Armisitice, Finally Something New From MUTEMATH

We were introduced to Armistice, MUTEMATH’s new album in August and let me say it was worth the wait. After many years of touring and recording MUTEMATH’s sophomore release finally came together. 

“We didn’t want our sophomore record to sound like a bunch of first record b-sides,” Paul Meany, frontman for MUTEMATH, said, “the recorded was sounding like that, we were trying to find that genuine inspiration that caused the first recorded to be recorded.”

“We finished our recorded like five times” Meany said “every time we thought we had finished it we would go and eat at Wolfgang Pucks.” 

Armistice was inspired by music that is almost the anti-thesis of MUTEMATH. Songs from Meany and company are normally very complex with a huge number of tracks.

“Inspiration came from very striped down music, lots of acoustic singer songwriter stuff like bob Dylan, James Taylor and Crosby, Stills and Nash…. really calm things and being challenged by that,” Meany said, “We wanted to find our own way in uncovering that sort of musical phenomena.”

Live shows are where it is at with MUTEMATH. They put on a show—well just skip to the bottom for the glowing review on their live shows—but what is their favorite song to play live?

 “Burden the last song on the [new] recorded and the last song written for the record it has really come into it own live and has a nice framework and freedom in that song. We take our time with that song,” Meany said. 

If anyone wants to see a show that changes your life and cause you to question your measuring stick for every other live show, see MUTEMATH.  They allow you into their world and cause you to experience the music instead of just listen to it. A MUTEMATH show is definitely worth any price.    

The following are recommendations from Paul Meany for a good time:

James Brown—“Best recordings performer/writer”

Eleanor Rigby by Ray Charles— “Every human needs to encounter this song once in your life time you will have ea better day for it.”

The Foals —“Good rock band that melds genres that you wouldn’t think would work.”

The Murder City Devils; One for the books

Every once in a while you come across that band that changes your life. Life change can be a good thing or a bad thing. Up until now most of my life changing experiences have been good. Last year I saw MuteMath perform in Portland and it changed the way I looked at live shows and music in general. This time it happened at Sasquatch with Spencer Moody of Murder City Devils.

I have grown up listening to many bands that profess to have a hatred for authority, but never have I seen it so forcefully expressed as with the Murder City Devils.

First lets get this out of the way: Moody was sauced, plastered and pretty well pissed when he came on-stage. This by itself would have made for an interesting show as he was stumbling around falling over monitors and almost hitting people with his microphone stand.

The commentary on humanity in between songs was what really hits you. If I were to take all the comments and synthesize them it would be something like this: high school jocks and former jocks
all need to go fuck themselves
and the only people who matter are those freaks, geeks and homosexuals. He also made out with most of the males on stage and one in the audience.

Moody also has a hatred for the media and all those that are in authoritative positions. When the media were allowed in to take some photos he spent a good portion of the time trying to disrupt their attempts to take pictures of him.

This bad boy and hate the world style of live show is one that has seemed to die off in recent years. You don't see many bands coming to their live shows drunk and pissed out of their minds any more. It was a blast from the past to see this form the Murder City Devils and one that I can say left a profound impression on me and right now I can't say if it is a good thing or a bad thing. While he was offensive and insensitive he did attempt to point out the double standard that many people have.

The fans of the Murder City Devils treat Moody like a mad prophet. They flock to him and he blesses them like little children. He tells them to take nothing from nobody and stick it to the man. And that is what makes the Murder City Devils one of those bands that leaves a mark on you and changes the way you see music, whether you want that or not.