Best selling releases
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John Beecher's poem, Undesirables, was originally published in 1964. Unfortunately, it could have been written today, considering this country's attitude towards immigration issues has changed little in the last 45 years. The context may be different, but the end result is the same: our knee-jerk reaction to bar immigrants for political affiliations or ideas seriously undermines the basic foundation of our Constitution. As John points out in the poem, some of the most important people in our country's history have been immigrants, and we're far richer (both culturally and financially) for it.
The Music
Once upon a time, there was a song by the band Joi called What You Are, and they released the raw tracks for a remix competition. Since Joi is on Real World Records, we thought it would be interesting to see what we'd come up with, and in return, what ol' Petey G. would think of our approach. Well...as usual around here, we ended up throwing away all of the original samples, re-recording the song's guitar riff, and turning the lyrical concept on its head. Joi's song What You Are is about how we're all one people, peace, love, etc. Undesirables is the reality check/answer to Joi's idealism: we very well might be one people, but we sure don't act that way.
Two funny things about this: None of us have ever actually heard the Joi song that gave us the idea for Undesirables.The sample pack we downloaded didn't have a complete mix, just isolated samples with no reference as to how they were arranged in the original song. Second, when we finished the mix and uploaded it to the Real World site for the competition, they wouldn't accept it! They said it had absolutely no relation to the original song, and since we didn't use any of the original samples, it didn't count as a "remix". Their loss, as far as we're concerned ;-)
Citizens
cover art: "cover #92" by Tone Deaf
Conrad St. Clair: bass, keys, programming
Mike Stehr: keys
Lou Caldarola: drum kit
Chris Huntington: guitar
Aya Peard: vocals
John Beecher: spoken word
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The Last Step is the closing chapter in the story of the characters first introduced in Evil Demon Weed: Bob (the Pusher), Candy (the Evil Temptress), and Johnny (the Good Kid on the Path to Ruin). Bob, Candy, and Johnny have been a big part of the growing Kicksville "mythology": they're featured on the cover on Enter the Flavor Hut, they're the thread that sews our live show together, and they're regulars in Tone Deaf's poetry.
When we last saw them, Johnny was being introduced to the Demon Weed, led on by Bob and his femme fatale, Candy. Now, in The Last Step, Johnny has become a hopeless junkie, Candy has taken the Vows, and Bob has fallen into the depths of a drug-induced psychotic break. Fun for the whole family!
Bonus question of the week! There are references to three other songs in this track: two Kicksville songs and a Rush song. The first person to guess two out of three gets a t-shirt - email your answers to info@kicksville.com!
The Music
To paraphrase Frank Zappa, music without dissonance or tension is like eating cottage cheese. If that's the case, then The Last Step is the spiciest Pad Thai you ever had! Musically, this song owes a lot to Zappa's work with Captain Beefheart: check out the song Sam with the Showing Scalp Flat-top, and you'll see what we mean....
Citizens
cover art: "Monkey's Memento" by Tone Deaf
Conrad St. Clair: keys, programming
Mike Stehr: keys
Lou Caldarola: drum kit, percussion
Chris Huntington: guitar
Tone Deaf: spoken word
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This track marks the first appearance in Season 2 of City Council member, Aya Peard. According to Aya, Touch the Ground is about "...keeping your head down and wits about you.... It's a no-worries song: move forward, follow through, commit, and don't get trapped!"
We started working on Touch the Ground during production rehearsals for last summer's tour, which makes it one of the first songs we were able to write with the City Council all in one place at one time. We brought in Tim Gruber and Amir Alam to overdub some tasty extra bits, but the majority of the recording is pretty much the City Council, giving the track a very "live" feel.
The Music
The song is really built around the bass line - I started playing the progression, and everything else just fell in place on top. The bass on the final mix was actually recorded live (first take, too)as a scratch track for the initial sketch of the song, but we decided to keep it. There might be a few minor clams, but overall the part had such a good feel it didn't make sense to re-track it. And although we've mentioned this before in Season 1, it certainly bears repeating: guitar + E-bow + Filter Factory = seriously hot aural action!
