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(three.man.amp)
(three.man.amp)
track listings
Harbour / Mechanical Monkey Eyes / Lounge
With its punishing opening guitar riff that tears out of the speakers,
HARBOUR, is a song that announces its presence with dark menace and
dangerous intent. A cold electrical beat and slurred vocal melody keep
things suitably mean and moody, until the chorus explodes in your face with
its glorious fireball of thrashing dirty guitar chords and melodic vocals.
Daniel Nixon's, voice with its dark threatening tone is like a cross between
Liam Gallagher and Kurt Cobain, leering and menacing yet with enough warmth
and melodicism to carry the songs.
MECHANICAL MONKEY EYES, a slower starting track opens on a clean repeating
guitar riff and insistent drum beats. The vocals, this time more open and
inviting draw you in with mesmerising intensity, all the while building to
the inevitable explosion of guitars that hit you as the song progresses.
With its climactic second half of overdriven guitar brutality and
impassioned vocal melodies, this is the sound of a band with the confidence
and vision to be serious contenders in the UK rock scene over the coming
year.
The more laid back mellow groove of, LOUNGE, just highlights this bands
confidence. The jazzy guitar chords that play out over shuffling drum beats
and finger clicks, are warm and soothing while the vocals play out in
suitably laid back fashion. A sound comparable to Incubus at their Morning
View best, (three.man.amp), sound like they've really hit their stride here,
this has got all the makings of that perfect hungover sunday morning
soundtrack, but with enough bite and intensity to also double as one of
those great live cigarette lighters in the air rock moments.
A very impressive trio of songs, (three.man.amp), have the sounds and the
songs to cause big noises over the next year or so. With a sound that's
pitched somewhere between the mellower likes of Incubus at their best and
the harder rocking likes of Hundred Reasons or Idlewild, this is a band
poised for big things.
The band formed in the mid 1990s as a four piece named Concrete Dog. At the
time, Concrete Dog consisted of: Daniel Nixon>Bass and Vocals, Pete
Swatton>Drums, Gary Roberts>Guitar and Simon Edwards>Guitar.
After playing locally for a few years, and recording 3 demos, Simon left to
work on his own project: Melaleuca.
The rest of Concrete Dog, staying as a 3 piece went on to record their first
EP, and filmed the video to the lead track, Reach. The new video and EP
were well received, and after some promotion the band began to negotiate a
management deal. Working with the company for just over a year, promoting
and gigging with the band in and around London, a difference of opinion led
to the split from their management company. However the band had been
working on a new set, and had put together 16 new songs. Now with all the
money they had they begun work on their debut album, Wormhole.
Realising the strength in the new material, they decided to shoot their
second promo video for the title track, Vanilla. This brought them to the
attention (via an ad in NME) of a new independent music label, Fin Music.
After signing a three album deal in 2001 the initial release of the album
was delayed due to financial difficulty. During this period the band
embarked on a side project composing music to a short film - Platinum
Souvenir, written and directed by Stuart Sewell.
By the end of the year it was obvious the Fin Music was in financial trouble
and backing for the bands activities was not forthcoming. Rather than lose
the rights to the Wormhole tracks, the band used a clause in the contract to
break from Fin Music. At this stage, it was decided that the name Concrete
Dog had become diluted as a result of the split from Fin Music. It was
decided that Concrete Dog were to split and reform as (three.man.amp).
At the beginning of 2003, whilst preparing to record the new EP, they began
rehearsing with Phil Mckenzie on bass guitar who had previously helped with
the recording of Wormhole, on completion of recording Daniel decided he
wanted to concentrate solely on singing, Phil was asked to join and they
became a four piece once again.
At the end of a fantastic year with shows all over the country, radio play
and great reviews they split with long term guitarist Gary at the beginning
of 2004 for perso nalreasons.Nowfinetuningthesongswhichwillmakeup
their second album the band are included on many industry distributed CDs
and are looking for new financial backing.
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