No return policy: 24 side projects we'd love to see come back
Ah, the side project. It's the perfect outlet for a creatively overstimulated musician who just can't be contained to one band. Unfortunately, many side projects are one-and-dones, rarely getting to tour or exist outside of the artist's main gig. Here are some of our favorite side projects of recent years that we'd love to see come back for another go 'round.
Contributors:
Scott Heisel [SH]
Brian Kraus [BK]
Brittany Moseley [BM]
Jason Pettigrew [JP]
Cassie Whitt [CW]
ABLE BAKER FOX
Before hoarse heroes Small Brown Bike and the Casket Lottery formalized their union in a side project, they put out a collaborative split EP to test the waters. It was a success, influencing them to revisit the project years later, now deserving of its own moniker, Able Baker Fox. The mashed-up group released their debut album Voices in 2008, and any Google search will point to the unanimous praise it received. It appears to be another one-off gem, with members returning to their respective parent bands to put out new albums. All things considered, bringing Able Baker Fox back may not be a bad idea. [BK]
ARTHUR
In the late ‘90s MxPx, along with their guitar tech, got a little two-faced—but, not in a bad way—when they formed Arthur using their middle names as psuedonyms. The goal of the project was to provide an outlet for the not-quite-MxPx songs they were writing. The band, showcasing a softer sound, released an EP, Loneliness Is Bliss, in 1999 and a full-length Watch The Years Crawl By in 2010. The band officially broke up in March, citing that it made no sense to exist if they were merely remaining stagnant. [CW]
BLACKPOOL LIGHTS
Formed after the Get Up Kids finished recording their then-final album, Guilt Show, Blackpool Lights were a meat-and-potatoes rock group fronted by TGUK guitarist/vocalist Jim Suptic—and their debut album, This Town's Disaster, was awesome. TGUK broke up the following year, allowing Blackpool to hit the road hard, but then the Get Up Kids reunited in 2010 and Blackpool Lights have been on the back burner, save for 2010's Okie Baroque EP. With TGUK once again on a small touring break, we hope Suptic takes off his Home Depot apron and puts on his ax. [SH]
CINEMATIC SUNRISE
Judging from his various projects and solo work, it seems it may be impossible for Craig Owens, whose primary gig these days is frontman of Chiodos, to sit still. Cinematic Sunrise featured, among others, Owens and Chiodos bandmate Bradley Bell on keyoard and Underminded vocalist/Isles And Glaciers and future D.R.U.G.S.-mate Nick Martin. After 2008’s A Coloring Storybook and Long-Playing Record EP release and their sfinal shows in 2009, Cinematic Sunrise were laid to rest. [CW]
THE DAMNED THINGS
What do you get when you put members from Every Time I Die, Anthrax and Fall Out Boy in a room with instruments? Cock rock with Keith Buckley's dog bite, Scott Ian's metal mindset and Joe Trohman's pop package. It's a stellar same-page result for one of the biggest surprises in side-project personnel history. They released a single studio album, 2010's Ironiclast, jumped right into big-boy festivals and support tours (Buckcherry!), then abandoned ship to return to their first loves, who are all busy as ever. [BK]
DISCOVERY
It was a match made in indie-hipster heaven when Vampire Weekend keyboardist Rostam Batmanglij and Ra Ra Riot frontman Wes Miles teamed up in 2005 and started their electronic side project, Discovery. They took a break from writing and recording once Vampire Weekend and Ra Ra Riot’s popularity began to rise, but got back together to finish what would become their debut album, simply titled LP, which came out in 2009. Discovery haven’t released any new music since then, but both Batmanglij and Miles have kept busy with their individual bands: Ra Ra Riot released their third album, Beta Love, this January, and Vampire Weekend’s third album, Modern Vampires Of The City,comes out May 14. [BM]
THE FALCON
This Chicago punk supergroup (initially made up of members of the Lawrence Arms, Alkaline Trio and Rise Against) cranked out an EP and LP in the mid-2000s and even managed to string a 2007 tour together with an amended lineup that included Smoking Popes' Eli Caterer on guitar, but they've been pretty dormant since then. That's partially because Dan Andriano is pretty busy with his solo career as well as his day job as bassist in Alkaline Trio, and it's also because frontman Brendan Kelly has a hard enough time keeping his main band, the Lawrence Arms, active. (Being a stay-at-home dad, as he was for a number of years, is definitely a full-time commitment.) [SH]
FINALE
