We have been busy in recent months, getting to play shows with the likes of Quasi, Dengue Fever, Bill Orcutt, Derek Monypeny, Grex, Roger Kunkel, etal. We also put the finishing touches on Too Many People! I have never done one of these talk about each song things, so here it goes. This batch of songs came together in a variety of ways – some in the backyard, some in the basement. There are some different textures we hadn’t used before, which is always fun. Like Emotional Crevasse, it is all over the place. Dig the beautiful cover art by Arrington de Dionyso.
HEART OF DUSK
During the first year of the pandemic we held occasional jam meet ups in Greg’s backyard. This was the first song seed from those sweaty afternoons. This tune kind of captures the hazy psych of Sacramento’s north end.
DRY HANDS OF EL PASO
If you’ve ever been to El Paso in the winter, you know that your skin is constantly cracking and peeling. This song would be especially hard to fret with such conditions.
PATH OF THE PYTHON
This naughty little serpent is anchored around Greg’s Alturia synth build-up. I love how the one-chord grinder goes into the Arabic melody with Rachel and Linda, and then falls apart.
SUBURBAN BLUFFS
It’s fun being an ambiguous little asshole when it comes to song titles. We kept thinking of things to add to this, but ended up keeping it very lean. It serves as a nice palate cleanser to end side one. And a little pedal steel from H-Bomb!
SLICKSTER SLIMESTER
Another backyard burner from the early pandemic days when we wondered if we would ever gig again. I wanted everyone to go hog wild with free jazz lunacy on those end sections and hog wild they went.
MOTORCADE FOR THE PRINCE
This thing somehow reminds me of being in Thailand, but sounds nothing like Thai music. Why?
VETS DAY AT THE DINING ROOM TABLE
More ambiguous song title bull-shittery. Spoiler – Greg and I worked on this song on Veterans Day. Care to guess which room?
CROCKETT CREEK
Great, now Jed has a fucking field recording thing on an album. Deal with it. I wanted to line up a a drone guitar note with a creek or river. I believe the Crockett Creek was churning along in F that day. I worked on this with Matt and it was another example of lots of ideas to add things, but then deciding less was more.
Order Too Many People LP, CD, or download at Lather Records.
Order our drone recording, Long Tones of August, at Trouble in Mind.
A short drone set video (w/zither!) opening for Orcutt and Monypeny.
A live review from San Francisco in the recent issue of The Wire.
New San Kazakgascar Instagram thing. Official old-style San Kazakgascar site.
Lather Records 