PAIN

"Zurzeit leider keine Termine gebucht"

PAIN

"Cynic Paradise goes boom! all the way with its full frontal guitar attacks and will make you shake`n`dance!" Emma Perez / ZILLO (D)

One of the most creative and innovative masterminds of the Metal scene strikes back – Peter Tägtgren, infamous studio wiz and head of mighty Death Metal veterans HYPOCRISY, serves us the latest slab of infectious Industrial Metal with PAIN´s "Cynic Paradise"!

Tägtgren, always striving for a different outlook on the music he loves, decided to go for a one-man-band in 1996 that would truly push boundaries outside of the realms of HYPOCRISY. He decided to not only play every instrument himself, but opted for a rather technoid approach after experimenting with beats on his computer. Thus PAIN and the self-titled debut album saw the light of day in 1997, released on Nuclear Blast. In 2000 "Rebirth" followed which features the fan favourite single 'End of the line' that went Gold in Sweden, marking the commercial breakthrough of PAIN. Album number three, "Nothing remains the same", saw the Metal / Industrial mixture develop to pure perfection in 2002 – the BEATLES coverversion 'Eleanor Rigby' was even recorded with a massive Swedish orchestra, and 'Shut your mouth' can be considered a classic tune today! The album entered the Swedish charts at # 6. "Dancing with the dead", released in 2005 and dealing with Peter`s near death experience, even outdid the previous record with going for a sensational # 3 in the Swedish album charts. Straight rock influences outweighed the electronic beats this time around, and the album easily is the darkest and gloomiest in the whole PAIN history. After the impressive live DVD set "Live is overrated" in 2006, Mr. Tägtgren unfolded the "Psalms of extinction" to his huge fanbase in 2007. Illustruous guests such as Anders Iwers (IN FLAMES), Alexi Laiho (CHILDREN OF BODOM) and Mikkey Dee (MOTÖRHEAD) starred on the album, and PAIN supported NIGHTWISH on their massive European tour in front of over 150.000 people in 18 countries.

2008 sees the return of PAIN to motherly folds: just like the debut, Peter Tägtgren will release "Cynic Paradise" on Nuclear Blast – fittingly on Halloween! This time around, Peter even let his live musicians help him a tiny bit with the studio work: drummer David Wallin can be heard on 'Don`t care', guitarist Michael Bohlin added some additional programming, and bass player Johan Husgavfel is playing on 'Live fast / Die young'. And to continue the guest star tradition, Anette Olzon of NIGHTWISH fame is singing on the ultra-catchy 'Follow me' and 'Feed us'! "Cynic Paradise" shows Peter Tägtgren from his most variable side, even including Western slide guitars and mixing it with monstruous riffs and tough beats. Check out this masterpiece – and step into the "Cynic Paradise"!

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PAUL GILBERT

"Zurzeit leider keine Termine gebucht"

PAUL GILBERT

Normally we would never have an artist writing his own bio but when it comes to Paul Gilbert, the rules don’t apply!

SILENCE FOLLOWED BY A DEAFENING ROAR – LINER NOTES

2007 was a great year for me.

As a musical experiment, I decided to confront my cynicism about instrumental guitar music by making a whole album of the stuff. I called this album “Get Out of My Yard” and posed as a cantankerous, territorial, old man on the cover.
By focusing on what I do best (guitar playing) and by being humorously truthful about my age and obstinate musical opinions, I managed to create more excitement and positive reaction to my music than I have experienced in a long time.

As I sometimes joke, “Now that I’ve stopped singing, my career has taken off!”

I didn’t want the excitement to end with the CD, so I started bothering my manager with constant e-mails and phone calls saying, “We’ve got to set up a tour! I want to go everywhere!”
And before I knew it, I was on the road. Six months of touring from Japan to Australia to America to Europe and finally to South America.

Life on the road is wonderfully focusing for a musician. You give up basic comforts, but you gain the daily adrenaline rush of walking onstage to play music. The GUITAR MUSIC from “Get Out of My Yard” gave me new ways to give my best performance to the audience. I was no longer tied to the microphone to sing every song, and for me playing guitar is often just EASIER than singing. So I could relax and “feel” the music more. Also, the long length of the tour allowed the band and me to achieve a level of power, tightness, and ease that I have never been able to reach on shorter tours.
Being a good musician is very important to me, and all this PLAYING made me feel a noticeable improvement in my abilities. That was truly satisfying.

Then I came home and didn’t play guitar for two months.