Wise-cracking Sprechstimme-core fulcrum Keith Buckley is known for his mighty roar in Every Time I Die and the Damned Things. He teamed up with guitarist Steven Riter for Finale,a side project that shows a more melodic side of him that most people aren’t used to seeing and hearing. In 2007,Buckley, Riter, bassist Niko Georgiadis, synth op Joseph Stocker and drummer Jon Mirro conjure a ’70s rock vibe that sounds far more authentic than many of the nostalgia carpetbaggers enjoying positive reviews on Pitchfork, Rolling Stone and viewer-free blogs. [JP]
FOXBORO HOT TUBS
When you're Green Day, you can pretty much do whatever you like. Case in point: Foxboro Hot Tubs, a garage-rock side project that appeared out of thin air in late 2007 and dropped their full-length debut, Stop Drop And Roll!!! In early 2008. Sporadic shows followed, but we don't expect a sophomore album any time soon, mainly because Green Day's Dos! is more or less the second Foxboro record. (“Fuck Time” even started off as a Foxboro song.) [SH]
HEAVENS
This dark indie pop-rock project of Alkaline Trio’s Matt Skiba and his former roommate Josiah Steinbrick (also of F-Minus) released Patent Pending and toured briefly in 2006 never to be heard from again, unfortunately. However, Skiba’s solo material, in eerie spirit, is not a far cry from Heavens, so we can feed on that in their absence. With Alkaline Trio having just released a new album and a the HELL EP possibly in the works, we probably shouldn’t be counting on more from Heavens any time soon. (See what I did there?) But, just imagine that Skiba-Steinbrick collaborative magic happening again. [CW]
THE HORRIBLE CROWES
Fans of the Gaslight Anthem got to hear a slower, more subdued side of frontman Brian Fallon when he teamed up with friend/guitar tech Ian Perkins to start the Horrible Crowes. During their free time while touring, the two bonded over Nick Cave, Tom Waits, the National and the Afghan Whigs. They soon started writing together, crafting enough dark, soul-influenced songs to release their debut full-length, Elsie, in September 2011. Little has been heard from the duo since then, but seeing as the Gaslight Anthem released one of 2012’s best albums (Handwritten), the Horrible Crowes can be slightly forgiven for not releasing a follow-up yet—but only slightly. [BM]
INTERNATIONAL SUPERHEROES OF HARDCORE
While their identities are still a mystery (although notice you'll never see them in the same place as New Found Glory at the same time), ISHC did their best to rid the world of bad screamo, eBay flipper scum and, rather inexplicably, Batman for a few years in the late '00s. Given that NFG's schedule seems busy as ever, it's unlikely ISHC will be releasing any new material in the near future—then again, that's probably what they want us to believe. Dang superheroes, always being mysterious and shit… [SH]
ISLES & GLACIERS
Isles & Glaciers are like the scene version of the Wu-Tang Clan. With massive “members of” clout (we're talking Pierce The Veil, Emarosa, Chiodos, the Receiving End Of Sirens and more), you can hear Jonny Craig, Vic Fuentes and Craig Owens trading off fiery verses like it's no big deal on their debut EP, 2010's The Hearts Of Lonely People. It's all speculation if we will ever see a sequel from the supergroup. When individually asked about the project in interview asides over the years, members have all had varying takes on the future. The task of getting seven road warriors together seems nearly impossible. To date, they've only played live together once at SXSW in 2009 (at AP’s annual 100 Bands party, natch). One thing is certain, though: The demand will wait. [BK]
MONSTERS OF FOLK
With Conor Oberst and Mike Mogis (Bright Eyes), Jim James (My Morning Jacket) and M. Ward steering the folk machine, it’s a wonder foam-mouthed hippie-hipsters aren’t gnawing off the face of Coachella to revive this super group. The aptly named Monsters Of Folk, raked in the top tier of sensitive mountain-porch-swing cool dudes to form a project that was on fire for all of one self-titled Rough Trade release, before its members abandoned it for their primary bands. [CW]
ONE : FIFTEEN
Comprised of Minus The Bear keyboardist Alex Rose and drummer Erin Tate, One : Fifteen were a smoove-R&B duo formed in 2008. Three songs ended up on their Myspace page (including “Saturday,” a mega-jam featuring a guest spot from P.O.S.), but a proper release never materialized, nor did live shows. MTB remain pretty busy, so the likelihood of Rose and Tate revisiting One : Fifteen seems slim, but we can hope. [SH]
ONLY CRIME
