The traditions from the Mississippi delta and the Kentucky mountains get warped by a quartet that hollers, clangs, and pounds the life back into those acoustic styles like their originators intended. The punks, rockers, and indie-hipsters like them, too.

14 MP3 Songs in this album (43:48) !
Related styles: BLUES: Acoustic Blues, ROCK: Americana

People who are interested in Tom Waits Robert Johnson Dock Boggs should consider this download.


Details:
An open letter to those who already know about us.

We here at the Agnostic Mountain Gospel Choir donât do things the way the music industry expects us to. Thatâs why weâre authoring our own press release instead of hiring someone else to write about us in glowing terms so you might, in turn, write about us in glowing terms. Maybe itâs a detriment, but youâll get the goods straight from the horseâs mouth. We wonât lie to you. Really.

Hereâs a quick backgrounder for those who donât know about us, weâre from Calgary. We play music based on pre-WWII blues and mountain music though weâve got our own weird, displaced take on it. In January, 2001 we formed with only a weekâs rehearsal for a gig. People kept asking us to play. We put out two CDs by ourselves: St. Hubert (2003) and Fighting and Onions (2005). Critics said good things about them and people as far away as Japan and the Czech Republic bought them. Weâve played some cool and prestigious roots festivals in Canada and sold out a few clubs. Someone in Belfast, Northern Ireland heard of us and asked to play at a festival there. We did. It led to us doing a few more shows in the UK and recording a live session for a show on BBC Radio 2. Suffice to say, a few cool things have happened to the band.

Therefore, good fortune encouraged us to record a new CD. Itâs called Ten Thousand. A record company in England is putting it out while weâll deal with it ourselves in Canada. (For all of you who will inevitably ask about the cover, look up Hell Bank Note in the Wikipedia. It will give you some background on the concept.)

Well, then, what about the music? Weâre still not a choir. We never have been. Weâve had a change in drummers, though. Jay Woolley left the band amicably. Pete Balkwill, our original drummer from way back when, rejoined the band amicably. He owns a really large drum kit. Judd and Vlad have started tinkering around with an old trombone, but that still doesnât make us a choir. Ten Thousand was recorded in a big studio with Dave Alcock, a producer/engineer who has got a few sessions under his belt (Tanya Tagaq Gillis, Compadres, Chixdiggit, Falconhawk, Amos Garrett). So, has any of the aforementioned changed our sound? Yeah, a bit. Youâll be the judge of how much if youâve listened to our other discs.

The music is still rough and rowdy. People will probably continue to describe us with nouns like moonshine, potato sacks, hobo campfire, and caveman. Most of the tracks were cut live off the floor, but we did more overdubbing. You see, this is our third disc. We thought we would take a few chances.

âThe Boigâ, âNehemiahâs Misfortuneâ, âGo Back Homeâ, and âRainstorms in My Kneesâ pretty much follow the Delta-Appalachian-country-blues-death tradition albeit adorned by clanging and banging in the background. Youâve come to expect that from us, or not. âYou Got It Wrongâ and â10,000 Yearsâ are of the mountain-music-cum-bluegrass vintage that BBC DJ Mark Lamarr described as âangry pickingâ. And theyâre fast.

We covered a Cajun song (âLa Valse de Balfaâ), but in our own strange way. Itâs been in our live set for a while. We also covered another Son House song (âEmpire State Expressâ) and a Sleepy John Estes number (âStop That Thingâ). Those are our tributes to old music. May the authors be wealthy in the afterlife, if there is one.

Then there are the weirder songs.

Judd wrote a song that wound up sounding like it was from Mali once we all started playing on it (âTaking It Outâ). He was also keen on overdubbing it to death. So it features Judd and Vlad showing what they can do on trombones and my first fully electric guitar solo with this band. Itâs a bit of a trip. Wait a second. Thatâs Judd and Vlad on the phone. Theyâve got something to say about the trombone. Just a sec, let me put them onâ¦.

âYes Bob, thatâs right, a trombone; but no ordinary trombone. This trombone was found on a Winnipeg junk-shop wall, as is, by which I mean that it is a beautiful old thing that barely functions. Somehow the fact that it barely functions makes it right for the Choir.â Thanks, Judd.

Whatâs that Vlad? âIâve always loved the âbone.â Thanks for that.

Describing âDumb It Downâ is difficult. Weâll say itâs a take on how old blues might have turned into early street jazz outside the local Church of Cynicism. Does such a thing exist? It does now. Slide guitar overdubs were the order of the day on this one.

âNever Be Deadâ was pretty much written by all four of us right before we went in the studio. Pete and Judd wanted it to sound like a jug band turned into marching band. Whatâs that Judd? Heâs contradicting me.

âNo itâs not. We wanted it to sound like a techno song played on traditional instruments. Much of the album, in a way, is an experiment in the driving, trance-inducing rhythms common to some cantankerous forms of folk music and to the same instincts that have emerged in the music made in the last 30 years. Which is to say, weâre the kids we want to hornswaggle, and the grizzled ones doing the hornswaggling, all wrapped up into one weird Frankenstein monster with a marching drum and an old trombone.â

Okay, believe who you want.

âLife Is Longâ could have been a gospel song if we were a choir, which weâre not. Instead it sounds like a demented something or other. We just donât have the words to describe it. Maybe writing this press release ourselves was a bad idea. Sorry, weâre plumb out of adjectives.

Anyway, you probably get the idea. We hope youâre intrigued enough to give it a spin. Iâve noticed it sounds especially good in my car. Maybe listen to it there first. Thanks for your time.

And We Quote:

Highly recommended! (Four stars!)
- Uncut, London, England

Iâm going to move to Agnostic Mountain if this is what it can produce!
- Blues Matters, England

The songs are raw like a bloodied knuckle; they have the authenticity of a campfire and the impact of a heavy skillet on soft nose cartilage. ⦠All hail to the AMGC - theyâll make a believer out of you.
- Americana-uk.com

The bandâs awe-inspiring blend of the boldest and most boisterous elements of artists like Mississippi Fred McDowell and Tom Waits leaves listeners stunned: mouths gaping and ears ringing.
- Exclaim!, Toronto

[A] sound that brings to mind moonshine stills, Depression-era crossroads, and clothes fashioned from potato sacks.⦠Fighting and Onions will indeed hit home with shit-kickers of all ages.
- Georgia Straight, Vancouver

[I]tâs immediately apparent that thereâs a raw, emotional intensity at play here that no amount of bluff can possibly duplicateâ¦. [T]his voice makes Captain Beefheart and Howlinâ Wolf sound like angelic upstarts.
- Penguin Eggs

It's twisted and gnarled and sinful. Needless to say, it comes highly recommended.
- Hour weekly, Montreal