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this is how they
communicate
interview with Shangrala
by jon bosworth jaxvillain@yahoo.com
What: Shangrala CD Release Party with Johnathan
appleseed, Elevation and more.
WhERE: Jack Rabbits in San Marco (1528 hendricks
ave)
WhEn: Friday, February 15 th
As Jacksonville’s music scene gives the impression
of being on the upswing, with Black Kids
creating a national buzz and some great homegrown
acts suddenly making a local name for themselves
(Antarctic, A Slight Breeze, Buffalo Tears, etc) Shangrala
brings their first full length album, Clearance to
Land, to the table. It is easily the best local release
of 2007. In fact the album stands up against most of
the national releases that have found their way onto
my iPod this year.
“I’m excited about playing a lot of shows now.
2008 is the year to play a lot of shows,” said Shangrala
singer and guitarist Jude Kahle.
EU caught up with Brian Jerin (who also plays
guitar and sings with the band) and Jude Kahle while
Jerin was contributing to a secret Christmas album
side project with sometime Shangrala collaborator
Jared Bowser in Kahle’s home studio. Although currently
staged in a small corner of Jude’s bedroom,
this Pro Tools setup once commanded a better portion
of the living room of Jude’s Riverside home,
as did a drum kit, a number of amplifiers, a large
sound board and all of the other gear necessary
for Shangrala to record Clearance to Land. Instead
of dropping thousands of dollars on recording in
a professional studio with a professional engineer,
Shangrala trusted their own skills to adequately track
the album. But listening to it, you’d never know it
was their first attempt.
“We liked the pace that it gave us to create and
we have the capabilities. And it’s free. All it took was
time and beer,” said Jerin.
No one in the band had professionally recorded
a full album before, although all of them have been
part of bands that had. A good deal of the two years
Clearance to Land took to make can be attributed to
them taking their time and care to create the sounds
they knew they wanted.
“We definitely learned a lot. It was a group
effort. We know what sounds right to us,” said Jerin.
As Brian, Kahle and Bowser layered tracks
and tracks of guitars and electronic noises to their
version of ‘Angels We Have Heard on High,’ throughout
the interview, I tried to grasp how these small
chunks of music could resemble the larger composition.
Much like the time it took to create Clearance to
Land, it was impossible to see how such a disparate
songlist, esoteric assortment of influences, and
remarkable amalgam of talent could coalesce into
the singular dynamic sound of Shangrala, and yet
the album sounds as though it was conceived in one
songwriting session.
“Musicians will like us. We’re kind of musician’s
music, to some extent,” said Kahle.
It is true that their songs have dynamics and
a complexity that could almost be considered math
rock, which may make them appeal to musicians,
but there is a sincere pop ethic that is more borne
from bands such a Death Cab for Cutie or Jealous
Sound. That is not to say they are in any way derivative.
Shangrala has a genuinely unique sound that
croons through Kahle’s sincere and faltering vocals,
jangles through Jerin’s dreamy guitar, and punches
out of Mike VonBalson’s crisp drums to alternately
lull and pulverize the listener in a cunningly deliberate
fashion. From folksy tunes like ‘Time’ to complex
rock songs like ‘Zilla,’ the album truly expresses their
breadth of abilities and doesn’t pigeon-hole the band
into any single genre.
The song ‘Race for the Ages’ shows the skilled
songwriting that can come from a strong rhythm as
drummer VonBalson and bassist Will Hill create a
groundwork for a rock song that is exquisitely complemented
by Walt Hill’s keyboards. The recording is
so crisp and each part so distinct, it is impossible to
imagine it was recorded in a home studio.
“We only had six songs when we decided to go
to Vision Sound, we were just going to do a demo
EP. We tried to master it ourselves, but it didn’t come
out the way we wanted it to. So we went to Vision
Sound to master it. It blew our minds how great it
sounded. That geared us to do a full eleven song
record, since we knew we could go there and make
it sound as good as a record you could buy off the
shelf,” said Jerin.
Producer Paul Lapinski enhanced the dynamics
of the band and made every layer stand distinctly
apart. The mastering process also gave the album
an audio level that standard albums use.
“With all the different melodies we had, it was
good to have someone else’s ear listening to it, I
think it helped us out a lot,” said Kahle.
Shangrala has submitted Clearance to Land
to all of the big websites for review, including NPR,
Fader, Absolute Punk, Pitchfork Media and Sputnik
Music, which gave them a five star review.
“When we first started talking about it we said
if we get a three star review, that’s pretty good. Sigur
Ros got three stars on Sputnik, so we would have
been happy with that,” said Jerin.
As the three put the finishing touches (a series
of “Heys” from “Mr. Mouse”) on their Christmas
carol, the full vision of the song was finally realized
and I could sing along. Just as I sing along to Clearance
to Land. It gets as much play as Modest Mouse
and the new Radiohead in my car. There hasn’t been
a locally released record to come out this good since
The Cadets released On the Death of Science As a
Major World Religion to little fanfare this past summer.
Shangrala has a CD release party booked at
Jack Rabbits on February 15 th , which is certain to
be one of the best local rock shows of 2008. In the
meantime you can purchase Clearance to Land from
myspace.com/shangrala.
eujacksonville.com |january 17-23, 2008 19