Charlie Everywhere

Best New Band

Charlie Everywhere

Balancing the synthesized textures of hip-hop and house music with distinctly human elements (soft, co-ed harmonies; electric guitars), this Saratoga duo don’t just make excellent electronic music—their music is just plain excellent. Think Portishead, but less gloomy. (By a lot.) Watch for their debut disc later this year. - Metroland

The Falstaff’s building on the Skidmore College campus has played host to countless bands, concerts and events over the years. Located on the outer ring that circles the campus, this haven built of stone crag and soft wood has many reflective surfaces that make for an extremely hit-or-miss sound situation. Calvin Johnson said it best a few years back when he wondered how he ended up booked at a ski lodge.
Last night, a band I know quite well shared a night with a band I do not know so well and it simply worked.
Charlie Everywhere’s set kicked off as it has as of late (I’ve seen them three or four times in the past two months) with “As Far As I Can See” - an excellent way to start an evening of music. Their portion of the night ran through familiar songs featured on their MySpace page in recent months (”When I’m Small”, “Mouthfull of Diamonds”), but veered into darker, moodier territory with a few new songs and an obscure Pink Floyd cover. Highlights included the aforementioned “When I’m Small” which is built on a nasty, nasty drum loop and some flip-flop angel/demon vocals from Sarah Barthel. Her partner in crime, Josh Carter delivered my other favorite moment from the set with “You Are the Ocean (and I’m Good at Drowning)” which must be the best song in their clutch of street-beat influenced psych-pop. (Note: “You Are the Ocean” recently became available in the band’s SNOCAP store on their MySpace page. Highly Recommended purchase!!) - Matthew Loiacono

Pulse - Musician's Corner: Charlie Everywhere
Written by Mike Ryan
Friday, 29 February 2008
Charlie Everywhere


Who’s who:
Joshua Carter - vocals, guitar, drums, keyboards, loops and samples
Sarah Barthel - vocals, keyboards and guitar


About the band:
Saratoga Springs’ Charlie Everywhere formed roughly nine months ago. The meaning behind the band’s name is a closely guarded secret, but Carter said folks are welcome to suggest their own theories.

Artists such as Curtis Mayfield, The Beatles, Sonic Youth, Herbie Hancock, Radiohead, Madlib, J Dilla, Mogwai, My Bloody Valentine and David Bowie have influenced the duo’s dreamy, beat-driven alternative rock. Fans have compared Charlie Everywhere’s music to that of Portishead and The Beta Band.

The group’s first full-length album, which has yet to be titled, is due out by early summer. A local CD release party will likely take place in either April or May.

Charlie Everywhere has received airplay on WEXT and WEQX, as well as on radio stations in California, England, Scotland and Germany. Following the release of their CD, the band will be sending about 400 copies of it to various college radio stations across the country and trying to build a tour around the college towns playing their music.

The band has approximately 19 original tunes, and is hoping to add a few cover songs to their arsenal including “Happiness is a Warm Gun” by The Beatles and “Green is the Colour” by Pink Floyd.

Carter and Barthel both currently wait tables. In the future, they hope to play as much as possible, make a living from their music and influence other artists.

Charlie Everywhere is playing a benefit show for the Capital District Federation of Ideas at 8 p.m. Saturday, March 22 at 383.5 Madison Ave. in Albany with Desperately Obvious and We Are Jeneric. Donations are requested, and all proceeds will fund future CDFI events. For more information about the organization or the event, visit www.federationofideas.net.

To check out the band, visit www.myspace.com/charlieeverywhere2.


Quotable Quotes:

“I love creating something that’s never been created before. It makes me very happy that we’re out there doing something different,” Barthel said.
“When people hear our music for the first time, I hope they think it’s at least interesting,” Carter said. “I would just want them to have an experience.”

—Mike Ryan
- Saratoga Today

Charlie's Angels- Be on the lookout for genre-bending Saratoga Springs duo Charlie Everywhere


Happening Cats-
Things seem to happen pretty quickly for Charlie Everywhere. The Electro-pop duo got their first show- a gig last year at King's Tavern in Saratoga Springs before they even had the songs to fill a set. "Sub-Bombin asked us to play,"explains vocalist/keyboardist Sarah Barthel, referring to a local collective of DJs, hip-hop artists and electro-rockers that now includes Charlie Everywhere on its roster. "We had about three weeks."

Barthel and partner Joshua Carter (vocals, guitar, percussion) wrote the songs for their set-list in a hurry, but the well-attended King's Tavern gig was a success. Since then, word-of-mouth and exposure on social-networking Web sites have contributed to a growing buzz about the duo. Metroland named the pair Best New Band in 2008, and record labels are expressing interest. "We've been talking to some different labels," says Carter. "We're playing the waiting game. We're excited."

