Not that this is anything large in terms of DETAILS, but as I have followed and at times posted in here and Social Media, dredg were looking to make new music, it was just when, how long, etc. And I imagine a lot of it was timing for the band members and their schedules.
But it is good to finally get actual confirmation it's happening.
When it comes out? I wonder if it won't happen until late in the year or maybe even in 2019. But I do suspect this could be the 1st album they make in a long time without any expectation from any labels, etc. I.e. this is dredg, how dredg want to make music. And especially how long its been and the overall experience of their last record Chuckles and Mr. Squeezy from 2011.
But, as a HUGE fan, I am incredibly excited to anticipate this album, whenever it does get released (6 months, or maybe in the next couple of years).
odd video, and for example, nothing like the straight forward Fair to Midland video that was just made. The colored drinks somehow are like a drug or something perhaps? a Psychedelic drug, lol.
The song itself I like, although many accounts of people who didn't care for it, have mentioned how much better it is live. I wouldn't disagree, but the album version of this song I still like.
I could go ahead and post multiple new entries, but I guess a new notes entry might make sense and be more efficient.
#1) I shouldn't be so shocked or surprised by all negative reviews of the new dredg album. I and many others sort of saw it coming. But its now come to the point of cliche and predictability.
Blah Blah Blah. Haha "Chuckles" is not very funny. haha, dredg sucks. What was dredg thinking? How could dredg become more gay? What faggotty title and even more mailed-in, lazy music. Etc, etc.
I am not great at predictions, but I really am curious what some of these neanderthals (and the ones that I like, but still find it their need to go out of their way to piss on this new album) might say, say in 2 years even about this record.
I mean I went in assuming it would be different, shorter, more stripped down. But it still would sound like dredg. And guess what? IT DOES. The melodies are still there, namely the vocal melodies on many songs, like especially their last 2 records, ARE EARWORMS. For hours really.
Maybe I'll dissect it more thoroughly if/when I ever get the chance this year (which certainly is questionable). But if not before, at least by the time the Album Index is due.
It's a record that FLOWS, it doesn't have any songs I skip. It probably just doesn't have as many breathtaking elements or sections compared to their others. But it still has enough, frankly, MORE THAN ENOUGH COMPARED TO MOST OTHER BANDS, to still enjoy and want to go back to. And I'm rating it at 4-stars, and until I feel any way worse about it, it'll stay at that.
And also, the band may actually receive the most exposure commercially/mainstream ever. Which is ironic, but regardless, still a GOOD THING.
Gavin did say something in this interview about breaking up potentially, but I recall he's said that in the past. But if this is the album that gets them to get BIG like they in many ways deserve, however many pissants have worse diarhea-of-the-mouth than I do about it, it really won't matter. In fact in some ways it'll probably be something that helped them.
Who would have thought, making an album so many fans and non-fans hate would acquire you your most success? Very ironic, but perhaps in a good way.
New music: Josh Rouse
Michael Nesmith
MarchFourth Marching Band
Spinvis
Fountains of Wayne
new song from The Dear Hunter from the other night in Hollywood.
I'm slowly catching up on television, finishing off Parenthood and Fringe the last 2 weekends. But the gf activity has slowed it up more than I'd like. And I have still yet to watch AMC's The Killing. But maybe in some way that's a good thing, as I did the same with Rubicon last year and it ended up being enjoyable to not have to wait week after week for the next episode. The Walking Dead as well.
But I do need to get going on probably 35 hours or more of DVR cleaning to do. And of course the 2011-2012 network lineup announcements are right around the corner, I think coming 1 week from tomorrow-Thursday of that week.
Message Boards: I am leaving/lurking on them more so than any other time. Why? I'm just fed up with a few bad apples, along with too often topics being buried about an unknown band. Many of those criminally unknown bands will find THIS LIST I'm sure.
You know, someone else can report news and introduce them to new bands. Apparently on the forums, I'm really not all that great at it, at least in terms of percentage. If said readers REALLY still want to know what I am listening to, discovering, and news about new releases only posted on a few sites like last.fm or 1 or 2 forums, then THEY SHOULD JUST READ THIS BLOG. Or the twitter and facebook posts I make.
