Search - Goldrush :: Ozona

A little bit alt-country

Bryan Maury | 09/07/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The desert will do funny things to a man. Some get driven mad from the heat; they hallucinate and sooner or later, they crack.

Some however, forge through and manage to make the most of the situation, much as Goldrush did when their bus broke down in the middle of Ozona, Texas.

There they were; stranded, like fish out of water, worlds away from their home of Oxford, England.

Ozona is a tiny town, but apparently it has a bar, and when you're a group of hard-drinking lads from England, that's enough. After all, the best way to fit in with a bunch of hillbillies is to share their common bond - booze.

So the band decided to make the most of it - the result, an album that blends equal parts Wilco, Pavement, the Replacements and "Crazy Horse"-era Neil Young.

The albums title is a nod to that sleepy little town that helped inspire them create this masterpiece, put out on their own label, Truck Records.

The band formed in 2001 and has shared the stage with the likes of Soft Parade and the Flaming Lips (a band that they have been compared to on some level).

"Counting Song" and "Let You Down" are remakes of songs that appeared on 2003's "Extended Play." These newer versions maintain the same feel and theme carried throughout "Ozona," ethereal indie-rock with traces of alt-country.

Robin Bennett's whiskey-soaked vocals spin tales of love and loss as the rest of the crew jam out tunes that seem to inspire the listener to hop in their car and make the drive down to that quite, dusty town in Texas.



And as luck would have it, Goldrush is coming to town. That means you don't have to trek all the way out to Oxford to see them, heck; you don't even have to go to Ozona."

Cool man

alexander laurence | Los Angeles, CA | 11/09/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Goldrush is one of the best up and coming bands from England. They started about five years ago. Soon they caught the attention of Mark Gardener. I saw Mark Gardener play with Goldrush last June. It was a legendary event. Goldrush is one of the most musically pure bands. They have caught the imagination of people like The Flaming Lips. This Oxford band works in the tradition of Ride and Radiohead. Some of that rich material that Radiohead has left behind, Goldrush had dud into. It's like a mix of folk music and sonic experimentation. This album has the feeling of traveling around country roads. Ozona is the name of some place in Texas. The pilgrim soul has been honed by producers like Dave Fridmann and Rob Campanella, who have worked on some of the most forward sounding records of the past ten years. Goldrush will be playing a lot in California this month. Hopefully you will check them out.



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