Colin Spring and the Naugahyde Nights
Corvallis, Oregon, United States | INDIE
Music
Press
Top 12 DIY Albums
With titles like “Joe McCarthy Is Sweeping Off His Grave, you might expect to find lyrics of a political nature on Colin Spring’s latest release. And though you would not be wrong you may bve surprised by the depth of feeling and the range of emotion that are also present, chugging along aton a rolling Wurlitzer oregan and and solid blues rock beat.
“What is all this free speech for when we can’t use it anymore/It’s the red scare with a veil across its face…they’re still blacklisting all the tongues that misbehave”, sings Spring in his husky, born to rock voice-not quite Dylan, not quite Springsteen, just absolutely real. “Does She Still” takes a quick trip throught past loves; “Lover, There’s A Light On” has the feel of an Italian ballad with plaintive mandolin, while the poetic imagery of “November” will take your breath away. Check it out, you won’t be sorry.
- March/April 2006
All Music Guide
Review by John D. Luerssen
Balancing folk-rock intelligence and indie rock swagger, Colin Spring blossoms on his fourth album, How I Came to Cry These Tears of Cool. A young master of heartfelt story-songs in the tradition of vintage Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan — a notion supported by titles like “Fresh Kill in Nowhereville” — Spring has a knack for tales of cross-dressers and drug deals gone awry. Produced by Seattle boardsman Johnny Sangster and augmented by the likes of Mark Pickerel (of Screaming Trees) and Jim Sangster (of Young Fresh Fellows fame), How I Came to Cry These Tears of Cool sounds as inventive as the stories Spring tells. The power of “Joe McCarthy Is Sweeping Off His Grave” gives the disc wings, but songs of immigrant struggle (”Chinatown”) and desolation (”November”) are where this rising talent from Washington state soars.
allmusic.com
- allmusic.com
Praise for Colin’s previous releases
Spring lands in the company of the most important talents this town (Seattle) has produced in
recent years...Meet the Sea is the best album since Modest Mouses’ second release
-The Stranger
Dashboard Tallies is a beautiful poetic record. Grade: Deans List
-Insite Magazine
Greatest Narrative songs ever, Boy Named Sue, American Pie, Gimme Three Steps, Let Me DIe
in the Summertime by Colin Spring
-introvert Magazine
Colin Spring understands the romance of a dirty kiss, the pathos of a sidewalk full of bandy-legged
drunks.
-Everett True-author/journalist Melody Maker/Plan B - various
Prior to forming this four piece in 2000, Seattle based Spring had recorded two solo albums (1998'sDashboard Tallies, Pedestrian Kills and 2000's Meet The Sea....Or Be Washed Up). The band's alt-country sound brings to mind an amalgan of Wilco, The Byrds, Bruce Springsteen, Miracle Legion, and even The Feelies, with Spring's acoustic guitar interacting naturally with Michael Hallett's electric, coaxed along by Fran Hapke's brisk drum fills. But despite the relatively similiar song structures, it's Spring's enormously insightful, heartfealt lyrics, which he sings in a narrative, Dylan-like vocal style, that constantly keep the listener absorbed. "A Jukebox To Put My Dimes In" and "Clean Out The Boxes, Ma" (which feature Melinda Friedman's attractive backing vocals) are bothe sincere and moving, while the more potent "Miles" builds to a rousing, emotion-drenched climax. With nary a weak moment, this excellent LP ranks among the most pleasant surprises of the year. May 2005 - Mark Suppanz
Counting his excellent 2004 LP with The Band That Murdered Silence, Cancion del Pollo, this is Spring¢®s fourth LP. And despite the absence of those band members on this album (with the exception of backing vocalist Melinda Friedman on three tracks), this one is even better than his last. The arrangements are more varied and inviting, and Spring¢®s co-production (with Johnny Sangster, who also contributes musically) is warmer and more full-bodied. But as before, it¢®s Spring¢®s exceptional storytelling skills and captivating lyrics that keep the listener enthralled. Perhaps his arduous childhood experiences traveling throughout the U.S. (detailed on the CD¢®s back sleeve) contribute to his ability to create such vivid, emotional narratives. Whether describing thrilling yarns about daring prison breaks or failed drug-running attempts ("Chinatown", "Culiacan"), reminiscing about old lovers or friends ("Does She Still?", the beautiful standout "November"), or editorializing on our nation¢®s decline of free speech rights and civil liberties ("Joe McCarthy is Sweeping Off His Grave"), Spring¢®s campfire tales never fail to leave one contented. - The Big Takeover
Organic, lyrically rich folk-rock
songs are Colin Spring's hallmark, the kind of tunes
that make other songwriters look as if they've
acquired language by mistake. - The Oregonion
...excerpt, full interview at colinspring.com
An interview with Spring, who will play with his band The Post Modern
Conveniences in Bend on Wednesday (see “If You Go”), clocks in at right
around a laugh a minute. He’s a funny guy, even when he’s taking a
break from painting a house to make a few extra bucks.