Citizens
cover art: "Pity the Foo" by Tone Deaf
Conrad St. Clair: bass, guitar, percussion, programming
Mike Stehr: percussion
Lou Caldarola: drum kit, percussion
Chris Huntington: guitar
Beaker: guitar
Aya Peard: vocals
Amir Alam: guitar
Tim Gruber: percussion
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Fair warning: If you're easily offended, you probably shouldn't listen too closely to this song! Started as an homage to Ministry (one of The Mayor's biggest influences), Krankypants is crude and filthy, but seriously tongue-in-cheek. Krankypants, the song, features the secretly-taped mutterings of Krankypants, the man. Surprisingly, despite his gruff demeanor, Kranky is an amazingly sensitve, award-winning jazz pianist, arranger, and accordionist. He's easily one of the best improvisers I've ever worked with...or even seen for that matter. And on some level, that talent translates when he's telling his very un-PC stories - you might get a little disturbed, but they're funny as hell and told with a certain.....shall we say, "flair" ;-)
The Music
Here's a good drummer joke (and it's funny because it's true): We had recorded most of this song around a programmed drum part, but it just wasn't clicking. During one tracking session with Lou Caldarola, we played him the song and asked if he wanted to replace the programmed drums with a live part. Lou goofed around a bit, and ended up recording a few measures each of the four or so "standard" Ministry beats. We edited the tracks he cut, fit them into the song, and a few weeks later sent Lou a rough mix of the result. His response was: "I love this song - who played the drums? They're awesome!" He still doesn't remember tracking this song....
Citizens
Conrad St. Clair: keys, programming
Mike Stehr: bass
Lou Caldarola: drum kit
Chris Huntington: guitar
Beaker: guitar
Tone Deaf: wow
Krankypants: voice samples
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Kalamaya
Tani Diakite, the singer on Kalamaya, is from the Wassoulou region of Mali. The language he's singing in is Bambara (also called Bamanakan), and very roughly translated, Kalamaya means "it's not good to fight." Basically, the lyrics of the chorus are: "Music makes me happy / I don't want to stop / I just want to play my ngoni / I don't want to fight..." The song was built around Tani's melody and kamale ngoni (African harp, like a cora but smaller), but since Tani makes this stuff up on the fly, the final version is very much Kicksville-ized...there isn't much structure to Tani's open-ended jamming/improv. And forget about getting him to do the same thing twice ;-)
The Music:
Tani's melody is incredibly haunting and beautiful - the main goal when arranging this song was to stay out of its way! Andy Ewen's guitar part (the main riff through the song) really adds a nice touch of old-school R&B, and Chris Huntington's flowing Afro-pop lines in the bridge provide an interesting contrast. Spice it up with some airy synth textures and a 1974 Buick hubcap strapped on top of a snare drum, and you've got a song!
Citizens:
cover art: "Spiritual" by Tone Deaf
Conrad St. Clair: bass, guitar, keys, programming
Mike Stehr: keys
Lou Caldarola: drum kit
Tani Diakite: kamela ngoni, vocals
Andy Ewen: guitar
Chris Huntington: guitar
Beaker: hubcap, ride cymbal
Djam Vivie: djembe, kroboto
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At the end of 2008, Kicksville began releasing weekly single "episodes" of sonic ambition into the digital ether. Thirteen tracks later, 'The Singles - Season 1' is nothing short of a mind-melting, genre-defying journey of sound through samples, sequences and taut organic instrumentation that, according to Wired.com, is "built for artistic insurrection."
That was just the warm up. Starting 4/20, 'The Singles - Season 2' will begin a radical new journey through Kicksville with the first single, "Dumfukistan" - a bizarre concoction blended from James Brown funk, aggressive techno, spoken word, and country chicken-picking a la Chet Atkins. And continuing the tradition of bringing in an artist to create uniqe cover art for each single, the 'Season 2' artwork will be from the catalogue of the legendary performance artist and City Council member, Tone Deaf.
Stay tuned: if you thought 'Season 1' was good, just wait till you hear 'The Singles - Season 2'!
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Kicksville is new and fresh and clean and pure and NEW AND FRESH.
How do you describe a band anymore in this day and age of over-hype, mega-links
And blogs, blogs, blogs, I mean, there’s music coming out of every corner of your world these days and you still haven’t heard anything that knocked you off your ass…..for better or worse……until kicksville. That’s how I see it, that’s how I heard it. that’s why I signed it. that’s how they dined it.
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File under:experimental-groove-driven music that spans the globe but keeps the beat. Mix in a powerful message (via activist and poet john beecher), improvisation, paintstaking programming, melodic sensibility, award-winning poetry and bizzaree sound effects and you need to listen to this record right now.
Staff picks
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2009 Really Raw Honey Underground Mix
Various Ropeadope Artists
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Inventing the Wheel
JDT
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Undesirables
Kicksville
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Last Step
Kicksville
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Touch The Ground
Kicksville
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Krankypants
Kicksville
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Kalamaya
Kicksville
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Concerning Small Town Abberations
New Madrid Faults
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Cabinet
Cabinet
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Dirty's Mobile Beat Shack
Dirty Drummer
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Dumfukistan
Kicksville
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Addicted To Distraction
Black Landlord
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Hopeless
New Madrid Faults
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Fatty Acid
Fatty Acid
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The Singles - Season 1
Kicksville
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Live at the Rockwood Music Hall
Dred Scott Trio
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This is R TIME
Reut Regev
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Cycles
indigone Trio & Strings
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Tom Tom
JD73
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No Consequence
Japhy Ryder
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Amplexus
HUW