Holy schnikeys! Loved the stuff I'd heard on DLBN, so I went and ordered Freak Guitar and Move. They finally arrived yesterday.
Man oh man oh man oh man. Absolutely brilliant stuff. I can't stop listening to The Satanic Moonwalk. One of the bestest funkiest grooves I have ever heard.
Thanks Shawn!
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Crunch Time --- Thursdays 3 - 4:30 EASTERN Time
Majority rule don't work in mental institutions - Fat Mike
Freak Kitchen was actually considered for Rosfest 2005. I was part of an online conversation with one of their members... Phil I think it was. Definitely more of an "angular" style of music, which is cool if you like that sort of thing. Personally, it makes my head spin... or is that the drugs. Anyway, and I thank George for letting me be a part of the process, the decision was made that they probably wouldn't be a good fit for ROSFest. Now NEARFest, that's a different story...
Freak Kitchen at CalProg!!! There's an idea! This band definitely has to be one of the biggest discoveries of the year for me, no question! I credit Gary for my current love of their music as he's been pushing them for a long time!
Freak Kitchen was actually considered for Rosfest 2005. I was part of an online conversation with one of their members... Phil I think it was. Definitely more of an "angular" style of music, which is cool if you like that sort of thing. Personally, it makes my head spin... or is that the drugs. Anyway, and I thank George for letting me be a part of the process, the decision was made that they probably wouldn't be a good fit for ROSFest. Now NEARFest, that's a different story...
Although they're not prog at all and probably not a fit for RoSFest, I wish they made the roster just so I could see them live. All in good time I guess.
I'd say they have progish parts at times. Even though the songs are shorter, he definitely throws in some cool time sitnature changes. The songs seem to evolve from beginning to end.
I have all the albums I don't notice this in any particular songs. I love this band and I believe that reason for my love is that the structure of the songs is reminicent of that of popular music, very catchy with verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus form. I think its cool because these guys are so talented that it makes the popular music form interesting again. Personally I don't think they're progressive rock at all, tons of new bands use odd time signatures and I don't really find that reason enough to call them any more than a kickass hardrock band. No one calls System of a Down, Megadeth or early Metallica prog rock but they all have the same characteristics as Freak Kitchen.
I should probably add that although Freak Kitchen uses more interesting modes and scales than most other rock bands, (for instance middle eastern scales are very popular with Mattias) this kind of experimentation comes from a definite jazz influence - particularly Coltrane and the mid 60's avant garde, so I guess if you were to look at the music from a harmonic POV it's pretty progressive.
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-Adam See- Overnight Sensation --- Wednesday Nights 10-1 Pacific Time Beyond And Before --- Thursday Nights 7-8 Pacific Time
"Well Opinions are like assholes, everybody has one"
The other thing I like about this band is that they seem like such cool people. And if you ever venture over to freakkitchen.com or freakguitar.com, you could spend days reading everything there. They have studio and tour diaries with pictures and a history of the band. The coolest thing though might be that on the freakguitar site, Mattias actually tells what tuning he used for every song. I believe there is also tablature as well. I don't know if that's humility or confidence in your ability, but it's like 'here is how I did it, knock yourself out'. I think that's cool. So many of the 'rock stars' when I was young were more iconic and aloof, to me it's refreshing to see guys every bit or even more talented behaving as 'regular guys'.
I wish Mattias lived in the states so that it wouldn't cost an arm and a leg to interview him. He seems like a fascinating guy to talk to.
Freak Kitchen are a breath of fresh air. Just a really good rock band with a sense of humour and great catchy songs that get in your head and make you want more. Thanks Gary!
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