“Let me get down from this ladder real quick,” he says after he answers
the phone. “I’ve got to be careful. I don’t have health insurance.”
Spring lived in Seattle for 10 years before moving to Portland about a
year ago. He grew up in Flagstaff, Ariz., where he started playing
music in high school. Ask him how he started playing guitar and he deflects
the question with typical self-deprecation.
“I’m not a guitar player. I’m a guitar owner.”
But one spin through the songs at myspace.com/colinspring reveals that
Spring is just being modest. His songs are an infectious blend of 1960s
folk and 1970s pop, with a heavy dose of his wit and wordsmithery.....
- Interview in the Bend Bulletin October 2006
excerpt, full interview at colinspring.com
This weekend’s Yakima Folklife Festival marks the one-year anniversary
of singer/songwriter Colin Spring ’s relationship with Yakima. He’s
been back several times since last year’s festival, has several sets
scheduled for this weekend, and will be back again next month for two
concerts.
Wild-haired and wickedly funny, Spring writes modern folk-rock music
that’s gritty, real and romantic, but also bright and humorous at times.
It’s poetic urban storytelling reminiscent of Dylan, Springsteen and
Steve Forbert.
- By Kim Nowacki
Colin Spring & the Band That Murdered Silence: Cancion del Pollo
[Home Recorded Culture]
Cancion del Pollo means Song of the Chicken, and is certainly not the most romantic of album titles. But as singer/songwriter/leader of The Band That Murdered Silence Colin Spring explains with a poem in his liner notes, he’s not actually writing about poultry. The “chicken” is the common man, the working class – and its song “stutters and starts like a factory belt full of chicken parts.” If Spring didn’t sing the Song of the Chicken, he asks, “who than [sic] shall it be?” Luckily, Spring is a lover of everyday people and their forgotten stories, and he tells 13 of them on Cancion...
Spring’s own story is biography-worthy, as proven in the mini one he scripted on his web site. He tells the tale of his “disenfranchised bookworm” mother, who reared Spring on her own after his father died in a car accident and her second husband served time for dealing dope. As a child, he was embarrassed of his low-income housing and craved summers, when he would visit his wealthy grandparents on the East Coast. However, in retrospect Spring notes, “I can see why that life drove my mother out west and why I would not trade any of those boring comforts for the teepee or the Goodwill's or the random hodge podge of drinking mugs in the kitchen cabinets.”
The tales he tells are no less humble and just as interesting. Putting the Spring in Springsteen, Colin knows how to wordsmith predictable short stories into dazzling folk epics. Opening track “Come Back, Baby Jean” is the umpteenth recounting of two jaded kids that run away from home to seek their fortune – but Spring’s couple are “Poorly skilled and richly reckless, they drove off into the sunset/A scripted cliché of the young and feckless on a quest to where the Coke runs bottomless.” In “Sweet Repose,” a typical summer evening is turned into a torture chamber, from which a “sweat-soaked dying moon wants so bad to be a survivor.” There are tinges of Tom Petty in Spring’s many moments of low-class desperation, and the dozens of ideas stuffed into each line call Elvis Costello to mind.
Like Costello, Spring’s music is built for the lyrics. The folk-rock sound is unfinished and raw, complementing his understated style; Spring’s voice is unimpressive and the acoustic guitar riffs often become repetitive in their attempt to accommodate his lyrics. But pay attention, and Spring’s down-home poetry cannot be denied, making this Cancion enjoyable for all but the most pretentious listeners.
- Left Off The Dial
Paste Magazine 02/01/06
3 1/2 Stars!
