After five years of life on the road, hundreds of shows, thousands of miles and countless unforgettable experiences, Philadelphian nomads Lotus are waiting at your doorstep, and they want to come in and share some stories with you.
Since its inception in 1999, when twin brothers Luke and Jesse Miller met Mike Rempel at a camp in Colorado and eventually Steve Clemens and Chuck Morris, Lotus has become one of the hottest and most recognized live acts around. Constant touring and a dedicated, grassroots word of mouth campaign has seen the band ascend through the ranks, and with it, the ability to pack houses from San Francisco to Chicago to Buffalo.
Combining a sometimes explosive, sometimes delicate balance of electronic textures, from deep house to drum and bass, with more traditional, jam-oriented jazz, funk and world music, Lotus appeals to a diverse crowd of club goers and jam band supporters. The band’s rhythm section provides the backbone necessary for their adventures in deep electronic space and funk forays. Clemens, whose steady acoustic and electronic drumming drives much of the material, teams well with Chuck Morris’ percussive hues and bassist Jesse Miller’s gliding bass lines and sample additions. Luke Miller, who splits time between keyboards and rhythm guitar, further layers the often polyphonic feel giving guitarist Mike Rempel plenty of solid beats and atmospheric textures to affix his crafty guitar work to. Added together, Lotus has become a tight-knit collective together for the purpose of pushing the envelope and shaping a new sound.
With the release of Nomad, the band’s debut studio effort, they’ve now become solidified as a true contender on the national music scene.
“Finally having a studio album has been great,” said Lotus bassist Jesse Miller. “We never felt in a position financially to make the album we wanted to make. Now we have a product we are very proud of which has generated much more attention from the press and opened new ears.”
Nomad, released in September on Harmonized Records, is a clear indication of maturity and a positive push towards future success for this young band. In its first month of release, it quickly climbed to the top of the Home Grown Music Network charts and by the end of 2004 was the HGMN Best Seller.
“All of Nomad, with the exception of “Travel,” was in rotation live. The difficulty in translating live material into a concrete studio track is that live there are so many ideas and parts that are designed to be extended with improvisation and studio material tends to work better if it is more compressed,” Miller stated. “For many of the tracks we took basic elements-melody, breakdown, beat-arranged these and reformed them with new elements to create the track.”
From the smooth, groovy electronica of the album’s opening track, “Suitcases” to the surrealistic, get-you-in-the-mood “Livingston Storm” to the wah wah funk of “Greet the Mind,” Nomad offers the many varying sides of Lotus, all the while in a more stripped-down context. “For Nomad we had several goals-to make the album as a whole work, something you can listen to from start to finish, applicable in many environments, from dance party to driving to spaced-out with headphones and consistent,” said Miller.
In doing so, they utilized creative interludes, flowing bass lines, driving drum beats and a slew of extraneous percussive and keyboard sounds to make for a head-bobbing party album fit for a long drive down the interstate, a pre-game warm-up or even a shower serenade.
Much like Lotus’ sound on Nomad, their live shows present a feel that attracts both the jam band crowd and the dance club frequents. Deep sonic trance couples with high-energy funk, producing full sets of non-stop dance parties where everyone in the room is at least bobbing their head or swaying their hips. Through extensive layering, electronic sampling and a melding of world beats and vibrant rhythms, Lotus achieves lift off immediately upon hitting the stage.
It’s all about the energy and band-crowd interaction. “Live, we want to rock the crowd, get them dancing, energize them, bring everyone to that place where magical musical moments are born-when you feel that ripple through the crowd and onto stage,” explained Miller.
Currently embarking on a cross-country tour that will see the band performing from Philadelphia to Vancouver, Lotus is poised to have another breakout year in 2005. Hitting major markets in Los Angeles, Seattle, Colorado’s Front Range and ski towns, as well as shows at Tribeca in NYC and the Funk Box in Baltimore, the message and sound will continue to spread to new areas and new ears. Helping along the way is one of the most dedicated fan bases and street team organizations around. “Without word of mouth and street level promotions we wouldn’t have shown up in San Francisco for the first time to a crowd of 300 people. You can’t hear this music on MTV, so grassroots promotions is by far the most effective method for a band like Lotus,” alleged Miller.
After 2004, which saw the band release their first studio album and make the move from smaller bars and clubs to large clubs and theatres, they are now able to do things a bit more their way and not have to make the sacrifices of past tours.
“Now we can come into a place like the TLA in Philly or the Fox Theatre in Boulder on a weekend and put on a show. By this I mean we don’t have to make sacrifices on the sound, lights or staging. And usually the energy spent in those areas manifests itself musically to produce some of the best stuff we’ve performed live,” Miller said.
So, 2005 is shaping-up to be another big year for Lotus. Already a week into their first cross-country tour of the year and with plans for several summer festivals and a new studio album later in the year, they’re ready to show why they’re consciously creating the future of music. Expect to see tour dates throughout the Midwest and Northeast later this spring as well and possibly even some remixes of Nomad material later this year.
“It’s tough to say where we’ll be at the end of 2005. Hopefully, Lotus continues to be exposed to a larger fan base throughout the year, better attendance almost always equals a better show,” Miller said.
