A Taste of the New Record

Here's a three-song trailer (tracks two through four: Lightning, Finally Here, Spilling Blood) of our new album Spilling Blood, which we just had mastered at Masterdisk by Scott Hull.   Why is it three songs, all in one file?  Just to be difficult.

So yes, we finally finished this record.  We're working on cover art, and as soon as that's hammered out it will be available as a pre-release download while we shop it to labels, play it for our girlfriends and in general decide what direction we're going to go with this thing.

In further news, you may have noticed that the site doesn't look as good as it used to.  All the sidebar navigation has switched places with the top navigation bar, and neither of them look right in their new homes.  We haven't changed anything on our end and we're not sure why that happened.  In fact in older browsers it still looks right.

Anyway, I'm in the process of building a new site with a different content management service, so we're all just going to have to deal with this for the time being.  When the new site's up it'll include new music, new photos, new videos and new everything.

For now, enjoy the excerpt of our next record!

FREE SHOW TONIGHT at The Grand Victory

Sorry for the long radio silence.  It's entirely my fault.  We have so much news to share with you, but I have to get ready for tonight's show, so it will have to wait.

Tonight we're playing a show with Autumn Bells, Slow Country and Wilderlands at The Grand Victory, 245 Grand St between Roebling and Driggs in beautiful Williamsburg, Brooklyn.  I'll quote in entirety The Grand Victory's post about tonight's show:

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  10:30 PM— Oceanographer is a Brooklyn five-piece featuring our own bartender, Jeremy, on guitar and main vocals.  Metromix New York had this to say about them:  “Deftly bridging the gap between the lovely French electronic movements of Air and the touching classic American soft rock of a Gerry Rafferty or Michael Murphey—all the while including the subtle rancor found within the products of such otherwise grandiose bands as Coldplay and U2—Oceanographer arises from the BK indie pile as a singular, wonderful delight.  Led by the sad, steady vocals of Jeremy Yocum, this group can easily aim for levels of midlevel major success, and if the right ears find them… well, let’s just say Oceanographer could very well end up a band you’ll want to be able to brag that you saw back when they were only playing the little stages in town.”  Listen here.

• 9:30 PM— Autumn Bells is a newer band, fronted by ex-Hula drummer Alex Beard and featuring some of NYC’s best indie veterans.  Autumn Bells would like you remain quiet as they play, please, or else you’ll miss the gorgeous subtlety of what they’re doing.  There’s only drums when they’re absolutely needed, and if a song doesn’t need to reach a climax then it doesn’t need to reach a climax.  There’s a meloncholic country twang injected into Beard’s previous band’s reinterpretation of Bedhead.  There’s no Autumn Bells site up yet, but you can listen to one of their tracks at their previous website, from when they were called The Bottoms of our Hearts.  Just click here and it should start playing.

• 8:30 PM— Chase King is one of the singers and songwriters in Brooklyn’s Slow Country, one of our favorite NYC bands.  He’ll be playing tonight backed by a few of Slow Country’s members.  This is a place where Mojave 3 meets The Clientele, and all vocals are languid and verbed-out.  Perfect for a drive through the countryside on a rainy day when the last thing you want to think about is your destination.  Listen here.
  
  
  
  
   

• 7:30 PM— Jeff Malinowski (of Basement band, Ghost Gamblers and other projects too numerous to list here) will be joining his wife Amal Bouhabib, also of Ghost Gamblers, to unveil their newest project Wilderlands.  While still minimal Americana folk, their music lacks the melancholia of the rest of tonight’s acts, instead tugging at the heart with a gentle contentment paired to a slight yearning for sunny fields and fresh lemonade.  Philip Sterk will be joining them on pedal steel.  They don’t quite have a site up yet, but you can hear an acoustic porch-front performance in Maine on the video here.

So please, if you live in the New York City area, come see us!  If not, stay posted, as we'll be unveiling some big things in the coming days.

See you tonight!