Sensitive singer/songwriter for the leather jacket crowd
Itinerant singer/songwriter Colin Spring may strum an acoustic guitar and sing songs of social consciousness but he’s not about to ditch his leather jacket. His raucous punk aesthetic and rock and roll heart drive these songs beyond sentiment, adding a fierce, defiant edge to even the most plaintive confession. Album opener “Joe McCarthy Is Sweeping Off His Grave” rips along with a rollicking Blonde On Blonde guitar/organ carnival lope and topical song rage, but tracks like “Does She Still?” and “November” best represent Spring’s street-tough purple heart. Here, he recalls the pensive, acoustic side of Peter Laughner (rocket from the Tombs, Pere Ubu) with songs of Dionysian indulgence and pining nostalgia. Spring is joined by an able cast of Norhwestern indie rock underdogs. Most notably The Walkabouts’ Carl Torgerson, who harmonizes without sweetness during the rugged doom of “Lover, There’s A Light On”. Rob O’Conner
- Paste
Discography
Can't Dance Too Wet To Plow compilation w/Doug Marscht, Klaus Flouride, et al
Dashboard Tallies,
Pedestrian Kills (1998)
Meet The Sea...
Or Be Washed Up (2000)
Cancion del Pollo w/ The Band That Murdered silence(2004)
How I Came To Cry These Tears of Cool (Fall 2005)
Photos
Bio
Colin Spring is a NW singer/songwriter known in certain circles for cramming humorous and poignant narratives into the small space of time that is a folk song, all the while managing to avoid overt corniness, or extreme earnestness.
Spring is foremost a writer. There is no questioning his lyrical ability and he possesses rare skills in this department. The Oregonian went so far as to say, “he makes other songwriters look like they have acquired language by mistake.”
Great writers draw from extraordinary real life experiences or vivid imaginations. Spring undoubtedly draws from both. Often times it may take repeated listens to begin to grasp the scope of ideas, metaphors and entendres that lay within even a verse of Spring’s prose. Art is no less subjective than the marquee sign proclamation, "the best burger in town” but it is generally agreed that you have to begin with some real substance and the rest is just dressing. Or at the risk of sounding overly crass, you can only polish a turd so much.
Spring’s last album, the tongue in cheek entitled, How I Came To Cry These Tears Of Cool, was a collection of personal perceptions that spanned the time from Spring’s childhood as the son of a failed drug runner to the accusatory and paranoid atmosphere of the previous election cycle.
That album has long since sold out of its first pressing, which is a noteworthy feat for a grassroots artist that sells most of his merchandise on the road. . And in the meantime he has been busy cataloging new compositions and testing them on new audiences.
Notable Accomplishments
Selected for main showcase at the National Folk Alliance Conference in Memphis.
He was a finalist at the prestigious Dave Carter Memorial Songwriting Contest at the Sisters Folk Festival.
He has opened for Americana icon and Juno Winner Fred Eaglesmith several times and has twice MC’d Fred’s annual Southern Picnic in Ontario, Canada.
Other national acts Colin has played with include Greg Brown, Chris Smither, Devil Makes 3, Richard Buckner, Bobby Bare Jr, Curt Kirkwood of the Meat Puppets', John Doe of X, Pat MacDonald (Timbuk 3), Evan Dando of the Lemonheads, Jon Langford….
Press Reviews
Top 12 DIY Albums Performing Songwriter March 2006
Paste Recommends…..3 1/2!-Paste Magazine February 2006
Balancing folk-rock intelligence and indie rock swagger, Colin Spring blossoms on his fourth album…a master of heartfelt story-songs in the tradition of vintage Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan.-All Music Guide John D. Luerssen (author River Edge, The Weezer Story)
…the kind of tunes that make other songwriters look as if they’ve acquired language by mistake-November 2005 The Oregonian
Spring’s exceptional storytelling skills and captivating lyrics keep the listener enthralled…vivid, emotional narratives never fail to leave one contented-November 2005 The Big Takeover
Spring lands in the company of the most important talents this town (Seattle) has produced in recent years...Meet the Sea is the best album since Modest Mouses’ second release -The Stranger
Spring's enormously insightful, heartfelt lyrics, which he sings in a narrative, Dylan-like vocal style, that constantly keep the listener absorbed. With nary a weak moment, this excellent LP(Cancion del Pollo) ranks among the most pleasant surprises of the year. -May 2005 The Big Takeover
Colin Spring understands the romance of a dirty kiss, the pathos of a sidewalk full of bandy-legged
drunks. -Everett True-music journalist/Melody Maker/author
Links
