Sounds of Fire and Light from Rind Stars

Rind Stars is a smart rock n roll band from the complicated American South. Each one of the five members could front their own band, and all would be vastly different. But they don’t. They mine conflict and compromise to create the rich music of Rind Stars.

Their album, Sounds of Fire and Light, finds them moving from stage to stereo with a bundle of great songs. Over fourteen tracks they sing about wives, dying, God, suspicion, hatred, jealousy, liberation, happiness, potential and coming up short. It’s real stuff and the music underneath brings it to life, launching it like truth bullets from the speakers. You hear it and it’s obvious these guys are damn good players, handy with a note and phrase. You listen to it, and you relate, you understand.

Rind Stars formed in Memphis in late 2005 and call the city home, though no members are natives.

Kevin Conway came from the Texas coast of the Gulf of Mexico and plays guitar, bass, and sings, as well as engineering and studio work. The tall Flint Hills of eastern Kansas gave us Rock N Roll Tiger (Matt Timberlake), who sings, plays guitar, bass, and random odds and ends.

The swampy fields of northeast Mississippi sprouted two Stars. Andy Oltremari supplies drums and percussion and sang on the album, though he refuses to do so live. Donovan Childress plays bass, guitar and sings. His trademark white suit and sweatiness are the stuff of legend.

Jeremy Shrader comes to Rind Stars from the string of hilly hamlets tucked around Nashville. He plays keys, trumpet, melodica, fluegel horn, guitar, he sings& If something needs to be in a song and nobody knows how to play it, he’s the guy who plays it. He also does much of the engineering out of Electric Room Studio, in his home.
 
Rind Stars kicked off what many hope will be a long recording career with the release of their first album, Sounds of Fire and Light earlier this year. Out now on Electric Room records, this fourteen track album shows us a nimble fingered rock band working hard at their craft. A kaleidoscope collection of guitar tones crackle and churn from the speakers on the backs of excellent pop songs, made even more exquisite by lush three part harmony, Fender Rhodes, and consonant percussion textures.

With five singers and songwriters from varied but related schools of rock, the album covers a wide swath of American and British pop history, without ever being needlessly eclectic or random. In the press, Rind Stars are often likened to indie granddads like Pavement, Pixies, Meat Puppets, but never without mention of the Beach Boys, Beatles and Led Zeppelin. Current favorites of the Mid-South bar scene, Rind Stars combine chops, smarts, art, and taste to make rock n roll worth more than the notes and words it contains.

Chris Herrington, of the Memphis Flyer, writes: "Sounds of Fire and Light introduces a very solid rock band that evokes lots of comparisons without ever sounding like imitators."