Opposite Day

Artist Information

Biography

Blending art-rock, pop, experimental, math, jazz, and punk sounds with an absurdist academic childish lyrical fetish, Opposite Day has ratcheted up the aggressive pop tension and loosened the stylistic standards for Austin’s music scene over the course of 5 albums in over10 years.

The new album, Reindeer Flotilla is complete and will be released in November 2011.

? The 37 songs of Reindeer Flotilla can be played along with the final hour of the movie Tron (1982) – although it was written to be enjoyed separately as well.
? Reindeer Flotilla is Opposite Day’s 6th album, and the first all-instrumental work, 2 and ½ years in the making.
? It’s main theme was performed by Tosca String Quartet for the Golden Hornet Project in 2010.
? The album cover is by Austin artist Leah Haney, whom Sam discovered during East Austin Studio Tour.
? This album has way way more synths and fun effects than previous Opposite Day albums. Many of the songs blend robot sounds with an organic live band.
? Leila Henley of the Invincible Czars played sax on it.


WHAT DOES OPPOSITE DAY SOUND LIKE?
? "what the Beatles might have sounded like if they'd been part of the video game generation” – Texas Music Matters
? "The seamless, quirky manner in which they glide between genres while maintaining a punk sensibility nearly makes these musicians the kindred Texan spirits of the Dismemberment Plan" - Austin360.com (Austin American Statesman)
? “like both gibberish and truth”…”an unruly, unpredictable stew as impressive as it is bewildering.” – Austin Chronicle
? “like something Mike Watt might have dreamed up if he were forced to listen to Frank Zappa records nonstop” – Austinsound.net

WHAT ELSE?
? All of the members of Opposite Day also play in the local R&B band Sweetmeat.
? We’ve been ranked a top 10 band in the experimental and punk categories in the Austin Chronicle readers’ poll almost every year of our existence. If there were an EXPERIMENTAL PUNK category, we’d be #1!
? Our music video “Girl Spy; Super Spy” won best animated music video in Austin in 2005.

Instrumentation

Sam Arnold - guitar and lead vocals
Pat Kennedy - drums and mallet percussion
Greg Yancey - bass and vocals

Discography

2011 - Reindeer Flotilla
2010 - Mandukhai EP
2009 - What is is?
2007 - Safety First
2005 - Fictional Biology
2003 - Economics for Mr. Ugly

2005 Center for Art Rock Policy VI (compilation, 2 songs by Opposite Day)

Audio

• Wolves
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• Hungry Kitchen
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• It's Hydro, Oh
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• Elephant in a Pharmacy
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• Postmodern Warfare
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Lyrics

• Elephant in a Pharmacy
• Middle of the Street
• Brilliant Animals

Video

Photo Gallery

Press

• Review of Mandukhai EP [+ Show ]
  

  By Alex Daniel | Thursday, September 2, 2010, 04:33 PM Name a genre, and you can almost guarant...By Alex Daniel | Thursday, September 2, 2010, 04:33 PM
  
  
  Name a genre, and you can almost guarantee that Opposite Day dabbles in it on
  “Mandukhai,” the recently released companion EP to the band’s fourth full-length. Dissonant post-hardcore and noodly math rock? Definitely. Surf rock and spastic jazz fusion? Absolutely. Bilingual thrash metal and tribal, percussion-centric world music? Surprisingly, yes.
  On the band’s website, Opposite Day proclaims to have “loosened the stylistic standards for Austin’s music scene for the last 9 years,” and given the breadth of this variety, they certainly have the tools to do so. The seamless, quirky manner in which they glide between genres while maintaining a punk sensibility nearly makes these musicians the kindred Texan spirits of the Dismemberment Plan — another band with an irreverent eccentricity that could disarm the most steadfast elitists.
  But that’s where the comparison ends. Opposite Day’s music has a heavier sensibility, and it doesn’t strive for emotional nuance. What really makes “Mandukhai” special is simply the stellar musicianship. From the razor-sharp punk riffage of opener “Wolves” to the jazzy bass walk of instrumental “Carrots,” it’s clear that these guys are studied, clever and right at home in weird Austin.

• Review of Mandukhai EP [+ Show ]
  

  31|08|2010 [11:06:50] Jean-Philippe Haas The Texans have been emerging little by little from the Au...31|08|2010 [11:06:50] Jean-Philippe Haas
  The Texans have been emerging little by little from the Austin's alternative scene for around eight years now, and they are starting to get positive feedback out of their native state. Their latest disk, "What Is Is?", confirmed once more the musical choices made by the band since 2003, an unpredictable and technical punk-rock played by a line up of virtuosos far from being afraid by all kinds of breaks or, according to the latest official definition, the "Mongolian Surf Prog For Animals" [sic], in reference to the traditional Mongolian song "Mandukhai", rearranged for the occasion.
  
