Singer Riley Bray Finds his Vision Come To Life With Haunting, Powerful Release
The Golden Ghosts have delivered a debut album that reflects the spirit, resilience and timelessness of great American music. From the galloping, urgent opener “Heart of Coal” to the closing sonic spellbinder “Last Outpost”, Gleam captures the swirling dust of history and legend and turns it into sleekly textured cinematic music that ricochets between the cultural mythology of spaghetti westerns and the L.A. punk scene, and between the classic rock arrangements and signposts of Dylan, The Beatles, The Stones, The Doors, T. Rex, Love, Jimi Hendrix and Iggy Pop, and band leader Riley Bray’s own singular sense of direction and purpose. After years making his musical mark in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area as an engineer, producer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, Bray now approaches The Golden Ghosts as his first opportunity to front a group playing guitar and singing his own songs.
Bray offers, “I’ve had the sound of the Golden Ghosts in my head for a while,” he explains. “I heard it as having a sense of space, like Ennio Morricone’s soundtracks, but with the energy of ’60s garage rock and the beauty and expansiveness of contemporary textural music. To realize that, I knew I had to stop being a co-songwriter, which I was in my previous band, and move ahead on my own.” Bray recorded Gleam with his band mate and drummer Justin Goings, at his Rainspell studio in North Hollywood under near-lockdown conditions. He recalls, “Nobody outside the band heard the music before it was done. I didn’t want to hear any voice except the one in my head when it came to what these songs should be and what they’re about.” The two are now joined by keyboardist Flannery Lunsford and bassist Matthew Tucker who also both sing harmony.
The album’s main anchors are Bray’s exceptional voice — a rock-star perfect blend of dust, spit and wild honey — and guitar playing. Armed with his tasteful collection of vintage and modern guitars, and a sleek array of stomp boxes including a vintage tape delay that helps add to the spectral scope of the album’s aural landscape, Bray cut all the bristling guitar tracks himself except for the pedal steel contributions of Greg Shadwick. Upon completion of tracking, the band brought in Grammy winning engineering team Jim Watts and Ethan Allan for the mix. Gleam was mastered by Howie Weinberg.
The title song and “Heart of Coal” cut right to the soul of the Golden Ghosts. With its cascading chords and hoof beat rhythm, “Gleam” is a tribute to American individuality and endurance wrapped in a tale that straddles the old West and the Rust Belt. “Heart of Coal” displays his songwriting in peak form. On the surface the tune’s echoing guitar licks, brazenly unforgettable riff and percolating drums support the tale of a hard-hearted woman who nonetheless earns love. “It’s actually my look at living in America right now,” Bray relates. “The country is a complex and difficult place to be, but she’s a ‘woman with a heart of coal’ that I can’t help but adore.”
The mix of Americana, rock, folk and other sounds that fill Bray’s creative core are the result of growing up exposed to such diverse elements as classic rock and country music, western movies and the great singer-songwriters of the ’60s, from Neil Young to Lou Reed to Lennon/McCartney to Jagger/Richards.
As a front man, the lanky 6’7” Bray is a natural. His first experience as a leader was in Dangerfield Noobie, a group he formed in high school that was a staple at such historic Los Angeles nightspots as the Whiskey, the Roxy, the Key Club and the Troubadour. While living in Oakland he co-lead the psychedelic group Fauna Valetta, who released an eponymous album in 2008. On that disc Bray also played Farfisa organ, sitar and tabla, instruments he intends to weave into the Golden Ghosts realm. And in 2009 he made his debut solo EP Away From Me, the initial showcase for his self-realized songwriting and his fist step toward the Golden Ghosts. “Since finishing Gleam last year the band has been on the road constantly,” Bray says. “That’s the place where ideas and inspiration really come from. There’s an energy to being out there, to playing shows in different towns every night, that keeps you in a good place creatively — especially as a performer. Touring has helped me discover America, but it’s also helped me discover myself. That may sound heavy-handed, but it’s the truth. It’s helped me realize who I am and what I am here to do, and I think you can hear that in the Golden Ghosts and in the songs on Gleam.”
—————————
For More Information Visit:
—————————
http://www.thegoldenghosts.com
http://www.facebook.com/thegoldenghosts
http://vimeo.com/17516877
