Discography part 2 (only two years later!) Selling Doors, Door to Door

So yeah, here’s our second release, a split E.P. with the Lawn Darts entitled “Selling Doors, Door to Door.” The title is meant to represent that endless slog of being an independent band and how it feels sometimes.

Anyway, we recorded a load of stuff for our first album.   It took a while for us to get enough money to release the CD (after the whole original dudes stole our, so we ended up writing some new songs and thought maybe some of these should be on the CD as well.  Back into JMM we went with almost another year of playing under our belts.  I can hear the difference for sure.

So, having done two sessions, so we decided to make an EP as well, instead of having a kajillion song album (you know like this one!). Originally to be released on Mutant Pop before Tim changed his mind, we decided to make it a split release.  Then we went about thinking “Who can we convince to do this with us? Ah, the Lawn Darts!” and so we had a release party for it and everything (as seen here) and then the Lawn Darts promptly broke up.  It was a shame because that third album was shaping up to be a doozy. All their great music is on their Bandcamp.com site!

Alas.  

Also, alas, this mofo is WAY out of print, unless the Lawn Darts have some.  200 copies hand numbered by my wife who has actual penmanship.  Our original tracks are available on the above listed Digital Special Edition of Me, Myself and Your Mother (along with demos and live crap) and it’s free, or throw some bucks at it if’n ya want.

Recorded at JMM  studios in Metuchen.

Photo Used for cover purchased at the Junkologist, Keyport, NJ

Inside art by Rich

About half are silver bottomed cdrs, the rest typical blue.

Grover Kent-

Crissie V

Lumberjack Slam

Hey, Kate

Hybrid Moments

Lawn Darts-

Amanda Lynn

When I’m Gone

Open In Case of Emergency

Feed the World

(Lawn Darts tracks are on their Bandcamp page on the album “Day of the Darts”)

Sweet merciful crap! New Grover Kent News! New Album! New Single! New Tour!?!?!?!?!

From our secret underground lair Grover Kent have hatched forth a new plan for World Domination(tm)!

We've been keeping a tight lid on our new stuff because of the fact that plans have fallen through before, but not this time!  Announcing our brand new album which will be available on CD/digital AND 12" vinyl within the next 48 hours.  The Single is called "Hello, April!" and it is out NOW! Click Here to listen!

The new album is called This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things and is a doozy. We've been recording for the last 8 months and are so excited for you to hear it. Track list is as follows:

1. Baby, I'm Gonna Sell You a Bridge!
2. Swampland in Florida
3. The Mummy's Curse
4. Shooting Down Balloon Boy
5. Priory of Scion
6. Hello, April
7. We Make the Crop Circles
8. The Cottingley Faieries
9. Alien Autopsy
10. Piltdown Man Rides Again
11. Playing Chess with The Turk
12. Giants of Cardiff
13. Bohemian Rhapsody

Here's the Cover:

The tour will be two weeks up and down the East coast with our friends, the newly reunited ERGS! Holy Crap! It's gonna be a great time and we'll be filming the whole tour for a documentary to be entitled DVDees Nuts which will be out in the Fall.  Can't wait to see you!!!

Rich, Jay, Mel and Mark

Grover Kent Discography Part 1- Me, Myself and Your Mother

I'm doing this because I am a Discography nerd, and because, well, why not? Each week or so will be a new entry.

Here's our debut album in all it's erm, glory.

Title: Me Myself & Your Mother
Format: CD
Label: Self Released
# of copies- 200
Released 2003

Track Listing:

1. Pussykat
2. Suddenly, Summer
3. Girl Trouble
4. Suede
5. Kentucky Waterfall
6.  You Broke it, You Bought It
7. Jimmy's Little Blue Hatchback
8. Irritating Girl
9. Hockey and Food
10. Caroline
11. I sold My Brian to Science
12. Can't Believe It's True
13. Endless Vacation

Originally this was to come out  in 2012, but the manufacturer Short Run CDs (now defunct, NOT the people at Shortruncds.com currently!) stole our money and never made the product. For a band with very little money this was a serious blow.  Musician's Friend came to the rescue with  their own short run service! So it actually came out in 2003, despite the 2002 date on the CD art.  We made 2 runs of 100, there's no difference in them. OOP now for some time, although Interpunk still has some.  Currently it is ONLY available in DIGITAL DOWNLOAD form with a heap of bonus tracks.

Trivia-

• Our cover model is Rich's wife's grandmother Molly Grimm
• The back cover photo was taken at The Saint in Asbury Park.
• Said photo is one of only 7 known pictures of our drummer smiling
• Based on sweat patterns, it was taken after the set
• there's a secret bonus track, only available on the CD (OK, it's Endless Vacation)
• Steve sings lead on Endless Vacation. It's fairly Badass.

