free download

Weekly Music Download Round-Up #1

This will be my first installment in a weekly series of posts chronicling area bands and artists offering direct music downloads either for free or for a small fee (no more than $5). Releases included will typically be those that have been available for more than a few months, or albums from artists that are buzz-worthy but aren’t yet ready for their own dedicated post. There is a not-so-subtle theme in this one, see if you can catch on. And here we go…

The Caves – Fives Songs With… EP (2010) – First up is KC alt/indie-pop quartet The Caves, founded by Andrew Ashby and Jake Cardwell of The Belles (Ashby is also known for The String & Return), along with David Gaumé of The Stella Link. The band has been around for the better part of a decade, when they finally got a chance to release their first EP, and recruited Elizabeth Bohannon into the fold to play keys and lend a backing voice to the band’s previously all-Ashby vocals. The band plans for this to be the first in a series of three EPs, but there have been no updates on the status of future recordings. Download Five Songs for $5.

Hidden Pictures – Synchronized Sleeping (2011) – Next is Lawrence by-way-of Kansas City indie-pop group Hidden Pictures. The band has been the project of Richard Gintowt and Michelle Gaumé Sanders since its conception, and has featured a veritable who’s who of local musicians who have contributed for a short time then moved on to create something else. This album alone features the talent of four different bass players, three drummers, a cellist, a viola, trombone, and a saxophone. This album can be downloaded for only $5 and features six bonus tracks, the unreleased EP of Gintowt’s previous band, OK Jones.

Ghosty – Team Up Again EP (2010) – Ghosty has hit the rare distinction for a still-active local band, as this year marks the 10 year anniversary of the band’s first EP, though just like Hidden Pictures, it serves as Andrew Connor’s musical baby in that he has been the only constant through its lifespan. The band was formed when the Sioux Falls, SD, native met Richard Gintowt while attending KU, though Gintowt left the band early on to form OK Jones. Both pop heavyweights in their own right, Connor’s influences from Alex Chilton and The Beach Boys are much more apparent. This, and two others at the link, are available for free.

The ACB’s – Stona Rosa (2011) – Stona Rosa serves as the sophomore release from Kansas City’s The ACB’s. Their self-titled debut, itself a respectable mimic of In Color-era Cheap Trick with additional nods to Big Star and Badfinger, was completely obliterated when the group resurfaced in late 2010. Now with Andrew Connor’s Midas touch in tow, the band returned as a powerpop juggernaut, arguably releasing one of the best local albums of 2011, and sealing their position as one of the bands to watch over the next few years. The release is offered as pay what you want, but can be had for free if you wish.

Bonus: Billy Belzer – You Shouldn’t Have (2011) – If you’ve been keeping up, that links The Caves to Hidden Pictures through siblings, Hidden Pictures to Ghosty via college alum, and Ghosty to The ACB’s through Andrew Connor’s propensity to lend his talent to half a dozen bands at any given time. The family tree ends there for today, but as a bonus I am including frequent Ghosty contributor Billy Belzer’s solo debut, a release bringing in the talent of many area musicians, including, you guessed it, Andrew Connor. Connor and Belzer are also in Mary Fortune with Ghosty artist (and Connor’s wife) Liz Connor. Get the EP for $5.

The Grisly Hand free EP download offer

Kansas City’s resident country/Americana septet The Grisly Hand may have only been around for a short two and a half years, but the members have been playing in punk, indie and hardcore bands in the area for over a decade, their combined time in touring acts adding up to give them a lifetime of experience. Their first EP, a seven-track platter called Safe House, was released late last year, but long before that the co-ed group became a staple of the live music scene. They can sometimes be seen playing more than bi-monthly at locations spread across all areas of the city and in every setting imaginable, to every crowd possible.

The band of course has a Facebook account set up, and just this week hit a milestone, reaching 1,000 likes on their page. To celebrate and show their appreciation, they will be offering a free download of the EP to all of their fans until the end of the work week. Naturally, most of you should already own the release in one of its three formats (digital, CD or vinyl), but I’m not here to pass judgement. To get in on this deal, just visit this page and follow the instructions.

High Diving Ponies’ Pain Pills 7 inch download

There are few active bands in the region that have committed to churning out a respectably sized discography in the shortest amount of time possible as much as the High Diving Ponies. The band, in its current incarnation, caught my attention early last year by announcing their plans to release not one, or two, but three albums in the year of 2010. Their agenda was pushed into motion with the release of the 10-track Fractals in Heat, a fuzzed out, reverb heavy and, yes, probably substance-enhanced work that was equal parts grunge and shoegaze, a comfort zone giving just as much credence to Sonic Youth’s Evol as the pure wall-of-noise segments present in My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless.

The counterpart release to Fractals proper was the same album, mixed by Tim Goodwillie (GOODWILLIES), skewing the levels and creating a feeling the album is either being listened to through a slow-running blender, or the sound is vibrating off the walls of a steel grain bin. Listening to either release, you would expect that the currently played album is how it was meant to be heard, the preference is really in the hands of the audience. As quickly as the first two were made public, a third album was released. This one, titled Casino Economy, showed temperament on the band’s part, demonstrating a much more restrained approach to what was once just an onslaught of reverb. What could easily have been confused as an attempt to cover up a lack of songwriting skills in previous releases, was now stripped down just a little to reveal that underneath all of the noise there was real talent present.

Frontman Josh Thomas is no stranger to the use of reverb and noise as an artificial instrument. Prior to the existence of HDP, Thomas fronted Spidermums, a band similar not only in sound, but in the delivery of their physical product, using stenciled black sleeves to house each of their two CD-R releases (the last of which featured drumming from Gaurav Bashyaklarla of CVLTS), a trend that continued on with the Ponies. You could say that the change was more in name only than in sound, but with a new name came a new lineup, eliminating a cast that had largely been a part of Thomas’ endeavor previous to the ‘Mums, the straight ahead grunge outfit Bodisartha. The band garnered a bit of attention in the mid ‘oughts, and could be frequently found on the lineup at one of midtown KC’s shortest-lived but most documented haunts, The Sleeper Cellar.

Back to the present, and not to be outdone by… themselves, the self-described “danger pop” band released yet another album in November of 2010. Broken Sunbather would prove to be both a continuation of Thomas’ decision to focus on more of the intricacies that were often overlooked in some of his previous work, and a harkening back to the raw, out-of-tune fuzz rock they had built their reputation upon. Many of the nine tracks present on Sunbather had been tossed around in demo form by the band for most of the year, a few even appearing on a live recording the band posted online from a Recordbar show they played earlier that spring.

Little was heard from HDP for a few months. Their Twitter account was updated frequently, but mostly either updated the followers on what ever band Josh was recording/mastering (the previously mentioned CVLTS, as well as Baby Birds Don’t Drink Milk) or was limited to a one-line anecdote about drugs or a cryptic allusion to the thoughts taking place in his head at that particular moment. The occasional live performance announcement or a passing remark about a 7 inch would be made from time to time, vinyl had been mentioned as a possible format since the band’s conception, though cassettes were a frequent medium as well. As spring arrived, the discussion of a new analog release was steadily increasing, when last week, the news was out. The band plans to release the lathe-cut Pain Pills 7 inch in mid-June, and its run is limited to a mere 33 copies. They have posted a link where the EP can be downloaded for free. As far as getting your hands on a copy of the 7 inch, well I guess you’ll just have to check back in here after the band announces a release show.

Bonus: download Spidermums’ fantastic cover of The Amps’ “Bragging Party” right here.