In 2003 Good Riddance vocalist Russ Rankin got together with some friends in the punk/hardcore scene (including Aaron Dalbec of Bane and Descendents drummer Bill Stevenson) and formed Only Crime. The band released two albums, 2004’s To The Nines and 2007’s Virulence, but have been quiet since then. Fans are in luck, though. Two weeks ago, The Washington Times caught up with Rankin and chatted about, among other things, the future of Only Crime. “We started working on our third album in 2008 and we just finished it and we’re just finishing up contracts for a label [that] is going to release that album. So there should be some announcements coming shortly with that… We’re definitely still a band, it’s just that everybody is busy doing other things… There is a third album, it’s finished, and it will be released this year.” [BM]
OWLS
Short-lived side project Owls seemed more like a springboard for drummer Mike Kinsella's ongoing career as Owen than anything. Owls' intricate little guitar lines are often repeated for measures, with vocals stretching out where they please, two crucial aspects Kinsella took with him when he left the band to focus on his own music. Although there was a status update in 2012 boasting an “album's worth” of new Owls material, it's not too likely we'll hear it anytime soon. Kinsella recently pledged his allegiance to a more popular side project with Into It. Over It.'s Evan Weiss, Their / They're / There. [BK]
A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME
Frontman Josh Scogin is an unapologetic maniac when throwing down some serious next-level, chrome-melting hardcore in the Chariot. Forget dialing down intensity: He turns the rage switch to “off” under the banner of A Rose By Any Other Name, where he delivers quiet acoustic songs to balance out the blast-furnace tendencies of his day job. A solo album, One For My Master, One For My Dame, was released in 2010. But given the Chariot’s great sense of fractured menace, we think he’s overdue for a follow-up. [JP]
SILENT DRIVE
Best remembered as a Bane side project, Silent Drive also snagged a member of Drowningman and enjoyed a brief existence in the mid-'00s Equal Vision Records golden age. Playing emo rock with a little more muscle than the label implies, Silent Drive's sound sits somewhere between their forefathers in By A Thread and then-contemporaries in Finch. They put out one album (see the pattern with these bands yet?), 2004's Love Is Worth It, toured on it for a minute before flat-lining forever. [BK]
SKY SAILING
Adam Young made his name as the synthesizer-driven pop-maestro behind Owl City. But prior to Owl City, he created Sky Sailing in 2007 as his primary outlet for early acoustic-based (piano, guitar) works. An Airplane Carried Me To Bed, the first SS album, was issued in 2010 after the success of Owl City’s album, Ocean Eyes. [JP]
TEAM SLEEP
Singer Chino Moreno’s first foray outside of Deftones was a sweet DNA double-helix of hip-hop beats and atmospheric texture that manifested in one self-titled album on Maverick/Warner Bros. in 2005. When discussing his two new projects Crosses and Palms in interviews, Moreno is inevitably be asked about Team Sleep’s status. The singer says the group is very much alive and it’s all about finding a schedule where the central players (including DJ Crook and Death Grips drummer/producer Zach Hill) can get their schedules to sync up. [JP]
TWO TONGUES
Max Bemis has waxed poetic on his love for Saves The Day numerous times, and in 2008 the Say Anything frontman got to do more than just talk about Chris Conley & Co.—he got to create music with them. When AP caught up with Two Tongues—Bemis, Conley, former Saves The Day guitarist David Soloway (on bass) and now ex-Say Anything drummer Coby Linder—for our 2008 Noise On The Side special (AP 242), the band had finished recording their self-titled debut, which came out in February 2009. “The record is a concept record about the two of us and how we’re both sort of complicated, dark individuals and how we understand each other and care about each other,” Conley told AP in ’08. “We want to help the others see the light within themselves.” Here’s hoping they still have some soul searching left to do—at least enough for another Two Tongues album. [BM]
VOLCANO CHOIR
Before Justin Vernon was known for his indie-folk band Bon Iver, he was writing music with some fellow Wisconsin natives, Collections Of Colonies Of Bees, way back in 2005. Four years later, the band released their debut album, Unmap, which reached No. 92 on the Billboard Top 200. In 2012 Bon Iver picked up two Grammys: Best New Artist and Best Alternative Music Album for Bon Iver. Not long after picking up his Grammys, Vernon told USA Today he was working on a Volcano Choir album for “the Japanese market.” [BM]
XOSKELETONS
Cold Cave CEO Wes Eisold and former Hatebreed guitarist F. Sean Martin launched this ugly, thrashy, electro-punk unit in 2006 that issued one full-length and one EP’s worth of short, sharp shocks. While the duo remain friends, Eisold’s currently focused on this year’s model of Cold Cave, a dynamic rock band featuring current and past members of AFI, Jaguar Love, LCD Soundysytem and Samhain. [JP]