On my return home, I was planning to take a couple weeks to recover physically from living on a bus most of the year, and then get to work on a new album. But within the first week, I had to move from my house!
My wife Emi and I had been staying in a house in the Hollywood Hills that I loved because of the amazing view of Los Angeles and because of the wildlife that would often wander across our balcony; Raccoons, skunks, squirrels, lizards, birds, and coyote were common visitors, as well as beautiful, soaring hawks circling in the air. I felt fortunate to be able to experience these interesting creatures while living so close to the city. I’ll spare you the details of our move. Let’s just say it took some work.

And after two long months of packing, moving, and learning about the vast sciences of plumbing and electrical house wiring, I was very much looking forward to becoming a GUITARIST again. This CD is the result of that desire.

I suppose those two months without my guitar is the “Silence”. And the sound of me happily reuniting with my favorite musical instrument could be the “Deafening Roar”.

My first step was to start practicing some Bach.
I found a short, but challenging piano piece (Prelude No. 15 in G, BWV 860) that sounded like it would work well transposed to guitar. I found the sheet music and started to work out the fingerings and memorize the melodies. I love this kind of work because I can do it very methodically, and I can see steady progress as I practice. There is nothing to create, only notes to play, fingers to exercise, and music to enjoy.

But then the tougher work began. I started to create NEW music. This job demands that I sit with a guitar and tiny cassette player and try to compose music that will match the energy and sound of my full band at our tightest moment on tour. The atmosphere of being alone in my studio is very different from being onstage, under the lights, with my band, in front of 1000 excited people. It takes all my effort to transport myself mentally to that feeling onstage where the music flows.

And result of this effort?

Nearly all my ideas from the first week ended up directly in the garbage. This was not surprising to me, because I know I have to warm up my creativity just like I would warm up my fingers. But it’s always a bit unsettling to be working hard, and thinking, “No, not good enough. No not good enough.” over and over again.
So I kept trying, and kept practicing the Bach to achieve some sense of forward motion.
And finally the inspiration began to come.

“The Gargoyle” was the first song to be born. Having lived much of my musical life in the realm of heavy metal, I know I must include some metal music on every record. I enjoyed constructing a solid metal tune with double bass drum grooves, Iron Maiden-style chord progressions, percussive guitar rhythms, and super-fast guitar and bass solos. Added to all this, were some demonic melodies and even some “sweep” picking.

Having fulfilled my metal obligations, I could start to experiment with other styles.

The order that I wrote the other songs is a blur to me now. Mainly I remember being shocked that I was writing melodies.
I had set out to AVOID writing melodies. “Heavy riffs and flashy solos only!” is what I told myself. “Melodies are better sung by singers. Playing them on guitar is just a compromise of what a good vocalist could do.” These were my opinions at the outset of my writing.
Happily, I proved myself to be dead wrong, many of these melodies were actually composed with my singing voice.

I would record a rough backing track, then set up a vocal mic and spend the next 30 minutes humming into it, searching for melodies that I liked. Once I was satisfied with my hummed melody, I would record it for reference, then strap on my guitar and figure out how to play it.

Imitating my voice with a guitar became great fun for me. Almost everything I hummed required me to find new fingerings, invent new bending and sliding techniques, and search for different guitar tones than I would normally use. I loved that the melodies came directly from my inner melodic desire and weren’t influenced by my technical habits as a guitarist.
This was exactly what I wanted to do before I ever played guitar. As an 8 year-old kid, I had lots of musical ideas in my head, but no technique to play them. Now after many years of studying the fretboard, I have acquired some technique. And finally I remembered what I wanted to use it for!

Please enjoy this latest step in my journey of musical composition, guitar exploration, and ROCK. I hope to play these songs for you live soon!

Thank you,
Paul

PAUL GILBERT - Pics

PAULSREKORDER

"Zurzeit leider keine Termine gebucht"

PAULSREKORDER

Es ist weit mehr als ein Wetterleuchten, das da von Nordwesten aufzieht.

Paulsrekorder vertraten Anfang 2008 bei Stefan Raabs "Bundesvision Song Contest" würdig ihren Stadtstaat Bremen, aus dem sie stammen, oder in dem sie ihre Wahlheimat gefunden haben. Ihr Song "Anna" hatte natürlich gegen die etablierte Deutschpop-Großkonkurrenz keine Chance, dennoch bliesen die Bremer in nicht mal drei Minuten Millionen von Gehörgängen frei und galten für viele als Sieger der Herzen..