So yeah, whilst going through some CDs I came across a strange one...

labeled "GK Demos" 7/21/03 with 4 tracks.

2 had no vocals, but two were very early demos of Running songs.  So, I listened to them, and they are quite good.  Still not sure who's on the songs, or where they were recorded.  I vaguely remember recording a rehearsal at Stage Right once.

Lord knows it's possible I am wrong.

Anyhow, I took the demos and made a quick digital only single for you, for Christmas!  I wanted the cover to remind you of buying one of those dodgy bootlegs you'd get in the city.

I hope you like them, I think it's a bit of fun for the holiday.

If you want to download it click here: https://groverkent.bandcamp.com/album/demos-7-21-93

So where the hell is the new single you jerks?

Well, it's in limbo right now.  Direct all ire to me and my uber-shitty 60 hour a week work schedule and the fact that my singing voice seems to be shot.  Poor diet?  Stress?  Being super-duper tired all the time?

Probably all of the above, yeah?

Seriously, two years. Quite frankly, it's getting to a Def Leppard or Dickies level of absurdity here.  When I came up with the idea, I was still on Day shift at the coffee joint!

I intend to finish it after I move in early August.  I refuse to release anything I consider subpar so that's not helping either, you know?  If I accepted some poor vocal takes (to me) this could have been done already.  Lucky for you, my gigantic ego precludes me from doing that!

One thing that annoys me lately is a lot of song ideas and I can't do a goddang thing with them.  Frustrated?  You betcha.

In other news, my non-musical other project is coming along nicely.  I am trying to learn my way around some editing software currently, so there's that.

In unrelated news, I think I just managed to drop a sesame seed under the spacebar on my laptop.

Me, Myself and Your Mother (Special Digital Edition!) NOW OUT!

Today is the re-release of our first full length CD Me, Myself & Your Mother.  Hard to believe it’s been 10 years since we put it out, but time flies, right?  Anyway, this also marks the first time it’s available to download legally, chock full of bonus material that was previously available only on our Everything Must Go! odds and sods CD and the out of print split with the Lawn Darts, Selling Doors, Door to Door.  It also is the first time the live version of Pussykat is available to the general public.  This is neat because the two knuckleheads yelling it out as a request eventually became members of the band.

What else makes this special, you may ask.  Well, all the profits are going to go towards helping a family directly impacted by Super Storm Sandy.  So, the album is available as a “pay what you want” download.  I know we’re not Radiohead, but hopefully you will all open up your hearts and wallets.  Running out of Ramones is also included in that deal, in case you don’t have it.  Oh yeah, bonus tracks on that puppy as well.

Please go to groverkent.bandcamp.com and get your download on.  You can pay whatever you like.  I suggest $10 an album because it's charity.  Again, every nickel we get goes to help out some friends wiped out by that horrible bitch Sandy.  If you donate over $50, Grover Kent will send you a hand-screened T-shirt. MAKE SURE YOU INCLUDE YOUR EMAIL SO I CAN GET YOUR ADDRESS AND SHIRT SIZE! Shirts are on a first come-first serve basis.

Oh, about the family you’re helping...

Corey is my wife’s best friend since her school days.  Her parents have lived in Brick since forever.  I asked her for some details I could maybe use in this statement and she out-wrote me by a mile.  Here’s Pete and Phyllis Eckert’s story, as written by their daughter- 

“My parents are both 71 years old, and have lived in their house for 44 years.  They purchased it from my mother’s uncle.  He helped design and build the home, and closed on it just prior to my mother turning 16.  In fact, her “Sweet Sixteen” birthday party was held at the house.  She invited friends down to the shore from North Jersey (Irvington, to be exact), and they spent the day at the beach, had a BBQ, and danced in the garage.  Look out MTV!  Their house holds a lot of memories for them.  Besides numerous family visits in my mother’s younger years, she and my father raised both their children, babysat their 3 grandchildren, and continue to gather here to celebrate birthdays and holidays with their family from all over NJ.  It was their first house, what they thought would be a starter home, but the Nejecho Beach community became family, and way of living they still don’t want to let go. 

Like many, they did have flood insurance, but were grossly underinsured.  They are not waterfront property, and have weathered countless storms and hurricanes without ever having water enter their home before.  Who could have imagined they’d lose everything; structure, contents, and memories someday?  They are not eligible for full FEMA assistance.  Their only income is Social Security, their retirement savings, and my mother’s modest pension.  They will need to finance the demolition of their existing home, and construction of their new home (at the new elevation requirement…9 ft minimum!) through an SBA Loan.

