The Early Years: "So Far Gone" Video
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Conductor started as a collection of songs written in the winter of 2003 at house on the North Carolina coast. Cold winds blowing in from the Atlantic would often rustle palms and wind chimes on the porches of of empty beach houses. The steady noise made it a little easier for a string of break-ins to continue. Baffling local authorities. Although most of the houses were boarded up that winter, a few remained occupied. One of these, lit almost exclusively by candle light in the evening, housed a 4 track recorder, an acoustic guitar, a small city of wine bottles (both full and empty), and Andy Herod. At the end of a 2 year relationship and faced with having to find a new place to live in 6 weeks, the songs began to come out. Loss of love and identity and all that. Eventually each night he ended up on the couch watching the only movie that made sense or mattered, Dark City. Upon each viewing finding new meaning, symbolism and hope that seemed to apply directly to his own life. Some felt that this period may have gone on a bit long... At the end of the winter several cassette tapes where passed along to band mate Nicole Gehweiler as well as friend and producer Alan Weatherhead. A record was soon underway. Recorded at the Sound of Music studios in Richmond VA, Conductor ended up a swampy mix of pop and fuzzed-out rock songs. But when it came time to sequence the record, the band was stumped. Finally one smoky evening in the studio around 4 am, a story line began to reveal itself in the music they were hearing. Almost instantly, the track order fell into place and plans to animate the story began. Six weird months later came Conductor, a monument to the suicide of love erected by robots against a wintry sci-fi back drop of dark towers, moonlit skies and a cast of lost characters. Or perhaps it is just a break-up record. It is not yet known. What is known is that it's here, and it's massive.
Conductor started as a collection of songs written in the winter of 2003 at house on the North Carolina coast. Cold winds blowing in from the Atlantic would often rustle palms and wind chimes on the porches of of empty beach houses. The steady noise made it a little easier for a string of break-ins to continue. Baffling local authorities. Although most of the houses were boarded up that winter, a few remained occupied. One of these, lit almost exclusively by candle light in the evening, housed a 4 track recorder, an acoustic guitar, a small city of wine bottles (both full and empty), and Andy Herod. At the end of a 2 year relationship and faced with having to find a new place to live in 6 weeks, the songs began to come out. Loss of love and identity and all that. Eventually each night he ended up on the couch watching the only movie that made sense or mattered, Dark City. Upon each viewing finding new meaning, symbolism and hope that seemed to apply directly to his own life. Some felt that this period may have gone on a bit long... At the end of the winter several cassette tapes where passed along to band mate Nicole Gehweiler as well as friend and producer Alan Weatherhead. A record was soon underway. Recorded at the Sound of Music studios in Richmond VA, Conductor ended up a swampy mix of pop and fuzzed-out rock songs. But when it came time to sequence the record, the band was stumped. Finally one smoky evening in the studio around 4 am, a story line began to reveal itself in the music they were hearing. Almost instantly, the track order fell into place and plans to animate the story began. Six weird months later came Conductor, a monument to the suicide of love erected by robots against a wintry sci-fi back drop of dark towers, moonlit skies and a cast of lost characters. Or perhaps it is just a break-up record. It is not yet known. What is known is that it's here, and it's massive.
Ryan Shupe & the RubberBand: "Dream Big"
A fiddle player since the age of 5, Ryan Shupe first worked as part of a group at 10 years old when his dad brought together a bunch of talented kids to play in a band. He joined various types of musical groups in his teens and in college, only to be disappointed to see them break up just as they seemed to be in a groove. He decided to start his own band that would not break up and called it the RubberBand, because it was meant to be elastic. He brought in the players he needed but only when he needed them. (There might be just one other musician sharing the stage with him or there might be four others.) The lineup changed constantly until, without even trying to make it happen, the membership jelled. As of 2005, the members included Roger Archibald (guitar, vocals), Colin Botts (bass, vocals), Craig Miner (banjo, bouzouki, guitar, mandolin and vocals), Bart Olson (drums) and Shupe (lead vocals, fiddle, mandolin and guitar). The band's influences include such diverse performers as Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Bob Marley, the Police, AC/DC and Bela Fleck. Most have dabbled with a number of different instruments, and all have been playing since they were kids. Shupe is the group's principal songwriter.
