OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY
Our Love Will Change the World
(RAINBOW QUARTZ INT'L)
RELEASE DATE: FEBRUARY 8, 2005
Detroit's psychedelic pop kingpins Outrageous Cherry have come back around: while the band's expansive, conceptual LPs, Supernatural Equinox and The Book of Spectral Projections, established O.C. as the "Moody Blues" of the garage rock set (and were featured heavily on Little Steven's "Underground Garage" radio program), Our Love Will Change the World is a shorter, sweeter, harder-hitting package of future rock n' roll classics tuned to the classic A.M. radio zeitgeist.
This isn't to say that the songs aren't laced with jagged, explosive guitar solos and haunted, cryptic lyrics like previous Outrageous Cherry records, it's just that this album is more a biting commentary on the modern world and the complexities of human consciousness; an effort to create a significant artifact at a time where the mass media and popular culture in general seem to have become little more than a projection of a shadow of a cobweb in the corner of Joseph Stalin's daydream. (See, there's still more psychedelia to be heard here...)
Oh, and also thrown in for good measure are a couple of love songs about pretty girls going insane, and a funky bump n' grind number about walking the streets of Detroit during the city's blackout (where incidentally, Outrageous Cherry ran into Gene Simmons, Steven Tyler and Tom Hamilton-- all on the way to the Stooges show-- with no electricity).
Led by multi-talented singer, songwriter, producer, and bandleader, Matthew Smith, Outrageous Cherry formed in 1993 as a brainstorm project. Matthew is a native of the Detroit area and has played in bands with Epic Soundtracks, Simon Bonney (Crime & The City Solution), Warren DeFever (His Name Is Alive), and wrote most of the songs and played guitar on the Volebeats debut album, Up North.
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY IS:
Matthew Smith -- vocals, guitar Larry Ray -- guitar, vocals Courtney Sheedy -- bass Carey Gustafson -- drums, vocals
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY DISCOGRAPHY
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY:
2004 "Our Love Will Change The World" CD (Rainbow Quartz)
2004 "Why Don't We Talk About Something Else" EP (Rainbow Quartz)
2003 "Supernatural Equinox" 2 LP/CD (Scratch/Rainbow Quartz)
2003 "Stay Right Here For A Little While" EP (Rainbow Quartz)
2003 "I've Been Obsessed" 7" (Orange Sky)
2001 "The Book of Spectral Projections" CD (Poptones/Rainbow Quartz)
1999 "Out There in the Dark" CD (Del-Fi/Poptones)
1998 "X-Rays In The Cloudmine" EP CD (Mind Expansion)
1998 "Split w/Godzuki" 7" (Disques Twist Top)
1997 "Nothing's Gonna Cheer You Up" CD (Third Gear)
1996 "Stereo Action Rent Party" CD (Third Gear)
1995 "All In A Chain" 7" (March)
1994 Self-Titled CD (BarNone)
1993 "Pale Frail Lovely One"/"It Always Rains" 7" (Third Gear)
COMPILATIONS, ETC:
"Regrets I've had a Few"- by Troy Gregory on his SYBIL CD (2002, Fall of Rome)
back-up band
Gants tribute 7" (Japan-only)
features "Six Days in May"
TEENSTER (1999, BOAC)
features "Last Rock Star".
LONELY PLANET BOY (1998, BOAC)
features "Boxtop"
LOSING MONEY, LOSING FRIENDS (1998, March)
features "Don't Lie" and also "Pale Frail Lovely One"
Ghettoblaster 2-various (2002, Motor City Brewing Works)
features "If It's What You Want"
Ghettoblaster-various (1998, Motor City Brewing Works)
features "In the Realm of Nothing Happening"
GO SONIC-various-10 Detroit bands on one 7" (1995, Go Sonic)
features "The Vastly Underrated Dennis Wilson Solo LP"
LIGHTING A MATCH UNDERWATER-various (1995, Detroit Electric)
features "Sad and Amplified"
MATTHEW SMITH IN THE BEGINNING
Detroit is a haunted city. It has been a musical ghost town ever since Motown relocated to the west coast in the early 70's. Somehow Detroit turned out to be a good place to pursue a wide range of musical obsessions. In the 80's, I'd run into Mick Collins at the record shops and he'd tell me all about the 20 different bands he was going to form. This seemed far-fetched at first, but pretty soon I found myself doing the same thing. My daily routine began to revolve around an enormous amount of musical activity. I studied composition at U of M with composers William Albright and William Bolcom, played in an Indonesian gamelan ensemble, played bass and guitar with numerous rock and roll bands, and was a founding member of the Volebeats. In 1993 I started Outrageous Cherry. I think we were the only psychedelic-Motown-garage band at that time.