Entstanden ist der Name "Paulsrekorder" auf einer feuchtfröhlichen Party 2002, als sich zu fortgeschrittener Stunde plötzlich alle "Paul" nannten. "Rekorder" war ohnehin eines der Lieblingsworte der Musiker – da war der Weg nicht weit.

Paulsrekorder haben 2002 als Indie-Kapelle angefangen. Das sagt sich so dahin. Als was denn sonst? Fast jede Band, die im Proberaum abrockt, klingt erst mal nach Garage. Paulsrekorder entwickelten sich aber nicht zu einer Combo mit Indie-Attitüde. Dazu klang die Musik von Beginn an viel zu unterhaltsam, und die Texte hatten Hirn und Hintern, ohne verkrampft bedeutungsschwanger sein zu müssen. David würde nie Zeilen schreiben "für die man entweder ein Philosophiestudium braucht, oder die immer so klingen, als ob sie eine Menge sagen können wollten". Andererseits reimt sich bei Paulsrekorder nicht "Haus auf Maus", nichts klingt prollig oder wie bei so mancher Deutschpop-Konkurrenz derart peinlich, dass es einem die Schamesröte ins Gesicht treibt.

Paulsrekorder sind keine Fun-Rock-Band, geben sich aber auch nicht spaßfeindlich: "Wir nehmen uns selbst nicht allzu ernst, deshalb wird man bei uns auch immer kleine Seitenhiebe auf typische Rockstarposen finden. Vor allem unser Gitarrist Kai ¬ der ist der Poser überhaupt." Angetrieben von den Drums des gebürtigen Schwarzwälders Sebastian und dem Bass von Davids Bruder Jonas (der zusammen mit ihm auch immer wieder die markanten, scharfen 80er-Jahre-Synthies traktiert), ist die Musik von Paulsrekorder am Ende des Tages halt doch immer noch handgespielter, frenetischer Gitarrenrock – da dürfen die beide Saitenquäler Frederik und Kai auch mal die eine oder andere Pose aus der Dose kratzen.

Gemeinsam mit den Produzenten Michael Tibes (Nena) und Christian Neander (Pohlmann, Niels Frevert) brachten Paulsrekorder im Studio in aller Ruhe und Entscheidungsfreiheit ihren Sound auf den Punkt. "Vorbilder an sich haben wir eigentlich nicht. Wichtig ist, an sich zu glauben, nicht ständig die Fahne in den Wind zu halten."

Was Paulsrekorder aus der Musik von Selig und Spliff, von Ideal und Nationalgalerie, von den Talking Heads und Muse, von Niels Frevert und Nena, von Bloc Party und The Killers ziehen konnte, war "die spezielle, ganz eigene Atmosphäre, die sie schaffen. Wie sich ein Song melodisch und harmonisch bewegt, wie sich ein Refrain daraus entwickelt." Die Atmo bei Paulsrekorder ist denn auch eher eine Art lebensfroher Sturm und Drang, aber "nie böse oder düster". Ansonsten piekst bei vielen Paulsrekorder-Songs immer wieder ein kleiner Eighties-Stachel ins Ohr. Heiß geflirtet wird mit der Neuen Deutschen Welle (NDW).

Davids Texte basieren auf Geschichten, die er selbst erlebt hat. Und weil in seinem Leben auch immer sehr viel Spaß im Spiel ist, sind sie geprägt von positivem Lebensgefühl. Bei "Anna" singt David die Zeile "Komm wir leben das Gefühl, bevor es sich verliert" und will damit einen kleinen Anstoß geben, "doch mal nachzudenken über die Dinge, bei denen es sich lohnt, noch mal darüber nachzudenken."

Bei Paulsrekorder ist das Glas immer halb voll, auch wenn man den Rest schnell mal verschütten kann.
Die Single "Verschwende Meine Zeit" (VÖ: 05.09.08) und das Album "Hier und oben" (VÖ: 19.09.08) erscheinen bei ferryhouse productions im Vertrieb von Warner Music.

