Vanguard Squad's 5th release,
Last of the Blacksmiths - And Then Some[/b], is now available. Custom 45 with handmade letterpress sleeve or CD-single, $5. Limited.Last of the Blacksmiths are a folk band from San Francisco. Pump organ, Wurlitzer, Clavinet, banjo, 3-part harmonies, brushes... I am currently obssessed with the drummer, and his uneaqualed ability to hold back. It takes two sticks to drum, it takes a hurricane to be subdued. And this dude has tasteful silence to a T.The songs were recorded live, with no overdubs, at The Studio Time Forgot. Completely in the analog domain, through a vintage Neve console and onto a 24-track 2" tape machine that once belonged to Herbie Hancock (mad Headhunters breakbeat oxide shed residue, son!), lovingly maintained by Kevin Ink.Fans of birdwatching, hope, independence, determination, grass blades, The Giants, warbly voices, walking places, Carter Family recordings, grandparents and children be advised, you will enjoy this.For sounds, pictures, stories and more, go here:http://www.vanguardsquad.com/store/vgs005.php
Bambouche
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Ha! Awesome.
Post pics of the 45 sleeve, please. People need to see how nice it is (although they won't be able to feel the quality of the offset printing).
Buy this beautiful record, people.
Two long lines of oaks
Meet like a bombed cathedral vault
That's a half truth. It's 100% post-consumer waste paper with a flat offset pink/grey background and a letterpress (textured) detail. The cover was designed by George Pavao, father of Nigel Pavao, the fellow who wrote "You Think I'm Okay." This is family music, in so many ways. (See the Ha! Awesome. comment above.)
Oh, and touring America, visiting every ball stadium, keeping specific tally of which citys serve the best dogs and kraut...
There are genuine things. Unique moments. Seconds that pass and make you wish you had a 'freeze' button. There are lifetimes, that when being lived, go unnoticed. Those lifetimes, if condensed, reveal a great arch of hope. Like two long lines of oaks. Knock loud. Life is deaf. Moments, things, that once seen, make it impossible for you to look at a picture, for instance, the same way, ever again. Afterwards, you look at the picture and your first interest is what it looks out on. Imagination reclaiming its rights.
There are those records that people listen to and put on a shelf. Records that have no consequence on the listener. They are part of a large pile of things. So many records are built on style and strategy. Those records are miserable. Miserabilism has had its greatest success in creating such near-total confusion that few people recognize how miserable they really are. The function of all miserabilists is to conceal the truth; to make misery seem like its opposite; to make the world safe for miseabilists exploitation.
Then there are those records that affect you. Records that were made with very little consideration for you, leaving them genuine to what they are, yet somehow, in their lack of consideration for you, still manage to change you. This is where 'beautiful' comes in.
While most people prefer the feigned indifference, the showbusiness, the pageantry, I prefer a genuine thing, a unique moment, something I didn't see coming.
To me, the Last of the Blacksmiths are that thing. They do what they want, they are writing songs that are important to them, songs about grass blades and swimming in the Russian River, songs about flea markets and songs about their wives. Songs that mean nothing to me, personally... yet, somehow, contradictorily, they are songs that mean everything to me, personally.
"We live for a day..."
ITS NOT A GAME!