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY IN THE EARLY 90s
I met Larry Ray through my pal Frank, who also turned me on to the Beach Boys. Larry started out playing in the mid-70's with Ted Lucas and his legendary Detroit psych outfit the Spike Drivers. Larry's guitar playing reminds me a lot of Sonny Sharrock, who I once witnessed playing a guitar solo so passionate and full of power and infinity and chaos (he broke half the strings in one strike!) that it suddenly changed my whole conception of guitar playing. When later on I noticed that Larry was ripping his vintage Les Paul to shreds on every song whether it was a rocker or a slow ballad, I figured Sonny would approve. Outrageous Cherry was supposed to be a bubblegum band. I envisioned the Archies, if Leonard Cohen had written their songs to pay the rent. What we ended up with was a Motown groove, no cymbals, AM radio melodies, California harmonies, well-crafted somewhat psychologically disturbed lyrics, extended dueling guitar interplay in the tradition of Haight-Ashbury and the MC5, and band photos that looked like Television circa 1975. Our early work drew lots of Velvet Underground comparisons, even when it sounded more like the Turtles and Love. One Chicago critic who hated it called us "the Ten Years After of the 90's" (he may have been right!). Through several albums with several different record companies, O.C.'s music became in different measures both accessible and inscrutable. The band did a bit of touring, but I mostly recall a lot of shows where we would experiment with new tunes in front of a small Warhol-factory type scene that comprised Detroit's underground.
MATTHEW SMITH ON THE ART OF SONGWRITING
Outrageous Cherry's 1st album (1994, Bar None records) was the first batch of tunes that I felt really good about. It was preceded by more than 10 years of notebooks filled up with stuff that wasn't that great. When I wrote "Pale Frail Lovely One"- at first a blatant attempt to write in the style of Petula Clark's 60's hits- I felt I'd written my first really good song. This gave me the confidence to trust my instincts, which prompted the writing of hundreds, maybe thousands of different kinds of songs. I write songs nearly every day. Sometimes several songs a day. I'll fill notebooks with lyrics, and then I'll come back to it later with a guitar. I'll randomly open to a page, pick up the guitar, and if the vibrations are right, the lyric and the chords I'm playing will start to fall into place. I try to let this process go where it wants to go. Sometimes an upbeat pop song, sometimes a depressing-sounding ballad, sometimes even a 20 song space opera will rise out of the fog of these explorations of the unconscious. When I was a kid in the
Detroit Public Schools I used to sometimes just go into a spontaneous trance, just "zone out", so to speak. It would kind of freak people out. This kind of psychic faculty comes in handy when you're playing long guitar solos or writing songs.
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY REHEARSES IN A TINY KITCHEN
Outrageous Cherry's equipment set-up is the exact opposite of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer's, although we'd have a ball with all of their equipment. We use three small AMPEG amps, a snare drum, a floor tom, a tambourine (which Carey tapes to the floor and hits with her foot), Courtney's Fender Musicmaster bass, Larry's '72 left-handed Gibson Les Paul, and Matthew's 1968 Lake Tahoe blue Fender Jaguar. We use Ibanez and D.O.D. fuzz pedals and a D.O.D. wah-wah. We rehearse in a tiny kitchen in Hamtramck, Michigan, which is a small Eastern European community in the geographical center of the city of Detroit. O.C. doesn't use cymbals, but we'll use gongs and chimes if someone leaves them lying around the studio.
