, that’s right, the live portion of the package. Good. Now push play and join me on this journey of sonic discovery!
Disc 2 was recorded live at New York City’s Carnegie Hall in 1970 and having never had the opportunity to catch Jethro Tull live, I now feel cheated for being born too late. Thankfully, I now have this live recording in my possession and it’s fair to say that its one of the most important pieces of my collection. I’m sure it doesn’t need to be said, but Jethro Tull are a bunch of bad asses! Opening with “Nothing Is Easy”, it takes all of five seconds to realize that this performance is going to be a thrill ride and by the time Ian Anderson utter s the first lines of lyric, it’s a stone cold fact that the world’s best scientists would spend several lifetimes trying to dispute that Jethro Tull are a spectacular and brilliant live group. The band comes across as confident despite this recording being early on in the careers, the breaks are tight, the solos are filled with passion and creativity, and the energy is infectious. Close your eyes tight enough and you may smell the sweet fragrance of weed filling the air. This is a crystal clear recording and whoever had the foresight to push the record button needs to be thanked, maybe even knighted.
By far my favorite part of this concert is the second track, “My God”, and oh my God . . . Ian Anderson, what have they fed you, my friend?!? First off, the song is one of those dark and gritty tunes in tone, opening with some chaotic acoustic guitar flourishes before dropping into that ever so somber and mournful chord progression. The music almost sounds like a dirge and Anderson’s vocals always come across as intense and manic, and once the drums and electric guitars come in on the second verse, it’s like lightening striking a tree and splitting it in half. I love the feedback . . . I know it’s technically a flaw but it adds an authentic air to the recording, make me feel more like I’m right there watching everything going down in front of me. Then, it’s all about the flute solo. Amazing. Absolutely amazing . . . filled with vibrancy and massive elements of creativity, immediacy, humor, and intellect. Anderson is insane and a god. The dude’s head must spin from lack of oxygen after doing this kind of thing every night! I never thought the flute could be so rockin’, even after hearing Tull for the better part of my life and knowing better. Flat out . . . Jethro Tull rocks!
And it’s not just Anderson who shows his chops and musical proficiency on this live album. Guitarist Martin Barre and pianist John Evan steal the spotlight on numerous occasions, adding flair, lighting up the sky, dancing between the bombast and the delicate, none of it possible without the rhythm section of Glenn Cormick on bass and Clive Bunker on drums. The way these guys communicate musically on stage is something to behold . . . like one musical being split into five personalities! “To Cry You A Song” is outstanding and a great example of how this unit works together to create a stunning tune. There’s something just a little sinister about the tones of all of the instruments and Barre’s guitar work is of a searing nature, the lyrics spit out by Anderson are packed with imagery that makes me want to throw my current life to the side with all of my dirty laundry and try my hand at something else. The starts and stops to the song are just that tight . . . world class. Love it!
Christ, I could go on about every song . . . “A Song For Jeffrey”, the medley of “Sossity, You’re A Woman/Reasons For Waiting”, and “Dharma For One” (bitchin’ drum solo) are all killer! The thing I realized with Jethro Tull is that the music they create is thought out, highly intelligent music meant more for firing up the mind than it is to get your ass swinging on a dance floor. The off time rhythms, the odd chord progressions, the intellectual subject matter, the arrangements of the music, it all screams progressive rock and I love that. It never feels like these cats are trying to speak above me. They may be speaking above me, but that’s more due to my own lack of intelligence than the band trying to be superior mental beings. Stand Up is a must for any who are trying to get into Tull, but I think you’d be better served to pick up this collectors package (complete with pop-up figures of the band in the packaging . . . get it? Stand Up? Pop-up? Intellectual) and spin the live portion over and over and over again. The live venue is where one truly gets to understand a musician and what it is that they’re trying to express, and this performance is one of the best I’ve heard from anyone, to the point that I’m inspired to complete my Jethro Tull catalog by draining my bank account and filling up my Amazon cart.
