Here's something a bit special to me. This is a collection of demos we recorded of a co-worker of my brothers way back in the early 2000s. What makes them special is that these demos served as the foundation of my band's first album.
When we recorded these our intention was not to start a band. My brother Pat met Kenny at work and in passing Kenny mentioned that he sang and played a little guitar and wrote songs. He wanted to record them so he had something to give his kids and friends. Pat offered to record him and Kenny accepted and that was it.
The plan was to make simple guitar and vocal demos but after the initial sessions Pat started to enhance the recordings with other instruments played by him, me and other friends. By the end of the sessions a core group emerged and that became the first incarnation of
Pearhead.
01 Brown Guitar
02 Cinnamon Roll
03 Ghetto Song
04 Willow
05 Michelle
06 None and Slim
07 Red White and Blue
08 She's A Dancer
09 Remember Love
10 Tell The Wind
11 Set You Free
12 Mango
13 Soft Mattress
14 Whiskers on a Kitty
Reality Notes
Two songs here have some additional instruments.
Ghetto Song has some heavy guitar and slight percussion and the title song,
Tell The Wind, has some Mandolin. Both of these songs received further treatment before they were done.
Two other songs,
None And Slim and
Mango, were held over and rerecorded for the second album and two more songs,
Willow and
She's A Dancer, were demos from the second album sessions but they fit in nice here. She's A Dancer features Kenny playing the banjo. After the first album was done and the band coalesced he felt there were enough guitar players and he switched to banjo.
Remember Love is how it appears on the finished album but because it is just guitar and vocal I feel it fits in.
Some of these might sound rough guitar wise. Kenny never laid claimed to musical proficiency but his songs are amazing. He has that ability to paint pictures with words. In the course of enhancing and overdubbing we learned to follow his vocals more than his guitar. He was always rhythmically sound when he sang. when we recorded the next album the bulk of the songs were recorded as a band then enhanced so there are fewer solo demos from that album.
The cover art was sketched by our drummer from the time Ryan. He was doodling while listening to the finished album. I added the text.
If you want to hear how these songs developed you can listen to and download both albums at our
ReverbNation page or check out my netLabel's
website where you can download everything I've been involved with that I can offer for free (it's a bit of a mess at the moment but all the download links are good).. Our new album is nearing completion. We've added a second lead singer/songwriter and I'm very excited about what we've been doing. Still a few months away but I'll share it here when it is done.
