Ford & Fitzroy 'Canyons' album

Ford & Fitzroy's Canyons is a sweeping, epic album, a statement of dark euphoria. A minute into "Las Vegas Blush," the opening track, there is a massive expansion of sound and lyrical tone. Its volume increases with immediacy, as vocalist Jay Schneider's metaphors describing the city below become more vivid, more detailed. The group's music spans two sides of a divide. In a few seconds, the sound of disjointed outsider rock segues into something pleasantly familiar; pop melodies incised through swaths of textured guitar.

This is a band unafraid of contradictions. They espouse lurching shifts in sound and content, alternating between the ugly and the sweet. "Las Vegas Blush" epitomizes this in its lyrical juxtaposition of the bashfulness that fuels romantic adolescent feelings with the brash sexuality of Las Vegas. Jay Schneider describes another song with memorable imagery, "Mussolini's Eyes", as "a masochist fantasy set to the backdrop of Europe at war in the 1940s."

Ford & Fitzroy take their name from Van Morrison's expansive, emotionally exhausting "Madam George". "Astral Weeks is a spectacular album, lyrically and musically," says guitarist Glenn Waldman. "We wanted a name firmly routed in the past. Nobody really knows what Ford & Fitzroy means in the context of the song - is it a street corner, is it two people? But its alliterative power brings forth dirty streets and broken instruments." At their heart, that's precisely what Ford & Fitzroy are doing.

The group's lineup -- Schneider, Waldman, guitarist Mina Kim, Jay's brother, Scott on bass, and drummer Mike Sweeney -- formed on a "New Year's Eve a while back," according to Waldman. "We wanted to get together to record an album. Through the process of trying out many styles - accordion, handmade percussion, etc., we landed back on rock and roll." Canyons, he continues, "Was recorded on weekends and weeknights all last winter. We were in an old car garage-turned-studio with our feet smashed against space heaters for warmth. In the end, we did what we set out to do: record an album how we wanted it recorded, to have it sound how we wanted it to sound."

The band's live shows have received their own acclaim. Accounts have appeared painting Schneider in the archetypal role of a man possessed, his body wracked and rapt as he channels a sequence of emotions, as the band careens around the stage bearing instruments aloft. But that's not how The Cougar Label noticed them. They were heard down the hall at the practice space working over the melodies of "Handbags & Hand Grenades" against the muffled thudding of the other bands nearby.

Canyons is an impressive debut from a band that must be seen as well as heard. It will be released November 11, 2008 at all major online retailers.

meet the band
FORD & FITZROY ARE
JAY SCHNEIDER
GLENN WALDMAN
SCOTT SCHNEIDER
MIKE SWEENEY
NATE ECKSTROM

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Ford & Fitzroy - Canyons