Monday, November 1, 2010
ProgBury/Go-Prog Festivals
Recent weeks have seen us travel to Bury St Edmunds, and Gouveia in Portugal. At ProgBury we were onyl the fourth band to ever play this brand new venue - set in a newly-constructed retail area of the town centre. This really is a fantastic new live venue with a great sound; hopefully it will become a permanent fixture in the Prog festival calendar. Great organisation and run by some very passionate music fans.
Go-Prog was also a fanstastic event featuring an extremely eclectic line-up and some incredible bands. Stand-outs for us were 'Senogul' (well worth checking out http://www.senogul.com) and the amazing Mats Morgan Band who stole the show with their unique brand of Zappa inspired avant-garde jazz (and we thought we were difficult to categorise!).
Darran carried a cold for both of these gigs but nobody seemed to have noticed. Don't know whether that is a good or bad thing?!
Roadhouse, Birmingham gigĀ
The next gig will be on the 25th of November at the Roadhouse in Birmingham. We intend to include a few acoustic numbers into the set, including 'Clinical' and 'Unravel'. Both these tracks will involve Steve making the long and lonely trip from drum stool to keyboard stool, and 'Clinical' will feature a specially written piano etude (by Steve). We're also working on a new cover by Chick Corea called 'Majestic Dance'.
Electric Garden Festival
On the 21st May 2011 we will be playing the inaugural Electric Garden Festival in Blackpool.
"The Electric Garden Festival will (for the first year) be a 2 day celebration of Progressive Rock in May 2011. Starting on the Friday night we'll have 8 of the best UK and Overseas acts to entertain you with an excellent sound system and convivial atmosphere. The first acts have been announced but more will be added so please sign up for our mailing list to be kept up-to-date about the latest news. Tickets are on sale at a hefty advance discount and will also entitle you to a free programme for the event. We hope you will buy in advance and help make out inaugural festival a runaway success."
Spiral Vendetta distribution
'Spiral Vendetta' has now been internationally distributed by Voiceprint, and you can now purchase the album from practically every on-line store including Amazon, Play, HMV etc (although don't forget that it can also be purchased here). If any of you wish to promote your writing skills (and our album!) we would encourage you to post a review of the album on any of these sites, good or bad!
New reviews
Check out the reviews page for new reviews of the album, including one by Michael Sharkey for Prog Archives. We were also lucky enough to be featured in 'Album of the month' in Guitar Techniques, which is a bit of an honour as this magazine is hugely respected by the band.
Interviews
Keep an eye out for an interview we've recently done with Bob Mulvey and Jez Cook for DPRP. We'll tweet news of this when it goes online.
Thanks for your support!
Darran, Steve and Dan
Recent weeks have seen us travel to Bury St Edmunds, and Gouveia in Portugal. At ProgBury we were onyl the fourth band to ever play this brand new venue - set in a newly-constructed retail area of the town centre. This really is a fantastic new live venue with a great sound; hopefully it will become a permanent fixture in the Prog festival calendar. Great organisation and run by some very passionate music fans.
Go-Prog was also a fanstastic event featuring an extremely eclectic line-up and some incredible bands. Stand-outs for us were 'Senogul' (well worth checking out http://www.senogul.com) and the amazing Mats Morgan Band who stole the show with their unique brand of Zappa inspired avant-garde jazz (and we thought we were difficult to categorise!).
Darran carried a cold for both of these gigs but nobody seemed to have noticed. Don't know whether that is a good or bad thing?!
Roadhouse, Birmingham gigĀ
The next gig will be on the 25th of November at the Roadhouse in Birmingham. We intend to include a few acoustic numbers into the set, including 'Clinical' and 'Unravel'. Both these tracks will involve Steve making the long and lonely trip from drum stool to keyboard stool, and 'Clinical' will feature a specially written piano etude (by Steve). We're also working on a new cover by Chick Corea called 'Majestic Dance'.
Electric Garden Festival
On the 21st May 2011 we will be playing the inaugural Electric Garden Festival in Blackpool.
"The Electric Garden Festival will (for the first year) be a 2 day celebration of Progressive Rock in May 2011. Starting on the Friday night we'll have 8 of the best UK and Overseas acts to entertain you with an excellent sound system and convivial atmosphere. The first acts have been announced but more will be added so please sign up for our mailing list to be kept up-to-date about the latest news. Tickets are on sale at a hefty advance discount and will also entitle you to a free programme for the event. We hope you will buy in advance and help make out inaugural festival a runaway success."