Phyllis Eckert is a retired special education teacher in Brick.  Pete Eckert is an Army Veteran who worked in Mortgage and Finance for decades, before later becoming the “Unofficial Mayor of Brick”, greeting and servicing customers at Joe’s Service Center until he retired.  Last June, they celebrated their 50^th Wedding Anniversary with family and friends.  They hope to begin construction on their new home as a celebration of their 51^st!"

So, you're helping people who were helpers themselves.  Army vet and Special Ed  teacher.  That's the sort of thing that speaks for itself, and I hope you'll be generous.  Help us help some good people, and get some music in the process

MM&YM Delayed!

Due to me being a bit of a knucklehead we had to push back the rerelease by one week.  Sorry about that.  More new soon.

Decade of Dork Rock PLUS Grover Kent needs your help to help someone else...

So yeah, our debut full length album Me, Myself & Your Mother was released 10 years ago this year!  Seems like only yesterday...actually it seems longer than that :)

So, we are re-releasing the thing.  Why now, you ask?  Well, what better time?  10 years in, and with a great tool like Bandcamp.com we can make it available directly to you in digital form.  Yes, I know CDs already contain digital files.  It seems a huge portion of the population chooses to ignore that fact for the sake of marketing buzzwords, but whatever!  There's going to be a heap of bonus tracks (some previously released on the CD only Everything Must Go! collection) along with a live version of a classic that has previously unreleased.

When?  The release date is January 29th.
How much? Free! Well sort of...

It's going to be pay what you want.  Seriously, whatever you want to plunk down is what you'll pay, and that includes "nothing." I know, we're not Radiohead, so I am not expecting to be building the Monroe Flagella Memorial Skatepark and Waffle Hut or anything (oh, if only!) but there's a reason for this.

My friend Corey, or, more specifically, her parents.  See, Hurricane Sandy fucked her parents but good, destroying their home and damned near everything in it.  They didn't have a lot of flood insurance because they never has more than an inch of water in their crawlspace.  So, they don't have enough money to rebuild, and they are both retired.

If you know me, I have been out of work for a while so I am not swimming in cash either.  Maybe by giving some music away, I can help.

So, you pay what you want.  After Bandcamp and PayPal fees, Grover Kent will be giving the profits to Corey's folks, Mr. & Mrs. Eckert.  I know it won't be too much, but whatever you can give will be helpful.

Seriously, pay $5 for it.  Pay $10 for one and DL Running for free if you want.  Hell, pay $500 for each because you're some kind of eccentric millionaire.  Whatever you can do, please do it.  They need every nickel they can get.

More news to come including a limited premium for some bigger amounts.

Thanks!

NEWS FORTHCOMING!

Hopefully by WEDNESDAY this week there will be some great news regarding the 10th anniversary re-release of our debut full length album, Me, Myself and Your Mother!

Keep an eye out!

The new single is so close to being done...

So, we put the finishing backing vocals on the EP tonight. Jay is going to mix it this week, so I am legitimately thinking that "I Love You, Christina Hendricks" will be out sometime in July.

 Yes, of this year, ya smartass!

More news to follow in the coming days.

 

Jay and Sarah monitor the recording of backing vocals

 What the "magic" looks like onscreen

Pssst! You need an amp?

Hey everyone! Are you a musician or know someone who is? Would you or they like to purchase a fine amplifier? It is a Marshall JCM900 100Watt head along with a 4x12 cabinet. Serious offers please. It's ridiculously loud, and sounds awesome. The head has been painted silver and the cabinet has been covered in faux snakeskin. If you ever saw my band Grover Kent, you've seen it.

I am asking 800 but I am entertaining all other serious offers.

Just so you know...

lead vocals are done and have been for a while.  After backing vocals and mixing this thing should be ready.  Hopefully soon :)

More news! Good and bad!

First the bad: Well I am in the hospital with cellulitus.  It's a nasty infection, and it makes my leg look like a Renfaire turkey leg (ladies...how YOU doin?).  I should be going home tomorrow, so that's a good thing.

Good News- Guitatrs have been recorded for the new single.  That means El Gordo (me!) has to get a move on and record the damned thing...


Soon my pretties, soon!

AVAILABLE NOW, uh, again!

As many of you have surely noticed Grover Kent's catalog has been off of der Interwebz now for some time ever since our digital label Are you Listening Records went cans-up.  Also, since we move like a sloth on ludes, we only just got around to making it available again!

Presenting the official GROVER KENT BANDCAMP PAGE!

Right now you can only get our 2006 (holy crap it's six years old already!) EP Running Out of Ramones but it's got BONUS TRACKS! I know what you're thinking "Rich, what about those of us who buy CDs? Where's our Bonus tracks?" Well, if you bought the Grover Kent odds and sods collection (Everything Must Go!), they are originally from there, so you're already covered.

So there you have it.  If you don't already own the thing, and you're some weirdo who simply can't stomach the idea of CDs anymore, here's your chance to buy it.

