may 07, 2007 : advocate blurb

What's going on for Quark in May? Well, Kiss Kiss has a lot of the month already booked but we'll be getting some of the stuff from our recent shows online (audio & posters mainly)...which isn't as a good as a show but who knows, there are a couple of things in the works so keep checking back.

Also, I (John) played a long set at The Sugarcube in Cromwell backing up Phil Bowles, in which the Rhodes made its formal debut.

There's a bit about us in a recent Advocate article ("Missing Out") written by Brian LaRue. Quoth: ...Quark opening for Man Man at the Wallingford American Legion last week and, as was the case the last time I saw them, being soundly ignored. The proggish, melodically dense indie rock quartet played well, and not a single passage was boring. But there were more people in the parking lot for their set than there were inside. Sometimes a band’s set feels special because it feels like something personal, a bit of an open secret. Sometimes a set makes one feel like one wins, and everyone who missed it loses. Well, people in the parking lot, you had your chance.

Well, I don't know about there being more people outside, we did have a decent crowd but there were some technical issues (our amps drew too much current and tripped the breakers, *twice*). But both Pre-Shock and the Man Man show were a great time and we want to thank everyone who came to either. Hopefully we'll have something soon.

april 18, 2007 : pre-shock and wallingford

Many thanks to everyone who supported us last weekend in Allston, Manchester & Albany. We had a lot of fun at each show and met a lot of great people, including Sean and his band...they are all great guys (and girls). April continues to have a lot going on for us: tomorrow we play Pre-Shock, an all-day music fest preceding Culture Shock, at the SUNY Purchase Student center with 12 other bands (Jerseyband is headlining). We made a poster, which you can see above. Then next Tuesday the 24th we're hitting the Wallingford American Legion with Man Man, thanks to manic productions. Tickets are $8.00 in advance and can be bought here. Check out the myspace page and our shows page for some more details. As always, you can listen to and perhaps order "Sleep Facing Southward" on CDBaby.com

We taped last Saturday night's show in New Hampshire, and a nice guy named Mike taped all of April 5th's show in Philly. So hopefully we'll have some new audio up soon. Maybe we can patch into the soundboard at Purchase, too. Finally, we'd love it if someone could come and take pictures for us at Purchase (tomorrow), so we can get some new ones up on the site :)

april 10, 2007 : shows with sean walsh

There's been quite a bit going on...you can now buy tracks from SFS on our myspace page. During March, Pat toured with Kiss Kiss and John did some piano/conductor work for a community theater. Last Thursday, we played at Spazz House in Philadelpia with some great bands (Aunt Dracula, Pork Tamer, Blueliner). Thanks to those of you caught this one. If for some reason you didn't have time on a Thursday to drive five hours to see us, we're playing shows this entire weekend with Eyeball Records' Sean Walsh, and there's a show in Purchase, NY next weekend as well. Check the shows page for details on those. Hope to see all of you there!

january 16, 2007 : quick fix

Sorry about the delay in getting those links up under the songs on the EP page. We've fixed them now. Also added the flyer that someone (Sean?) made for the show at L two weeks ago on the photos page.

january 11, 2007 : online and in print

Can't believe we forgot to report on this stuff. First, our friend Dan Barry has reviewed Sleep Facing Southward for his column in the Hartford Advocate, "Local Motion" (Link to review). Here's some of it:

...An orgy of horns like those in Radiohead’s "The National Anthem" form a brassy frame around Pat Lamothe’s gravel-lifting bass. "Going and Coming" is a bit mellow by comparison, but "When" launches from heartfelt balladeering into an overblown symphony, much like the Smashing Pumpkins used to in their prime. Quite unexpected — the combination of jam and indie aesthetics was fertile ground just waiting to be gardened.

You can check out Dan's (much appreciated) chronicling of local music at hartfordadvocate.com, his blog local commotion, and the local commotion myspace.

Second, "Sleep Facing Southward" is available online and a couple more places: iTunes Music Store and Rhapsody. Note that the for the iTunes link to work you need to have the program installed already. There's a way around that but if we tried to host the script our website bill would explode. Incidentally, the picture at the top of that last link is a Vectrex...a completely analog video game console. :)

january 8, 2007 : new year

Happy new year, everybody. We had a great time on the 5th, it really felt like one of our best. Mike once again lent us his talented trumpet playing. Thank you to the L for having us and just being great in general, thank you to Bludrum for descending on Highland Ave and thank you to everyone else for coming to see us and for receiving us so warmly.

december 03, 2006 : more downloads

Thank you to everyone who came to see us at SUNY Purchase on Friday. We had a good time.
Also, there is a new recording available to download. It's the set we played in rehearsal the night before we went into the studio.

november 26, 2006 : new website

This is the new site design. Hope everybody likes it. It's pretty much based on the artwork for the "Sleep Facing Southward" CD, which in turn is based on a photo of a tapestry that our friend Chad Etting took. Also a classic font called "Futura" that has a cool geometric look to it. Here is a quick article about Wes Anderson's use of Futura to set a consistent mood in his films.