ON STAYING BUSY IN THE MOTOR CITY
It's difficult to describe chronologically, but I've played onstage or in the studio with these people in the last decade: Outrageous Cherry, the Witches, the Go, Simon Bonney and Bronwyn Adams (ex-Crime and the City Solution), Kim Fowley, Damo Suzuki, Ira Cohen (the poet!), Saturday Looks Good To Me (vocal on "No Good with Secrets"), Denise James, THTX, Volebeats, Yuji Oniki, Ryan Adams/Whiskeytown, Yo La Tengo, John Sinclair, Monster Island, Destroy All Monsters, Andre Williams Mystic Moog Orchestra, Doc Roun-cee and the Blackman, His Name is Alive (writing/singing on "Universal Frequencies"), Giant Sand, Epic Soundtracks, Viv Akauldren, Medusa Cyclone, the Dirtbombs, the Many Moods of Marlon Magas, the Spring Reverbs, Bantam Rooster, Rodriguez, and many, many others who are less well known. There's not much else to do around here.
RECORD PRODUCTION IN THE 21st CENTURY
From time to time, I am asked to produce records by artists who are inclined to put their music into the hands of someone who favors distortion and reverb over clarity and balance and couldn't care less about conservative production values and so-called modern recording techniques. My method as a producer revolves around capturing an inspired performance on tape and mixing it to project as much energy as possible. There has to be spontaneity at all levels of this process to get it right. I've produced records by the Go, Kim Fowley, Slumber Party, Denise James, Yuji Oniki, the Cuts, and the various groups I play with as well, including Outrageous Cherry, THTX, and the Volebeats. Although some may consider the aesthetic to be "retro", I think these records sound futuristic. I'm not particularly motivated by nostalgia. True, I collect records- old ones especially. However, I really do envision a future where digital technology becomes obsolete and the old electronics prevail, generating a legacy of sound that resonates more appropriately with the human condition. I believe this is why hip-hop producers sample old records. The old recording technologies were never really improved upon. The same goes for guitars, amplifiers, and synthesizers. The old ones sound best. Of all the LPs I've produced, I think "Whatcha Doin'" by the Go really stands out. It kind of kicked off this whole Detroit-garage thing, features some of Jack White's best guitar work, has a unique atmosphere, and at low volumes still sounds like it is going to blow your speakers.
Our Love Will Change the World
(RAINBOW QUARTZ INT'L)
RELEASE DATE: FEBRUARY 8, 2005
Detroit's psychedelic pop kingpins Outrageous Cherry have come back around: while the band's expansive, conceptual LPs, Supernatural Equinox and The Book of Spectral Projections, established O.C. as the "Moody Blues" of the garage rock set (and were featured heavily on Little Steven's "Underground Garage" radio program), Our Love Will Change the World is a shorter, sweeter, harder-hitting package of future rock n' roll classics tuned to the classic A.M. radio zeitgeist.
This isn't to say that the songs aren't laced with jagged, explosive guitar solos and haunted, cryptic lyrics like previous Outrageous Cherry records, it's just that this album is more a biting commentary on the modern world and the complexities of human consciousness; an effort to create a significant artifact at a time where the mass media and popular culture in general seem to have become little more than a projection of a shadow of a cobweb in the corner of Joseph Stalin's daydream. (See, there's still more psychedelia to be heard here...)
Oh, and also thrown in for good measure are a couple of love songs about pretty girls going insane, and a funky bump n' grind number about walking the streets of Detroit during the city's blackout (where incidentally, Outrageous Cherry ran into Gene Simmons, Steven Tyler and Tom Hamilton-- all on the way to the Stooges show-- with no electricity).
Led by multi-talented singer, songwriter, producer, and bandleader, Matthew Smith, Outrageous Cherry formed in 1993 as a brainstorm project. Matthew is a native of the Detroit area and has played in bands with Epic Soundtracks, Simon Bonney (Crime & The City Solution), Warren DeFever (His Name Is Alive), and wrote most of the songs and played guitar on the Volebeats debut album, Up North.
