ARTIST: Favourite Sons
TITLE: Down Beside Your Beauty
LABEL: Vice Records
GENRE: Indie
BITRATE: 221kbps avg
PLAYTIME: 0h 42m total
RELEASE DATE: 2006-09-12
RIP DATE: 2006-08-23
Track List
----------
1. When You're Away From Me 4:09
2. No One Ever Dies Young 3:04
3. Down Beside Your Beauty 3:01
4. The Tall Grass 4:09
5. Rise Up 3:04
6. Tear The Room Apart 3:52
7. 'round Here 4:17
8. Pistols & Girls 3:44
9. Hang On, Girl 3:59
10. Walking Here 4:46
11. The Things That We Do To Each 4:53
Other
Release Notes:
http://www.favouritesons.com/
http://www.myspace.com/favouritesons
http://www.vice-recordings.com/
"This band exists to talk about the things you go through when you confront the
big stuff: love, regret, fear," says Ken Griffin, the singer and principle
songwriter of Favourite Sons. "WeÆve all been right to that edge, pushed through
it and now we're back to show people the other side, as brutal as it might be."
As the creative force behind the hugely influential (and criminally overlooked)
Æ90s art rock band, Rollerskate Skinny (Beggars UK/Sire US), Griffin certainly
speaks from experience.
The same can be said for the four other Sons, who spent years cutting their
chops with the Philly-based psych-pop group Aspera (Jagjaguwar Records) before
relocating to New York in 2004 after parting ways with their singer.
Singer-less, but eager to start anew, bassist Matthew Werth and guitarist Justin
Tripp tracked down Griffin in the summer of 2004, only to learn that he had
spent the last four years crafting a new repertoire of songs focusing largely on
his unique vocals and melodic sensibilities. Following a dark spell and thoughts
of quitting music forever, Griffin demoed 14 of these songs in a two-day session
in an attempt to capture ôa brutal, unsentimental type of songwriting" inspired
by the likes of Lou Reed, David Bowie and Nina Simone. ôAt that point, I had
nothing to lose. It was create or perish,ö he says earnestly.
Werth soon passed along two of GriffinÆs tracks to some record companies and
received an amazing amount of interest before the band had ever played together.
At their first practice Griffin was shocked to find the band had already taken
his songs and shaped them into the type of "thunderous, plain beauty" he had
dreamt of. ôIt was so moving. The band was already playing the songs with such
confidence and commitment. All I had to do was pick up the microphone and sing,"
he remembers.
A few weeks later, the Sons decided to play some shows. ôI was terrified,ö
admits Griffin. ôIn the past, I could always hide behind my guitar and a wall of
noise and samples. But at these shows, I just had to stand out there, close my
eyes and sing."
Based on the intensity of their earliest performances (ôit was like watching a
preacher of damaged love songs fronting the Stooges,ö said one reviewer), LAÆs
Gold Standard Laboratories offered to put out a 7ö single in early 2005. Shortly
thereafter, the Sons were approached by James Oldham (son of the famous Andrew
Loog Oldham and head of the UK indie Loog Records) to release a four-song single
in Europe entitled the Treason EP. With less than ten official shows under the
belts, the Sons headed off to Europe to tour in support of Treason.
Upon their return, Vice Recordings, who had expressed interest from the earliest
demos, stepped forward and offered the band a long-term deal. The Sons recorded
Down Beside Your Beauty in Brooklyn in January, with acclaimed studio wiz Victor
Van Vugt (PJ Harvey, The Fall, The Pogues) coming in to handle mixing duties the
following month.
Grounded by GriffinÆs confessional lyrics and the bandÆs thundering guitars and
rhythm section, Down Beside Your Beauty has nothing to hide and a world of
courageous conceits to offer. What you hear is what you get and what you get is
nothing short of rock music stripped down to its most visceral
elementsùdelivered with power, conviction and complete honesty.
ôThere are so many apologetic undertones hidden in the way bands play nowadays,
says Werth. ôThis is not that at all. This is something right from the
battlefield.ö