weary blues from waiting: the long wait for the follow-up Croup album

In 2004 The Croup, a studio project conceived by Jason Gambrell and Casey Brandt, released its self-titled debut album.  Described on CDBABY as “Bluegrass with… post-punk sensibilities”, The Croup is an album as sweet as it is hornery, as concise and coherent as it’s bleary-eyed and rambling: it’s as if the band went into the studio with a lot of enthusiasm only to find it sweaty with only room temperature Grolsch to take the edge off.  That might not actually be very far from the truth- most if not all of this album was recorded in the bedroom that was converted into a studio in Casey Brandt’s Brooklyn apartment in the middle of summer with the AC off for noise purposes.  Not that the album suffers for it; rather, instead of crashing into the alcohol-fueled chaos of early Replacements albums, The Croup growls quietly (“Coney Island”), snarls a curse (“Debilitate”), then apologizes with a sweetness so subtle it’s both surprising and sublime (“Rock and Roll”, “In This Hole”).

That was in 2004.  Since then, both Jason Gambrell and Casey Brandt have moved onto other musical projects, and indeed, Brandt has since moved to Maryland.  Before moving, however, Brandt and Gambrell were able to write and record at least ten tracks for a second album, more akin to Brian Eno than early Wilco.  Ambitious as this follow up effort may be, in this age of ftp sites, Skype, and MySpace pages I see no reason why we can’t expect to see a second Croup album sometime in the near future.

At this point I should mention that I am friends with both Jason and Casey and have made music with both Jason and Casey: I hate to use this blog to shame, but as both your friend and your former colleague, for god sakes finish the second Croup album!  It’s been six years now, don’t let this turn into your Chinese Democracy. I shame because I love.

Here is the video for Coney Island off the first album, released about three weeks ago.