There's an expression in creative writing circles: "Book characters should talk more like actual people, and actual people should talk more like book characters."
What I like about this idea is the exchange of expectation-- taking one idea (people in books tend to talk like poets, much more memorably that real people do) and trading it for another, opposite idea (people in real life should try to talk more memorably than actually occurs).
I apply a similar rule to listening to (and by extension, judging) music: I like all forms of music, but usually listen only to metal or jazz.
And I don't know if you're familiar with stereotypical metal versus jazz fans; they're usually polar opposites. Metal is often anti-intellectual ("Does it rock or not?!"), and jazz tends to be the reverse, overthinking everything ("I found his use of progressive thirds intriguing") and not generally concerned with whether Paul Motian's new album rocks (or swings, as they say).
I try to exchange expectations between criticism of these two genres. I try to get the "feel," the guts, of jazz (ignoring music theory unless it's relevant to the Rawk factor), and then analyze metal.
Jazz has plenty of people who'll analyze the shit out of a chord progression, but very few who'll try and rock out with it. Metal, on the other hand, has scads of leather-clad Visigoths who don't give a second thought to the most basic music theory tenets (for example, did you know that the main riff from "Raining Blood" is a diminished scale in E flat?), but will sure as hell tell you if the new Havok album "fucked my face off," as the terminology goes. The two approaches are due for an exchange.
And maybe you don't give a wildebeest's butthole about theory, and just wanna know if something rocks or not. If so, you should skip down a bit, because I'm about to go up my own butt on this motherfucker.
First, preamble: I listen to different genres of metal for different reasons. Thrash is for aggression and driving fast, black metal is for rage and catharsis, doom/sludge/stoner is for feelings of might, and drone music like Earth (or Sunn O))) or Alcest), while having stoner applications, is for darkness-- for a trance-like, sleepy state of relaxation.
Yup, relaxation. You can listen to Earth loud as shit (like Sunn O))) in concert), but it's still calming. Like standing on a heavy-breathing giant that you know has your back.
I call this doze metal. Dream metal. Lunesta metal.
And this music has a ton in common with jazz, specifically the type of jazz you probably think of if you don't listen to much jazz-- e.g., John Coltrane or Miles Davis. (Though notlike Cynic, Atheist, or later-period Death, which are more like jazz fusion, à la Weather Report). Coltrane and Davis, in addition, are both renowned (in part) for their modal jazz.
Short version: modal jazz sits on one or two chords for awhile. It tends to be slow and take its time. It gives a soloist time to spread out and relax into it, rather than having to sprint between chord changes (like guitar soloists in thrash metal would have do to, for example).
Earth, and their new Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light 1 (released 2/22) are modal metal.
Earth has time.
Earth has fuuuuuuuckloads of time.
They are not. in. a. hurry. to. get. anywhere. Sometimes, they don't actually "go" anywhere at all.
If you have the time, you will love this album.
If you're in a hurry, you will hate this album.
Earth's last record, The Bees Made Honey in the Lion's Skull (even their titles take time), was laconic to the point of petrification, and, with its undistorted heavy string guitars, often could've passed for background music in a Sergio Leone western.
The first four tracks off of Angels... follow a similar blueprint, though having evolved that sound without fundamentally changing it: a cello pervades the music, sometimes in the background, sometimes fore, and makes the sounds more gentle and more bittersweet than previously.
This is reminiscence metal.
The cello particularly, and the overall instrumentation in general, gives "Old Black," "Father Midnight," "Descent to the Zenith" and "Hell's Winter" a mournful whimper; the dominant, sometimes only chord in the songs lend themselves to single-tone singalongs, aka mantras and chants; Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light 1 is an hour-long farewell, like ice in the sun falling from a roof.
The instrumentation is eclectic and impressive: cello, electric and acoustic basses and Dylan Carlson's twangy clean-channel telecaster. Promotional materials mention that Earth put "a greater emphasis on improvisational songwriting tactics," which help explain the sparse arrangements. It might also explain why the last piece, the 20-minute title track, is the most absorbing and clearest evolution in Earth's sound.