Especially given I have another factor (a girlfriend) taking up my free time, the posting on the forums are one thing I can at least consider a casualty. This blog perhaps as well, but hopefully not ultimately. In other words, the time I might spend posting about said band or new album on 5 different forums, will be given to this blog and twitter/fb. Which it is for the most part already. But not giving activity to the forums is one tradeoff.
That and, I am really sick and tired of some of the trolling that takes place. It may only be 1 or 2 users, and then may have some others feeding said trolls. But it's enough to not even care to give said trolls and troll-followers the time and energy.
Haters are gonna hate. Kids will act like Kids. And 16-20 year olds will act like petulant children as well. Especially on something as faceless as an internet message board. They can go ahead and do that, while denying others of stuff like news and tours that someone like myself would know about long before the rest of the forum.
And of course bands become popular on said forum after those users that leave/lurk 1st talked about them, in many cases, not even giving credit or even bothering to find the original thread.
The broken record of that process after how many years, really just lends to the idea of the leave/lurk. The web and the boards/forums/last.fm/imdb/facebook/youtube/blog comments gives any douche with a keyboard and mouse a license to embarrass themself in as many ways as they enjoy doing. But ultimately, if nobody feeds said troll, they are more or less talking to themselves and thus their activity deemed irrelevant.
I love how so many people are shocked by hearing the samples and "Upon Returning."
Dat's cool and all, and I think the samples sound fine. I mean different? yeah, but everything they've (the band) said is this album will be a lot different. But I don't get the sense it's music without value.
It sounds like a mix of ballads and synth-driven songs. And just read this entry and many other sources online. I'm certainly open for that.
I did read something over on Traversing suggesting what may have been good to do with this record, is cut it down a bit and release it as an EP or Mini-album. Kind of like Oceansize'sHome and Minor EP.
I just am still of the feeling this won't be dredg's Road Salt or Buzzard (Pain of Salvation and Margot & the Nuclear So & So's).
It's a different approach, yeah. But the songs are still there it sounds like. And I also have confidence that their next work will be more of a full "Rock" and layered record as their others are. Or at least more ambitious and in-depth. It kind of makes sense to change or alternate a bit. Each record is a reaction to the last.
An album of the year candidate? it's probably by default more of a record that likely will fall in the top 20-30, but its odds are low to become an everyday masterwork kind of record, so unlikely.
2.0 probably isn't too far away as this is starting to look like a Wikipedia entry.
Switching topics to the new album Chuckles and Mr. Squeezy, the cover is creepy. How did you make that happen?
It started with Drew, on tour with Circa Survive, and I think “masks” was the general idea. Drew started making masks and we started picking the ones we liked. Drew’s brother came on board and he’s a photographer from Hurley so we got the idea of having the dichotomy of having a beautiful girl with a mask on. We did the shoot and we really liked how clean it is. Even though it’s creepy, it’s clean; it’s not busy or cluttered. The color scheme we thought really fit the style of the new record. With Dan the Automator’s production, it’s a very clean record, a very streamlined record. We thought it fit really well.
After listening to the new album, it sounds like Dan is a member of the band, not just an outside producing force. Is that what you were going for?
Yea, this is definitely collaboration. This is the new Dredg record but it reminds me of when other bands work with a DJ or producer and it’s a collaboration record. We knew that going into it. The timing of it was perfect where we didn’t want to spend a whole year writing a big Dredg rock record, not that we don’t want to again, but, just for this one we had these songs we’ve been trading over e-mail with Gavin in Seattle and the rest of us in the Bay Area. We thought it was the perfect time to go with a collaboration, so you are correct by calling him a 5th member.On our last record, Matt Radosevich was a 5th member musically, but he’s not a musician in the sense where he has his style. That’s where Dan lies and it’s definitely more like a collaboration record. It could say “Dredg and Dan the Automator” on the cover, but, it doesn’t.