Spiral Vendetta distribution
'Spiral Vendetta' has now been internationally distributed by Voiceprint, and you can now purchase the album from practically every on-line store including Amazon, Play, HMV etc (although don't forget that it can also be purchased here). If any of you wish to promote your writing skills (and our album!) we would encourage you to post a review of the album on any of these sites, good or bad!
New reviews
Check out the reviews page for new reviews of the album, including one by Michael Sharkey for Prog Archives. We were also lucky enough to be featured in 'Album of the month' in Guitar Techniques, which is a bit of an honour as this magazine is hugely respected by the band.
Interviews
Keep an eye out for an interview we've recently done with Bob Mulvey and Jez Cook for DPRP. We'll tweet news of this when it goes online.
Thanks for your support!
Darran, Steve and Dan
Tuesday, September 13, 2010
September Newsletter
We're delighted to announce that we will be playing at the new prog-rock festival, 'ProgBury'. We will be the opening act on Sunday 17th October, playing alongside the likes of Wishbone Ash and Focus. The festival will be held at 'The Apex' - a wonderful new venue in Bury St Edmonds. Hope to see you there; it promises to be a great weekend.
We organised two local warm-up gigs in Cardiff this month at the Buffalo Bar and the Earl Haig Club. The opening gig, in which we performed 80% of the material for the first time, went very well. This was also Dan's debut gig with Godsticks, and those who attended will agree that he put in a fantastic performance. Our material is very challenging to play live, and requires a certain amount of concentration (as is so often the case with this kind of music). However, the intense rehearsals really paid off and we had a lot of fun. We can't wait to play the upcoming gigs at The Peel with prog-band 'Parade', and Riffs Bar on the 30th September. For a list of all our upcoming live performances click here.
We've teamed up with Favored Nations once again to release the first track on the album, 'The Offer Still Stands', as a digital single. As always, the ever-creative Chris Maguire provided some stunning and eye-catching artwork:
We recently featured in the 'On the threshold' section in issue 70 of the excellent magazine 'Classic Rock Presents Prog'. Anyone who subscribes to American publication 'Progression Magazine' will see a Godsticks interview in the next issue.
Click here for a list of reviews of Spiral Vendetta. We've been quite overwhelmed at the positive response we've been getting. Look out for reviews in Guitarist Magazine (issue 334), Guitar Techniques (issue 184), December's issue of 'Guitar Player', and November's issue of 'Bass Guitar Magazine'.
The very successful advertising campaign on Planet Rock radio has just come to an end. Ten copies of the album were up for grabs, along with two Boss guitar pedals. Congratulations to the overall winner, Philip Quinn. For those of you who didn't win, the album is available to buy here.
Thanks for your support!
Darran, Steve and Dan
We're delighted to announce that we will be playing at the new prog-rock festival, 'ProgBury'. We will be the opening act on Sunday 17th October, playing alongside the likes of Wishbone Ash and Focus. The festival will be held at 'The Apex' - a wonderful new venue in Bury St Edmonds. Hope to see you there; it promises to be a great weekend.
We organised two local warm-up gigs in Cardiff this month at the Buffalo Bar and the Earl Haig Club. The opening gig, in which we performed 80% of the material for the first time, went very well. This was also Dan's debut gig with Godsticks, and those who attended will agree that he put in a fantastic performance. Our material is very challenging to play live, and requires a certain amount of concentration (as is so often the case with this kind of music). However, the intense rehearsals really paid off and we had a lot of fun. We can't wait to play the upcoming gigs at The Peel with prog-band 'Parade', and Riffs Bar on the 30th September. For a list of all our upcoming live performances click here.
We've teamed up with Favored Nations once again to release the first track on the album, 'The Offer Still Stands', as a digital single. As always, the ever-creative Chris Maguire provided some stunning and eye-catching artwork:
We recently featured in the 'On the threshold' section in issue 70 of the excellent magazine 'Classic Rock Presents Prog'. Anyone who subscribes to American publication 'Progression Magazine' will see a Godsticks interview in the next issue.
Click here for a list of reviews of Spiral Vendetta. We've been quite overwhelmed at the positive response we've been getting. Look out for reviews in Guitarist Magazine (issue 334), Guitar Techniques (issue 184), December's issue of 'Guitar Player', and November's issue of 'Bass Guitar Magazine'.
The very successful advertising campaign on Planet Rock radio has just come to an end. Ten copies of the album were up for grabs, along with two Boss guitar pedals. Congratulations to the overall winner, Philip Quinn. For those of you who didn't win, the album is available to buy here.
Thanks for your support!
