Thursday 30 December 2010

Frontier(s) LP & 7"

As usual I'm a little slow on new releases, but at least this one came out in 2010 so I'm not THAT far behind! Anyway, the band is called FRONTIER(S). The main reason I was interested in picking these records up is that this band features some dude called Chris Higdon, who used to be in two bands from 10-15 years ago, called ELLIOTT and FALLING FORWARD. Both were great bands, although I have to admit that Elliott lost their way a little with their third album. Anyway, I have no idea what this dude has been doing for the past few years since Elliott called it a day, but I guess it doesn't matter. The point is that he is back and playing music again. Frontier(s) features Chris's trademark vocal over music that I would say is the exact midpoint between Falling Forward and Elliott. It's faster and noisier than Elliott, but the guitars aren't as 'hard' as some of the heavier Falling Forward moments. A crap description I know. But this is good. If you ever heard or liked either of those two bands then you'll like this for sure.

I picked up both of their releases recently, which is a little late since both came out in the summer of 2010. First up, their LP, entitled 'There Will Be No Miracles Here'. I got one of the white vinyl copies. Always nice when the vinyl colour goes nicely with the artwork:

The second record is a 7" entitled 'The Plains'. This features two songs, neither of which are on the LP. The packaging is very nice on this one. It's not often I have seen a shrink wrapped 7". But this one was:

The sleeve is a tri-fold affair, with all the text 'pressed' (the opposite of embossed) into the card. Must have cost quite a bit to make these things! Also, the dust sleeve glued into the sleeve, and is made of brown paper, which is slightly different and therefore cool. The only sucky thing is that I ordered a white one and got sent a back one in error.


I've only owned these records for a little over a week, but I can't stop playing them. This is really good stuff, especially since I haven't listened to anything of this style for a long time. This might even make my best of 2010 list if I do one...

11 comments:

Mike said...

I loved Falling Forward back when they were around. I'm not sure how much I'd like a new band with that sound. Still, I'll have to check it out.

jhulud said...

I lived in Louisville when Falling Forward were around...great band on record and live. Followed Elliott and not we have Frontier(s). I like your description as their sound being between FF and Elliott...it completely fits.

Graham said...

They're playing the Purple Turtle soon, might check them out

mcs said...

Have you got these records, Juan? If so, did you get the 7" on green?

jhulud said...

I sured did Marcus...got all colors of the 7" and all of the LP including the Euro press from Arctic Rodeo.

xfarsidex said...

Gonna see the band in January.
Funny, I like the third Elliott-album the most of the three.

I'm still looking for video-footage of Falling Forward; somebody somewhere has to have taped a show.

Lins87 said...

someone tell me the dates for this tour. Thanks

Piesay said...

on what label is this? care to share?

mcs said...

Both are released by No Sleep records.

brian said...

recently finished my ELLIOTT collection... i missed seeing frontier(s) in brooklyn though, but i got the 7" in all 3 colors and both the europress and us press of the LP... again, i cant' stop listening to them.. maybe elliott will play Krazyfest 2011.. one can only hope

Anonymous said...

The band also has featuring members of Mouthpiece and Staygold.