ARTIST: Third of Never
TITLE: Moodring
LABEL: Jam Recordings
GENRE: Rock
TIME: 31:36 min
SIZE: 53,1 MB
RIP DATE: Jun-21-2007
RELEASE DATE: Jun-21-2007
WEBSITE: n/a
Track List:
01. Mystic Slide 04:25
02. Bag of Boxes 04:01
03. DJ 03:32
04. Wide Awake Sleeping 03:42
05. Redneck Riviera 03:06
06. Chalk Salad 00:32
07. Let My Love Open The Door 02:26
08. Segue 00:19
09. Deep Run 02:20
10. Everyday Is A Lonely Night 03:45
11. Taboo Stu 00:38
12. Anybody's Anything 02:50
Release Notes:
MOODRING FEATURES GUEST SPOTS FROM JOHN "RABBIT"
BUNDRICK OF THE WHO AND DENNIS DIKEN OF THE
SMITHEREENS---
AN INTERNATIONAL INCIDENT: The debut album from
THIRD OF NEVER had it's start as a script. Guitarist
Jon Dawson, who had grown frustrated with the
musician pool in his native North Carolina, was
working on a project that would incorporate live
rock and roll, film, and a stage play. " I was
having a hard time finding musicians that would
dedicate themselves to the usual amount of work that
it takes for a band to work, so I wanted to devise a
new way to put the songs on display, so the original
idea was to create a story that could be told
through a song cycle. The performance would take
place in a theatre with actors putting on a play,
and between scenes the band would play a song that
moved the story along, and at the same time
transitional films relating to the play would be
projected. The songs were recorded in demo form and
a rough script was drafted. It actually made it to
the workshop stage through the efforts of friends in
New York, but a chance meeting with Kurt Reil of the
Grip Weeds turned my attention back to the idea of a
traditional band situation."
Dawson saw Reil perform with the Grip Weeds at a
music festival in North Carolina, and was smitten
with the bands approach to music. "I was envious of
what they were doing, as I had tried to find
musicians like that to form a band around, but had
been having great difficulty." As the months
progressed, Dawson continued working on the idea of
the rock band/play/film project. He contacted
Smithereens drummer Dennis Diken about being
involved in the project, and during their
conversation Dennis suggested recording at the House
Of Vibes in New Jersey. "Dennis spoke highly of this
studio, so I went online and lo and behold it was
owned and operated by the Grip Weeds! I saw this as
a sign and immediately approached Kurt about forming
a band. After a few days of discussions Kurt was on
board, and that got us going."
To flesh out the band, Dawson went after a pair of
brothers who had already made their mark on the
indie rock scene. "I was a big fan of a record that
Kurt and Dennis had worked on with Jim Babjak of The
Smithereens, and the bass player was Vince Grogan.
Kurt said that he was still living in the area, so I
went after him, and was lucky enough to get him. Now
what I was looking for was a
multi-instrumentalist....someone who could handle
guitar and keyboard duties, along with vocal
support. "Kurt had played me a few tracks from this
album that he co-produced and played on by CJ
Grogan, and it was fantastic. I just got the urge to
call him out of the blue and pleaded my case, and
yet again I lucked out and brought him in to the
fold. I now had the absolute dream line-up that I'd
been looking for. It was like going from despair to
jubilation in a matter of weeks."
The next step was to finish the songs. "I turned
over my demos and lyric ideas and we just took it
from there. It was really a situation of everybody
throwing in their ideas into a pot and seeing what
worked the best. Writing with Kurt and CJ was a real
education and alot of fun." While the songs were
being fleshed out, Jon got an email from one of his
musical heroes, John "Rabbit" Bundrick of The Who.
"I'd contacted Rabbit several months earlier about
being involved in the project, but he was in the
midst of recording the latest Who album in England,
and was unavailable. Luckily for me, the sessions
were soon over and Rabbit was now available. I
originally contacted Rab about playing on the Pete
Townshend cover that we do on the album, as he'd
played on the original. However, he asked me to send
all of the tracks, which I did. A few days later he
contacted me and said that he'd be glad to play on
the whole album, as he was a big fan of what we were
doing, which absolutely floored me. I'd gone from
not being able to get a band together at all to
having some of the top musicians in the world at my
disposal. We had a nice little trail of music strewn
from Carolina to Jersey to England."
The songs that make up MOODRING follow the story of
the original script idea. "It's about a guy who has
had enough of reality, and the lengths that he goes
to in order to avoid it. There is a neat little
story there to follow if people want it, but the
songs work on their own also. If you want to sit
down and listen to the whole thing and have a little
movie for your ears you'll be able to...if you just
want a bouncy little number to listen to while you
do the dishes, then it'll work on that level too."
The band will be promoting the record through live
shows, radio, internet, and film projects.