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POHLMANN

"Zurzeit leider keine Termine gebucht"

POHLMANN

pohlmann. ist nett, sieht gut aus und er trägt die Sonne im Herzen. Wobei dort auch viel Platz für Melancholie und Nachdenklichkeit ist, doch dieser junge Mann bringt selbst Ängste und Sorgen so entspannt rüber, dass die Gemüt aufhellende Wirkung nur knapp an der Rezeptpflicht vorbeikommt. Einige sagen, er sei die deutsche Antwort auf Ben Harper und Jack Johnson. Und auch wenn solche Verweise der Individualität eines Künstlers nie gerecht werden können, beschreibt dies die Stimmung der Songs des Hamburgers doch recht gut. pohlmann. ist ein Wanderer, immer auf der Reise zwischen hier und dort. Ankommen, um sich ein neues Ziel zu suchen, scheint seine Devise zu sein. Und angekommen ist er mit seinem Debütalbum „Zwischen Heimweh und Fernsucht" ausgesprochen gut.

Die Single „Wenn jetzt Sommer wär" (hier begegnet er dem nahe liegenden Vergleich zum Ex-Surf-Champion auf charmant-offensive Art: „In die Batze fahren und vom Dreier springen, und nachts auf der Straße Jack Johnson singen") belegte wochenlang den ersten Platz bei den Hörercharts des großen Radiosenders 1Live und verwies dabei Superstars wie Robbie Williams, Placebo oder Mando Diao auf die Plätze. Außerdem konnte der Ohrwurm das Leservoting des Hamburger Abendblatts gewinnen, und auch Beachvolleyball macht mit diesem lockeren Lied mehr Spaß, weshalb „Wenn jetzt Sommer wär" zum offiziellen Song der Smart Beach Tour 2006 gekürt wurde. Der nächste sichere Hit wird mit „Mädchen und Rabauken" im Rahmen von Stefan Raabs Bundeseurovision Songcontest vorgestellt.

Feinfühlige Balladen wie „Zurück zu dir" oder „An Mina" sind eine große Stärke von pohlmann., weil seine eindringliche Stimme hier perfekt zur Geltung kommt, doch zum Glück ist es längst nicht seine einzige Stärke. Die Melodien seiner Songs sind angenehm unaufdringlich, aber auch ungemein nachhaltig. Die beiden weiter oben beschriebenen Singles oder den nicht minder famosen Titeltrack des Albums muss man nur einmal hören, schon läuft den ganzen Tag ein Gute-Laune-Loop durch das Gehirn. Selten war melancholische Musik zwischen Folk, Blues und ganz viel Pop so herzerwärmend und optimistisch stimmend. pohlmann. liefert den Soundtrack für alle Jahreszeiten: Im Frühling und Sommer passt „Zwischen Heimweh und Fernsucht" sowieso wie ein Liegestuhl zum Sonnenschirm, an den dunkleren Tagen spendet es der Sehnsucht Licht.

pohlmann. hat keine Angst, sein Innerstes nach außen zu kehren, er lässt sein Publikum tief in seine Seele blicken. Das schafft Nähe und auch Verbundenheit, denn die ehrliche, direkte Art, mit der pohlmann. seinen Gedanken zu den Kuriositäten und Widersprüchen des Lebens Ausdruck verleiht, kann jeder nachvollziehen, der das Denken und Fühlen noch nicht verlernt hat. Wenn der gebürtige Westfale bei seinen Konzerten - vor kurzem erst begeisterte er das Publikum von Vonda Shepard, der bezaubernden KT Tunstall und sogar bei Rock am Ring und Rock im Park - die ersten Akkorde anstimmt, gehört ihm die ungeteilte Aufmerksamkeit. Und pohlmann. braucht dafür keine alles übertönende Lautstärke, die Intensität seiner Darbietung ist wirkungsvoller als jeder Dezibel-Orkan.

POHLMANN - Pics

PRESIDENTS OF THE USA

"Zurzeit leider keine Termine gebucht"

PRESIDENTS OF THE USA

With THESE ARE THE GOOD TIMES PEOPLE, THE PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA have delivered an inventive, uplifting and often brilliant rock & roll album. From the opening, celebratory blast of "Mixed Up SOB" -which embraces the spirit of the band's 4 million-selling eponymous debut--to the warm, Shins-like lilt of "Loose Balloon," the group commandeers your attention with fourteen contagious winners.

Simply put, THESE ARE THE GOOD TIMES PEOPLE delivers the goods with PUSA sounding as vital as ever. With the collective strengths of founding vocalist, basitar player and principal songwriter CHRIS BALLEW, original drummer JASON FINN and guitbass player ANDREW MCKEAG - who officially joins the band with this album--PUSA lend their joy and enthusiasm to any and all within an earshot.

