{"id":44429,"date":"2018-02-06T15:24:33","date_gmt":"2018-02-06T21:24:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=44429"},"modified":"2018-02-07T12:40:28","modified_gmt":"2018-02-07T18:40:28","slug":"banditos-bring-garage-punk-soul-to-proud-larrys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/banditos-bring-garage-punk-soul-to-proud-larrys\/","title":{"rendered":"Banditos Bring Garage-Punk Soul to Proud Larry’s"},"content":{"rendered":"

After spending much of the last two years on the road relentlessly showcasing their critically acclaimed\u00a02015 self-titled debut album<\/strong><\/a>, the six bandmates of Banditos<\/strong> regrouped in late 2016 at Plum Creek Sound Studios<\/strong> in Dripping Springs<\/strong>, Texas<\/strong> and democratically poured out sonic influences and emotionally charged personal experiences for their new album\u00a0Visionland<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Produced by Israel Nash<\/strong> and Ted Young<\/strong>, the Birmingham<\/strong>\/Nashville<\/strong>-based group\u2019s second full-length has one foot firmly planted in reality as the other tip-toes in and out of mental complexities, self-perception, and\u00a0altered-state illusions. The results are revealing, exhilarating, and profound.<\/span><\/p>\n

The album-titled track reveals these defining, cohesive thematic intricacies.\u00a0\u201cVisionland\u201d is named after the defunct $60 million theme park that was built in the late \u201890s near some of the band members\u2019 childhood homes in Bessemer<\/strong>, Alabama<\/strong>.\u00a0The park was shut down after only five years and the schizophrenic glimmer of hope it offered local residents connects to a greater overlying optimism for life present at the album\u2019s core, an eerily relevant theme in contemporary complex times. Jeff Salter<\/strong>\u2019s sweeping guitar strums swell at the song\u2019s intro, lifting through the murky haze into the warm and sunny clarity of a duet between singer Mary Beth Richardson<\/strong> and singer\/guitarist Corey Parsons<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cStrange Heart\u201d rides to\u00a0new 13th Floor Elevators psychedelic heights, with Richardson\u2019s scorching, raw, show-stopping voice echoing Merry Clayton<\/strong>\u2019s chilling performance on The Stones\u2019 \u201cGimme Shelter.\u201d Later in the album, singer\/banjo player Steve Pierce<\/strong> channels\u00a0the ebullient folk of electric Dylan\u00a0<\/strong>with his free & easy flow on \u201cFun All Night.\u201d The band also brought in the outside artistic talents of storied\u00a0<\/strong>keys player Earl Poole Ball<\/strong>, upon a chance interaction they had after seeing him play with Ramsay Midwood<\/strong> at Sam\u2019s Town Point<\/strong> in Austin<\/strong>, Texas. Ball has performed and collaborated with The Byrds<\/strong>, Johnny Cash<\/strong>, Buck Owens<\/strong>, Gram Parsons<\/strong>, Merle Haggard<\/strong>, and many other greats.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>There is a shared mindset throughout; a persevering glint of what could be, a distorted possibility, struck by a frigid gust of reality. Like\u00a0some sort of modern day, Southern-born The Band<\/strong>, some songs were written over years by a single member (the surfy jam \u201cLonely Boy,\u201d which was written by singer\/guitarist Parsons in response to being tour weary), others by a combination of the players (the punk-garage soul\u00a0Stooges<\/strong>-meets-Velvet Underground<\/strong>\u00a0churner \u201cFine Fine Day\u201d was penned when Parsons and Pierce drank massive amounts of vodka one day in Opelika<\/strong>, Alabama) and the dynamics show for it. There\u2019s a phantasm of\u00a0vintage \u201860s Etta James <\/strong>soul\u00a0<\/strong>(plus burning-hot background singers) on \u201cHealin\u2019 Slow\u201d and, later, the\u00a0hopping country blues\u00a0of \u201cDDT.\u201d Topics and styles range this way on\u00a0Visionland<\/em>\u00a0– the heavy and emotional to the light and simplistic – but the Banditos always sound like themselves and always drive the nail deep into the groove.<\/span><\/p>\n

The members of Banditos first met playing in various punk and rock \u2018n\u2019 roll projects around Birmingham at D.I.Y., all-ages venues. In 2010, Parsons and Pierce began busking around town and were soon asked to perform at their favorite local bar. Without a full band, they invited friends Randy Wade<\/strong> (drums), Salter (guitar), and Richardson to join them. Danny Vines<\/strong> (bass) joined the band later.<\/span><\/p>\n

Banditos are playing at Proud Larry<\/strong>‘s on Friday, February 9. Tickets can be purchased online<\/a> or at the door the night of the show.\u00a0\"The<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After spending much of the last two years on the road relentlessly showcasing their critically acclaimed\u00a02015 self-titled debut<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":238,"featured_media":44430,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7887],"tags":[11650,3519,1986,5,642,4,53,3,753],"class_list":["post-44429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-music","tag-banditos","tag-garage-rock","tag-live-music","tag-mississippi","tag-ms","tag-oxford","tag-proud-larrys","tag-the-local-voice","tag-tlv"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/2018-02-06-Banditos.jpg?fit=620%2C349&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44429\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}