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Giant Sand

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Greyer On The Way
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Greyer On The Way
Released: Jan 25, 2009
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General Info

  • Genre: Alternative / Americana / Indie

    Location TUCSON, Arizona, US

    Profile Views: 339034

    Last Login: 11/10/2011

    Member Since 2/17/2006

    Website http://www.msplinks.com/MDFodHRwOi8vd3d3Lmhvd2VnZWxiLmNvbQ==

    Record Label firerecords.com

    Type of Label Indie

  • Bio

    ABOUT THE NEW RECORD "BLURRY BLUE MOUNTAIN" (firerecords.com) due out October 25th, 2010 "These recordings were done in the space between the waking world and the sleeping one. there exists a point there with a broad landscape that has seldom been loitered in. as with every previous album, none of this was planned. every record has its own atmosphere. for me they are always a new place to live in and spend some time before moving on. On this album, it happened that every session we were able to record came between work loads that rendered us at that point of sleeping and waking. like the poppy fields in wizard of oz, we went in and out of consciousness at various times during recording. This is not a bad thing. nor does it make the record sound like we're asleep. it has the momentum of that place between sleep and being awake. and in that narrow slip of existence lies a landscape of reason that most of us hurry past in daily lives. this record is planted firmly there" "Between the crystal clear focus of your day to day and the luxury of sweet fuzzy sleep, we welcome you to the blurry blue mountain". ~ Howe Gelb

  • Members

    .. .... ....Thøger T. Lund.... Anders Pedersen.... Howe Gelb.... Peter Dombernowsky......

  • Influences

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  • Sounds Like

    .... ..Bored Lil Devil - 2002...... .. .. .. .. .. .... ..Shiver (Music Video) - Directed by Bill Carter 2001.. .... .......... .. .. .. .. .... .... ..Happenstance - 1994...... .. .. .. .. .. .... ..Yer Ropes - 1994...... .. .. .. .. .. .... ..Pathfinder/Unwed & Well Sped - 1993...... .. .. .. .. .. .... ..Love Is Like A Train - 1989...... .. .. .. .. ..

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Now Available: Giant Sand - Ramp (from 1991)

Beautifully remastered from the original tapes. Find it on iTunes and other online sources. Details here.

Coming Soon: Giant Sand - Off Ramp
(Outtakes from the 1991 release Ramp)

Unreleased songs, instrumentals, alternate versions, and even a few with the boys backing Victoria Williams..

OWOM RECORDS HOME

Giant Sand - proVISIONS
GIANT SAND - proVISIONS

First Giant Sand Album in 4 Years Out NOW


Experimental Americana pioneer Howe Gelb released new Giant Sand album, proVISIONS, September 2, 2008

Tucson, Arizona-based musician Howe Gelb released the first Giant Sand album in nearly four years proVISIONS on September 2, 2008. The work will feature friends such as Isobell Campbell, Neko Case and M. Ward.

"Giant Sand is a mood," says Howe Gelb. The creative force behind the extended family that has comprised Giant Sand over the years, speaks of "yippity and happenstance" that arise to inspire the soundscape that is Giant Sand. The musical family tree of the Tucson, AZ group is long and illustrious, beginning in 1980 as The Giant Sandworms and later spawning bands like Calexico, The Friends of Dean Martinez and OP8.

Howe Gelb has steadily amassed a prolific catalog of Giant Sand and solo material that spans the wealth of southwestern roots and lo-fi. Thick with musings scattered by desert winds, and soaked with eroding guitars and dusty piano, proVISIONS sonically explores love and loss in the socio-political climate of the modern world.

This incarnation of Giant Sand is comprised of Gelb, Danish musicians Thoger T. Lund (bass), Peter Dombernowsky (drums) and Anders Pedersen (slide guitar). It features talented friends/collaborators such as Neko Case, M. Ward, Isobell Campbell, Henriette Sennenvaldt, Lucie Idlout and Lonna Kelley.

A creeping cruise down a dark desert highway, these proVISIONS provide for the furthering ride of Giant Sand's completely unique sonic legacy.


Pre-order proVISIONS and get two bonus tracks a live version of "Stranded Pearl" and "Dead Horse Blues"! The DRM-free MP3s will be available for download in your Stash right away.