Laughs
But it could definitely be that way. Any fans that are turned off because it’s not a guitar rock record, I understand, but it’s also a departure record.
Do you have a favorite song on the new album you like to play?
Play or listen to?
I’d say play, as this one isn’t the big guitar rock record, like you said, so I was wondering which one of them appeals to you the most to perform.
We’re actually starting rehearsal today, so I haven’t played any of them live, per se, except for “Upon Returning” which we played on our last tour with Circa Survive. I love playing that live. But that’s the only one from the new record that we’ve had in the set list. So today, actually after I talk to you I’ll drive to meet the guys and start working out how to put this thing together live.
Can you tell me what the song “Kalathat” is about?
Kalathat is about this horrible, horrible tragedy that took place in the Silicon Valley. You hear about this in other places like Seattle and Southern California, when the .com bubble burst and the economy burst, where the hi-tech engineers and people who were doing okay and then lost everything, they also lost their pride. So, instead of sucking it up, they would kill their entire family and then kill themselves. So Kalathat is the last name of this gentleman who decided that money and pride was more important than living life and his family and he wiped out his entire family. It’s incredibly, horribly depressing. But it’s interesting that in 2008 or 2009 that someone can put the priority of financial success over the love of family. It’s just horrible.
It’s a really intense song and I think that if you’re worried about Dredg fans picking this up as well, I think this one speaks to the honesty of your music.
also here's the official track list (I know, it's old, but not old or it's only delayed for this blog)
1. Another Tribe 3:46
2. Upon Returning 3:55
3. The Tent 4:47
4. Somebody is Laughing 3:46
5. Down Without a Fight 3:53
6. The Ornament 3:04
7. The Thought of Losing You 3:33
8. Kalathat 3:25
9. Sun Goes Down 3:48
10. Where I'll End Up 3:44
11. Before it Began 2:58
@dredg Our 5th studio album "Chuckles & Mr. Squeezy" to be released May 3rd in the US. April 29 in all other territories. http://yfrog.com/hs244toj
so, there it is. Uh, unusual cover, although I'll confess, being someone who finds body art at times an enjoyable visual, I'm not reacting so outlandishly as some have/may about it.
The title itself, kind of the same thing. It's different, it's odd, it sounds potentially funny. Might it be "look at how funny or clever we are"? maybe, but when dredg do that kind of thing, it's not annoying. When Animal Collective do, it is beyond annoying.
So, yeah, the usual details should come shortly. There are a few more bits taken from this article written in German. Using google translator, I am inferring it's to be 11 songs, 40 minutes long. The 1st single is called "The Thought of Losing You" and is expected to be released on April 15th in Germany I'd presume.
But I suppose I can add/rehash some other bits that I recall about it. In speaking with Mark Engles, dredg's guitarist, last November, he said this album is not very guitar-driven. It's going to be different. That article kind of emphasizes that. They almost feel like a whole new band (with a new sound).
Many of the leftover tracks from the Pariah period won't be on this record. From what I recall reading, 1 or 2 perhaps, but one is/has been re-arranged.
I guess as much as I am attached to them, my feeling about this album is very wait-and-see. 2009's Pariah is great. One of the better records in the 2000's. But there's enough differences with this record, I'm not expecting another epic record like Pariah. Unlike some bands (Oceansize, PRR..even Mew), I am not waiting for dredg to make a statement album. They've done that.
The only thing I can cite as a concern is, an example like Coheed and Cambria or maybe more likely, Pain of Salvation. I don't want them to change so drastically, I'll wonder where the band I loved went.
Now comparisons like that are obviously pretty irrelevant, at least to the band and to a lot of their fans. But just from my personal taste and feeling, I naturally tend to draw comparisons, as a necessary evil I suppose. And the approach of not expecting huge qualities seems a little safer. At least as a follow-up. The danger lies in the one after the follow-up, and whatever happens after that.
dredg to me, have a pretty clean and nearly flawless catalog. But that may not exist forever. Citing PoS or even Dream Theater and Rush (and even Marillion, although I can at least claim my favorite band has never made a record I never wanted to listen to again).