The song "Mouthful of Diamonds," a download on the band's MySpace page, surely generated some of the attention: The ridiculously catchy tune features Barthel's breathy vocals and an addictive melody that rides over droning keyboard and a glitchy beat. It's a fresh sound, one that pairs a dance-worthy beat with airy vocals in the vein of indie-pop groups like Architecture in Helsinki, Stereolab and St. Etienne: groups not afraid to experiment, but not alien to a groove either.

"We get a lot of kids who like hip-hop at our shows," explains Carter. "I don't even know what kkind of sound we have, but you can definitely bop your head to it." Originally a drummer, Carter spends most of his time playing guitar onstage, but the band also incorporates live looping and sampling. "I do a lot of recording of my own drum and cut it up," he says.

Their sound combines elements of electronica, psychedelic rock and '90s shoe-gazing indie; Carter and Barthel cite artists like Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine and David Bowie as inspirations, along with underground hip-hop artists like Madlib, J. Dilla and The Pharcyde. "When we first started working together, we were trying to figure out what we wanted to focus on because we have so many different influences. Then we said, 'Fuck it,' let's do it all,'" says Barthel.

"We want to put together a collage of sound- things that don't necessarily go together," adds Carter.

"We're fascinated with different textures," Barthel says.

But they resist the easy categorization of their music, lamenting that they often get called "trip hop," an outdated label that stuck to bands like Portishead in the '90s, groups who trafficked in drum-machine beats, ethereal vocals and droning samples. "It's not that we dislike them. We're just more in the 'now' of that category," says Carter, before settling on "street-beat psych-pop" as a more apt description of their sound.

It's always cool when someone says, 'I've never heard anything like you before," adds Barthel.

"We can fit into any bill, except maybe death metal," says Carter, after the conversation turns to how the band could play with a variety of different acts, from DJs to hip-hop artists to indie rockers. "We have a diverse enough sound. You can dance if you want to, or stand there like a hipster with your arms crossed. We try to be tasteful. I think it would sound pretty stupid if we rhymed over our music."

Like their sound, the band's name remains relatively undefined. Although Barthel onces owned a 20 pound cat named Charlie, that wasn't the direct point of reference when the pair named the band. "We have sort of an inside joke," Carter says. "Some people think it's a Vietnam reference, or a drug reference. We like that. We leave it up to people's interpretation."

Although Charlie Everywere have only been together for a relatively short period of time, Carter and Barthel have actually known each othe for years. From their top-floor apartment looking out on downtown Saratoga Springs, the pair reminisces about their junior-high era friendship, when they were both students in Greenwich, a small town to the east of Saratoga Springs. "We both grew up there. We've been great friends since ninth grade. Little awkward Sarah and little awkward Josh hanging out together," Barthel jokes.

After high school, Barthel went away to college in Burlington, VT., to study visual arts, and Carter moved to New York City to play in the band Grand Habit with his older brother John. But both eventually ended up back in the Capital Region. "I knew what I wanted to do creatively," Carter says. "I had started working on ideas for Charlie Everywhere. Then she and I teamed up. She has a great voice."

"I've been singing my whole life," says Barthel, describing a background in musical theater. "But I never thought i would act [on it]. Honestly I think it was kind of fate that we got back together and started the band. We're committed to keeping this going for 40 to 50 more years."

The pair can't make loud music in their fourth-floor Saratoga Springs walkup, so they spend much of their time out at Carter's parents' place in Easton, a hamlet of rolling hills and farm fields just east of the Hudson River, where a converted barn/garage doubles as a practice space and recording studio (dubbed Ratland Studios after a rat population that plagued the barn until Carter's cats dispatched the problem).

The rural location has its advantages. "It's very quiet out there. It's inspiring," says Barthel. "We love nature." They also get some valuable parental feeback from time to time.

"My dad will come into the garage and say, 'Josh, I really like this song,'" jokes Carter feigning a low voice. "'Play Mouthful of Diamonds for me.'"

The pair self-recorded their upcoming debut release at the barn-studio, a full-length scheduled for release in the fall by Sub-Bombin Records, available through online retailers and local shops like Last Vestige. If all goes well, a yet-to-be-named larger record label may re-release the album at some point in the future. "We're extremely satisfied with our album," Barthel says. It is a bewitching recording, full of sophisticated late-night sounds, on that seems more likely to have come out of London or another urban location that rural upstate New York. "We're country bumpkins," quips Carter. "We're making country music for city people."


- Metroland- the Capital Region's Alternative Newsweekly