Jon Snodgrass (ex-Drag The River singer): Visitor’s Band
March 25th, 2009 by autopsy4 in News
Since Drag The River “broke up,” it stood to reason that guitarist/singer Jon Snodgrass and singer Chad Price would be releasing solo efforts. Chad is supposed to have one coming out by the end of 2009, and while I wouldn’t put the notion of another Drag The River album completely to bed, Mr. Snodgrass was the first to strike with Visitor’s Band.
Over the course of 2008, Jon managed to book studio time on both coasts and places in between to record Visitor’s Band. He also managed to pull in a few collaborators like Chad Rex, Joey Erg, Chris Pierce and ninebullets.net faves, Two Cow Garage.
It would be easy to assume that the album just sounds like a Drag album without Chad singing on any of the tracks, but that would be selling the album short. While the album is rife with Drag The River familiarities, namely the comforting sound of Jon’s voice and it’s nasally twang, Visitor’s Band spends a lot of time rocking in a way that is more Armchair Martian than Drag The River. The real star of the album is Jon’s voice itself. During the slow, sad songs, it’s there to comfort and wallow in the misery with you and during the rockers, it’s there to pound shots and sing-along with you, swaying shoulder to shoulder.
As an added bonus, the final track follows the Drag The River tradition of re-hashing the entire album, but instead of putting it all into just one track, Visitor’s Band offers up the entire album all over again, acoustically. It’s a fantastic addition to an album that was already Essential Listening.
You can hear samples of this album on ninebullets.net.
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