“Ain’t Goin’ Home This
Christmastime” is “imaginary B-side” to Springsteen’s “Santa” that shakes up “setting
sad lyrics to sad music” trope.
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Sloan
Simpson as photographed
by Jason Thrasher
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PLAY, POST & SHARE
Sloan Brothers | “Ain’t Goin’ Home This
Christmastime”
Sloan Brothers
System
Update
(Science Project Records)
Out Now
Streaming Link:
Track Listing:
03. Cryin’ Shame
07. So Good (Reprise)
08. Amplified
09. Coffee Black
10. Into My Mind
11. Mirrorball
12. Smile Down On Me
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Sloan Brothers | About
Sloan
Simpson has been recording for over
two decades. Until now, none of the music has been his own.
This changed with the release of his debut album System
Update (out now via Science Project Records)
under the name Sloan Brothers.
Though Sloan
Simpson says that while making his debut album he was “listening to mainly The Cure,” the album’s opening one-two
punch of the title track and the instrumental “Cleopatra Echo” feels like Daft Punk invited Herbie Hancock to form a trio jamming with The Grateful Dead during that band’s most spirited era of
ever-evolving journeyman collaboration.
Wow, how did Simpson
get here?!
The Athens, Georgia-based musician played rock and
jazz guitar growing up, but was frustrated by the hit his talents took when a
serious car accident sidelined him. Simpson
sold all of his guitars and quit the instrument.
With music still in his blood, if not in his grasp, Simpson began to document, through live
taping, the local scene in his new hometown of Atlanta, eventually relocating
to nearby Athens after years spent driving between the two as part of his
recording endeavors. His new hobby had become a good habit.
“I had a permanent recording setup installed and the
reality of losing my favorite venue really set in when I had to go remove it,” Simpson says of The Caledonia Lounge, a nationally-recognized Athens club that
closed in October of 2020, sidelining him again.
Like the life-changing event that inspired his
recording career of recording others, the closing of the Caledonia was eerily fortuitous for Simpson. While live music was in shutdown, he wrote and recorded
his first song.
“It was the first vocals I’d ever sung into a
microphone,” Simpson says. With his
friend, guitarist Kevin Sweeney contributing
solos, the first Sloan Brothers
single “For You” was released later that
month.
Pleased with the experience, Simpson picked up a bass, more microphones, and drum software.
Though he returned to guitar, he says that even without formal training,
“playing keyboards is what allowed me to start writing songs.”
He also started calling up more friends.
Simpson explains, “I asked my friend Robert Schneider (co-founder of The Apples In Stereo and Elephant
Six Recording Co.) if he would record backing vocals on the song “Into My Mind,” and he agreed. As I
kept writing more songs, I would ask more friends I knew from recording shows
over the years to contribute guest parts.”
In addition to Sweeney
and Schneider, some three-dozen or
more local luminaries also appear on System Update, including current and
former members of Maserati, Olivia Tremor Control, Japancakes, of Montreal, Drive-By
Truckers, Cracker, Casper & The Cookies, Camper Van Beethoven, Elf Power, and more.
In fact, it was Elf
Power’s Andrew Rieger that
inspired Simpson’s songwriting on
the album’s first single, “Songs Like
This.”
“I asked Andrew
if he would sing on something if I wrote one he liked,” Simpson jokes. “Andrew
sings the high part in the choruses and it was perfect for Kevin Lane of local pop legends The Possibilities to sing in the verses with me. I’ve been friends
with Bryan J. Howard of Cracker for nearly 20 years now, and he
jumped in on bass.”
The tune has one the most relatable indie rock
crush-couplets you’ll ever hear and is a defining example of the quality of Simpson’s songwriting future.
“I saw you buying records and I saw you at the coffee
shop
I didn’t hear your order but I bought the same record
you got”
These words provide a mere glimpse into Simpson’s ability to explore emotion
with the kind of candor that only comes from experience brought by age.
“I had long been avoiding expressing feelings as some
sort of misguided version of the ‘cool’ that rock ‘n roll had taught me growing
up,” he admits. “Once I lost family, I realized that it’s okay to express pain,
trauma, and desires.”
After half a lifetime taking home tapes of the
personal struggles of others in song, it’s about time that Simpson is giving us the same opportunity with his unexpected,
thrilling work.
System Update, the debut album by Sloan
Brothers is out now.
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Sloan
Brothers | Links
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Josh Bloom at Fanatic
Promotion | Contact