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bio

THIS IS EROSION ROCK: Inaccurately yet affectionately dubbed “the Godfather of Alt. Country” by the British press, Tucson, Arizona-based musician Howe Gelb has remained the sole epicenter and creative force behind the ever-fluid configurations of Giant Sand for over a quarter century, giving birth along the way to an extended musical family tree that fostered the likes of The Band of…Blacky Ranchette, The Friends of Dean Martinez, OP8, and Calexico.

"Giant Sand is a mood," explained Howe, as if to simplify the dizzying breadth of his prolific output as an artist. With an impressive catalog of material that stretches back to 1983, he can easily claim some 40 albums to his credentials as both a band leader and a solo performer, each of which maintains its own genre-defying singularity while also drawing on the not-so disparate threads of country, southwestern roots, lo-fi, jazz, and punk--or the “yippity and happenstance“ that arises to inspire the soundscape of whatever project Gelb is involved in creating.

But Howe’s initial signposts were planted crookedly in Pennsylvania during the 1970s, among them being the rock opera ZEQE 24,088 which was recorded in 3 hours at a PBS radio station. In 1972, when floodwaters claimed his hometown and family house, ultimately sending him downstream to Arizona alongside the debris of his parents’ divorce, the song “Steadfast” was born as an articulation of that disaster. Soon upon arriving in Tucson, he met his sonic soul mate in the guitarist Rainer Ptacek, and as a result the two went on to form the Giant Sandworms. After releasing only a handful of singles and recordings, the worms were finally put to rest, making room for Giant Sand to bubble comfortably from the soil by the early 1980s. From that time on, in one manifestation or another, an album of Howe’s music has been recorded and delivered every 4 to 8 months.

Now following a nearly four year hiatus, Giant Sand returns with the release of proVISIONS on September 2, 2008. Produced by Howe and Kent Olsen (Arizona Amp and Alternator, Marie Frank), the album’s 13 tracks were recorded during a summer in Denmark, and features the Danish musicians Thoger T. Lund (bass), Peter Dombernowsky (drums), and Anders Pedersen (slide guitar). As with past incarnations of the band, the current lineup utilizes a more natural form of playing, relying heavily on improvisation and “on the fly“ problem solving, as well as exploring melodic variations within Howe’s songs.

Also lending themselves to the casual mix are a host of talented friends/collaborators--such as Neko Case, M. Ward, Isobell Campbell, Henriette Sennenvaldt, Lucie Idlout and Lonna Kelley--all of whom ease warmly into the passenger seat to ride shotgun for a while on an album thick with musings scattered by the desert winds and soaked with eroding guitars or dusty piano.

Providing an alternate route around box-store labels like “Alt. Country” while ruminating on love and loss in the socio-political climate of a modern world at odds with itself, proVISIONS is a creeping cruise down a dark desert highway, forging another surprising and welcome byway in the completely unique musical legacy of Giant Sand.

~Mitch Cullin

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Howe Gelb by John Parish
You know sometimes you hear a song for the first time & it clicks so immediately that it's then impossible to imagine that it hasn't always existed - "Classico" from the new Giant Sand album is a perfect example. I've recorded this song three times in a year - the two versions that bookend Map & a third by Italian legend Nada for her new album, Tutto L'amore Che Mi Manca. Howe's lyrics on" Classico" and throughout the new record are typically unique, ranging from laugh out loud to painfully poignant, hitting all points bizarre in between. If there were only one person allowed to contribute further to the over-stocked pool of recorded music on this planet it should be Howe Gelb.

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Howe Gelb is the Kevin Bacon of the Southwest. Chances are, every musician in the region is connected to him in six degrees or less. He formed Giant Sand, which then spawned OP8, Calexico, the Friends of Dean Martinez, Band of Blanky Ranchette, and Arizona Amp and Alternator. He's worked with Neko Case, Richard Buckner, Scout Niblett, Steve Wynn, Julie Doiron, Evan Dando, Via Tania, and John Parish. He passed along a demo tape of a then-unknown Grandaddy to V2.
~pitchforkmedia.com

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Member Since:

February 17, 2006

Members:



Thøger T. Lund

Anders Pedersen

Howe Gelb

Peter Dombernowsky

Influences:

..>..>

Sounds Like:



Bored Lil Devil - 2002



Shiver (Music Video) - Directed by Bill Carter 2001

..

Happenstance - 1994



Yer Ropes - 1994



Pathfinder/Unwed & Well Sped - 1993



Love Is Like A Train - 1989

Record Label:

Yep Roc / OWOM Records

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