Party of Shine Aren’t Pretending!



LEGENDARY FOUNDING BASSIST FOR JASON & THE SCORCHERS RETURNS
TO THE STAGE WITH A BAND OF NASHVILLE ROCK SCENE LUMINARIES

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 4th, 2020

Jeff Johnson knows what he’s talking about when it comes to rock & roll, not only as music but also the attitude that defined a generation. “Rock & roll sort of grew up,” he muses, “it changed some of its naive views, but it’s still the same attitude and edginess. To me there’s not much difference between “Straight Outta Compton” and “Never Mind the Bollocks.” It all reflects going against the grain with an energy and spirit that is still alive but has taken on different forms. It can’t be confined to Keith Richards trousers or Jerry Lees hair.”

It’s not often you come across a band that cites UFO and Montrose as influences, so perhaps it’s high time. Party of Shine is a feast of a quartet: featuring Jeff on guitar and vocals, David Harvard (ex-Wishcraft/ China Black) vocals/ guitar, Mark Pilkinton (ex-Warm Dark Pocket) drums, and Steven Geiger (from L.A., ex-Goldfinger/ Motorcycle Boy) bass. While those groups may not be household names, they served in the trenches with honor in the days when the Nashville and L.A. rock scenes rivalled that of any place in the world, the days when Jeff played thunderous bass in the seminal Jason & the Scorchers, who detonated a whole genre that put Hank Williams and the Ramones under the same tent and played a vital role in spearheading the entire Americana movement.

Their self-titled debut LP (brought to you courtesy of Australia’s mighty fine Swashbuckling Hobo label) is a roaring platter made by deep-down musicians who love rock and roll and have done this long enough to know what to play and what to leave out. Maharishi Jones is a massive slab of guitar growl that portends what might happen had AC/DC and Crazy Horse ever formed a band together. What You Wanted introduces an acoustic guitar in the mix but it’s more like the MC5’s and the Stooge’s acoustic tunes rather than Hotel California.

Party of Shine has actually been together (in a way) for seven years. After the Scorchers abdicated in the face of changing times and record company indifference, Jeff left Nashville and followed his nose to L.A. (where he worked in filmmaking), and then to Mexico, then eventually all the way to Rio de Janeiro, where he fixed motorcycles and plotted his return to playing the music he loved. He may have absconded from his whole native continent but when he wasn’t rebuilding carburetors in Rio he dispensed with bass playing and absorbed himself in manifesting good, chunky menacing guitar, and he wrote songs, plugged in his Pro Tools and recorded his vocals and guitars, and then by the miracle of technology found like-minded confederates on entirely different parts of the earth to trade sound files back and forth, with combining rock and roll’s initial spirit with modern recording methods. With contributions both lyrically and musically from Jeff’s choice for vocalist, David (who wrote the lion’s share of the lyrics), plus input from Mark and Steven, their propulsive debut took shape. As the band was sort of the by-product of the recordings themselves, many musicians contributed to the stew, not just the final four members.

“It was sort of a patchwork quilt,” Jeff says, “The sessions in Brazil started by accident. At the time, I was working editing a film I had shot in Mexico. The render times in Final Cut Pro are timely. So, I bought a bass to play while waiting on the computer to do it thing with film files. I compiled a couple of riffs and sent them to Mark Pilkinton to add drum loops etc. It then developed into me doing guitar tracks and sending pieces which became songs Toshi JC played some bass, Timo Kaltio recorded some guitar, Griffin O' Neal did some piano. These guys were computer savvy enough that we could fly stuff around and then Mark and I could massage it together. I sent four or five songs to Joe Blanton in Nashville, to record (fellow Scorcher) Warner Hodges, who agreed to play drums on some of it. Mark played the rest.”

Party of Shine made their stage debut in Nashville in December of last year, proving their mettle and setting the course for their mission, which is simply… to play! Money? Not a big concern. Big crowds and mass adulation? Also not a concern. For Party of Shine, making the music is its own reward. “We want to just be able to play and be gypsies going from town to town, that and try and make dollars – but really the money is just cake. We simply just want to be a rock n roll band. To be valid under the moniker of rock and roll is all the shit should be.”

For more information…
www.facebook.com/partyofshine
Swashbuckling Hobo Records - Swashbucklinghobo.com
contact: hindsightis2020tour@gmail.com