The long-awaited Andy Smash AllOne EP has finally dropped! Described as a love letter to both Rochester, NY and Portland, Oregon, the EP features photographs I took in Rochester’s abandoned subway. This EP is being released in download-only form, and can be heard right here. As always, each track is available for purchase separately, or you can buy the whole enchilada for $5.00.
This project began as a cooperative effort between me (Andy) and David Brewer. David operates a ministry called AllOne, which coordinates charitable outreach the St. Johns neigborhood of Portland, Oregon. It’s like a match made in heaven: AllOne needed a promotional video, videos need music, and I’m always looking for an excuse to record…
David specifically asked me for music that he might remember from the days when he was my next-door neighbor at seminary in Philadelphia. Since this wasn’t a band project per se, it made sense for me to develop unfinished material from this era. So in many ways this EP reaches back to the earliest days of the screechiest Hotrod.
Steven Disagrees recalls the energetic free-for-all of Rochester’s tenth ward during the last decade. Set ’em Up and Shut ’em Down uses memories culled from countless late-night blasts between Rochester and Philadelphia as a backdrop for a fictional account of a sociopathic street racer. An instrumental version of this song was supplied to AllOne.
Jim Schreck supplied the sociopathic fretwork for the guitar solo on …Shut ’em Down. He’s also featured prominently on the exuberant instrumental Midlife Crisis Car. If you like what you’re hearing, you can hear some of Jim’s solo guitar work on YouTube.)
Tongue of Fire began life as a pre-seminary exploration of divine interaction with flawed humanity… but has wound up as an instrumental here. Some concepts don’t easily fit the three minute format. We’ll leave that in the capable hands of others.
The dreamy Someday Will Come Again represents a side of my music that doesn’t often see the light of day–a little less frenetic, perhaps? This song features multiple Jims. It’s built around a drum track recorded by Jim Schreck and Andy during the Now I Can Die A Happy Man sessions. That song was abandoned, but the germ for this song was born in a studio jam session with Jim Dolan and me. It reaches full fruition for the first time here.
The music represented here is only part of the bigger picture–David asked a number of musicians specializing in a variety of genres to contribute. We’re looking forward to seeing seeing how it all comes together. Watch this space for further developments!
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