I just realized that when Andy comes home for a visit we rarely talk about his music or whats going on with the band.
I found out two pretty incredible things, sadly, without him telling me.
#1. His band played a show with Butterfly Boucher. Know who
she is?
#2. His band was recently in Nylon Magazine.
These are kind of big deals (in my opinion, of course)
Apparently I'm not the only one that finds these guys incredible.
PAPER ROUTE
There's little twang in the beautiful electro atmospheres of this Nashville three-piece. In our DIY age of homegrown talent, Paper Route has, in a mere two years, emerged from their living room studio to create a sound that has much of Nashville buzzing with anticipation for their first LP and an upcoming spring tour.
With their inspirations firmly woven into their sleeves—think Björk meeting Massive Attack on an Mbox—the trio (JT Daly, Chad Howat, Andy Smith) has emerged from near-obscurity to create songs that flood with electronics, emotions, and regular bouts with insomnia. Each track's cavernous layering begs for repeated listens due to the precise sampling and heartfelt inspirations that hide and reappear upon each playback. "It usually begins with something that one of us has turned in and the rest of us sense some magic or mystery to it," says Daly of their songwriting process. "We listen, we daydream, we deconstruct and reconstruct things until we've found a moment. It's a long process, but in the end it's something that none of us could have done on our own. That's the best part about being in a band."
Even though their newest album remains incomplete, one can visit their MySpace page and taste the ’80s synths, haunting melodies, and heartfelt lyricism that have much of the Nashville music community stirring in their boots. Heavy topics run rampant throughout their productions. It's earnest but not overbearing, soaring but grounded, majestic but manageable. The compositions are in a word: divine. "Almost all the songs on the new album are about either love or God," admits Daly. "It's thematically a very resilient album for us. Where we started out singing of failed relationships, falling in and out of love, and spiritual unrest, the most recent songs carry much hope."
Tracks like "Are We All Forgotten" and "Enemy Among Us" swirl with shadows of disappointment illuminated with the hope found in Howat's thick programming and Daly's ascending vocals. The obvious standout, however, may be the near-ethereal "Carousel," which builds with digital grandeur to a soaring finale of epic proportions.
Despite their unquestionable talents, what really separates Paper Route from the rest of the DIY chaff is a commitment to their craft and their willingness to dump anything hindering the integrity of their music. "Nothing is sacred in our writing process, " admits Smith. "We will abandon anything that is not the best we can offer."
ADAM SHERRETT
myspace.com/paperrouteWhat do we do when he does come home?
Oh, ya know, the usual.
we have a crazy great time.
gee, i miss them.
