T E N E N E M I E S is the latest album from locals Us, Today. The album is a piece of art from start to finish. There were many times that I was listening to the album and found myself paralyzed waiting for the next note. We sat down with the band prior to the release on Thursday for some behind the scenes information…
Give us some background on Us, Today….
Us, Today started in late 2010. At first we were just getting together and experimenting with the sound possibilities of guitar, vibraphone and drums. We released our first album shortly after that, RH Sessions, which as an album was very raw and improvisatory. Our song writing started to mature, and structure grew from our improvisation. Our second album, Beneath The Floorboards was released in 2012. Since then, we've been focusing on performing and doing some short tours around the region.
The new album is a big of a change of direction, in that it is almost completely through composed, and it is much heavier than our previous albums. We have struggled over the years with narrowing down what genre we fit into, because we definitely incorporate multiple genres into our sound. I feel comfortable saying that this new album is experimental post-rock, because it's definitely the most rock 'n' roll album we've created.
Tell us about the recording process for the new CD….
We took a few months off of performing in early 2014 to focus on song writing for the new album T E N E N E M I E S. We already had a few songs complete, and a few sketched out, but most of the album came together in these writing sessions. We were able to fund the album through an Indigogo crowd funding campaign in June of last year. This album wouldn't have been possible without those contributions. Our earlier albums were VERY low budget, and though they really capture the early experimental spirit of the band, there is an obvious difference in the quality of those to the new album we are about to release.
We recorded the bulk of T E N E N E M I E S in one weekend at Oranjudio in Columbus, Ohio. We had a great experience recording this album, and feel like it is some of our best work to date. We had some over dubs recorded back in Cincinnati over the following months, and were able to have some of our friends in Cincinnati work on the album with us. Kristin's husband Jon plays upright bass on one track, and our friend Scott Holzman contributed spoken word poetry.
The artwork for the album, including the photography and all new merch and logos were designed by our friend Chris Glass. His contribution to the branding of the album is HUGE, and we can't thank him enough for his work. We had a few sessions with him where we discussed the album and the songs we were writing, and he created the image of the matches, with one burnt match.
Each song seems to flow into the other, was this planned? To make an album meant to be played from start to finish?
We didn't compose the songs in that order, but once we had it recorded we messed with the order of tracks to find something that would flow from start to finish. We had planned to print this to vinyl from the start, so when you're listening to an album on vinyl, you want something that flows from start to finish. You're not just listening to one track at a time, or putting it into a shuffle play list like with mp3s. It's like watching a movie, you start at the beginning, and by the time you get to the end you want to have experienced a lot of different emotional highs and lows.
What is next for Us, Today?
Lots of touring. In April we will be hitting Columbus and Athens, Ohio, Louisville, Nashville, Ashville, Baltimore, Philly, NYC, and Pittsburgh. More touring to happen this summer and in the fall. We'll be making some more music videos to go with this album too, probably to be released around the time the vinyl comes out. Stay tuned...
Us, Today
Don't Fear The Satellites
The Mike Dillon Band
@ The Woodward Theater
Thursday, March 26th
Doors at 7:00pm / Show at 8:00pm.
Tickets for the show are $10 in advance or $12 the day of the show. Tickets are available at MOTR Pub or online HERE.
