After about hour ten of driving through middle-America, you might find yourself needing a little sonic pick-me-up. The interstate stretches on, the drive broken only by the intermittent appearance of a rest-stop Star**cks and you find yourself shaking your head and blinking rapidly to snap out of the daze that has set in. The solution? Ann Arbor, MI band Nomo and their latest release, Ghost Rock!
I went back to the well several times on this album during the gazillion mile drive and it never failed to revive me and what's more, the record held up to repeated listens and revealed new textures and elements with each successive listen. Ghost Rock is the follow-up to the equally solid New Tones (Ubiquity, 2006), though this new record finds the group exploring some new sounds and moving beyond the Afro-beat Tones to incorporate Kraut Rock and noise elements into their sound.
Led by Elliott Bergman the band has coalesced over the past few years into an octet and the firming up of the numbers has resulted in an arguably tighter unit augmented by the addition of a ninth individual who on the face of it is a surprising participant: Warn Defever. The His Name Is Alive founder/member produced Ghost Rock and Defever brought a fresh batch of ideas to the studio as Bergman related in my recent interview with him. The funk is still there and the band continues to create some of their own percussive instruments, but the way in which Defever drew out those sounds is the new element that sets Ghost Rock apart from New Tones.
Speaking of New Tones, check out this sweet video before you click on the link to my interview with Elliott Bergman.
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Then head over to Nomo's Myspace page and official website.
Thanks for reading, now start listening...
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