Search - The Mocking Birds :: Still Here

Still Here is The Mocking Birds' eighth release, on their own Mr. Lucky Records, and like their other albums it features the tunes of front man James Velvet. Velvet has a back catalog of some five dozen recorded songs, "some of them way too good for the industry, some of them lousy, and none of them published," says a bemused Velvet. Still Here is a careful and nuanced look at one American?s winter of ?01-?02. Songs like "Gas Masks And Vaccines" and "Freedom Ring" address specific cultural and political trends while "I?m Still Here" and "Sail Away" examine images of home and loss, and the identities of place and possession. The tracks are stitched together in suite-like fashion with percussion loops by producer Vic Steffens of Horizon Studios, and the CD cover features the rich photography of Virginia Blaisdell. All the while The Mocking Birds show mighty muscle and the ability to play it fast or slow, hard or soft. The Mox play as only a true, gig-tested band can; all apart and all together, always with confidence. Connecticut concert promoter Rob DeRosa describes the whole package as, "starkly beautiful."