Saturday, March 8, 2008

Bros before schmos

So I have a new band I'm in love with. This doesn't happen all that often as I'm pretty picky about the kind of music I'll listen to 15 or 20 times in a week's span. The music I become obsessed with has to have a balance of instrumental and vocal performance (or no vocals at all works well), and a pleasing mix of virtuosity and accessibility. Now of course, certain albums have snuck past the gatekeeper (John Mayer's Continuum is one that immediately comes to mind) So if your qualifications are in any way similar to mine you might also love this new band: Punch Brothers. Their first album, released a week and a half ago is aptly called "Punch."

The frontman for the freshly-formed Punch Brothers is Nickel Creek mandolin virtuoso Chris Thile (Thee-lee), one of my favorite musicians in recent years. Actually, to be honest I get a little jealous of people my age who have such amazing levels of success, but it's so danged good. If you're a fan of Bela Fleck, Edgar Meyer, Chris Thile, Newgrass Revival, Nickel Creek, Tony Trischka, music, art, sweaters, cats, Precious Moments Figurines, guano, spelunking, historical-fiction, or crepes, you just might like these guys.

Oh, and I wasn't exaggerating about 15 or 20 times in the last week. It's been something like that. Mmmmmm... meaty music with emotion and intellect... delicious.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I definetly have to check them out. Do you think the album would be available in South Africa? Dayn, awesome blog. Happy Easter.

Matt Kellen
kellegraham.blogspot.com

MistaB said...

So you're picky with music, huh? I'm becoming familiar with that trait in all my musician friends. Have you ever heard of The Hudson Taylors (it's a collective album of 3 artits)? By the way, what's up? My email is mistabutla@hotmail.com if you don't want to comment on socialism on my blog.