Darran, Steve and Dan
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
We've recently been interviewed by David Elliot, aka 'The amazing Wilf, for 'The European Perspective'. You can hear the show here. Whenever we speak to David, he never fails to bring our attention to other great bands out there, and the show is definitely worth a listen if just for that reason.
The guys from DPRP who reviewed our EP last year, Bob Mulvey and Jez Rowden, have been the first to review the new album and you can read the review here. Any fan of progressive music that isn't aware of this site should really check it out - it's hugely respected and a great resource for progressive music. Look out for a DPRP interview in the coming weeks too.
Godsticks will feature in the 'on the threshold' section in the next issue of 'Classic Rock Presents Prog' (look out for a review of the album too). For those unaware, the magazine has been growing in popularity since its inception, and it's now bi-monthly. If recent articles in the 'Guardian' and 'Independent' are anything to go by, then prog is coming back into musical fashion - stranger things have happened we suppose!
Look out also for a review in Guitarist Magazine and its sister publication Guitar Techniques. CRS and Summer's End organiser Stephen Lambe will also be reviewing the album for the 'Classic Rock Society' magazine.
The 'album launch' gig has been moved from August to Thursday 30th September. This will be the first gig in the current 3-piece line up. Rehearsals are going very well, and we're looking to line up some more gigs over the next few weeks.
For any fellow 'gear-heads' interested in the guitars used on the album, check out the new 'Gear' page, which features some great pictures taken by a friend/photographer Pete Hurley.
Thanks to everyone who has bought the album so far! Plenty more news to come in the next few weeks, including more gig details, so stay tuned.
Darran, Steve, Dan
The guys from DPRP who reviewed our EP last year, Bob Mulvey and Jez Rowden, have been the first to review the new album and you can read the review here. Any fan of progressive music that isn't aware of this site should really check it out - it's hugely respected and a great resource for progressive music. Look out for a DPRP interview in the coming weeks too.
Godsticks will feature in the 'on the threshold' section in the next issue of 'Classic Rock Presents Prog' (look out for a review of the album too). For those unaware, the magazine has been growing in popularity since its inception, and it's now bi-monthly. If recent articles in the 'Guardian' and 'Independent' are anything to go by, then prog is coming back into musical fashion - stranger things have happened we suppose!
Look out also for a review in Guitarist Magazine and its sister publication Guitar Techniques. CRS and Summer's End organiser Stephen Lambe will also be reviewing the album for the 'Classic Rock Society' magazine.
The 'album launch' gig has been moved from August to Thursday 30th September. This will be the first gig in the current 3-piece line up. Rehearsals are going very well, and we're looking to line up some more gigs over the next few weeks.
For any fellow 'gear-heads' interested in the guitars used on the album, check out the new 'Gear' page, which features some great pictures taken by a friend/photographer Pete Hurley.
Thanks to everyone who has bought the album so far! Plenty more news to come in the next few weeks, including more gig details, so stay tuned.
Darran, Steve, Dan
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Well, it took 16 months of writing, 4 months of rehearsals, and 2 months in the studio, but we've finally managed to complete our debut album, 'Spiral Vendetta'. We're really proud of the material on this album and it's as varied in style as the EP we released back in 2009. The album track listing is as follows:
The Offer Still Stands (2:47)
Unnerving Allure (6:00)
Timshel (5:36)
Norman (6:00)
Put Seven in Bold (5:47)
Withdrawn (5:15)
Traverse (2:30)
R.R.R. (5:30)
The Continuation of Livid (4:30) instrumental
Unravel (5:00)
This time around we recorded the entire album at 'Mighty Atom Studios' with Joe Gibb - the producer and professional perfectionist that we worked with on the EP. Even though it was very, very hard work we had great fun working with Joe again; he really is one of the best producers in the business and cares as passionately about our music as us.
Some of you may already know that there was a line-up change at the beginning of the year. Jason Marsh (our original bass player) left the band to pursue more fusion-inspired instrumental music with fusion musicians Dann Glenn and Baba Elefante; you can check out their new material here.
Taking over bass duties on the album was Bryan Beller; a player we have admired for many years for his work with Mike Keneally and Steve Vai. It was a real pleasure to work with Bryan as we share many of the same influences, and as predicted his style complimented the Godsticks sound perfectly.
The new band line-up has also seen the arrival of bass player, Dan Nelson. Although still very much a young pup, he plays with maturity that belies his age, and hearing him play with the band the very first time was a real treat - a naturally gifted player with a big future ahead of him. As such, the live set-up has now been condensed into a 3-piece with Darran taking over all vocal, guitar, and keyboard duties.
