A self-proclaimed "country band traveling through space," The Space Merchants drive, jangle, and twang their way through sweet, haunting jams, as majestic as they are minimal. Theirs is a lo-fi psych experience, befitting of interstellar exploration as well as lonely highway trucking. The Brooklyn band's sweet, haunting songs, propelled by co-ed vocal harmonies, live in their own world where backporch Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings vibes coexist with outerspace psych-rock jamming.
Naming The Velvet Underground, Black Sabbath, and Bobbie Gentry as musical inspirations, and mining the realms of science fiction, religion and myth in their lyrics, the co-ed Brooklyn band marries backporch Americana with brain-blowing transcendence, a juxtaposition they themselves sum up as "like Johnny Cash explaining current theories in astrophysics."
On perfectly composed songs like "One Cut Like the Moon" and "Mainline the Sun," female and male voices intertwine in rich harmonies over bluesy guitar- and organ-driven rock. The instrumentation is classic, the song structures are tried and true. The Space Merchants follow a recipe that has been working since the birth of rock n' roll, yet these are songs that seduce, abduct, and lead guided tours of other worlds.
"While traipsing through the same atmospheric layers as the horde of shoegazers out there, The Space Merchants' 'Mainline the Sun' still has a few boots on the ground. Mainly it's singer/guitarist Michael Guggino's touch of gravel and the la-la-ladies doing harmonies who don't go the easy angelic route. If neo-Paisley Underground is useable, let's." –CMJ
The Space Merchants
One Day Steady
Near Earth Objects
Speed Bird
Urban Artifact
Sunday, August 30th
7p
