This Friday Night at Blueberry Hill one of St. Louis' hottest up and coming bands, The Mirror Stage, will be performing at the CD release show for their latest album Ten Thousand Tongues. The show not only spotlights the band's new album, but is also the first show on their current tour which takes them through Chicago, Louisville, Athens, and The O.N.E. Music Festival in South Carolina.
On Ten Thousand Tongues, The Mirror Stage (James Paul McAnally, Gregg Roberson, and Brea McAnally) create music which encompasses a wide collection of sound varying from rock, to indie, artsy, and pop. With equally diverse and not surprising musical and literary influences, ranging from The Arcade Fire and Bob Dylan, to T.S. Eliot and Haruki Murakami, the band's music cleverly walks the tight rope of substance and mainstream appeal. Whether you are in the mood for introspection or just rocking out, Ten Thousand Tongues is an incredibly strong debut CD worthy of a listen.
The band's artistic nature displayed in their lyrics, instrumentation, and live shows is also exhibited in their recently released video for the single “Electrical Storm”.
On the eve of the show, guitarist and frontman James Paul McAnally was kind enough to take a few minutes to talk to us about the band's music, the CD release and benefit show for the International Institute, and their latest video shoot for their debut single “Electrical Storm”
InsideSTL: For music fans unfamiliar with the band, how would you describe your music?
James Paul McAnally: The formula I always use to describe the music is "Radiohead revisiting Dylan's Highway 61." We have a similar musical palette as Radiohead in terms of instrumentation, experimentation, and treating the recording process very seriously to get exactly the right sound. We will play any instrument, chop it up, loop it, sample ourselves--whatever it takes to get across the right mood of the song.
On the other hand, lyrically, the best comparison we've heard is Highway 61-era Dylan. Dylan's songs like "Ballad of a Thin Man" and "Desolation Row" draw heavily on literature and historical figures to create a dense symbolic order over the course of a normal pop song, which is something that developed naturally for us as a band as well. All of the songs on Ten Thousand Tongues have a literary source. On our MySpace page, our "top friends" are all characters alluded to on the album as a way to help people connect the threads.
InsideSTL: What was it like making the video for the single "Electrical Storm"?
James Paul McAnally: We worked with some very talented people coming out of Webster's Film Program. Ryan Doris, the Director, had the use of a great warehouse space in the city and built the set from scratch. We guard our image in artwork and sound really closely, so we all worked hard to make sure that the video was as professional as possible without label backing and that it fit who we are as a band. We wanted a narrative as a way to help people enter in to the songs. Some of our music is difficult to grasp, so this was another way for us to communicate ourselves aesthetically.
InsideSTL: What can fans heading out to Blueberry expect to experience at the CD release show this Friday?
James Paul McAnally: This show is going to be absolutely amazing. We've brought in a highly-respected artist named Kathy Cannistra to help us design a stage set and performance that is going to be stunning. We've also brought in another multi-instrumentalist named BJ Mumford who will be playing accordion, hammered-dulcimer, marching bass drum and all the other things that are on the recordings but we can't normally pull off live. If you've seen us before, this will be a new experience. If you've never seen us, this will be the perfect introduction.
We're also really glad to be able to use the opportunity to do a benefit for a great organization called the International Institute, which provides new refugees with housing, job opportunities and educational resources to help the process of acculturation into our way of life.
InsideSTL: So what's ahead for the band in 2008 and beyond?
James Paul McAnally: Soon after the release, we'll be taking off on tour, which will be fairly constant through the fall. We'll be doing some radio interviews and promotion to help get our music to a larger audience. The national press is beginning to take hold, so we're trying to play all of the larger markets like Chicago, Atlanta and New York where we know we have a good draw.
We're also excited to begin work on our full-length later this year- it is already mostly written, so we have a rotation of about 10 songs that we bring in to the live show. We're developing much faster as a band than any of us expected and it's definitely coming out in the new songs.
Friday night at Blueberry Hill promises to be a great night of music for a great cause. Be sure to go and catch a band you will sure to be hearing more about in the future.
The Mirror Stage w/ Jon Hardy and The Public and Tell Tale Heart
Friday, June 20th at Blueberry Hill, 8PM.
Questions or Comments? Email me at smohapatra@insidestl.com
Links:
Mirror Stage on MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/mirrorstage
The International Institute of St. Louis: http://www.iistl.org