Oct 24, 2007 The Hanslick Rebellion's New Mystery Sound
The Hanslick Rebellion is back in the studio, polishing up new tracks and... a whole new sound?
"We're incorporating an established pop style that has nothing to do with rock and roll," says Rebellion keyboardist Jed Davis. "It's a sound that we love. It already has an audience of millions and fits perfectly with rock. Yet as far as we know, no rock band has ever tried mixing it in before. Layers of flavor!"
What is this mystery genre? The band's not telling. Guitarist Alex Dubovoy offered a hint, but only if we promised to keep certain key words CLASSIFIED:
"I'm a lifelong fan of [CLASSIFIED], in which almost everyone on the [CLASSIFIED] comes out to a [CLASSIFIED] song. The stuff is infectious - you can see the crowd get into it and start dancing over a ten-second piece of music!
"I knew from the start that this would be an interesting project which would definitely challenge us."
The Rebellion has long been known for stylistic shifts, but the band insists this is their wildest departure ever.
"We always do what we want," says Davis. "Combine that with our attention span issues and you get.. well, this thing we're working on."
Anything concrete at all from the H-Rebels?
"This is a three-song triple A-side single and all three of the tunes have connections to the Rebellion's dark past," Davis says. "I can tell you this: before the band broke up [in 1997], we had begun working on a new record and many, many songs were written. A couple of them ended up getting played by the Rebellion in our last handful of live shows. Now that we're back together, we consider these unfinished business.
"If you followed certain members of the band after the breakup, then you've probably heard recorded versions of two of these songs. But they've never sounded this face-fistingly awesome!"
"I was impressed by how well the tunes translated into this new style," adds bassist Mike Keaney. "Surprised? Fuck, no."
The three-song single will be a digital-only release paired with a video for one of the tracks.
"That will be our M.O. for a while," says Davis. "One knock on our full-length [the rebellion is here] was that it's 'stylistically inconsistent'. That we can't really do anything about. But by putting out three-song singles, we can team up songs that really complement each other, yet still change the sound up however we like from one release to the next.
"Plus these quick studio hits are a lot more exhilarating and fun."
"As soon as we got to the studio," Dubovoy adds, "there was a feeling of fun and a casualness that we've never had before. While I was recording guitar parts, I was dancing to the tunes... which of course made me have to re-record (laughs). I got into [CLASSIFIED] so much, I just started playing this crazy, spontaneous guitar solo in the live room - and I’m glad the guys were rolling tape because it was one of the best solos I’ve ever done.
"Honestly, it was easy playing these songs; they are so damn catchy. If you’ve ever been in a recording studio, you know you have to listen to each song like 50 times. In this case, I can listen to these tunes 50 more times and not get sick of them. My favorite is [CLASSIFIED] but all these songs are truly infectious."
Anything else we're... um... allowed to know about this release, guys?
Davis: "Alex sings lead! For almost thirty whole seconds!"
Alex: "[CLASSIFIED] will be proud!"
Davis: "I'll give you one song title, because dammit, I can't help myself: 'Let's Get To The Fucking'."
The mystery single will drop - "like a nuclear grenade," Davis says - in early 2008.
The Hanslick Rebellion is back in the studio, polishing up new tracks and... a whole new sound?
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