  This new EP does not shatter much the fundamentals even if some brass and new percussions tones make their appearance. From the very start, Sam Arnold and his two acolytes offer with "Wolves" a direct and fiery song, in order to disperse any possible reluctance. Then, "Serious Inspector" reminds that Opposite Day isn't always that predictable. Thus, Manukhai EP's nine tracks constitute an incredibly dense framework, swarming with appealing alternative rock patterns, steady rhythms, unexpected breaks, a mass of hard to follow ideas ("Don't Desintegrate"), and a good dose of humour which wouldn't have left Frank Zappa unsensitive.
  
  The rhythmic section led by Greg Yancey's bass and Pat Kennedy's drums plays as many complex grooves than wrenching steamrollers. And even though the trio is used to get done quickly with things, the musicians shyly try more subtle formats. But in the end, they will never be as comfortable as in their three-minute ultra-dense smashing tracks like "El Pollo Del Sol Mi Corazon", "Orderly Universe" or the instrumental "Carrots!". While waiting for Tron's original soundtrack's rearrangement in 2011 (!), Mandukhai allows us to enter the fall with a smile on the face, and something that will keep us waiting for a moment.

• Review of What Is Is? [+ Show ]
  

  Opposite Day comes from the Mike Patton/Frank Zappa school of spaz-funk, but on its latest, the loca...Opposite Day comes from the Mike Patton/Frank Zappa school of spaz-funk, but on its latest, the local trio evolves beyond slap bass and Madonna covers. More melody abounds on disc No. 4, as in "Hungry Kitchen," where the harmonic spray of chorus ("They're not human") is swept up by Oingo Boingo-ish verses. Animals and science are common in Opposite Day compositions, so on opener "Bacteria Know Everything," when singer/guitarist Sam Arnold states, "They look like fun bacteria; they look locomotive photosynthetic," it sounds like both gibberish and truth. Hyperspeed rant via the title track pits bassist Greg Yancey's four-string fluidity against Arnold's internal editor, as does the more streamlined "Current Currency Current." There are moments of deceleration (a cover of the Beatles' "Martha My Dear" never quite takes off), but there's nothing wrong with putting a little thought back under the microscope.

• Review of What Is Is? [+ Show ]
  

  By Marc Perlman • Jul 21st, 2009 • Category: Featured Story, Sound Reviews • Opposite Day has cro...By Marc Perlman • Jul 21st, 2009 • Category: Featured Story, Sound Reviews •
  
  Opposite Day has crossed a lot of different sonic boundaries over their career. They’ve played the hard rock/metal hangout of Room 710 and they’ve played the world/reggae/jam confines of Flamingo Cantina. And, they’ve brought their act to the insanely colorful and absurd Carousel Lounge more than once. If there’s one thing to know about Opposite Day, it’s that since their 2003 debut Economics of Mr. Ugly, the band has refused to be stylistically pinned down. Thankfully their fourth album What Is Is? (Future Banana Replacement) is fourteen more tracks of indescribable infectious rock and roll.
  
  On Economics for Mr. Ugly, Opposite Day charted a deviant course of twisting funky bass lines, quirky lyrics, and spunky guitars. Then on their subsequent releases after the departure of their original drummer, seemed to lose a bit of the mad scientist meets The Minutemen vibe and dabbled in something that would best be described as almost Phish band friendly. Fortunately, over the past two or three years, the crazy gene has returned to their DNA and the band that made both Madonna and Disney show tune covers so much fun reappeared! On What Is Is?, Greg Yancey’s bass lines pop, Sam Arnold’s guitars buzz just enough, and Pat Kennedy helps the band march to the beat of another planet again.
  
  Beginning with “Bacteria Know Everything” and “Hungry Kitchen”, the band sounds once again like something Mike Watt might have dreamed up if he were forced to listen to Frank Zappa records nonstop before recording. The beauty of Opposite Day has always been that it’s almost impossible not to love them, because they’re so goddamned different and it never sounds forced. If you can’t smile when Arnold sings the chorus of “Vegetablesssssss! Vegetablessssss! Oh my mom, won’t you send me some” on (what else?) “Vegetables”, you are hopefully six feet underground. Opposite Day has always excelled at blending an edge of metal shredding with the noodling of a jam band, but on “Earthworms” the band finally combines both parts of that split personality into their most accessible song yet with a powerful hook filled chorus. In the days when college radio actually existed, “Earthworms” would conceivably be played before the 3am math rock weirdo hour — it’s that good. Nowadays, there’s got to be a faint hope that a taste making blog can appreciate the song, right?
  
