28 May 2007

I'm new here, and I bring you Sons of William.

Well, though my name has been listed over there on the right since this blog's inception, this is my very first post. So hello, it's nice to meet you. If the Volume Knob blog is a family, June, Jess, and Megan are siblings, and I'm that one cousin who lives far away and only turns up occasionally for holidays. Sad.

I do have a couple artists in mind for future posts, but this first one was inspired by a show I saw on Friday.



All I knew about Sons of William was that they were touring as the opening act with Griffin House this spring, and that he liked them well enough to have them play as his backing band as well. Griffin's endorsement made me eager to see them, but these guys and girl from Louisiana exceeded even those high expectations!

The "sounds like" on their Myspace page nails it: Sons of William's music is steeped in traditional rock and roll songwriting and simplicity. They write songs that already feel like classics, and play them with an incredibly tight rhythm section, beautiful male/female harmonies, and some honest-to-guitar-god solos. It's been a long time since I was blown away by a live set from a new (to me) band, but this band had me from their first song.

Unfortunately my favorite song from their set isn't on the EP I bought, so I can't offer a download. But you can stream it on Myspace. Check out "Savannah" for a chorus that reminds me of Fleetwood Mac*, keep an eye out for their upcoming album, and definitely check them out if one of those tour dates is near you.

[purchase Sons of Williams EPs and other merchandise]

And since it was Griffin House who introduced me to this band, I should give him a little plug, too. He is probably best known for "Waterfall," the song from that Rembrandt kissing commercial that always makes me both giddy to hear the song and a bit uncomfortable to watch those people kissing from an inch away. Can't they feel me invading their personal space?

If you ever saw that commercial and dug the song, download the whole thing! And then go buy some of Griffin's CDs! ("Waterfall" appears on Lost & Found.)

That's all for now, but I'm going to try to be back soon. Thanks for reading.

*Which makes sense, since they ended their set with a cover of "The Chain" that I must say I enjoyed even more than the original. Is that blasphemy? Sorry.

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