Over the next few months, check out Classic Rock Presents Prog which features a Godsticks interview, and also look out for an album review in Guitarist magazine in the coming months. Hopefully we'll be playing in your local area within the next 12 months so please visit our website and sign up for our newsletter that will contain gig and news updates.
If we receive even half the amount of support and accolades in a year which culminated in us being voted 5th best band in Classic Rock Presents Prog, then we'd consider the album a success. At the moment, the album is only available to buy from the shop on this website.
Thanks for reading!
Darran, Steve, Dan
The Offer Still Stands (2:47)
Unnerving Allure (6:00)
Timshel (5:36)
Norman (6:00)
Put Seven in Bold (5:47)
Withdrawn (5:15)
Traverse (2:30)
R.R.R. (5:30)
The Continuation of Livid (4:30) instrumental
Unravel (5:00)
This time around we recorded the entire album at 'Mighty Atom Studios' with Joe Gibb - the producer and professional perfectionist that we worked with on the EP. Even though it was very, very hard work we had great fun working with Joe again; he really is one of the best producers in the business and cares as passionately about our music as us.
Some of you may already know that there was a line-up change at the beginning of the year. Jason Marsh (our original bass player) left the band to pursue more fusion-inspired instrumental music with fusion musicians Dann Glenn and Baba Elefante; you can check out their new material here.
Taking over bass duties on the album was Bryan Beller; a player we have admired for many years for his work with Mike Keneally and Steve Vai. It was a real pleasure to work with Bryan as we share many of the same influences, and as predicted his style complimented the Godsticks sound perfectly.
The new band line-up has also seen the arrival of bass player, Dan Nelson. Although still very much a young pup, he plays with maturity that belies his age, and hearing him play with the band the very first time was a real treat - a naturally gifted player with a big future ahead of him. As such, the live set-up has now been condensed into a 3-piece with Darran taking over all vocal, guitar, and keyboard duties.
Over the next few months, check out Classic Rock Presents Prog which features a Godsticks interview, and also look out for an album review in Guitarist magazine in the coming months. Hopefully we'll be playing in your local area within the next 12 months so please visit our website and sign up for our newsletter that will contain gig and news updates.
If we receive even half the amount of support and accolades in a year which culminated in us being voted 5th best band in Classic Rock Presents Prog, then we'd consider the album a success. At the moment, the album is only available to buy from the shop on this website.
Thanks for reading!
Darran, Steve, Dan
Monday, February 15, 2010
Godsticks - Jason Marsh leaves/New album/Bryan Beller
It is with great sadness that we announce the departure of Jason Marsh: bass player and one of the founding members. He has made no secret over the years (despite us trying to censor him) of his desire to perform more fusion-inspired instrumental music, and he feels the time has come to pursue this particular musical direction. It can never be underestimated the musical influence he has had on both me and the sound of Godsticks; I'm personally very sad that he's leaving but have the utmost respect for his decision.
Some of you may remember that Steve left back in November: well, that parting lasted all of 3 weeks until we realised that we couldn't live without each other. Yes, this is a very dysfunctional band but that's part of its charm!! Both Steve and I have been working extremely hard rehearsing the 10 tracks for the forthcoming album.
In contrast to the sadness expressed above, we're delighted to announce that none other than Bryan Beller will be taking over bass duties for the new album. Both Steve and I are huge fans of Bryan and we're really looking forward to working with him. He is one of only 2 bass players we think compliment our style (the other being Jason!).
We're working with Producer Joe Gibb again for this album, and begin recording at the beginning of April.
It is with great sadness that we announce the departure of Jason Marsh: bass player and one of the founding members. He has made no secret over the years (despite us trying to censor him) of his desire to perform more fusion-inspired instrumental music, and he feels the time has come to pursue this particular musical direction. It can never be underestimated the musical influence he has had on both me and the sound of Godsticks; I'm personally very sad that he's leaving but have the utmost respect for his decision.
Some of you may remember that Steve left back in November: well, that parting lasted all of 3 weeks until we realised that we couldn't live without each other. Yes, this is a very dysfunctional band but that's part of its charm!! Both Steve and I have been working extremely hard rehearsing the 10 tracks for the forthcoming album.
In contrast to the sadness expressed above, we're delighted to announce that none other than Bryan Beller will be taking over bass duties for the new album. Both Steve and I are huge fans of Bryan and we're really looking forward to working with him. He is one of only 2 bass players we think compliment our style (the other being Jason!).
We're working with Producer Joe Gibb again for this album, and begin recording at the beginning of April.