There are rarely drums in it, and the piece is rubato (without definite time) for much of its length. (Try and tap your foot to it.) It changes and morphs and slides in and out of time and then key; it's the musical equivalent of the goo in a lava lamp. Earth seem to love sevenths-- "tense" notes, that beg to be resolved and make it uncomfortable when they aren't. Like a very quietly argumentative man, who suddenly and periodically comes to some kind of angering conclusion (like the jarring string rakes at 10:50).
Frankly, just the fact that they used some degree of improvisation (like jazz) is reeeeeeeally cool.
Overall, Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light 1 is miraculously "blank." Very little happens, but (if you're patient with it) you won't want to stop listening. Soloing over it, it would be nearly impossible to find a wrong note or even a wrong sound; all are welcome.
Small Stone’s been steady rolling out some really good product these days. It’s always exciting when a party pack with their return address label shows up because that means heavy rock is inside. The latest shipment was no exception. Here are 3 of their latest and greatest.
Lo Pan’s- Sasquanaut
As far as I know, Thin Lizzy and Hawkwind never played together, but if they did and had a late night jam session Lo Pan’sSasquanaut might have been the result. This was originally released on another label but when Small Stone signed the band they did some remixing and remastered the whole thing. Never heard the original, but this sounds great. Vocals have a nice distorted halo around them and the band crushes while it swings. They can get kind of trippy at times like Mick Bolton era UFO but never to the point of pointless noodling.
Red Giant got my immediate attention with their great Love Gun album rip off cover artwork. Even better is the disc contained inside. Dysfunctional Majesty is their first album in about 6 years. Sounding like a really pissed off Clutch, it rocks hard right out of the gate. Crushingly heavy riffs combined with angry, strangulated vocals and frenzied drumming. Fire this one up in the car after a shitty day at work and defy the cops to pull you over. There’s even a good version of AC/DC’s “Let There Be Rock” as a secret bonus track. Can’t go wrong with this muther.
If you ever imagined what Angus and Malcolm Young would sound like borrowing a Frippertronics rig, then Blackwolfgoat’s debut Dragonwizardsleeve is right up your alley. Not the entire album is like that but opening song “Risk and Return” made me think of that. This one man instrumental band is guitarist Darryl Shepard (Hackman, Roadsaw, Milligram) not rocking like his old bands but once the rock is in you, it always comes out no matter how hard you drone. This would make a good gateway for people who are put off by the statistical density of Earth or Sunn O))). It’s also really good if you’re high on pot and need something to zone out to. But the best application would be to annoy your co-workers with. That really did the trick on a misty morning in the office.
Mercury/Vagrant Records proudly announced the March 15, 2011 release of Bob Geldof's new record "How To Compose Popular Songs That Will Sell," to be launched at SXSW where Geldof will perform and headline as keynote speaker.
The name Bob Geldof is habitual and ubiquitous. It is woven into three decades of the global narrative and its cultural soap opera. Ask people have they heard of him and all will answer in the affirmative. Ask them what he does and all will have a separate answer. Ask do they have an opinion of him and, for good or ill, most will. Ask how that opinion was formed and they don’t quite know. Whistle one of his tunes and most will remember it but they won’t know who wrote it. Bob Geldof is the most famous secret songwriter in the UK.
Bob's new solo album, “How To Compose Popular Songs That Will Sell”, is his first album since 2001’s “Sex, Age & Death” and his fifth album as a solo artist (his eleventh if you include his work in his band the Boomtown Rats). The album features 10 new Geldof compositions recorded with his band in his home and in various friends’ studios and produced by his longtime collaborator Pete Briquette.
Lyrically the album is full of love, hope and joy and one senses that Geldof is more comfortable in his own skin than ever before.
On March 17 at SXSW, when Bob and his band take the stage, there will be no question what Bob Geldof does, and that he is very very good at it.