The Kosheen sound has always been about integrating electronica with great song structures, and, locked down in the studio recording 'Damage', the band has created a subtly futuristic soundtrack for the 21st century. From the spacious titular track itself to the pop-driven forthcoming single 'Overkill' (about, says Sian, "personal or political frustration"); from the early 80s synth-stabbed 'Chances' to the epic hum of 'Under Fire', hefty beats jostle with acidic bleeps, Morricone guitars, plangent synths and haunting piano. Look out, too, for the rather swaggering majesty of closing track, ‘Your Life,’ which, says Markee, "grew from its opening chords – it stinks of flava!"
On a lark, the host of a late-night political talk show (Williams) decides to run for president. The thing is, he never expected to win.
The White Stripes: "Blue Orchid"
get behind me satan -is the white stripes? fifth album -produced by grammy award winning producer jack white -recorded in Detroit at third man studios, mixed in Memphis at ardent studios, mastered in new york city at masterdisk -album contains thirteen original songs -songs were written on piano, acoustic guitar, and marimba -songs are deceivingly orchestrated, some sounding as if they were recorded with a full orchestra when they only have piano and bass on them -none of the songs had been played live before the recording of the album -none of the songs were completely written before the recording of the album -contains the white stripes shortest song to date -only three songs are electric guitar based -the band used their live sound engineer to engineer the recording -their fourth album, elephant was released one year after completion. the first single from get behind me satan, ?blue orchid,? was released two weeks after completion -jack white has described the record as an exploration of ?characters and the ideal of truth? -the band will tour prior to, and continue after, the album?s release but are only playing countries and cities that they?ve never been to before. The band plan to tour the u.s. and Europe afterwards. -a vinyl version of the record will be put on hold pending a unique release. -produced by jack white, engineered by matthew kettle, mixed by jack white, mix engineer john hampton, mastered by howie weinberg, photos by ewen spencer all songs written by jack white album artwork design by the third man artwork layout by arthole graphics
Check out the video for "Guilt" by the Long Blondes as heard in the album 'Couples' released on Beggars Banquet.
Check out the video for "Dear Me" from the album "Hideout" released on Beggars Banquet.
My friend gave me a tarot card reading over the phone one night as I was watching TV with a guitar in my lap. "I've drawn a mountain," she said. "I'm a mountain," I said. So begins a song that became the title track of my new record. Most of these songs have been milling about in my mind for a while now. Some I started writing back when I put down the electric guitar and ding-digga-dinged my way through summer on the back porch. All of them live in the same wide frame and seem to belong together. "I am Aglow," "The Ring," and "I'm a Mountain," are tunes inspired by country music and bluegrass bands, singing for the joy of it, and telling new versions of old stories in song. "The Phoenix" builds on the themes of courage and regeneration and the inspirational "How Deep in the Valley" came from somewhere deep in the hymnbook of my memory. Down low in the picture frame (under a log) is "Salamandre," a children's song written by my friends Kate Fenner and Chris Brown. I am thrilled this modern classic can be part of this collection as it expresses my own love for the magical and precious amphibian and the time-honored relationship between nature and imagination. "Luther's Got the Blues" is my old pal Luther Wright's enduring, scruffy sidewalk lament, and Dolly Parton's "Will He Be Waiting For Me" lives in the world of lost love and yearning that I, too, know something about. I wrote "Goin' Out for an AIDS Vigil," and I am so happy to have my dad singing it with me. He also lends his warm and wise timbre to "Oleander." And finally, casting its glow over the entire record is the new folk song "Escarpment Blues," which tells the story of a current land-use conflict in Southern Ontario on the Niagara Escarpment, a UNESCO World Biosphere Reserve. I grew up on the escarpment on the farm where my family still lives, within a long green corridor prized for its fresh water resources, its endangered species habitats, its prime agricultural soils, and its wetlands and forests. These lands are under serious threat from the aggregate (sand, gravel, and shale) industry. The problem is large multinational companies want to open new quarries on top of the escarpment and extract the rock below these ecosystems, thereby removing and destroying them. So, after writing the song, I got the idea for the "I Love the Escarpment" Tour and set out in June 2005 with some of my best musical mates to hike the escarpment and make music along the way. Julie Fader (vocals, keys), Jason Euringer (vocals, stand-up bass), Spencer Evans (clarinet, accordion), Joey Wright (mandolin, guitar), and I hit the Bruce Trail (the continuous hiking trail that goes from one end of the escarpment to the other) and spent two weeks rock climbing, caving, hiking, and performing in theaters and community halls along Southern Ontario's spine. All proceeds of the tour went to help finance the research and advocacy work of Protecting Escarpment Rural Land (PERL), a volunteer organization I helped form last winter when the new quarry proposal came to light in my old stomping grounds of North Burlington. After a wonderful tour we put away our hiking boots and went into Reaction Studio in Toronto to capture these songs, all wrapped in up our camaraderie. This record was made for everyone, everywhere. Like the smiles we had on our faces when we made it, we hope it spreads far and wide.
