Moon Hooch have announced their next studio album, ‘Life On Other Planets’ will be released January 10. Recorded in a series of stunning, single-take performances, the collection may be the purest distillation of the double saxophone and drum trio’s sound yet. There’s no studio magic here, just three musicians (saxophonist Wenzl McGowan and Mike Wilbur and drummer James Muschler) who share a telepathic connection that transcends language, genre and tradition. The nine tracks on ‘Life on Other Planets’ mix elements of jazz, punk, funk, and EDM, swirling them all into an instrumental maelstrom the band calls ‘cave music’—derived from house music, but more jagged and primitive. The basic song structures had been developed over five or six years of touring and experimenting, however the majority of the recordings were completely improvised on the spot, much like one of the band’s hallmark live shows.
“We bottled our concert experience and captured it on this album in a way we never have before,” says Wenzl McGowen. “This is the first album where our fans will be able to listen and say, ‘This is exactly what it’s like to see them live.'”
While ‘Life on Other Planets’ is as pure Moon Hooch as it gets, it was not the album the group set out to record. When they initially headed into the studio in Winooski, VT, the band planned on creating a heavily produced and composed collection more along the lines of their previous full-length album, ‘Red Sky.’ Instead, they found themselves drawn to something more raw and immediate, recording everything live over the course of a week. The band had such a deep relationship with the songs that one take was all they needed.
“When we got to the studio, we just felt inspired to record these live pieces we’d been performing for so long,” says Mike Wilbur. “We never really consciously wrote these songs, and we never really consciously planned to release them, but we loved playing them and we realized they were something the fans were really excited about.”
MOON HOOCH
Tour Dates
1/22 – Hartford, CT – Infinity Music Hall & Bistro
1/23 – New York, NY – Bowery Ballroom
1/24 – Philadelphia, PA – Ardmore Music Hall
1/25 – Harrisburg, PA – Harrisburg Midtown Arts Center (HMAC)
1/26 – Winchester, VA – The Bright Box
1/30 – Covington, KY – Madison Live
1/31 – Louisville, KY – Zanzabar
2/1 – Nashville, TN – High Watt
2/5 – Dallas, TX – Gas Monkey *
2/6 – Austin, TX – Antone’s *
2/7 – Houston, TX – White Oak Music Hall *
2/8 – New Orleans, LA – One Eyed Jacks *
2/12 – Charleston, SC – Charleston Pour House ^
2/13 – Asheville, NC – Asheville Music Hall ^
2/14 – Charlotte, NC – Neighborhood Theater ^
2/15 – Greensboro, NC – Blind Tiger ^
2/16 – Raleigh, NC – Pour House ^
2/20 – Virginia Beach, VA – The Bunker Brewhall ^
2/21 – Richmond, VA – The Camel ^
2/22 – Washington DC – U Street Music Hall
3/11 – Brussels, BE – Atelier 210
3/12 – Massy, Paris, FR – Centre Paul Bailliart
3/13 – Toulouse, FR – Salle Nougaro
3/14 – Agen, FR – Le Florida
3/15 – Bordeaux, FR – Rocher de Parlmer
3/17 – Lille, FR – Le’ Aeronef
3/18 – Metz, FR – Les Trinitaires
3/20 – Chalons-en-Champagne, FR – Le Comete
3/23 – Zurich, SWI – Moods
3/24 – Paris, FR – New Morning
3/26 – Marseille, FR – Le Moulin
3/28 – Corsica, FR – Aghja
4/24 – Prague, CZ – Roxy
4/24 – Prague, CZ – Palac Acropolis
* w/ The Main Squeeze
^ w/ paris_monster
Photo by Luke Awtry