Recorded by Northwest legends The Fastbacks' own Kurt Bloch (Robyn Hitchcock, Mudhoney, Les Thugs) and mixed by Martin Feveyear (Epoxies, Amber Pacific, Screaming Trees), the disc marks an alignment between the band and EMI via the new imprint Fugitive Recordings. Sharing the landscape with recent, acclaimed efforts by Ween and They Might Be Giants, PUSA-as masters (and progenitors) of "Joy-Pop" - dig deep and pull off their most diverse and accomplished record yet.

Case in point is the twangy, swing-informed exuberance of "Flame Is Love," which effortlessly shares the company of more recent numbers like the riff-tastic "Poor Turtle" or the light, countrified "Truckstop Butterfly." As for the aforementioned "Mixed Up SOB," it was originally penned in 1989 and first existed as "a slow, 12-string kind of thing," says Chris. "It wasn't until I decided to Cars-ify it that it came to life."

"Chris is very prolific and there's never a lack of new material," Finn explains. "he's also got stuff from the last ten years on his computers. And he's always sort of rifling through fragments of material from hard drives, cassettes, Dictaphones, wherever. And every time we do a new record, he goes through that stuff. And every time I think I've heard every song that he's ever written, he pulls out like eight great songs I've never heard, and I'm like, ‘Why the %$#@ didn't we do this one or that one?'"

And then there's the glistening, piano-touched pop winner "More Bad Times," which is brand new, sort of.

Replete with an a cappella break and a captivating acoustic shuffle, the song--which can't help but be one of the main focal points of THESE ARE THE GOOD TIMES PEOPLE - is essentially a hybrid of Presidents music and the lyrics to a song by an old, obscure group known as Ed's Redeeming Qualities. "I used to go see them when I moved to Boston in 1988. They had a ukulele, a violin and an old man shaking a can of rice," Chris chuckles. "And they had a song, "More Bad Times," that was very different musically. But I always loved it."

"So, we're goofing around with acoustic guitars," Ballew continues, "and Andrew started playing a new riff, and all of the sudden that other song came into my head, and I starting singing those lyrics over it and changed the rhyme scheme and it just fit. I wound up writing a final verse and discovered how much fun it is to take an existing song and turn it into something else. When we finished it I was like, man, this is the feel good hit of the summer."

"I was just playing this part on this Silvertone guitar that Chris had in his house and it was tuned an octave higher. And he was like, ‘Keep playing that! Keep playing that!'" Andrew laughs. "He started jumping up and down and got all excited."

"It's certainly one of the high points and it's in a spot where we rarely go," Finn acknowledges. "We've gone a little bit further out toward the edges on this one, but in a totally focused way. Of course, people have always expected a ‘mixed grill' from us stylistically. Our earliest crowds in Seattle didn't know whether they were going to get loud, soft or all ska on a given night. That was part of the fun...as long as it wasn't ska very often."

Since the Seattle-based trio first burst into the public eye with its aforementioned debut - on the strength of radio smashes like "Lump" and "Peaches" - it has been plugging away in fits and spurts with remarkable success. Look no further than their twice Grammy- nominated debut The Presidents of the United States of America, which continues to thrive as an enduring modern rock disc since peaking at #6 on the Billboard Top 200. Enjoying the kind of longevity shared by eponymous classics of the genre like Violent Femmes and Weezer, it's found a new life on digital services like iTunes since its rights reverted back to the band in 2003.

1996's II rocked just as hard, giving birth to the full throttle, Top 10 single, "Mach Five," which fostered PUSA's most imaginative and infamous music video. Meanwhile, accelerated fan favorites like "Lunatic to Love" and "Tiki God" left their imprint on then-up and-comers The Hives.

In advance of a much-deserved hiatus, two well-chosen covers helped leave a substantial cultural mark. First, a boisterous take on The Buggles' "Video Killed The Radio Star" musically defined the smash Adam Sandler flick "The Wedding Singer." Next, "The Drew Carey Show" adopted the Presidents' rendering of Ian Hunter's "Cleveland Rocks" as its theme, bringing the trio into millions and millions of living rooms across the fruited plain. "Ohio!" indeed.

In 2000, Chris, Dave and Jason reconvened for the vibrant studio-only effort Freaked Out and Small, which boasted the airwave favorite "Tiny Explosions." Giving PUSA a chance to record songs that Chris had crafted outside of the band's unconventional 2-string, 3-string format, the project included the riotous track "Jupiter" and live in-studio performances on the accompanying DVD. "We weren't officially working again at that point, Jason explains. This Musicblitz company appeared out of the ether and offered us a chance to make a record with no touring obligation. Sounds like a hoot, says us, and we had a blast recording it for 10 days, then didn't give it another thought. Neither did Musicblitz, who went out of business a couple of weeks after putting it out."