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY IS:
Matthew Smith -- vocals, guitar Larry Ray -- guitar, vocals Courtney Sheedy -- bass Carey Gustafson -- drums, vocals
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY DISCOGRAPHY
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY:
2004 "Our Love Will Change The World" CD (Rainbow Quartz)
2004 "Why Don't We Talk About Something Else" EP (Rainbow Quartz)
2003 "Supernatural Equinox" 2 LP/CD (Scratch/Rainbow Quartz)
2003 "Stay Right Here For A Little While" EP (Rainbow Quartz)
2003 "I've Been Obsessed" 7" (Orange Sky)
2001 "The Book of Spectral Projections" CD (Poptones/Rainbow Quartz)
1999 "Out There in the Dark" CD (Del-Fi/Poptones)
1998 "X-Rays In The Cloudmine" EP CD (Mind Expansion)
1998 "Split w/Godzuki" 7" (Disques Twist Top)
1997 "Nothing's Gonna Cheer You Up" CD (Third Gear)
1996 "Stereo Action Rent Party" CD (Third Gear)
1995 "All In A Chain" 7" (March)
1994 Self-Titled CD (BarNone)
1993 "Pale Frail Lovely One"/"It Always Rains" 7" (Third Gear)
COMPILATIONS, ETC:
"Regrets I've had a Few"- by Troy Gregory on his SYBIL CD (2002, Fall of Rome)
back-up band
Gants tribute 7" (Japan-only)
features "Six Days in May"
TEENSTER (1999, BOAC)
features "Last Rock Star".
LONELY PLANET BOY (1998, BOAC)
features "Boxtop"
LOSING MONEY, LOSING FRIENDS (1998, March)
features "Don't Lie" and also "Pale Frail Lovely One"
Ghettoblaster 2-various (2002, Motor City Brewing Works)
features "If It's What You Want"
Ghettoblaster-various (1998, Motor City Brewing Works)
features "In the Realm of Nothing Happening"
GO SONIC-various-10 Detroit bands on one 7" (1995, Go Sonic)
features "The Vastly Underrated Dennis Wilson Solo LP"
LIGHTING A MATCH UNDERWATER-various (1995, Detroit Electric)
features "Sad and Amplified"
MATTHEW SMITH IN THE BEGINNING
Detroit is a haunted city. It has been a musical ghost town ever since Motown relocated to the west coast in the early 70's. Somehow Detroit turned out to be a good place to pursue a wide range of musical obsessions. In the 80's, I'd run into Mick Collins at the record shops and he'd tell me all about the 20 different bands he was going to form. This seemed far-fetched at first, but pretty soon I found myself doing the same thing. My daily routine began to revolve around an enormous amount of musical activity. I studied composition at U of M with composers William Albright and William Bolcom, played in an Indonesian gamelan ensemble, played bass and guitar with numerous rock and roll bands, and was a founding member of the Volebeats. In 1993 I started Outrageous Cherry. I think we were the only psychedelic-Motown-garage band at that time.
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY IN THE EARLY 90s
I met Larry Ray through my pal Frank, who also turned me on to the Beach Boys. Larry started out playing in the mid-70's with Ted Lucas and his legendary Detroit psych outfit the Spike Drivers. Larry's guitar playing reminds me a lot of Sonny Sharrock, who I once witnessed playing a guitar solo so passionate and full of power and infinity and chaos (he broke half the strings in one strike!) that it suddenly changed my whole conception of guitar playing. When later on I noticed that Larry was ripping his vintage Les Paul to shreds on every song whether it was a rocker or a slow ballad, I figured Sonny would approve. Outrageous Cherry was supposed to be a bubblegum band. I envisioned the Archies, if Leonard Cohen had written their songs to pay the rent. What we ended up with was a Motown groove, no cymbals, AM radio melodies, California harmonies, well-crafted somewhat psychologically disturbed lyrics, extended dueling guitar interplay in the tradition of Haight-Ashbury and the MC5, and band photos that looked like Television circa 1975. Our early work drew lots of Velvet Underground comparisons, even when it sounded more like the Turtles and Love. One Chicago critic who hated it called us "the Ten Years After of the 90's" (he may have been right!). Through several albums with several different record companies, O.C.'s music became in different measures both accessible and inscrutable. The band did a bit of touring, but I mostly recall a lot of shows where we would experiment with new tunes in front of a small Warhol-factory type scene that comprised Detroit's underground.