More news to come.

RIP Court Tavern

This one hurts, more than a little.  The Court was a great venue to see bands and a great place to play. 

Sad to see it go...

yes, that's us playing there.

Happy New Year!

I don't know what the year 2012 holds for Grover Kent, but I hope it contains shows and some recordings. Hope your holidays were awesome, and let's all try and make 2012 the best one yet!

I can tell you that there will be a deluxe version of our Out of Print debut album available before the summer. The digital version of Running Out of Ramones will be out quite soon. technically speaking, since the damn thing was CD only, the digital version was always available because it was a damned Compact Disc to begin with!

nice, 12 hours into the new year and I'm already complaining!

It's my Burfday!

So here's my gift to you!

a free download of Old Man Conroy!

http://www.mediafire.com/?63td0a0unb5tmhy

Still plugging, also we almost have artwork!

yeah, just got the cover prelims for our new single "I Love You, Christina Hendricks."  It's looking good!  Some minor tweaking, and then it's all up to me to finish the damn vocals.

Studio Update!

So I went over to Jay’s last night to record vocals, assisted by my aforementioned partner in musical crime and the lovely and talented Sarah Blake who is recording the current single for us.

It’s been somewhere in the neighborhood of six years since I have been recording and man, did it show last night.  Here’s what we learned:

1)      My first take is usually pretty much a resounding turd.

2)      The turd becomes the scratch vocal track

3)      I sing along to the scratch track, putting it a proper vocal performance

4)      I sing along to the proper performance, thus doubling my vocals appropriately

5)      Once properly “lubed up*” I am pretty consistent.

I am seriously rusty with this stuff.  Wow.  There was a time (probably 5 years ago or so) where 4 songs would have taken, at the most, two hours.  I mean, I’m not the dude from The Darkness or anything, so this really shouldn’t have taken as long as it did, but again, I’m not where I used to be.  You do have to walk before you can run, so by the time we record the album (where money is spent) things should be great!

Also, I had Chinese food last night (bad idea!)and, at one point, let out a fart that was so long and sonorous, we probably should have recorded it to use as a loop or something.  Sarah went from shocked to hysterically laughing to, I think, a little impressed.

I went from embarrassed to “well, ain’t no stoppin’ it now.” She puts up with a lot.

So, what did we actually get done?

Vocals for “Luxury Sedan” and “I Don’t Care About You” are ostensibly done, pending my nitpicky approval.  Vocals for “I Love You, Christina Hendricks” are mostly done, but I have some timing issues I am working through.  Nothing done on “Conspiracy Theory” at all yet…

* Nooooooooooot what you think.

Lyrically speaking (or speaking of lyrics...)

Man I’m such a pain in the ass about lyrics. 

“There’s a fine line between Stupid and Clever.”

I believe that, even if it is from a fictional documentary about a then-fictional rock band.  Hence not finishing the lyrics to “I Love You Christina Hendricks” until just before recording them.

My bandmates must want to KILL me sometimes with my metaphorical feet-dragging sometimes.  I just want to make sure I’m not being hackneyed and clichéd, unless I am doing it on purpose.  Sometimes, you want to make the easy rhyme because it’s what the song calls for.  You’re using it to make a point, you know?  Other times, you’re trying to say something important and personal and you will not let it go until you either lock it up ot throw it away and start again.

Here’s a prime example. I met my wife in 1997.  The GK tune “The Story of You and Me” began to take shape, oh somewhere around 2003.  After I had written “Caroline” about the birth of my niece, my wife would continually harass me about why I didn’t write a song for her.  She was light hearted about it but it was taking a while.  That song went through about a dozen revisions before I brought it to Jay in the summer of 2005 and we hammered it out.  Nobody heard any of those old versions, and I kept not even one phrase from them, other then the title which came from the last draft.  I think she heard it for her birthday in 05.  It finally was released in 2006.

Conversely, I wrote “Jimmy’s Little Blue Hatchback” on the way to the Tick Tock Diner after a Comrades show.  I was watching Jimmy (their singer) Tetris all his gear into this impossible looking space in his car and remarked how amazed I was by it when bass player Greg said “You should write a song about it!” to which then-new guitarist Darren said something along the lines of “He can’t write a song about that!”

Greg looked at him like “yeah, that’s what you think!” and I proceeded to write it on the way to the diner, singing it for Darren as he got out of his car in the parking lot when we got there.  That was back when I could write my own music more reliably and not have ALL the songs come out like "Blitzkrieg Bop."  It’s not “Bohemian Rhapsody” or anything, but it’s a good song and didn’t require any further tooling.

I think the last two songs that have sprung full into my mind like that were “I Think She Used to Be a Man” and “Rebound Guy.”