  On “What Is Is?”, Opposite Day have come full circle from their debut and their explorations of their second and third albums. Years ago they played The Little Mermaid’s “Under the Sea”; now they’re a band that covers “Martha My Dear” and still don’t sound a bit grown up. From Disney to Lennon and McCartney, from metal to funk, or from indie to jam band all that matters is that listening to Opposite Day is guaranteed to spread a grin from ear to ear.
  

• Review of Safety First [+ Show ]
  

  The real review in French is here: http://www.progressia.net/index.php4?rub=chroniques&idchronik=112...The real review in French is here: http://www.progressia.net/index.php4?rub=chroniques&idchronik=1128
  
  This is traslated by Babelfish:
  
  After Fictional Biology with the renovating virtues (cf our chronicle), Opposite Day is back with Safety First, a third album built on an identical formula: short and direct formats, truffés of changes and small lucky finds. The trio benefits from it to revisit the definition of its music: "art-pop, experimental-punk, hyperabsurd uneasy-listening with has smile". A whole program! Not tedious repetitions, useless lengths or diagrams solidified on Safety First, Opposite Day has since its beginnings with Economics For Mr. Ugly taken the party to surprise by equipping each one with its pieces of a dynamics which is clean for him, also short or simple it with the first access was. Oscillating between one minute thirty and almost five minutes, the seventeen titles of Safety First brew as on Fictional Biology quantity of influences, rock'n'roll and pop at the head, jazz, punk and metal according to near. The album starts on the hats of wheels with "Solid baby", cocktail punk-rock'n'roll survitaminé, typical of the receipt of Opposite Day: energy, humour, economy, and this small something in more which raises sauce. A discrete sophistication traverses the album thus, visiting all the styles, of pop of "Laurentide" to the jazz-rock'n'roll of "Elephant In A Pharmacy" But Safety First goes also further that Fictional Biology, somewhat moderating its metal heats with the profit of new new approaches for the group: folk-pop on "Install Paul Scoon"/"Astronomy Overflowed" or jazz-funk on "Brains". The longest titles like "Like An Alien" or "Spaceman Woman" will point out Kevin Gilbert or the most immediate compositions of Neal Morse, even if it is strong to bet that our three accomplices never intended to speak about these individuals! The few defects of Fictional Biology are forgotten. Top of its fifty minutes, Safety First acquires the statute of true album vis-a-vis at large frustrating half an hour of its predecessor. In addition, a production and arrangements more worked appreciably make it possible low of Greg Yancey to make devastations with its grooves hot, supported by the at the same time effective and subtle striking of the new beater Pat Kennedy while Sam Arnold deploys a play of guitar varied, often direct but which can also be done sober and moderate. Opposite Day is allowed on Safety First to make screws it with all the kinds which it practises, never not falling into theirs through. Under cover of tempting humour and atours, American makes a success of the performance to marry complexity with simplicity. Oh, and then rather than to lose itself in a vain synthesis, let us leave the care with Opposite Day to close this chronicle: We sound like Zappa, goal more poppy and heavy. Like the Pixies, goal more shreddy and jazzy. Concise Like King Crimson, goal more and absurd. Like Primus drank more melodic. Like Steely daN drank more insane and metal. Like They Might Be Giants drank heavier and mathier. Like Madonna. Exactly like Madonna. All is known as! Jean-Philippe Haas

• Review of Safety First [+ Show ]
  

  Austinites Opposite Day have been cranking out weirdo punk music for six years now, and Safety First...Austinites Opposite Day have been cranking out weirdo punk music for six years now, and Safety First is the band's third album, which makes them "official." Like most punk bands, the majority of songs last around two to three minutes. And while Opposite Day is definitely punk, the album's 17 tracks explore motley styles, ranging from hardcore to acoustic to experimental to Incubus-esque, all with silly and strange lyrics, which is why they call themselves "absurdist." The bass is, of course, a key element in Safety First, although sometimes it's a little too high and sometimes a little too funky and sometimes just immature. "Laurentide" surprisingly brings a bit more pop and accessibility, and "Astronomy Overflowed" carries a Simon-and-Garfunkel vocal style over a guitar that trickles like a gentle stream.

• Review of Safety First [+ Show ]
  

  In the bizarro world of Austin's Opposite Day, "Safety First" isn't exactly a motto that comes to mi...In the bizarro world of Austin's Opposite Day, "Safety First" isn't exactly a motto that comes to mind. No sooner has opener "Solid Baby" settled into a fairly blasé ska-inflected pop-punk than Greg Yancey drops a funky bassline, bringing the song to a standstill and leading into Sam Arnold's surf riffs. Safety First only unwinds from there, an unruly, unpredictable stew as impressive as it is bewildering. Like an improbable Weezer/Red Hot Chili Peppers collaboration, guitars explode atop intimidating bass then lull into absurdist lyrical melodies: "Elephant and me. In a pharmacy." The cartoonish detour of "Federalist 10" and zombie anthem "Brains!" sound like Spike Jones plundering Frank Zappa's garage, while the banjo of "Aztec Princess" sits in why-the-hell-not fashion alongside the beat-boxing of "Laurentide." Add the poetic, acoustic "Astronomy Overflowed," and everything seems inverted. Opposite Day may lack direction, but all the fun's in the wandering.