MATTHEW SMITH ON THE ART OF SONGWRITING
Outrageous Cherry's 1st album (1994, Bar None records) was the first batch of tunes that I felt really good about. It was preceded by more than 10 years of notebooks filled up with stuff that wasn't that great. When I wrote "Pale Frail Lovely One"- at first a blatant attempt to write in the style of Petula Clark's 60's hits- I felt I'd written my first really good song. This gave me the confidence to trust my instincts, which prompted the writing of hundreds, maybe thousands of different kinds of songs. I write songs nearly every day. Sometimes several songs a day. I'll fill notebooks with lyrics, and then I'll come back to it later with a guitar. I'll randomly open to a page, pick up the guitar, and if the vibrations are right, the lyric and the chords I'm playing will start to fall into place. I try to let this process go where it wants to go. Sometimes an upbeat pop song, sometimes a depressing-sounding ballad, sometimes even a 20 song space opera will rise out of the fog of these explorations of the unconscious. When I was a kid in the
Detroit Public Schools I used to sometimes just go into a spontaneous trance, just "zone out", so to speak. It would kind of freak people out. This kind of psychic faculty comes in handy when you're playing long guitar solos or writing songs.
OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY REHEARSES IN A TINY KITCHEN
Outrageous Cherry's equipment set-up is the exact opposite of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer's, although we'd have a ball with all of their equipment. We use three small AMPEG amps, a snare drum, a floor tom, a tambourine (which Carey tapes to the floor and hits with her foot), Courtney's Fender Musicmaster bass, Larry's '72 left-handed Gibson Les Paul, and Matthew's 1968 Lake Tahoe blue Fender Jaguar. We use Ibanez and D.O.D. fuzz pedals and a D.O.D. wah-wah. We rehearse in a tiny kitchen in Hamtramck, Michigan, which is a small Eastern European community in the geographical center of the city of Detroit. O.C. doesn't use cymbals, but we'll use gongs and chimes if someone leaves them lying around the studio.
ON STAYING BUSY IN THE MOTOR CITY
It's difficult to describe chronologically, but I've played onstage or in the studio with these people in the last decade: Outrageous Cherry, the Witches, the Go, Simon Bonney and Bronwyn Adams (ex-Crime and the City Solution), Kim Fowley, Damo Suzuki, Ira Cohen (the poet!), Saturday Looks Good To Me (vocal on "No Good with Secrets"), Denise James, THTX, Volebeats, Yuji Oniki, Ryan Adams/Whiskeytown, Yo La Tengo, John Sinclair, Monster Island, Destroy All Monsters, Andre Williams Mystic Moog Orchestra, Doc Roun-cee and the Blackman, His Name is Alive (writing/singing on "Universal Frequencies"), Giant Sand, Epic Soundtracks, Viv Akauldren, Medusa Cyclone, the Dirtbombs, the Many Moods of Marlon Magas, the Spring Reverbs, Bantam Rooster, Rodriguez, and many, many others who are less well known. There's not much else to do around here.
RECORD PRODUCTION IN THE 21st CENTURY
From time to time, I am asked to produce records by artists who are inclined to put their music into the hands of someone who favors distortion and reverb over clarity and balance and couldn't care less about conservative production values and so-called modern recording techniques. My method as a producer revolves around capturing an inspired performance on tape and mixing it to project as much energy as possible. There has to be spontaneity at all levels of this process to get it right. I've produced records by the Go, Kim Fowley, Slumber Party, Denise James, Yuji Oniki, the Cuts, and the various groups I play with as well, including Outrageous Cherry, THTX, and the Volebeats. Although some may consider the aesthetic to be "retro", I think these records sound futuristic. I'm not particularly motivated by nostalgia. True, I collect records- old ones especially. However, I really do envision a future where digital technology becomes obsolete and the old electronics prevail, generating a legacy of sound that resonates more appropriately with the human condition. I believe this is why hip-hop producers sample old records. The old recording technologies were never really improved upon. The same goes for guitars, amplifiers, and synthesizers. The old ones sound best. Of all the LPs I've produced, I think "Whatcha Doin'" by the Go really stands out. It kind of kicked off this whole Detroit-garage thing, features some of Jack White's best guitar work, has a unique atmosphere, and at low volumes still sounds like it is going to blow your speakers.
