Band Biography
Michigan-based Northern Rock collective the Great Lakes Myth Society declared itself a proper entity on January 1st 2004. The group’s previous incarnation as the Original Brothers and Sisters of Love yielded two critically-lauded albums (1999’s “The Legende of Jeb Minor” and 2001’s “H.O.M.E.S.”) for the Brooklyn, New York indie label The Telegraph Company and successful appearances at New York City’s Knitting Factory, CMJ, SXSW and Boston’s NEMO Festival, but by 2002 the amicable departure of violinist and native New Zealander Elisabeth Auchinvole and the record company’s untimely financial collapse had left the band with two gaping holes in its side and a mammoth completed record with no home. Rather than fold up their maps and head inward, longtime friends Timothy Monger (accordion, guitar & vocals), James Monger (guitar & vocals), Gregory McIntosh (guitar & vocals), Scott McClintock (bass & vocals) and Fido Kennington (drums & vocals) adorned themselves in the most affordable black suits available and took to the stage under a new banner. The Great Lakes Myth Society’s eponymous debut, an alternately brooding and nostalgic blend of muscular English folk-rock, pine-kissed Northern Americana and Midwest grit was released in April 2005 on the Boston-based label Stop, Pop & Roll. The band hit the road, and within weeks the GLMS had broken into the CMJ Top 100 and appeared on both the CNN website and NPR’s All Things Considered.
In the spring of 2006, the band inked a deal with Southeast Michigan-based publishing house, record label, web developer and video/television production company Quack!Media and began work on a new record. The resulting “Compass Rose Bouquet”, a phrase described by James Monger as a “dangerously colorful metaphor for summer in the North”, views the region through a much broader lens than the one used to oversee the band’s previous offering. In this episode, ghosts of dead high school friends drift along the sidewalks of your hometown in a parade of smoke (“Midwest Main Street”), ravens scour the Massachusetts turnpike for half-finished beers (“Eastern Birds”), fleets of black flies arrive overnight with detailed maps to the holes in your screens {“Days of Apple Pie”} and petite girls in summer dresses, with legs still white from winter eagerly sign the lease to the apartment you’ve lived in for the whole of your twenties (“Heydays”). Scott McClintock muses “the self-titled debut was indeed quite a darkly cloaked affair; smoky with soot and stained with lamp oil. “Compass Rose Bouquet” manages to mix that bare-branched-midnight-orchard vibe with some (gasp) sunshine and greenery...only there's probably a dead body under all the lawn clippings”. A combination of boots hitting the stage, brakes on the highway and rain on your roof, “Compass Rose Bouquet” arrived on July 10, 2007, followed by a limited edition single in March 2008. In late 2008 they began recording their third full-length album.
Band Links
GLMS on Twitter
GLMS on Facebook
GLMS on Last.FM
Reviews and Features
TIME OUT CHICAGO: Album ReviewVILLAGE VOICE: Album ReviewAMPLIFIER MAGAZINE: Album ReviewPITCHFORK: Album ReviewALL MUSIC GUIDE: Album ReviewINK 19: Album ReviewDETOUR: Concert ReviewVITAL SOURCE: Album ReviewCAUGHT IN THE CAROUSEL: Album ReviewALL MUSIC GUIDE: FeatureSPIN: SXSW Wrap-upHOUSTON CHRONICLE: Video InterviewTHE BIG GREEN: FeatureMETRO TIMES: Cover StoryMESCALINA: Interview (Italy)BBC COLLECTIVE: Review (U.K.)METRO TIMES: Feature MOTOR CITY ROCKS: FeatureALL MUSIC GUIDE: Review (self-titled)
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