DHD 10 ANIMAL BEARD - Dark And Dying Nights

Animal Beard is the longtime project of Chris Ryan. Since its inception in 2000, Animal Beard has existed in various forms, including a five-person band with theremin and standup bass; a guitar/bass/drums trio; and as a solo act. Despite the occasional prolific stint of playing shows, it has primarily been a recording project.

Dark And Dying Nights is Chris' first new work in years, recorded on his own over the last few months. The results are bleak and distorted - more raw than his previous solo work, but with the same familiar pop touch. It's a weirdly cathartic addition to the Animal Beard canon and -I hope- an indicator of more to come. The whole thing is available for FREE download here.

Chris Ryan: voice, guitar, keyboard, drums, drum machine

SLs update.

Recording for the SLs full-length is going well - almost as well as I had dared to hope it might. Having had the thing more or less "done" in my head for so long, the process of expelling it, piece by piece, into the world has been interesting. It's challenging to reinterpret years-old songs in a way that still sounds vital (not stale or limited by the way an inexperienced youngster may have originally conceived them). But applying the current-SLs sensibility to this early-SLs material has yielded some worthwhile results so far, especially since "the vision" I'm trying to express is more or less the same. (I think I'm just better at it now.) I'll try to post regular updates here as the project continues.


Also, last month I discovered* that A Diamond Eye Shines In Failing Light made it to #47 on Not For Resale's Top 50 of 2010 List! I appreciate the recognition, especially coming from someone who I did not foist that record upon. NFR's glowing write-up of They Poisoned Us All is here: "Like an industrial TV On The Radio these two tracks grind off a parallel universe of soulful pop hooks, nimbly dodging the piston heavy stomp of martial drumming dropping around them, kicking up dust and filthy noise in their wake. The first track is a little more song-oriented, the second spreads itself into a more ambient and lopsely structured artifact. It's a nice two-sided double shot of this bands capabilities, underlines the two key features of last year's album."

I'm not sure I could have put it better myself. Nice folks, and with rarefied tastes!

More soon.

*No, I was not Google-ing myself. I stumbled across this completely by accident while looking up info on Yellow Swans.

AB

At Emusication Proclamation:


Chris lost his guitar pick mid-song. Naturally, he continued playing. The results were impressive: