Califone To Release ‘Funeral Singers’ Oct. 6; Film, Tour TBA (MP3)

This entry was posted by harry s truman on Tuesday, July 14th, 2009 at 11:35 am.

Chicago/LA’s Califone (aka Red Red Meat’s delicious table scraps) will release their new album, All My Friends Are Funeral Singers, October 6 on their new label Dead Oceans. The release of Funeral Singers marks their first release of new material in three years (to the month). As can be expected, the band members will extract sound from a variety of devices, including guitar, violin, banjo, percussion, optigan, stylophone, baritone ukulele, mbira, and thumb piano.

In conjunction with All My Friends Are Funeral Singers, Califone are also releasing a feature film of the same name, which will be submitted to festivals in 2010. During their soon-to-be announced tour, the band will provide a live soundtrack to the film, silent movie-style.

According to Dead Oceans:

Primary songwriter and vocalist Tim Rutili, whose artistic endeavors stretch beyond music and include the creation of surreal short documentaries, music video and film scores, recently wrote and directed his first feature-length film. The screenplay for the film draws on the same themes and inspirations as the album, and many of the songs were written at the same time and contain the same images and characters. The film, also titled All My Friends Are Funeral Singers, will be submitted to film festivals early next year.

Modest Mouse and Iron & Wine producer/former Meat-man/sometime Califone member Brian Deck calls lead singer Tim Rutili’s songwriting his favorite yet: “They have found a sound unlike anyone else, and are able to draw otherworldly sounds from very common instruments. It’s melodically inventive and economical and delivered with more detail and nuance than before.”

This year, Red Red Meat re-released their flagship album Bunny Gets Paid on SubPop. Hopefully some MP3s from Funeral Singers are forthcoming; in the meantime, you should check out Red Red Meat’s “Gauze“, from Bunny Gets Paid.