— Jeremy

Our song's in a jewelry video, plus we're playing on Friday at a DIY space in Bushwick / Bed-Stuy

You can hear one of our songs ("All That I'm Good For," from our upcoming record Spilling Blood) in this short video featuring the jewelry of Catbird, models Anya Skidan and Matt Greene, Kevin's little dog Teepee, shot in the apartment where he lives with his wife Leigh.  It was made in conjuntion with East Side Bride.

After the Honeymoon from Laramie Dennis on Vimeo.

In local news, we're playing a show at the Bushwick / Bed-Stuy DIY space Family Haus this Friday.  It will be $5 at the door (cheap!) and you can BYOB or get affordable drinks from the bar at the show.  We'll be appearing with New Atlantic Youth, Bloom, and Philadelphia's Trololo.  Doors at 7, music at 8, and we go on at 11PM.  This is going to be a good time, more party than concert, so we hope you'll come hang out with us.

One last thing:  We're aware that many of you had a problem getting into our show at Pianos on Februay 10th due to a miscommunication between the club's management and their security.  We understand that it was pretty much a nightmare, full of stress and frustration, and (though it is in no way our fault) we would really like to make it up to you.  If you were one of the people turned away or hassled by the security at Pianos that night please contact us so we can figure out something very nice to do for you.  Thanks for understanding, and we'll see you Friday!

On Shoegazing, Breakthru Radio, New York Gazers, and The Deli Magazine

This Tuesday we were featured on DJ Mojo's weekly podcast on Breakthru Radio.  It's a track you've probably heard before ("Niagara," which is available on just about every page of Oceanographer's entire web presence at the moment), but Mojo has some very warm things to say about us and we're alongside some other really great music, so we thought we'd point you in the direction of this podcast.  Thanks, Mojo!

Also, I just became aware that New York Gazers, a new Facebook group, recently started up and is putting together information about New York City shoegaze bands, live performances and events, and anything that combines shoegaze and our grand City.  It's in fledgling form, but I'd love to see it succeed, so please follow the link and "like" it!

And lastly, at the direction of New York Gazers I stumbled across this page on The Deli Magazine's New York City music scene blog.  It's a list of New York area shoegaze bands, compiled in order of either "Web Buzz" or "Popularity," ranked automatically according to what I'm sure is an arcane and totally accurate algorithm.  We were surprised to find ourselves ranked at 27 and 28 (respectively) out of 55, and in fact we're thankful to be included at all.  Who'd have thought?

And a small word about that whole shoegaze thing: I'm aware that for a couple of reasons our music doesn't exactly fit into the specifications of the genre.  The vocals are not effects-laden or buried in the mix.  You can understand (most of) the lyrics.  The song structures are a little out-of-the-ordinary for the genre.  We have at least a little bit of stage presence.  All the same I've always used the word to describe our music because we do use a lot of guitar pedals and soundscapes and we focus a lot on texture.  OK.  Glad we straightened that out.

So... check out our new show listings, have a good week, and I hope we see you soon!

Playing a brand new venue in two days

We're very excited about our upcoming show, at The Grand Victory— the new venue where Bruar Falls used to be.  Its grand opening was on Thursday, and I have to tell you the place is absolutely gorgeous (click on the thumbnails to the left to see for yourself).

In the interest of full disclosure I am a little bit biased, as yours truly will be working there Saturday nights, so I'm a little emotionally invested in the venture.  But it really is a picturesque place to see us play, maybe the best sounding room in an intimate venue in Brooklyn, and with inexpensive drinks (or high end cocktails, whichever floats your boat).  And with a $5 door charge and a forecast of above-freezing temperatures there's really no excuse to miss this.

Joining us will be our friends Money / Paper / Hearts (their drummer, Drew Mendenhall, used to play in a side project with me and Eric) and Eagle Hawk Falcon Owl.  Both of these bands are definitely worth catching, so why not come by at 8:00PM and stay for the whole show?  I mean, it's three bands for $5.  What a deal.  Hope to see you there!