• Review of Fictional Biology [+ Show ]
  

  The Following is translated from French by Babelfish. The original is here: http://www.progressia.ne...The Following is translated from French by Babelfish. The original is here: http://www.progressia.net/?rub=chroniques&idchronik=1043
  
  Educational art rock'n'roll for animals". It is the definition provided by Opposite Day to qualify its music. Although incomplete and somewhat restrictive, "System Of A Down is degraded with Frank Zappa" would undoubtedly be a definition more speaking. Indeed, this trio texan delivers in its second album Fictional Biology of the at the same time short, powerful and removed from rim songs, between alternative rock'n'roll, jazz and metal. But all is not also simple. In spite of the extreme concision of the titles (between two minutes and four minutes thirty), Opposite Day succeeds in placing there more variations than of many groups of supposedly progressive rock'n'roll in their slices of bread of fifteen minutes. Sometimes unexpected variations which confer an interest unceasingly renewed on each listening. By way of example, one will find funk, jazz and the punk one in instrumental "the Yo! O.D. Rock'n'rolls the Club ". The influence of Frank Zappa is one of more shouting, as much in the incongruity of the transitions that in the humour of the texts... but it is not only, far from there: Gentle Giant ("Stinky"), System Of A Down ("Sweatshirt Song", "Southeast Asia"), Midnight Oil ("The Monroe Doctrine" furiously evokes the whole first discs of Australian), The Monty Python (the words of "It' S A Deal" are as uninteresting as to die of laughing) answer also present at the call of this completely shifted album. Inter alia jokes, Opposite Day began again in concert and for its manner the totality of compilation "The Immaculate Collection" of Madonna... with more or less of happiness it should be underlined! Result to note on the official site... An album runs (much too short! Thirty minutes hardly!) and full with freshness which slips between the ears with a disconcerting facility. Completely essential in these times of humorous food shortage, Fictional Biology will advantageously replace your box of Prozac for a ridiculous sum. And the only side effects to fear are the smile and irrepressible dodelinement of the head.
  
  Jean-Philippe Haas

• SXSW 2006 wrap up [+ Show ]
  

  ... Austinites the Invincible Czars made new fans when they invited Opposite Day, a local act that d...... Austinites the Invincible Czars made new fans when they invited Opposite Day, a local act that did not participate in SXSW, to play a song during the Czars midnight showcase at Latitide 30.
  
  "The audience and SXSW staff raved," Czars czar Josh Robbins said. "The stage manager said it was one of the coolest things he's seen in 10 years of SXSW. We think they're the best band in town."

• Economics for Mr Ugly review [+ Show ]
  

  If there's one thing Austin needs right now, it's more bands with songs about 5-year-old superspies,...If there's one thing Austin needs right now, it's more bands with songs about 5-year-old superspies, cannibalistic bagels, and monkeys throwing their own feces. This is not sarcasm: In the wake of the capital city's silent (and now smoke-free) spring, Opposite Day's freewheeling, absurdist debut is a welcome batch of high-spirited non sequiturs. Musically, the local threepiece plots a course marked by schizophonic guitars, limber drumming, and loads of, as Anthony Kiedis once so eloquently put it, "funky-ass Flea bass." While they obviously owe a debt to earlier rock oddballs like Frank Zappa and They Might Be Giants, Opposite Day is still very much a unique specimen, and Economics contains enough hairpin turns to frustrate the most ice-veined Formula One driver. Although there are the inevitable moments of high-concept wankery, along with a handful of head-scratching interludes, the 311-ish "Adam Smith" and breezy bossa nova "Candyland Bomb Squad" suggest that underneath all the gee-whiz grandstanding lurk actual songs. "Android Food" feels imported from a Fishbone album, but it's hard not to be swayed by the lubricious rhythms. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, comes the killer psych-rock intro to "Danger! Monkey." If Opposite Day ever figures out exactly what it is they're going for, they could really turn some heads. Even if they don't, however, their fantastical menagerie of cephalopods and androids already offers a much-needed respite from the rational world.

Setlist

1. Bacteria Know Everything
2. Wolves
3. Elephant in a Pharmacy
4. Serious Inspector
5. What is is?
6. It’s Hydro, Oh
7. Southeast Asia
8. Carrots!
9. Current Currency Current
10. Safety First
11. Gravity Storm

Unlike a Virgin - Opposite Day does art-rock versions of Madonna's Imaculate Collection:
(listen here: http://www.oppositeday.com/madonna.html)

Basic Requirements

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