A full reformation followed a series of reunion gigs for 2004's Love Everybody, and while critics were handing out four star reviews and "Some Postman" was a radio favorite, the band ultimately realized that operating as a touring band and maintaining its own PUSA record label was a huge undertaking. As Finn puts it, "Being our own label was interesting, but ultimately the day-to-day realities of managing a retail operation were taking too much of our rocking time. Plus, during our frequent Diva tantrums it was less fun calling and screaming at ourselves!"

With Love Everybody, Dave stepped away from the band for touring purposes and ultimately passed the guitbass to McKeag, a Seattle music vet and longtime friend of the band who was initially introduced to the group by Dederer years ago and who first served as a roadie for The Fastbacks when they opened for PUSA on their June 1996 U.S. tour.

"After 200 shows in the band, I've finally earned my stripes. Woo-hoo!" Andrew laughs. To which, Finn adds, "Andrew is a huge, huge guitar player. He takes the rock & roll of the band and capitalizes the ‘R's'." It's a notion upheld by the punchy, rollicking "French Girl," the quirky and undeniably sharp "Fangs"--which boasts Jason's finest harmony vocals to date--and the blistering, forceful anchor track "Ghosts Are Everywhere."

Then there's "Deleter," a bona fide funk song with horns that the band built from a beat that Finn had been playing at soundchecks for years. "One day at practice we put it together but I couldn't make any lyrics fit," Chris explains. "Then I remembered an email I had from Robyn Hitchcock--who I've been friends with and whose records I've been playing on for a while--and he asked, ‘Do you still have that horn part you did?' So I wrote back, ‘No man. If I know you're not going to use it, I delete it. I'm a deleter.' And he replied, ‘She's a deleter.' So we started riffing back and forth. That banter became the chorus. I wrote the verses and we finished it." Soul singer Fysah Thomas rounds out the song with the first ever guest vocal appearance on a Presidents album.

With a cover image of a hand with a pin coming in to pop a balloon, Ballew says the track "Loose Balloon" fostered the album art. It was also the first song he wrote for THESE ARE THE GOOD TIMES PEOPLE. Written on Christmas Day 2005, the first he spent alone after his marriage dissolved and his kids were off with their mom, Ballew says, "The split was a positive one but that day I was really bummed. My whole life was changing. And that song came out as therapy."

When it's suggested that although it came from a dark place, it still translates as a song of strength, Chris is quick to explain. "When you write a song and you play it live you have to live it," he says. "If you tell a sad story, you have to live it over and over again each night. So my version of musical therapy isn't to wallow in the sadness but find that little bright spot and turn up the volume on it."

That sentiment lends itself to the title of the record: "Whenever we were on tour over the last couple years and things were sucking and we're sitting backstage somewhere, cold and eating whipped turkey in some strange third world country, everyone would be quiet and I would say, ‘These are the good times, people.' Like, this is it! This is what we signed up for! And it sort of mutated into the record title, when I thought that without the sarcasm, it could be used as a positive statement. "

Perhaps that outlook also explains why PUSA have persevered and remain able to make inspiring music on their own terms long after so many of their ‘90s alt-rock peers have gone by the wayside. With an average age of show-goers at around 20, the band's high energy shows continue to pack venues all over the world, selling out shows in London, Amsterdam, New York, Sydney and Seattle on its last world trek.

With THESE ARE THE GOOD TIMES PEOPLE, new and old fans alike should find little problem joining the party with PUSA circa 2008. "I know this stands up strong against our entire catalog. And I hope our fans agree. We've finally gotten to the point where we can let the vibe come to us and then we jump out at it and reel it in. I think we've really brought our ‘A' game to this album. I feel like we've given as much as we ever have on this record."

Forgoing the director role he has assumed in the past, Ballew says a democratic dynamic steered the project and greatly improved the energy of the band. Playing to their strengths on THESE ARE THE GOOD TIMES PEOPLE, Chris concedes, "I've just kind of learned over time that it's a lot of stress for me and I don't necessarily end up with something better. I just decided to lay back and not care while caring deeply, letting the cream rise to the top."

PRESIDENTS OF THE USA - Pics