Fall 2009: Demos and Experiments

Our third album, which is going to be called "Wind Sprints Winner," is completely written and we are starting to learn/practice the songs. Hopefully we will be more active in the near future, and get this thing finished! In the meantime, I'm demoing/experimenting with the songs so I can have their arrangements worked out when we record for real. If anything is good enough to share, I'll upload it to this here world wide web. Be my friend on facebook! Let me know what you think! Thanks.

1. Discovery

A FAILED EXPERIMENT IN FILM MUSIC

Of all my musical failures, this one hurts the most. I really wanted this on my resume.

Earlier this year, Steven MacLauchlan and I were in touch with the operator of a sci-fi-themed adult website (yes, you read that correctly). This delightful pornographer gave us an opportunity to write some music for his intergalactic stag reels. Steven and I have always wanted to do film music, and what project could be more perfect? Step one was, of course, in-depth research on human-alien "relations." Step two: off to our workstations!

Maybe we were a little too enthusiastic and freaked the guy out, maybe he wasn't feelin' the outerspace thumps Steve came up with...whatever the reason, the guy stopped responding to Steve's emails. But I thought we did an okay job. Steve has posted his compositions on his website - Crown and Anchor - so I figured I'd put mine up too. Some of you guys might get a giggle listening to them once or twice, so what the heck. You can also hear me get more and more off-task, as the later ones I recorded are about as sexy as a pocket-protector.

Thanks a lot for listening!

PS - These jams are all safe for work and play; they contain no human-alien sexual content. Sorry.

1. Effing the Choir

2. Norse Orgy

3. One Finger Fun

4. Miami Intro

5. Miami

SUMMER EVERYWHERE

This is our second record, our first as a full band. It's full of songs about driving across the USA. Family vacations, roadside diners, touring with a rock band, waking up early to hit the road, goofy tourist traps, seeing cool animals along the road late at night, and more. Almost all the travel I've done has been by car, and over the years I've learned the driving/riding personality of all my friends and family. My personal strength is endurance driving. Steven's specialty is city driving and backing up the trailer. Jared is the extreme conditions guy. He gets that from our dad. In fact, I think Jared and I have always wanted to drive like our dad: In any condition, for incredibly long periods of time, with the odds and elements against us. But I digress...here's how the record was made:

Songs
written and arranged by Justin Brown
recorded and mixed by Adam Baber at The Red Room, Roanoke, VA.
bits and pieces recorded at home by Justin Brown.

The Band
Justin Brown: vocals, guitar, keyboards, drumming, melodica.
Troy Gatrell: bass guitar.
David Beale: drumming.
Adam Baber: drumming.
Jared Brown: guitar, harmony vocals.

Thanks to everyone who helped out, including Jake and Jerry at the studio.

VIVA ENCYCLOPEDIA

The second record I made mostly by myself. I finally understood what I wanted to write and what my strengths were so I gave my musical project a new, horrible, impossible to remember name. My ideas for this record were: use mostly acoustic guitars, analog keyboards, lots of percussion other than drumkits, sometimes multiple drumkits, and VHS movie samples. Lots of bands' first records contain little facets that never show up in their discography again. I think it's safe to say that nothing I write in the foreseeable future will have a 2 minute organ solo. A lot of these songs give a good indication of the direction that Troy, David, and I would take on the next record, however. I'm not sure if there are any great "songs" on this album, but there's some nice music.

Written and Recorded by Justin Brown at Brown House and Granny Little's House
except "Handshake Lesson" written and recorded by Jared Brown
Justin Brown: vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards, drumming.
Jared Brown: vocals, guitar, drums on "Handshake Lesson"
Nic Frederic: bass on "Blood"
Steven MacLauchlan: harmony vocals on "Viva Encyclopedia"
Marcie Simpson: claps on "I Navigate"

You can preview three songs from the album at our myspace page.

1. Viva Encyclopedia
2. Beware/Fireflies
3. My Friend the Robot
4. Syrup
5. Handshake Lesson
6. Honey
7. The Guest
8. Match Game Adaptation
9. I Navigate
10. Fairbanks
11. Bucket's Empty
12. Blonde Swan
13. Blood