Longtime musical collaborators Kyle Fischer (guitar, vocals) and William Kuehn (drums) began writing a new batch of songs in the late summer of 1995, thinking they lacked only a bassist. When they found Caithlin De Marrais (vocals, bass), they knew they had found a uniquely captivating voice to front the band as well. Fischer and Kuehn had met at all-ages shows in Madison, Wisconsin, where Kuehn was cajoled into replacing Fischer on the drums in Ezra Pound (with Matt Tennessen of Pele). Fischer switched to guitar, and the two departed together a year later in search of broader sonic horizons. Meanwhile, Fischer had met De Marrais in a University of Wisconsin poetry workshop where the two had organized extra evening sessions of the class and soon found they were the only ones attending. Here they wrote the poems that would later become songs on the band's first album. Rainer Maria's various releases began mapping their trajectory. The original demo cassette, a run of 350 now long out of print, documents the excited initial efforts of a band just 6 weeks old. Their debut self-titled EP appeared on Polyvinyl as a result of the experience of early tours, playing house shows or all ages "spaces" from Austin TX to Kent OH, even a double-wide house trailer in rural Mississippi packed with 100 melting kids. With the "New York, 1955" single, the band began experimenting with what happened when they turned the volume down. Past Worn Searching signaled the beginning of Rainer Maria as a full-time band. Recorded at the sweltering hot, now defunct Ghetto Love studios in Chicago during Summer 1997, Past Worn Searching and its stripped-down production ushered the full arrival of dueling vocals, sonic excess, and youthful exuberance. That fall, Rainer Maria toured the entire continental U.S. for the first time--more than 50 shows booked by Kuehn himself, including a west coast tour with Braid. The band?s second LP, Look Now Look Again, was released in April 1999 to the open arms of fans and critics alike. Look Now Look Again climbed to 19 on CMJ?s top 200 and spent 16 weeks on the charts. Stellar reviews and write-ups appeared in The New York Times, Alternative Press, Magnet, CMJ, and The Village Voice to name a few. Rainer Maria appeared in Spin three times in the latter half of 1999 and Look Now Look Again was named one of the magazine?s 20 best records of the year. The band would go on that year to record and release Atlantic, a three-song CDEP recorded at Pachyderm Studios (P.J. Harvey, In Utero) in August. Just days later, they band relocated to the East Coast. Rainer Maria then spent the better part of a year holed up in a converted cow barn, the previous home of Pepperidge Farm Bakery?s original dairy farmer. There, they wrote their third and most ambitious album, A Better Version of Me, which was released in January 2001. The album hit the #1 spot on CMJ and was supported by a relentless tour schedule of over 200 shows. Fall 2002 the band again returned the studio to record Long Knives Drawn, their fourth album. As a teaser, the Ears Ring EP appeared early November 2002 and was the band's first new material in over a year-and-a-half. Two months later Long Knives Drawn was released and the band embarked on a two month tour with Mates of State followed by a mini-tour in Canada, and then a tour with Denali. Next up for Rainer Maria is a three week tour with Coheed and Cambria in support of their newest release, Anyone in Love with You (Already Knows) , a DVD of their 3/11/03 Cat's Cradle show filmed by members of Bifocal Media (Braid Killing a Camera, Michigan Fest 2002) which includes a bonus audio CD featuring selected various live tracks the band has been accumulating over the years. Anyone in Love with You (Already Knows) will be released on March 9, 2004.
