A Hotel Nourishing

"Comprised of just two members, the tellingly named Sonny Baker (guitar & vocals) and Cam Rogers (drums), A Hotel Nourishing specializes in its own unique blend of basics. Deus Ex Machina, the pair’s first studio effort, has the feel of a Neu! jam session being crashed by members of King Crimson and My Morning Jacket. AHN does so much with so little, while managing to avoid any pretentiousness with such a heady mix of styles. Rogers and Baker squeeze every last drop out of their instruments, and the result is beyond sweet." -Alison (WBFO) to Buffalo Rising - Buffalo Rising Magazine

Matt and I were waiting patiently in a corner of Nietzsche's for one performance, and were entirely shocked by the one that preceded it. A Hotel Nourishing took stage and we dropped jaw at their ethereal presence in a place notoriously known for sound distortion.

The two band members are peaceful, just up on stage, unaffected. Nothing is happening at that moment, other than the noise that their limbs and lips are producing. Sonny Baker's voice is harmonic in the same way that makes Dan Auerbach so alluring, a seamless melding of words. There is no defined sentence structure or end points, simply an amazing amount of self-control over timing. They've created wry and foreboding lyrics to be sung joyfully. Soulful Delta blues meet a Buffalo basement and some real time drumming talent, Cameron Rogers.

The drum in the music is its own entity, pitter-pattering, even moaning, and forming soft sounds that even the drum didn't know it could make. Between the strumming and the drumming the synchronization is flawless, but again, the two seem to be encased in their own bubble. The riffs are tight but whimsy, to match the other sounds that are colliding midair. It's my new music to write to, that's for sure.
(Jan.2008) - The Artery Magazine (www.thearterymagazine.com)

"Just when you think you’ve seen everything that guitar and drums can do, you see Sonny Baker and Cameron Rogers and you change your mind. A Hotel Nourishing manages to smoothly blend an incongruent mixture of post-punk, math rock, jazz, prog rock, and beyond to maximum effect. Think Fugazi meets Frank Zappa. Joy Divison meets John Coltrane." - donny kutzbach, Artvoice - Artvoice

"As it happens, A Hotel Nourishing is not a famous or even a well known band about the nation. What they should be known for is starting a movement of well thought out and well crafted music amidst cannons of bubblegum garbage and hip hop waste. They transcend the muck and invest time and dedication to their craft......." (2/14/2008 campussqueeze.com) - Campus Squeeze